I thought they were poor.

6th December 1993. It was my noble Father in law Major Mohinder Singh ji's 7th death anniversary. 

Mohini, my gentle hearted wife wanted to do something thoughtful as a tribute to her father. We agreed that it would be nice to provide warm shawls to the poor. So we bought a 100 woolen shawls and distributed some to the cook, maid chauffeur and the watchmen and some underprivileged people in the immediate neighbourhood. 

The problem with the Sikh people is they are a hardworking and therefore a prosperous community.  We therefore had no clue where we would find poor people in Pune so we decided to drive around at night and find homeless people and gift them the remaining 85 shawls. Better still we would take our young sons Mohit (10) and Pavit (8) to accompany us to learn about charity.

We were amazed that we could not find any homeless person. Damn! You can't find beggars when you want them. After about 20 min of cruising around in the cold we eventually saw a man sitting cross legged under a tree wearing only a loin cloth.

Mohini asked the boys to gift the shawls with their own hands. So the boys eagerly grabbed one shawl and ran up to him and said "Namaste! it is very cold, we would like you to have this shawl to keep you warm." The boys were shocked when the man snatched the shawl and flung it in the other direction. He scowled at the boys and they fled back to the car.

We drove towards the railway station, there would certainly be some poor people there. After about half an hour, we finally spotted a man sitting on the pavement with two medium sized plastic shopping bags. He appeared lost in thought. Our sons cautiously walked up to him and handed him a shawl.

He was taken aback. He returned the shawl saying, "I don't need this shawl." The boys pressed him to keep it saying that "Don't worry you don't have to pay for it. It's a gift and it will keep you warm during these cold winter nights."

He replied in a strange tone, "I am already struggling to cope with so many possessions" and he pointed to the two plastic bags. "Please take your shawl back as I have no place to keep it. Thank you for your kindness but I am quite comfortable."

Confused and dejected the boys returned back to the car. They refused to proceed with the charity effort that night.

Mohit said "Really strange, we thought these guys were poor, but they behave like they are very wealthy,  mom do you think they are crazy? He is content with his meagre possessions and no roof over his head." He asked "Dad, mom, how can that be possible?"

We had no answer as we drove back home silently, each of us lost in our thoughts, mulling over what had just transpired. It has been 22 years since that incident but none of us speaks about charity in the same arrogant patronising manner anymore. Much, much later we finally came to realise the meaning of that evening.

• The rich are not those who have much but those that have stopped desiring more.
• By accepting the donation the recipient defines the donor.                                                        

The next day we handed the remaining shawls to the Gurudwara* for distribution to the needy.

 __________________________________

A Gurudwara - is a place of congregation for Sikhs to hold religious discourses. They also feed the needy.

Win the argument but pay the price

Human behaviour is often strange and inexplicable.

We are always running away from the truth and often damaging what is precious to us. We wait for people to die before we say something nice about them. Conversely we would be prepared to die before we could bear to hear something bad about ourselves.

I ask myself, why can't we appreciate the good in others, and also recognise and accept that which is not so nice within ourselves?

I do not know what changes occur in the minds and hearts of other people, but over time I have been transformed, after coming to understand myself somewhat better. This understanding gave me an insight into many of my own deficiencies. One particularly painful realisation was my own conduct and how it caused unhappiness. Maybe it even set the stage for my separation from my brothers, who were also my colleagues and partners in our family business.

In the course of my work I see this tragedy unfold repeatedly and surprisingly quite often in organisations and families. I share this with you because I hope my experience can still stop some of you from you poisoning your relationships with people you care about or should care about.

Most people study academic stuff like history, geography, languages, science, etc; no doubt all this learning is important. However it is crucial to learn how to manage yourself and your relationships. If we can learn to manage this aspect we shall always be respected, loved, cherished and even forgiven our follies.

We are hostages of our character. We react instinctively and often unconsciously. Ingrained nature is easier to manage than changing it. Awareness of our personality traits facilitates the management of our own personalities in a manner of our choosing. With luck, feedback from true friends and guidance from teachers it is even possible to transform ourselves so that we can not only preserve but enrich our relationships.

I should know for I am now 53 years of age and whenever I let my awareness levels drop, I lapse into silly behavioural mistakes. Changing hopefully for the better each passing day I am less offensive, make less of these mistakes and the damage I cause is smaller.

For a long time, my best friends were my brothers, sadly we have now become strangers to one another. We have drifted apart and fallen into black holes from which no feelings can ever emerge.

The love we had has turned not into hate, but something more ugly, indifference. How did this come to pass? This is a confession on my contribution to this sad state of affairs.

Being honest is important, but if your straight forwardness causes unnecessary anguish, by being dismissive, demeaning or disrespectful then it is never positive and always counter productive.

It is often prudent to keep quiet and always important to choose your words carefully. Regrettably I have often paid a high price for how I have communicated in the past. Being sensitive about other people's feelings and opinions is a key to success.

I was very good at my work and what I did. This made me arrogant. I had come to completely dominate the area of the organisation's operations for which I was responsible. Therefore in my areas of responsibility I was often dismissive of the opinion of the most important of my colleagues, my brothers.

I expected people who loved and respected each other would have blind faith and overlook my faults and stupidities as I did theirs. I believed I would not only be forgiven but be respected for being brutally frank. Unfortunately in my experience this is not the case. Not everyone loves to debate, or approach matters in a clinically logical manner.

I have learnt, never ever take anyone for granted. No one likes being taken for granted. Sure you may be family, friends or colleagues, you still can't permit your tongue to speak independent of your mind. Your heart may be pure but your behaviour and your words speak their own language because. The interpretation and meaning of our words and actions lie with the listener and observer and not the initiator.

Take for example my eldest brother Varinder who was responsible for commercial matters; he would often made suggestions on technical matters which was my area of responsibility. I must have hurt him too many times by simply reactively rejecting his ideas almost immediately. Sure, I was right on the merits of the case most of the time but my delivery of this communication was rude, and insensitive.

He would not give up and I would not change. After several years and over discussions with my human resources mentor Mr. Nana Shaney, I came to understand some of my bad traits. I tried to change and soon saw dramatic improvement in my interpersonal relationships with my brothers and father.

Initially I would react without hesitation, that was a dangerous and terrible manner.

As a student of the Western school of management thought, I did not believe in pussy footing around, I go straight for the jugular of the problem. However this approach is rarely good for Eastern and Indian culture, where we are expected to be more tactful. Here disagreements are often misunderstood as disrespect.

Where ever I have consulted working with two different generations of owners or management I have observed this problem and the chasm it creates. Younger Indians are increasingly influenced by Western thought and conduct at the workplace, but retain Indian mores and values learnt at home and in society. Couple family and business involve two or three generations into the workplace in a fast changing world and it is like walking in a minefield.


After many unpleasant incidents and almost tearing our team apart I learnt to be more sensitive. I would listen and not react. I would try and think about what was suggested and in some cases the ideas were pretty good. In many cases the ideas were either irrelevant or impractical. In such cases I would probe further for details on the idea and on further discussion we would conclude that the idea was not worth pursuing. By engaging my team members rather than opposing or dismissing them I became more effective. I learnt to respond rather than react. I did not have to debate or argue or scream and yet we were a more solid team.

I too suffer from what seems to be a national trait, we Indians are very bad listeners. I missed important cues and feedback and continued like the bull in the china shop.

I frustrated many team members because of my intense focus on planning, detailing and reviewing. I believe it is essential that all arguments, debates & brain storming be exhausted before we commit ourselves and resources to any endeavour. Good management is reflected in near flawless execution of plans and rarely having to rework targets, decisions or actions. This makes sure that a minimum of resources and time is actually used for any project or assignment.

At our top level meetings I would insist on a debate to cover all possible angles and options in our strategy formulation and planning processes. I thought my contribution was essential and positive, but by others I was sometimes perceived as argumentative, obstructionist and a general pain in the butt. Yet what I misunderstood as lack of belief in planning and detailing was really a resistance to my communication manner rather than to plans and actions. However since I was the guy who had to actually deliver the results I was often tolerated.

Perfectionists are an irritating lot. We may respect them but it is not easy to like them. I was one of them people who wanted to dot all i's and cross all t's.

I embraced ideas from my staff and subordinates more readily than I did those of my brothers and board members. I was a very good leader but a lousy team player.

In a team your proving that you are right is secondary to keeping the team united both in purpose and strategy. Ego gives birth to loneliness.

My brothers appreciated my viewpoint and approach, they simply could not tolerate the personal behaviour of mine. They liked the message but resisted the messenger. In spite of the negative dynamics we achieved great success but could have been still greater had we learnt better the art of carrying other brothers with them.

I sometimes wonder, maybe we would have overcome the storm that engulfed and eventually destroyed our organisation had each of us been wiser as individuals, as a team and as brothers.

Every argument or debate I won made me more difficult a person. I grew more powerful but the team grew weaker.

I make no apologies for the professional success we achieved but I do feel sad for the personal failures that I paid for in achieving that success. I realised a little late in the day that the same results could have been achieved, and so much anguish and pain could have been avoided had I not been, so combative, arrogant and chosen my words well.

I share these experiences because it is I pray that others do not make the same mistake professionally, or with their family and friends.

Being SPIRITUAL is different from being RELIGIOUS

We have often heard the phrase 'Religious fanatic' but it is doubtful if we have ever heard of a 'Spiritual fanatic'.

I too like many other people had made the mistake of thinking of religion and spirituality as one and the same thing.
We claim we are Sikhs, Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Christians etc, simply because we are born to parents who made the same claim, like their parents before them. Most of us are mere zombies mindlessly following practices and rituals. Do we really follow the teachings of Christ, or Buddha, the Guru or Prophet?

Their comes a time when we begin to seek answer to such questions? If we are lucky we find someone who provides us some answers. If we are blessed and extremely fortunate we need not be told, for our answers will be born out of our own experiences.

We discover spirituality in many ways and this is one incident that helped me to become a less religious but more spiritual person.

I had to attend to business in Allahabad (Uttar Pradesh) and decided to fly from Delhi to Benares and then drive on to Allahabad.
Located on the banks of the holy river Ganga, Benares is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world and the oldest of India.

As I sat down in my aircraft seat and buckled myself in, I noticed two South Indian gentlemen, dressed in their traditional clothing of Lungi and shirt but they were barefooted.

It is rare, even for us Indians to see barefooted passengers on an aircraft. This however was not the only eye opener.

As is my habit I always greet my co-passengers and converse with them. If I am lucky I am able to engage them in a debate. This is a tremendous opportunity to learn about random matters and opinions which I am rarely exposed to during my other social interactions. I was intrigued with my fellow travellers and we started to converse.

Residents of Malaysia, my co-passengers were Dr Arjunan Balasubramaniam and Swanand . They remarked that they were on their yearly pilgrimage to various holy Hindu shrines in India. I learnt a little later that Arjunan is amongst Malaysia's leading attorneys and Swanand manages his own shipping company.

They planned to visit the Kashi Vishwanath temple at Benares dedicated to Lord Shiva and then bathe in the holy Ganga adjoining the temple.


I with my curious but immature mind remarked to Arjunan that it was quite obvious that he worshipped Lord Shiva, and Arjunan must be very religious to undertake this pilgrimage every year.

Arjunan responded, "I worship the One True lord and all his manifestations, including Lord Shiva.". He further added, "On the contrary I am not religious at all, but I am deeply spiritual."

I was puzzled. This was a revelation for me and I began to think, I always used the words religion and spirituality interchangeably believing them to mean the same thing. This interaction planted the seeds of a friendship. We decided to hang out together in Benares.

We arrived at Benares and I was appalled at what I saw. Here was one of India's most religious places, mentioned since ancient times. Hindu teachings have referred to Benares for more than twenty thousand years. The great city had been turned into an ugly mess with no discipline and garbage strewn everywhere, except at the temple premises.

Shock gave way to anger, then sadness and despair as I travelled through the city to the temple of Kashi Vishwanath, the temple of 'The King of the Universe'. The temple itself was magnificent and quite clean but the surrounding areas was indescribably bad. Food was strewn everywhere, dogs, cattle, monkeys abounded in their feasting of the food so wasted and discarded on the roads and by-lanes by 'devotees'.

We washed up and entered the temple and paid our obeisance. The vibrations from within the temple were overpowering and soothing to the soul. My anger and despair was transformed into hope as I bowed and surrendered to Him, and said a silent prayer.
For fleeting moments I felt calm before I was rudely shoved by people standing behind me, waiting for their turn to transact whatever they had come for.

I emerged from the temple recharged, and back to the reality of this beautiful world made ugly by our neglect and abuse.

We debated what to do next. We decided to take a bath at the bathing ghat near the temple. I took one look at the state of the river Ganga. Mother Ganga, which is considered to be the holiest of holy rivers. She has the power to wash away the sins of all those who bathe and pray in the river. I could not but help feel that the Holy Ganga was herself being overpowered by the sinners and the pollution we humans had created.

There was so much debris floating near the banks that devotees had to push the rubbish away to find a clear patch in the water in which to bathe. I balked at bathing or even touching the Ganga’ s water because I was not yet willing to believe. However Arjunan and Swanand calmly disrobed and after clothing themselves in 'dhotis' waded into the river and offered their prayers while taking a dip in the holy Ganga.

The terrible state of the Ganga is an example of human selfishness and apathy. We seek salvation but we cannot even provide the basic courtesy so required to take the first step in this direction. I swore that I would do something about this situation and decided to devote some part of my life to preserving the environment and our cultural values.

I sought to continue our discussion on spirituality and religion and the meaning of life, but the pressure of the appointment in Allahabad meant I had to leave with my doubts unanswered. Reluctantly I bid adieu to my new found friends and drove off to Allahabad.

Many questions nagged me until nearly three years later I met Sant Baba Ishwar Singh ji of Dheradun. I sought his guidance on religion and spirituality. I have summarised what I learnt and wish to share it with you.

• There is, but one God.

• He is known by many names. The names being given by people as they have learnt of Him and how they have experienced His greatness.

• He is not like a human being but is energy manifest in this universe.

• There are countless religions, but all religions are merely roads to reach Him.

• To merge and be one with Him should be our aim.

• However we forget the destination and our stuck on our various roads. We fight for religion but not truth, each religion claiming that "my God is better than your God", and "my road is better than your road" etc.

• Organised religions are ever growing and powerful institutions serving to fulfil mainly political and social needs. Performing rituals for birth and death, marriages and separations, acquisitions and losses, etc. Religion has come to be associated with power, greed arrogance and falsehoods.

• Religion has become materialistic and at best offering superficial solace to the masses, often failing to touch the soul or the consciousness.

• Organised religion as practiced nowadays is a hijacked and distorted version of the teachings of Gurus, Prophets, Messiahs, and Saviours.

• Religion which was meant to bring people closer to one another and to God had actually caused great divisions between men and distanced humanity from God.

On spirituality and spiritual beings he said;
• Spirituality means love, compassion, tolerance, friendship and contentment with what we have and with the universe in which we exist.

• Spiritual beings do not follow a particular religion save that of truth. They do not believe in dogma and rituals, they will spread joy and peace wherever they go, for the Lord travels with them.

• All people, creatures and nature are precious to the spiritual being.

• A spiritual person never gets provoked into anger.

• Spiritual people do good things and help others without expecting anything in return, for they know it is not their own doing they are only doing God's bidding.


If something is burning we can pour water to cool it off, or we can find and eliminate the cause of the burning. Religion is like water thrown on an inextinguishable fire. Spirituality on the other hand removes the burning caused by fire of hate, greed, false ego etc.

I was until not long ago a bad guy, but the good thing is I knew I was bad and I needed to change. I consciously tried to change my nature, but always relapsed because our sub-conscious is much more powerful than the conscious mind.


With the blessing of Babaji my spiritual teacher and guide, I have changed considerably for the better, because my core has changed. I no longer struggle to be something I am not. I hope and pray that you too are as lucky as I have been.

Yoga at the speed of light

Fascinating.

Professor Subhash Kak of Louisiana State University recently quoted Sayana, a fourteenth century Indian scholar who commented on a hymn in the Rig Veda. The Rig Veda, the oldest and perhaps most mystical text ever composed in India."With deep respect, I bow to the sun, who travels 2,202 yojanas in half a nimesha."

A yojana is about nine miles; a nimesha is 16/75 of a second. Translated into easy-speak it is 185,794 miles per second, which matches the figures put out by modern day scientists that the speed of light is 186,000 miles per second.

How could a Vedic scholar who died in 1387 A. D. have known the correct figure for the speed of light? If this was just a wild guess it's the most amazing coincidence in the history of science!

Yoga tradition is full of such coincidences. Many yogis and students of yoga wear a rosary or 'mala' round their necks comprising of 108 beads to keep track of the number of mantras a person is repeating. Why 108 beads ?

Part of the reason is that the mala represent the ecliptic path of the sun and moon across the sky. Yogis divide the ecliptic into 27 equal sections called nakshatras, and each of these into four equal sectors called paadas, or "steps," marking the 108 steps that the sun and moon take through heaven. Each is associated with a particular blessing force, with which you align yourself as you turn the beads.

Traditionally, yoga students stop at the 109th "guru bead," flip the mala around in their hand, and continue reciting their mantra as they move backward through the beads. The guru bead represents the summer and winter solstices, when the sun appears to stop in its course and reverse directions. In the yoga tradition we learn that we're deeply interconnected with all of nature. Using a mala is a symbolic way of connecting ourselves with the cosmic cycles governing our universe.

But here is the another coincidence: The distance between the earth and the sun is approximately 108 times the sun's diameter. The diameter of the sun is about 108 times the earth's diameter. And the distance between the earth and the moon is 108 times the moon's diameter.

Could this be the reason the ancient sages considered 108 such a sacred number? If the microcosm (us) mirrors the macrocosm (the solar system), then maybe you could say there are 108 steps between our ordinary human awareness and the divine light at the center of our being. Each time we chant another mantra as our mala beads slip through our fingers, we are taking another step toward our own inner sun.

As we read through ancient Indian texts, we find so much the sages of antiquity could not possibly have known-but did.

The yogis have always maintained that our present cosmos is billions of years old, and that it's just one of many such universes which have arisen and dissolved in the vastness of eternity.

In fact the 'Puranas', encyclopedias of yogic lore thousands of years old, describe the birth of our solar system out of a "milk ocean," the Milky Way. Through the will of the Creator, they tell us, a vortex shaped like a lotus arose from the navel of eternity. It was called 'Hiranya Garbha', the shining womb. It gradually coalesced into our world, but will perish some day billions of years hence when the sun expands to many times it present size, swallowing all life on earth. In the end, the Puranas say, the ashes of the earth will be blown into space by the cosmic wind. Today we known this is a scientifically accurate, if poetic, description of the fate of our planet.

The 'Surya Siddhanta' is the oldest surviving astronomical text in the Indian tradition. Some Western scholars date it to perhaps the fifth or sixth centuries A.D., though the next itself claims to represent a tradition much, much older. It explains that the earth is shaped like a ball, and states that at the very opposite side of the planet from India is a great city where the sun is rising at the same time it sets in India.

In this city, the Surya Siddhanta claims, lives a race of 'siddhas', or advanced spiritual adepts. If you trace the globe of the earth around to the exact opposite side of India, you'll find Mexico. Is it possible that the ancient Indians were well aware of the great sages/astronomers of Central America many centuries before Columbus discovered America?- the Mayans or Incas!!!

Knowing the unknowable: To us today it seems impossible that the speed of light or the fate of our solar system could be determined without advanced astronomical instruments. -as Sanjee argues!!

How could the writers of old Sanskrit texts have known the unknowable? In searching for an explanation we first need to understand that these ancient scientists were not just intellectuals, they were practicing yogis. The very first lines of the Surya Siddhanta, for of the Golden Age a great astronomer named Maya desired to learn the secrets of the heavens, so he first performed rigorous yogic practices. Then the answers to his questions appeared in his mind in an intuitive flash.

Does this sound unlikely? Yoga Sutra 3:26-28 states that through, samyama
(concentration, meditation, and unbroken mental absorption) on the sun, moon, and pole star, we can gain knowledge of the planets and stars. Sutra 3:33 clarifies, saying: "Through keenly developed intuition, everything can be known." Highly developed intuition is called 'pratibha' in yoga. It is accessible only to those who have completely stilled their mind, focusing their attention on one object with laser-like intensity.

Those who have limited their mind are no longer limited to the fragments of knowledge supplied by the five senses. All knowledge becomes accessible to them.

"There are [those] who would say that consciousness, acting on itself, can find universal knowledge," Professor Kak admits. "In fact this is the traditional Indian view."

Perhaps the ancient sages didn't need advanced astronomical instruments. After all, they had yoga !

Our Thanks to Sheel Rege for this interesting article.

Who do they work for ?

Ms. Madhuri Gupta the 53 year old member of the Indian IFS - Indian Foreign Service was recently arrested for allegedlly spying and providing information to Pakistan. Most Indians were aghast,and wondered how she could she have indulged in unpatriotic activities.

Ms. Madhuri claims that she did not receive any financial benefit but did it only to take revenge against her bosses in the IFS, who treated her badly.

This raises several big questions ;

1. What do we Indians understand and believe is India ?
2. What is patriotism in today's world.?
3. Who do people work for?

Here are some thoughts on the last point.

• Try to meet your elected representive in Government. Is he even approachable?
• Visit a government office, do they appear to be the servants of the citizens?
• What about many organisations, do they exist for the customer?
• Look at employees, how often do they work for their organisation?
  Legally and technically these people work for their organisation and stakeholders, but in reality they work for their superiors within the organisation i.e. people, within thier organisations.
  
  Ms. Gupta appears to be prima facie unpatriotic, but she claims she bears no ill will against her country but her damaging actions arise from her ire against her bosses and the system. Research has repeatedly shown that nearly 73% of poor morale is the result of poor leadership.
  
  Surprisingly this is not unusual as people often indulge in malicious behaviour when they believe that the system does not work and they can only sabotage, damage and discredit the people in charge for they represent the organisation and the system. To negate their efforts.
  
  Was Ms. Gupta always negative? When did she become negative and what caused her to become like this?
  
  It may come as a surprise but secret destructive behaviour where in people turn against their own organisations, is not all that uncommon. This happens nearly all the time and not all actions can be as damaging as those of Madhuri Gupta.
  
  On the other hand there are individuals who give their all to build and nourish their organisations. Many people just want to get on in life, pay their bills, reduce hassles, look after their parents, prepare for their retirement and provide for their children's future.
  
  In the positive or in the negative view taken by these people, the major influencing their outlook and hence actions stem from their superiors. In their growing up years it is family and teachers. In later years it is the person for whom they work for. In the case of the entreprenuer, they look only at themselves based on their heros.
  
  What can you do to avoid becoming a Madhuri Gupta or have someone like her running loose within your organisation or even personal life? Let me share with you our own experience.
  
  The first generation owners of our company, my uncle and father had a very rough relationship with employees. The relationship was always confrontationary.
  
  We inherited many good practices and things, but good labour relations was not part of our legacy. Soon after taking over we had a labour strike.After a very long conflict which lasted over 17 months both we and our workmen were drained out.
  
  We brothers learnt from observing our elders and from the labour strike, that there are no victors in a war, there are only losers. So we resolved to build and nurture a harmonious relationship with employees and create a positive environment to grow, not only for the company but the employees as well.

While it was the right moral thing to do,our management team did not see it that way.
Managers and staff thought we were crazy. They had developed a hardened attitude.
Their reactions were understandable. Perception always lasts longer than fact.

On the other hand inspite of our best efforts we simply could not win over our workers, they refused to believe that we had lost our taste for battle.

We followed a simple rule of advertising; 'Keep the message simple, repeat it often'. It took a good a couple of years for everyone to start believing us and our intentions. Even then it remained fragile for another couple of years before becoming solid.

With the grace of God and the support of many, our family, customers, suppliers and our employees we started a brilliant rise in our fortunes. The employees were charged when they saw that believing in themselves and their organisation we could truly become a world class organisation with win-win and all inclusive growth.

This meteoric rise gave birth to many issues but the biggest problem was getting people who shared our beliefs.

We were constantly on the lookout for managerial talent. We recruited many managers and staff members who were tested for technical competence and knowledge but we were negligent about thier people skills. In time we realised the heavy price we had to pay for this negligence.

Human beings tend to try and dominate their immedeate circle of influence. They want to be the alfa member of the pack. Some do it by the primitive way of violence and fear, others do it by persuassion and reward.

The art of good management is to seduce people to achieve rather than bully them to do your bidding. It requires significantly greater effort and patience to inspire than to drive people. We can drive people with fear or we can lead with inspiration or a reasonable combination of both.


Several staff members, managers and general managers were recruited that pretended to share our values but were actually belligerent and even abusive in their conduct with their juinor team members. Several cases of slapping workers in addition to verbal abuse were reported.

Ouput did rise dramatically as fear is a powerful driver of human action. However a year down the road, all our efforts directed towards nuturing relationships, team building and providing a sense of belonging went down the tube.


When confronted they took pride in their actions, claiming that your juniors should be fearful of the boss. Violence is the most primitive behaviour of mankind and should not be tolerated particularly in a professional organisation.

In one plant we took immedeate action and in the other we failed to take any noticable action because the managers were 'indispensable'.

Blaming urgencies many people recruit senior staff that do not share their management's or organisation's values. One bad boss can turn an entire section of people within the organisation against itself.


Sadly when faced with a dilemma, values are often sacrificed at the altar of expidiency. We too have been guilty on this count.


When running under extreme pressure there is a tendency to take shortcuts or shoot from the hip decisions. We soon learnt that a shortcut is the longest distance between two points.

Exploitive relationships can be developed in an instant , but there are no shortcuts in building genuine relationships. They have to be developed and nurtured over time, yet they can be destroyed with a few stupid words or thoughtless actions.


Eventually we got our act together and changed our approach and we were amply rewarded by the love, commitment and hardwork of a magnificient team.

People work for other people before they work for organisations and nations.

We should not be surprised if we continue to see many more Madhuri Guptas emerging in Government and within business. Effective mangement of people and relationships, productively and positively is the hallmark of great nations and institutions.

Trust your instinct, if you believe in yourself.

It is said that;
'As per all known laws of aerodynamics, the body shape, weight, design and frequency of flapping of the wings, the Bumble Bee cannot fly. However, since the
Bumble Bee does not know anything about the subject of aerodynamics, it flies.'

Surprisingly, knowledge is often a barrier.
Some people know so much about certain things and what could go wrong that they get paralysed.

Here are two examples from the lives of our father and uncle which shows that following their instincts and ignoring 'knowledge' can sometimes pay off.

My father Man Singh ji along with my Uncle Manohar Singh ji had founded our organisation. Both brothers had been schooled only to the 4th grade in a large village in rural Myanmar. They could not study any further because of the advent of World War II in Burma.
They emigrated to India in 1964 after the Burmese Govt nationalised all properties and businesses belonging to foreigners, rendering most Indians almost penniless.

Before they started their manufacturing project, they hired a highly reputed management consultancy firm. The consultants were to provide a demand supply and project viability report for the steel forging business for a rather stiff fee.
The consultants submitted a report in three months recommending that the project proposal be cancelled as there was no scope for such a venture. My dad shredded the report and went ahead with the project.

It was the late 1970's when Messrs Bajaj Auto the giant scooter manufacturing company in Pune still imported certain parts from Italy. Sometimes even importing them through very expensive shipments by air freight. One such critical component called 'cross' had been developed in our plant after great effort, because the material was very difficult to forge.
Only one steel manufacturing company in the world situated in Italy seemed to be able to manufacture that particular grade of steel required and they kept Bajaj Auto on a tight leash.

Dad had a philosophy that if anyone could do it so could he.
He sought Bajaj Auto's permission to develop the steel on his own with other mills. He travelled to Italy and tried to excite other steel mills without success.
Dad then sought the help of a steel trading friend and approached several steel manufacturers in Japan, again without luck.

His persistence eventually landed him in the offices of Daido Steel. They were impressed with Man Singh ji and agreed to make the quality of steel required provided the order was large enough and they wanted certain modifications in the specifications.

Excited Man Singh ji returned to Pune, India with an offer to provide a solution for this serious supply problem that Bajaj Auto faced.
All the metallurgists, managers, engineers and the technicians at Bajaj Auto were extremely knowledgeable. They advanced many arguments why Daido steel could not provide a solution, and why we would fail. They also questioned the seemingly low level of knowledge possessed by our father etc.

Man Singh ji eventually lost patience and sought the personal intervention of Mr. Rahul Bajaj the Chairman and Managing Director of Bajaj Auto to be permitted to be given an opportunity.

Mr. Bajaj a mature and shrewd industrialist hedged his bets. Realising a great upside benefit if we succeeded he encouraged my father, but warned him that it would be at the risk of our company. Either way Bajaj Auto was safe and could only benefit.

Our father invested a huge amount of money from our capital in 1982 and imported the steel from Japan. The engineers and metallurgists at Bajaj kept on testing the steel and the cross products that we supplied. Eventually with reluctance they gave their approval.
Respect for our organisation and Man Singh ji moved up several notches for we had solved a huge strategic supply problem and also passed on a huge saving to Messrs Bajaj Auto Ltd. From then we had a very special and mutually beneficial relationship with Bajaj.

My father did not allow the huge pool of knowledge available to deter him most of the time. He followed common sense and his instincts and made a grand success of his life.

Sometimes it pays to ignore popular or common knowledge and follow your instincts. This is a risky prescription and fraught with danger. However if you believe in your self and your team, pursue relentlessly and sincerely implement your strategy you will find your pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

We learnt to always question 'knowledge' and who is providing that 'knowledge'.

"An expert is someone, who is never in doubt, but frequently in error."

The National Institute of Naturopathy - Pune

The government is the agency that everyone loves to hate.
Sometimes the government surprises us by undertaking some useful and even pleasant activities. The National Institute of Naturopathy in Pune is one such example of government oversight.

This pleasant discovery was made recently when my wife and I took my old aunt there for treatment. Poor lady was suffering from neck and shoulder pains and no medicines were helping.

Appropriately housed in a 1.6 acre lush, green, and quiet place, the institute is located at Tadiwala Road and quite close to the noisy Pune railway station.

The moment you enter the calming premises you leave behind the hustle and bustle behind almost immediately. However our first visit there will be always remembered as a frightening experience.

As we approached the treatment area, our hearts stopped for a moment.Two bluish grey aliens came towards us walking real funny and even strange. May the Lord be praised! They spoke Hindi. It seemed they were ordinary folks, merely caked completely in mud (this is part of the full-body mudpack treatment). The hardened mud all over the body, between the thighs and around the crotch explained their strange gait.

Once we got over that scary bit, we went in to meet the consulting doctors. Dr.Dinesh Kumar & Dr Sathyanath. Consultations are helpful to understand the ailments and likely causes and are genuinely free,(normally anything said to be free, comes with hidden strings attached and a pay later tag). The doctors are knowledgeable, pleasant and behave like healers. We sometimes confuse treating with healing and can say they are healers.

Then stealing a few more minutes of their time we got a quick tour of the facilities, the history and the activities of the institute.

The centre has been around for nearly a century. Even Mahatma Gandhi ji started visiting the institute regularly from 1936 onwards. He is reported to have conducted several experiments in naturopathy during his stay. The bungalow and the adjoining cottages along with the land was gifted by Dr. Dinshaw Mehta in 1986 to the Government of India and named 'Bapu Bhavan' in honour of Gandhiji.

The doctors explained how naturopathy worked. The human body has enormous resilience and capability to heal itself. The institute helped people by de-stressing them using, yoga, employing mudpacks, various massages and bath treatments.

Results speak louder than words. We studied the expressions of most of the people leaving the institute after receiving treatment and were happy to note that they appeared mostly relaxed and happy. Even my normally grumpy aunt deemed it worthy to permit herself the luxury of a smile.

Operating under the Ministry of Health in Delhi , it's the only such facility in India. It's an institute with good yoga centres, gymnasium, library, research facilities, training centre, health shop and health-food restaurant.

Providing free training and even a stipend to 50 Young men and women each year. These trained personnel are picked up for suitable jobs almost immediately after completion of training. These youngsters earn handsome salaries in addition to providing wellness to scores of people all over the world. They are in much demand for the skills and practice they acquire at the institute.

I am sure you must be thinking, many things are simply associated with the government; it is expensive, dirty and the staff must be quite disinterested, blah, blah.....

The institute shocks you because it's clean, airy and well managed. It surprises you further because the charges for everything are either free or quite low. The staff are efficient, cordial and helpful. They do not receive nor expect any tips or gifts or favours.

Maybe these folks are drinking too much of those very reasonably priced healthy juices and herbal teas, otherwise how else can you explain this unusual efficiency and pleasantness. God bless these wonderfully helpful people.


p.s.

1. My Aunt is feeling much better now.
2. You can get more information at the institutes website http://punenin.org. While informative the website does not bring out effectively the fact that they are spreading wellness and enriching lives.