Whatever be the political affiliations, as a common man, i am glad to note that the SMART CITY project is getting into good shape. It may be recalled that negotiations were started during the regime of last government. After a marathon round of discussions, the agreement was signed towards the fag end of the next government. So much for the speed in governmental sector. Some might argue that this deal is better than the last one, others might have a point or two against this argument. I can simply say 'Better Late Than Never'.
In the present situation, chances of Kerala getting any 'Brick and Mortar' industry is quite vague. Atleast clean & highly technical industries like 'Smart City' project is the only hope of Keralite's youth. May the project zoom at great speed and come to comlpetion asap
Amen
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Kerala & Infrastructure
Industrial revolution did bypass Kerala. Poor chaps who started some factory or the other in the state of Kerala bled to death. Only after the demise of so called factory & the entrepreneur, the workers did realise that they require regular income. After a while, some of the workers too committed suicide. That was Kerala in the long past.
Better sense prevailed in malayalees & they started getting trained in technical as well as secretarial stuff. Once they learned the ropes, all flocked to middle east & started earning a nice salary. During my childhood, we watched in awe uncles who came from gulf on leave. They brought nice clothes, toys, electronic gadgets not to forget the perfumes & sweets. Even though many worked in gulf on manual labour, with the influx of money from outside, stratification of jobs started taking place. All of a sudden everybody wanted a 'white collar' job. In the nineties manual labour became a taboo for mallu youth. Thanks to the 'All promotion' policy of alternating governments, we have a lot of educated unemployed youth.
When IT industry was shaping up in India, Keralites had a good role. With Software Technology Parks, Kerala became a good destination for multinational companies. However governmental support has been not very encouraging and companies started moving off. One example that I know personally was that of a company that does back end jobs for airline reservations. They wanted to buy some land in Kovalam to start their own campus. Surely the company had enough money but things did not augur well. They were offered office space in some IT park or the other & the company shifted to Bangalore.
Somehow the IT park concept still lives on. Recently there was a news item saying that construction works of IT park at Pallipuram, Cherthala has come to a standstill owing to wages issues. It was reported that workers are demanding a 35% hike. The current wages were reported to be at Rs. 310 per day. In a private organisation, annual increment might just barely touch the 35% figure. In case of public sector or governmental organisations, annual increment dies not come to that level. The absolute value of daily wages does not amuse me much. But for a normal guy in north india, the amount is pretty high. Since the report did not mention what skill category gets Rs. 310 perday, comparisons vis-a-vis prevailing rates elsewhere are uncalled for. I am just concerned about the quantum of increase that is being demanded. Are we going back in time to the factory era?
All infrastructure related works involve a lot of manual labour since there is a lot of concreting involved. When will we have better class roads, bridges, railway lines, ports etc in Kerala ? Since we are "God's Own Country", may be we should approach Him for an answer. For those who don't have a direct approach, we have so many varieties of middle men in the form of astrologers, swamies, aasammies etc
Better sense prevailed in malayalees & they started getting trained in technical as well as secretarial stuff. Once they learned the ropes, all flocked to middle east & started earning a nice salary. During my childhood, we watched in awe uncles who came from gulf on leave. They brought nice clothes, toys, electronic gadgets not to forget the perfumes & sweets. Even though many worked in gulf on manual labour, with the influx of money from outside, stratification of jobs started taking place. All of a sudden everybody wanted a 'white collar' job. In the nineties manual labour became a taboo for mallu youth. Thanks to the 'All promotion' policy of alternating governments, we have a lot of educated unemployed youth.
When IT industry was shaping up in India, Keralites had a good role. With Software Technology Parks, Kerala became a good destination for multinational companies. However governmental support has been not very encouraging and companies started moving off. One example that I know personally was that of a company that does back end jobs for airline reservations. They wanted to buy some land in Kovalam to start their own campus. Surely the company had enough money but things did not augur well. They were offered office space in some IT park or the other & the company shifted to Bangalore.
Somehow the IT park concept still lives on. Recently there was a news item saying that construction works of IT park at Pallipuram, Cherthala has come to a standstill owing to wages issues. It was reported that workers are demanding a 35% hike. The current wages were reported to be at Rs. 310 per day. In a private organisation, annual increment might just barely touch the 35% figure. In case of public sector or governmental organisations, annual increment dies not come to that level. The absolute value of daily wages does not amuse me much. But for a normal guy in north india, the amount is pretty high. Since the report did not mention what skill category gets Rs. 310 perday, comparisons vis-a-vis prevailing rates elsewhere are uncalled for. I am just concerned about the quantum of increase that is being demanded. Are we going back in time to the factory era?
All infrastructure related works involve a lot of manual labour since there is a lot of concreting involved. When will we have better class roads, bridges, railway lines, ports etc in Kerala ? Since we are "God's Own Country", may be we should approach Him for an answer. For those who don't have a direct approach, we have so many varieties of middle men in the form of astrologers, swamies, aasammies etc
Sunday, May 30, 2010
Embrace of Laila
Whats in the name? But we all do have our own names. Names that were thrust upon us & later on we imbibed them. Most of the whirlwinds have been given names these days. The first one that comes into my memory is 'Katrina'. Nice name isn't it? Recent one to strike the coastal Andhra Pradesh, India was called 'Laila'. Normally a trail of devastation is left behind after these storms hitting the coast. However Laila was as sweet as her name, to the point that the destruction was not very devastating. However we indeed had torrential rains in most states of southern India. I was starting from home on 19th May. Had to go in heavy rains. Once I reached Hyderabad, I found that most of the flights operating to Visakhapatnam was canceled. Especially the ones which were operated through the propeller based aircrafts. Even after reaching Visakhapatnam on 22nd, rain god was in full swing. After a few days, sun came out in full glory. The humidity coupled with strong sun makes life pretty miserable. Hope better climate will come up soon.
I had been away from blogging quite a long period. So i thought to write something to keep the spirit alive. Hope this suffices!
I had been away from blogging quite a long period. So i thought to write something to keep the spirit alive. Hope this suffices!
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Budget Blues
Much awaited union budget of India is out. People of this federal republic is eagerly awaiting budgets from the state governments. Already inflationary tendencies are seen around. Long back there was some talks about increasing the milk price from none other than a union cabinet minister. MILMA - government controlled co-operative society responsible for milk collection as well distribution in kerala has indicated that they require a price hike of about RS. 3/- urgently. Already the hike in petroleum products got into effect. This will definitely have a great compounding effect on most of the commodities. In a nut shell, the middle class will have to bear the grunt. (I am not forgetting any classes below that, but i guess they exist only on paper. Either they got into the middle class category or they have already extinct with earlier budgets.)
The silver lining might as well be the increase of income tax slabs. It was indeed expected since all 'government SERVANTS (?)' got their pay hike implemented in the last fiscal. There was a news item from Gulf stating that one Mayor got arrested in connection with the flooding of Jiddah (I guess it was Jiddah, do correct me if i am wrong). The arrest was made on the charges of not effectively utilising funds earmarked for storm water containment. If this mayor happens to be a 'government servant', i am all for implementing similiar stuff right here in India. Authority must come hand in hand with responsibility & people at offices must be answerable.
The silver lining might as well be the increase of income tax slabs. It was indeed expected since all 'government SERVANTS (?)' got their pay hike implemented in the last fiscal. There was a news item from Gulf stating that one Mayor got arrested in connection with the flooding of Jiddah (I guess it was Jiddah, do correct me if i am wrong). The arrest was made on the charges of not effectively utilising funds earmarked for storm water containment. If this mayor happens to be a 'government servant', i am all for implementing similiar stuff right here in India. Authority must come hand in hand with responsibility & people at offices must be answerable.
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