For the last few months, the spotlight has been on India’s top three Hindi general entertainment channels Star Plus, Colors and Zee playing musical chairs for the number one slot. Colors was the leader last week only to be overthrown by Star Plus in Week 28. In its pre-occupation with the intriguing leadership battle, the media industry seems to have ignored the one player which has quietly inched its way up the GRP charts. NDTV Imagine, which toppled Sony some time back to settle down as the number four player in the Hindi GEC category, has improved its viewership further in the last couple of weeks thanks to “item girl” Rakhi Sawant’s reality show Rakhi Ka Swyamvar.

Rakhi Ka Swyamvar – where she is supposed to choose her life-partner — opened with a TRP of 3 plus which is creditable in today’s fragmented cable and satellite TV market. And even though its popularity dipped subsequently, the show still managed an average weekly TRP of 2.3, according to TAM’s latest data. The channel executives are clearly not complaining. The buzz that Rakhi’s show created, drew new viewers to NDTV Imagine, boosting its reach by 20 per cent. Reach, in television viewership measurement jargon, is the percentage of people of a particular universe (in this case the Hindi Speaking Market) who have viewed the channel for at least a minute.

This additional reach (which is now 48 per cent and still low compared to 64 per cent for Colors and 60 per cent for Star Plus) will benefit its other shows, the channel executives feel.

The good news is that other than reality TV, the channel’s fiction shows like Bandini and Jyoti are also working. It usually augurs well for a Hindi GEC when its fiction starts delivering since nearly 70 per cent of the total TV content in the genre is fiction followed by non-fiction or reality shows and films. Its top two shows Bandini and Jyoti are also delivering an average TRP or 2. In the last five months, the channel has built its GRP from 70 to 126 now. The target is to touch 200 in the next few months, according to a senior NDTV Imagine executive.

It may be an ambitious target, but with another new show called Meera to be launched soon followed by a couple of fresh soaps, the channel is ready to give a spirited fight. And once it grabs the eyeballs, advertisers will follow. Sudha Natarajan, who is the COO of the Lintas Media Group, says that big advertisers look for reach but since they find it expensive to buy all three top channels, they spend on the top two and flank it with the number four or five player.

What’s probably also propping up the channel’s morale is the fact that NBC Universal’s team is currently in India taking an operational review of NDTV Imagine and NDTV Networks in which it had picked a 26 per cent stake for $ 150 million. The buzz is that instead of pulling out of the deal, as it was rumoured earlier, it is ready to back the venture whole-heartedly. And, may even increase its stake.

(1) Here in Delhi traffic tickets tend to arrive in the mail at least a month, and often a few months, after the alleged offence took place. On almost every occasion the alleged offence was committed at a time and a place where our car was not. Every year we receive a ticket relating to an unlikely offence allegedly committed on the suspicious date of March 31. The alleged offence is never severe — jumping a red light, taking an illegal right turn, speeding, not wearing a seatbelt — and attracts a fine of something like Rs 100.

I heard about someone (for the gossip-wary, this is a source just once removed) that she has had her traffic tickets cancelled by the simple expedient of having a friend in the traffic police shift those tickets to some other car license plate number in their database — any one, just so long as it is not her own.

(2) On 18 June I parked my little car as usual in the municipality-authorised lot a stone’s throw from Delhi Police headquarters and a short walk from this newspaper’s office. The parking attendant gave me a ticket and I paid him his Rs 10. Come evening, when I returned to collect my car I was told it had been towed away by the traffic police. The parking contractor had been waiting for me so that he could take my keys and recover the car from Daryaganj police station. Why was it towed? I was told by the attendants that this was because the local traffic cops had not received their monthly monetary subvention from the parking contractor. So a traffic cop came and picked up one car, which happened to be mine, allegedly as a means to harass the contractor. The attendants urged me to “write about it”. (My car does not bear a “press” sticker.)

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Case (1): The ticket system needs to be totally overhauled. Protesting a wrong ticket is an impossibly inconvenient process; the fine is low, therefore one grimaces, pays and forgets. But it’s an unjustly obtained revenue stream, wide open to abuse. I want my traffic tickets to arrive within a week of the offence and carry a photo of my car committing the offence (or the name of the ticketing officer, if it wasn’t a camera-caught offence). Yes, traffic cameras are expensive, but as even relatively law-abiding Washington, DC, found, a sizeable investment in cameras and systems yielded an immediate and huge income in traffic fines. The city earned back its money within several months, as I recall, and everything earned afterwards and since is gravy.

Case (2): Parking policy is a mess. Rs 10 for a whole day’s parking is an absurd indulgence, but one which, not being lavishly paid, I am grateful for. The contractors’ attendants are very useful because they watch our cars while we’re away (yet petrol vanishes from my tank). Having individual contractors, though, is a problem, because it opens the way to abuse. I can’t think of any good solutions. But perhaps we can bypass the problem by making parking totally fee-free. Parking zones should be very brightly marked (we’ve needed more intelligently designed street furniture for a long time now) so that any illegal parking can be noticed and the owner ticketed or the car towed under the transparency safeguards in case (1) above. The lost revenue can be made up by boosting fuel prices and instituting a respectable annual car-owners’ tax.

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Whatever it is, the traffic police and those who plan and build our transport infrastructure need to be efficient, responsive, transparent and responsible. There’s too much traffic on the roads, and too little logic and design going into managing it. What’s the use of always playing catch-up? Eventually, this transparency thing is going to become a significant local political issue.

This one is going to sound like a rant over a seemingly trivial issue, especially for those who do not have to rely on public transport. Who on earth would want to read a thousand-word diatribe against what almost everybody—including this blogger—thinks of as Maximum City’s iconic service? Nevertheless.

I have always marveled at the clockwork efficiency of the two pillars of Mumbai’s commuting system—the local train and the BEST buses, and have often harped about them in discussions with colleagues from Delhi, a city which is only beginning to get a taste of what public transport should really be.

Which is why it came as a bit of a shock to me when the guy behind the wheel in one of those new air-conditioned BEST buses refused to open the door for me and a fellow passenger. His reason—we weren’t at the designated stop.

Here is what happened. The two of us had just missed the bus at the stop, but saw that it had halted at the traffic signal some 15-20 feet ahead. So we run up to the vehicle and knock at the glass door, asking to be let in. The driver, however, decides to throw the rulebook at us instead and doesn’t oblige despite repeated pleas, while the conductor merrily sits down nonchalantly on one the seats, deliberately oblivious to our existence.

That’s when the two of us decide to play tough. We go and stand right in front of the vehicle, blocking its path for a good 10 minutes, because of which it misses as many as four green signals. Charlie, meanwhile, is unmoved. He simply switches off the AC, throws out a yawn, while deputy digs his little finger into his ear, waiting for the “cattle” to clear the road.

All this while, none of the other passengers decide to take up for us. Instead, two elderly persons come right up to the front of the vehicle and start yelling at us from inside, ostensibly holding us responsible for a possible blot on their punctuality record. Doesn’t getting to office on time matter to us as well? While neither side can hear the other through soundproof doors, a little bit of lip-reading tells us one of the old men is threatening to call the cops. We don’t relent, so he does. We stay put.

Moments later, my ‘partner in crime’ sees the next AC bus approaching from a distance and decides to call off the protest. We head towards the stop where two cops accost us, asking what the problem is. We explain our point firmly but politely, are asked for our names, ages and mobile numbers, but not home or office addresses, and are allowed to hop on to the next bus when it comes.

Did we behave like juveniles? The pair of geriatric commuters obviously thought we did, though I can’t say anything about the other mutes inside the bus that morning. Let me make my case for why I think we were right.
 
For starters, we were consumers of the service and if we felt it was deficient, we were well within our rights to protest peacefully—which we did. I also say the driver’s ‘official’ stance was that he was merely following BEST rules was not driven by conscience, but by a self-acquired right to act tough and say no.

AC buses don’t run throughout the day. What if this one were the last of the morning? Worse, what if I were a pass-holder? Could I be denied the comfort of traveling AC when the establishment itself has taken a month’s fare in advance for a promise of service?

Secondly, any Mumbaikar will tell you that for all its efficiency, the BEST is making huge losses. In fact, its accumulated cash losses are estimated to have exceeded Rs 1,600 crore in 2008-09. And all of this was on account of the transport division—BEST’s other service, power distribution, is profitable. Despite this, the transport division’s employees are among the most highly paid public utility servants in the country. The pay, in fact, is so good, that the division’s establishment costs, which include wages paid to drivers and conductors, amount to as much as 96 per cent of the revenues the division generated, according to news reports quoting the utility’s general manager, Uttam Khobragade.

While figures on seat occupancy are difficult to come by, one can safely assume that if the transport division has to stay afloat in the long run, capacity usage has to be ramped up.

BEST, in fact, has been spending huge amounts on ads, appealing to Mumbaikars to move from private transport to its buses and has even introduced a facility that allows commuters to flag down and board moving buses on routes such as 211, which serves Bandra West. The driver has to oblige and can be hauled up if he doesn’t.

The flag down rule obviously doesn’t apply to AC buses, but I don’t recall having seen any other driver of such vehicles refuse passengers the right to board if the bus is absolutely stationery and has vacant seats. And I am not too sure BEST has instructed its drivers not to let in passengers in such cases in the first place.

By denying us entry, the driver served to defeat the efforts of the establishment to keep its head above the water. My fare was Rs 25, that of my co-passenger, Rs 15. Assuming that’s the loss the bus makes on every journey, the establishment will be forced to forego revenue of Rs 2,080 a month on a single bus, based on two trips a day for 26 days. I don’t what BEST drivers earn in a month, but anyone’s uncle can tell that’s a huge percentage of their gross monthly pay.

Thirdly—and this one is for the geriatrics and the mutes—BEST has been known to discontinue loss making routes in the past. By lambasting us (as the old men did) and for keeping quiet (as the rest of them did) they were working against our interests as well as their own. All they could and should have done was to ask Charlie to open the door and let us in. There’s strength in numbers.

The New York Times wrote in its editorial - There is a kind of bloodthirsty thrill in learning that Google plans to develop a personal computer operating system to compete with Microsoft Windows.

That’s what it is, a bloodthirsty thrill. With Google announcing its intent to launch Chrome OS — an open source, lightweight operating system — for the netbooks by 2H10, we wonder whether Google can actually live in direct competition with Microsoft.

Google’s case

Think of it this way, Chrome OS comes with the promise to expand the usage of web-based apps and services, stimulating search and page view volumes, which are critical to Google’s ad-based monetisation strategy. Second, this move exerts a price and margin pressure on Microsoft’s netbooks business plan unerringly when Win7 launch is just around the corner. Lastly, Chrome OS will ensure a continued availability of its search, apps and services even if Microsoft insists on a tighter coupling of Win7 and Bing.

Already, over 30 million people are using Google’s Chrome browser, says Sundar Pichai, VP Product Management, Engineering Director on Google’s official blog.

You might have noticed that Google has also done away with the “Beta” label from its Google Apps such as Gmail, Google Docs, Google Calendar and Google Talk. This move, we believe, sends out a signal to enterprise buyers that Google apps has reached a degree of maturity and that it should be considered as a viable option to Microsoft Exchange and Office. Enterprises could find Google’s cloud-based app strategy compelling if the total cost of ownership of software, infrastructure and support services remain attractive.

Microsoft’s case

The strongest segments of the PC market have been the netbooks followed closely by consumption in the emerging markets. The lower-priced version of Windows XP is the only operating system that currently runs on netbooks. However, Windows 7 OS, when it is released, will also run on netbooks and allows Microsoft the ability to re-evaluate product and pricing for netbooks.

It is widely expected that a version of Windows 7 will have a price in line with the current XP version, to help Microsoft get an easy entry in the netbook space. Win7 is also said to fix many of Vista’s problems, including better ease of navigation, start-up time, general performance, and compatibility.

Microsoft too believes that as economy improves, the new Win7 could help spur PC and thereby the company revenues.

The verdict

Google’s new Chrome OS has grown directly out of its browser, also called Chrome, which was introduced last year. Google could see lasting benefits by bringing together incremental traffic through its OS and applications. The technical drawback that stares Google in the eye is that 70 per cent of enterprise applications cannot run in a browser (Google’s Chrome is essentially a browser-based OS) and there are major limitations to the amount of computing that can be done within a browser today. Experts also allege that while the Linux kernel underneath Chrome OS could be packaged up with a suite of peripheral driver controllers, it is not clear who, if anyone, would provide on-going patches, critical bug fixes and other updates for Chrome OS on Linux.

Seems like Microsoft will not let the Google Chrome OS steal away the thunder.

In the euphoria surrounding the Delhi High Court judgment that decriminalised homosexuality, an important point — one that has some relevance with homosexuality’s wider acceptance in society — is being ignored: homosexuality is not just about gay sex.

The law will come to accept “sexual acts against the order of nature” but what about “emotional acts against the order of nature”? Isn’t discussing and accepting the latter more ground-shifting than the former?

I was listening to a panel on CNN-IBN debating the issue when, provoked by the aggressive sermonising of the religious leaders on the panel (“they can do what they want in private; just don’t expect my God to defend it”), Sunil Gupta, out-gay photographer, threatened to walk out if they (the religionists) kept referring to gay people as “them”. “I am not them. I am us—look into the mirror and you’ll see me,” he exhorted.

Mr. Gupta’s anguished cry goes some way in demonstrating what a sexual revolution should ideally constitute. The debate, unfortunately, has centred on the letter of the law and gives little credence to the genuine emotional needs of certain men to love other men. If it was framed in that context, and within the larger framework of family and stable relationships, the call for acceptance will find many more takers.

Mr Gupta said as much, when he hailed the verdict for allowing him and his partner to present themselves as a couple to Mr Gupta’s family. “We are very much like you,” he told his more conservative relatives, “we are a family.”

The trouble with a movement that lays too much emphasis on the details of the sexual act to drive home the very valid demand for greater acceptance is that it risks running afoul of the vast majority, not all of whom may be bigoted. If an ordinary conservative housewife were asked her views on the verdict, she may smile slyly and then, all-aglitter, denounce it for purporting to kill the family as that institution is known. “It’s unnatural for two men to do it,” she may say.

However, if she were told about a long-term stable relationship such as Mr Gupta’s and that the verdict is only the first step towards greater legal representation for people who happen to love their own sex, she may have her doubts.

Equality for LGBTs ought to be predicated within the confines of the family, so that the definition of a couple can be broadened to include two husbands, two wives, or, of course, a husband and a wife. Re-framing the debate in these terms will remove some of its rancour because most people have an image of the gay community that, justifiably or not, revolves around terms like promiscuity, wanton sex, and ruined lives. Popular movies such as the recent Brokeback Mountain only reinforce such stereotypes — of lonely men passing their time in wait of redemption.

The onus lies on both sides. Gay people need to do more to celebrate acceptance not by organizing wild parties that only bolster pre-conceived ideas (city supplements foolishly portray these parties as progress). Instead, they need to enlarge the canvas and welcome the shy, quiet, maybe even asexual members within their lot who don’t care two hoots about what all one can get up to in the bedroom, only that they be allowed to live in peace with someone of their own gender.

That is, if a more delicate engagement were allowed would religionists have a tough time explaining their bigotry.

“A King shall be diligent….,” you said, quoting Kautilya in your budget speech, and then decided to follow Kautilya’s advice.

But who is the king here, dear sir.

We are living in a democratic country where the government is of the people, and by the people.

It is elected to serve the people rather than rule them.

I thought that was elementary, dear sir.

Regards…
VG

Budgets always invoke a lot of speculation. While a whole bunch of experts believe that it is a non-event, a lot of people keep themselves hooked on to the television. And then, the usual culprits come and demystify the numbers for ‘aam aadmi’.Here are some common features of every Budget.

The opposition will always say that the incumbent government could have done much more. Some like the Left even say that government is anti-poor and anti-labour. And that, even after the FM allocates some 50,000-60,000 crore for the poor.

The finance secretaries, who helped prepare the Budget, will come and defend it stoutly.

Then corporate honchos will give ratings. Seldom it’s very low.

The worst part – the poor FM has to give interview-after-interview to television channels. Given that the number of channels have increased manifold since the mid-nineties, I wonder how any FM gets the energy to speak to all of them.

In my view, the FM should call all of them in a single forum and let the editors shoot their questions. And let all channels telecast it at the same time.

For one, it will save the ‘aam aadmi’ from flicking through some 20 channels (all of them claim that they have an exclusive with the FM). More importantly, it will help the FM save some serious breathe because he has to answer the same questions to different editors.

Most importantly, since the crème de la crème editors land up to interview the FM, they will make sure that they do not repeat the same questions. The result – good quality questions from the best editors. And the best part – television watchers won’t have swollen fingers due to channel-flipping.

Coming back to the headline… Mamata didi brought the ‘Bengali flavour’ back to the Budget on Friday. After Lalu’s crude humour, it was back to ‘duronto’ and ‘Ijjot’.

Now I am waiting for Pronob da’s ‘Boget’ …

I should probably look to move into a slum, at least to some erstwhile slums. The idea comes from what I have been seeing lately.

While many of them have officially maintained their status as slums, there is no dearth of people living there worth a few millions. They still enjoy many of the basic amenities that most denizens can’t even dream of.

The slums, the old and well-established ones, have no problems with water or power. Even when the taps go dry in the house or if the motor of the tube well goes dead, leaving me wringing my hands in frustration, the domestic help would say with a smirk, “I didn’t have to store water in my house. We never have problem with water.”

And, the best, all this for free. We shelled out a neat sum, both as bribe and also to get the official sanction for the water connection. We also need to pay for the water. But, not so where the domestic help lives (rather where all domestic helps who work in the neighbourhood live).

There is indeed agreement on the need for help to the less privileged, but why shouldn’t the ones who pay not get the civic amenities? The domestic help has her explanation to that. “We all vote and go to political or other rallies whenever and whereever the politicians need us to go.”

The slums, all on encroached land, also have continuous power. Power cuts could mean the power distributor’s office could get attacked, or even burnt down.

The experience of an acquaintance is a case in point. He lived in a house in a place that continues to be designated a slum. What still gives it away is the width of the roads. Otherwise, you do not have any other signs.

He moved out, and shifted to a place closer to his wife’s office, in a relatively upmarket area. And, all hell seems to have broken loose. “I am water starved now,” is his lament. “I have to make all arrangements for storing water and be prepared for power cuts all the while. I never had this problem in the earlier place where I paid just about a quarter of what I pay now.”

He, never bothered to buy anything to store water. He virtually had 24-hour water supply. Here, he was speaking of the municipal water supply.

Perhaps I should take a cue from this. Taking a leaf out of the acquaintace’s book, I must probably do the opposite. I must move into a slum.

A new Sea Link, new flyovers, metro railway, mono rail… you name it, Mumbai is getting everything short of a 7:13 Zeppelin service (fast) from Borivali to Nariman Point. And the city is so dug-up during this monsoon that soon the time taken for the daily commute will be in double digits – at least for some days. But wait a minute – do we need all these bridges, flyovers, metro service, additional trains? Do all the people travelling from the suburbs to town need to travel? Is there anyone out there thinking of the beautiful possibility of 20-30 per cent of commuters staying at home and working – at least for three days a week?
Imagine firms that encourage  part of their workforce to log-on from home  (call them e-force if you want) and be supervised by seniors who are similarly working from home? Fast Net connectivity, cheap cellphones and video conferencing possibilities can be exercised to the fullest, right? Once or twice a week teams can meet up, play their social roles and even do real meetings where coffee and biscuits are served.
BMC can then reward those organisations with, say, 30 per cent employees working from home at any given point of time, with lower taxes. This move will certainly reduce traffic, number of deaths on railway tracks, wastage of fuel, electricity use and the need for never-ending digging for better ‘infrastructure’.
Sure, if you moot this idea at your office there will be strong resistance by those people who can be called ‘traditional’. The physical presence of boss and employees under one roof is not required any more – alright it cannot be abolished overnight, but a beginning can certainly be made. In a maximum city like Mumbai, there is no better reward to give employees than a few commute-free days.
I can talk about newspaper organisations because I have been working in one for 14-odd years. Honestly, there is no real need that I can see for reporters travelling to an office, holding meeting with seniors, scurrying out to meet contacts and attend press conferences and returning to office to file copies. Instead they can wake up in the morning, have an e-conference with the respective editors, talk to contacts over the phone, or if necessary, travel directly to meet people or attend conferences and file copy from wherever they are. Yes, a desk that can lay out pages needs to travel to an office every day – but that constitutes less than 20 per cent of a newspaper edition.
Today if you commute everyday for two hours to stare into a computer screen and then another two hours to reach home, it can be termed a criminal wastage of resources, time, energy and terrible under-utilisation of available technology.
Oh…its 6 PM? I got to leave…two hour commute in the rain, you see!

Well, for all of you who’re wondering… the ride over the Bandra-Worli sea link is wonderful! As wonderful as it’s looked these past few nights all lit up! It may have been a bit of a slow drive this morning what with there being as many OB vans as cars, but driving down a good road and watching the sea on both sides on a cloudy morning was a pleasant change from the claustrophobic lanes of Mahim. One was actually hoping it would take a little longer — I couldn’t  even finish reading one newspaper and I barely listened to three songs on the radio. But I enjoyed the drive feeling somewhat guilty about having packed off my daughter to school in an auto.

For all those who predicted a traffic snarl at the Worli end in the morning… well, sorry to disappoint you but I took less than five minutes to get from the sea face to Annie Besant Road. I may have been in early — I was off the bridge by 8.25 — and it could  get worse at Worli in the coming days but today I just zipped through. My colleagues tell me there was absolutely no traffic on the Bandra-Mahim-Prabhadevi route which means the sea link has made a difference. Like all Bombayites I too am thrilled that the city now has a sea link. Perhaps, a little more thrilled than many others because I happen to live in Bandra and work in Worli — it doesn’t get much better that that.

For the last eight years I have watched the sea link coming up  living, as I do, a stone’s throw away from the point where one gets on to the bridge. With every visit to the promenade, we would try and gauge how much further the bridge had inched over the water. Well it’s finally made it to Worli and it’s a pity the local administration isn’t more efficient — this could have happened four years back and by now the second stretch between Worli and Haji Ali should have been complete. I came to Bombay exactly 20 years back — the city was less congested, the streets less crowded, the air fresher. Now the city stinks, you can’t think of driving anywhere because of the horrible traffic. Except on the Bandra-Worli Sea Link.