The Hindu Business Line : Are there more engineers than required?

Story so far: As any other normal person, I don't get worked up with politics. Yet, when the Prime Minister addressed the nation, over the TV, after apparently giving up hopes of order in the House, I decided to sit and listen.

Episode 84

We all know he is an odd man out there — an academician among politicians, a thinker among plotters. Will the experiment work? How far would his sincerity prevail in an atmosphere of compromises and bargains? To what extent will Manmohan Singh's dream ideas work out in practice? Well, that was my question last week.

"Dear Swati, I firmly believe that our Prime Minister's dream shall remain a dream," writes Bhanu Parashar. "All his (actually of the Left parties) populist measures shall have to be financed by some source, which at least till now seems non-existent." Grim message, to start with.

"Yes, Swati, not all CAs listen to our honourable PM's speech," writes Karthik Narayan. "Dr Singh has come up with a rather strong agenda. Even though one may push aside his speech as impossible, one has to give credit to our PM who has presented five Budgets in a row — an enviable fete. He is shrewd, committed and honest. Going by his standards and goodwill, his agenda very rightly reflects his role as the father of Indian economic reform movements."

Karthik goes on to analyse each phase of the `new deal'. "For accelerated growth, administrative reforms are needed, and loopholes should be plugged. Government has to become more effective, efficient and people friendly — that needs superhuman efforts. Corruption is our greatest enemy. Agricultural slump and farmers' woes come next. Our farmers' sagging spirits are to be uplifted by replenishment of resources and subsidies. Water is a high-priority to attend to." So?

"PM's dream is too complex in the sense that he has to address too many things at the same time. And each item is so important and needs equal attention. How he is going to handle all of them is just too mind-boggling. We find that one man, JUST one man, is going to shoulder the entire responsibilities of an entire nation of a billion plus population!

"The situation is just similar to the position of Sachin Tendulkar, the master blaster, who had to shoulder the entire Indian batting quite some time back (before the advent of Rahul Dravid and Ganguly), especially during the World Cup of 1996." What analogy! "And we have to act as responsible citizens and weed out corruption in our own small circle. That way our PM's work is half done!" Good thinking.

Radhakrishnan writes in: "I feel Manmohan's dream can work through the following policy changes. Farming should be undertaken by companies instead of individuals, as in the case of tea estates. Initially companies should be given support by the government through favourable fiscal policies. All lands to be taken by companies on lease for, say, fifty years, and farmers engaged for pay with benefits. There can be a loss of profit policy covering monsoon failures.

"Companies can brand their own products; there will be lot of backward integration by companies who are into agri-based products; they can bring in R&D, new management styles for improving productivity and so on; and modern methods of farming can be deployed. Thus new centres of excellence can be achieved in farming. Is this possible?" Interesting.

"Possible if Manmohan or anybody for that matter gets more than 75 per cent of seats in Lok Sabha and can convince the party not to think of returning to power, and there is the will to do it. I don't think that this will happen. So let's have it in our dreams." Oh.

"Hi Swati," writes Kamal Anil Kapadia, of PwC, Mumbai. "It depends on how much co-operation he gets from his supporters and the Opposition. When one comes up with a proposal, there are many waiting to reject the same. Also, it takes a lot of time to explain good things about the proposal. Hope for the best!" Optimistic.

Kamal also adds: "I have noticed that in companies there is a careless attitude towards wastage of water and electricity. I would be grateful if this topic forms a part of your feature as a matter of debate." Thanks for the suggestion.

"Hi Swati, I have been a regular reader of your column and love the way you talk about CAs as I myself appeared for Final CA this time around," writes Prateek. All the best! "I guess Mr Singh has no option but to please the poor as the mandate which they talk of (which I guess is a misnomer as none got mandated) does not allow them to exceed their briefs. With talk of reservation in private sector, free electricity to farmers and other promises, I guess we are moving away from the development path.

"I often wonder why no government ever thinks of reforming CA profession. They talk of agriculture, management, IT and everything but CA. Because CAs can, with innovative tax planning, defeat government's Budget. People often said Mr Vajpayee was the right man in a wrong party. I believe Dr Singh is no doubt the right man but the boundaries in which he has to work are even tighter than what Mr Vajpayee had because at least Mr Vajpayee had pre-election unconditional support whereas Mr Singh has to play a negotiating role always. Somehow I believe post-poll alliances should not be allowed as they are against the spirit of democracy." We'll have more to watch during the Budget session.

Let me do some justice to mails I'd kept pending last week, the ones on minor road accidents. "Dear Swati," writes Thangavelu. "Do you know about the fear psychosis while driving? Cyclists are afraid of autos and two-wheelers; two-wheelers are afraid of water tankers and buses if you are in Chennai; car drivers are afraid of State Express buses; bus drivers are afraid of sudden intrusion of pedestrians and cyclists in the path." So, it comes in a circle.

"Even though the accident involving two vehicles is minor, we need an FIR copy to get the insurance claim. Cost of getting FIR from law enforcing authorities is usually 3-5 per cent of the notional value of the insurance claim. Mostly the fight is to fix the blame on the other driver, so that one can pay lesser amount to the copy to get FIR. Hence, they are not fighting unnecessarily, but to lessen own burden, when actual payment is made to collect the FIR.

"Finally, ego also clouds etiquette making them argue in the middle of the road unmindful of causing problems to the other road users. However if insurance companies waive the need for FIRs in claims involving minor accidents, the above scenario will vanish to a great extent." A pertinent suggestion.

"Major reasons for accidents," writes Karthik again, "are roads being unusable, poor traffic maintenance, and drivers. Potholes, abnormally sized speed breakers, broken edges, and uneven surfaces. In certain areas, road is totally unusable. At various junctions there are no traffic signals. The recent trend of timed signals is a phenomenal improvement in traffic regulation. "Lane system also avoids accidents. Onus is on auto drivers to think straight; they are the most unpredictable on the roads today; even they don't know what they are going to do next on the roads. Motorists unnecessarily speed in between cars and buses — something awfully risky and totally uncalled for. There's never that much hurry needed in life." Sage advice.

********

During the week, I had to take off for a whole day to accompany Naagu, a cousin of mine, to engineering college, for the sake of admission. More than the cut-off marks, those long queues and anguish were enough to put one off.

I asked Naagu, "Hey, why don't you do CA!" No, he was keen on becoming an engineer. While waiting, I interacted with some of those aspiring students, who were very enthusiastic about studies, but were equally blank about what the future held for them even if they finished their course. Do we need these many engineers, I asked myself. What are your thoughts? Mail in by Friday.

Swati_CA@hotmail.com

For archived episodes of this column click on: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/nic/swati/index.htm

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