Humility, simplicity, compassion: What interactions with Dr Kalam taught me

The time I spent with Dr Kalam is no less than a legacy that I have inherited. We met for the first time during my IIM-A days in 2009. He was visiting our campus as co-faculty for a course in nation building and I was one of the few students in his class.

What followed were a series of interactions during the classes and a chance meeting with him after the course got over — and life took a 180-degree turn. One moment I was geared to go for this MNC job and the next moment I came face to face with a truth that was embedded in one simple question he asked: “So, Srijan, you have been gifted with the best education, blessed with high intelligence and you have acquired the much sought-after golden recognition. Don’t you think that it is now your responsibility to use all this not only for your own progress, but also for the progress of the nation and for solving the problems of the world? Wouldn’t that be doing true justice to your abilities?”

In what one would term as a snap decision, I had made up my mind. And thus, began my journey with my childhood idol.

From 2009 to 2015, I witnessed immense humility, simplicity, profound wisdom and the sheer spirit of giving to others unconditionally — the core values by which Dr Kalam lived his life.

I was part of the countless lectures he delivered and listened to his thoughts and ideas that he shared with people. We shared conversations during our many lunches, dinners and walks; and each of these associations ignited new thoughts and ideas in me. As I write this, I am reminded of all the brilliant thoughts he sparked and how each of those thoughts helped me to learn, evolve and transform. My learning with him was just not confined to mere ideas that we shared but also in making me a better human being for I witnessed not just a pragmatic boss but also an emotionally thoughtful human being.

One of the things that really inspired me was Dr Kalam’s sensitivity towards the people he called his friends. His love for friends and his thoughtfulness were commendable and taught me a lot about the strength of the bond of friendship. A very simple but touching incident that I have mentioned in my book – What Can I Give? Lessons from My Teacher, APJ Abdul Kalam – comes to my mind.

Back in 2014, Dr Kalam and I were visiting the Scottish city of Edinburgh, known world over for its research. As was his schedule during most of our trips, a series of visits were planned to various laboratories. One of the visits was to Anne Rowling Regenerative Neurology clinic headed by Professor Siddharthan Chandran. He showed us all the work being conducted in this small but cutting edge laboratory and we were quite impressed by what we saw.

As we were about to conclude our meeting, we came across the last researcher — a young lady from England. She was working on a very special technology to regenerate speech and her project was aimed at helping those who were suffering from brain degeneration leading to loss of the ability to speak over time.

The innovation she was working on to fix this problem was called voice banking which could be used to store a person’s voice and later be used in communicating with others. While we were all quite impressed, Dr Kalam had a very particular interest in the said technology. He asked a series of questions to understand more on this and left saying he would like to know further.

Unable to curb my curiosity over his keen interest in the voice banking, I asked him the reason for the same to which he replied, “I have a friend, a wonderful man whom I respect a lot. He was a great orator once but now he has a lot of difficulty in speaking fluently. I want to hear him speak beautifully again. You know who he is?”

Before I could reply, he answered his own question: ‘Vajpayee ji.’

It was extremely touching and endearing to see Dr Kalam’s love, and compassion for his dear friend, whom he hadn’t met for so long. Due to my schedule, I would often lose touch with my friends and disconnect. That incident taught me a valuable lesson about the strength of friendship and how it transcends geographical boundaries.

(The author is an IIM-A graduate who co-authored many books with Dr Kalam. This is an abridged extract of Srijan Pal Singh’s upcoming book to be released on July 27)

Love is the Only Answer

JAGDISH KAPRI





Civilised society , mainly the self-proclaimed custodians of civilisation, has spent fortunes on development and manufacture of weapons of mass destruction, but little has been done to lower the levels of hatred among nations and religious groups. As scriptures of all religions tell us, hate has never been able to banish hate. Any violent retaliation to violent deeds perpetrated by misguided elements will only lead to more violence and terror.The root of all evil, according to Confucian ethics, is self-centredness or selfish desires that cause disorder and disruption in the human community . The opposite of selfishness is `jen', variously translated as humanity , love or benevolence, a matter of treating others with the care and concern with which we treat ourselves.
So, the question is: can developed countries rise above this selfish desire and provide a leadership full of jen? This is the leadership the world requires. The passion aroused through nationality has outlived its utility. Every religion preaches eliminating the ego sense so that we can love the humanity as our own family . This clash, dissension and chaos in the name of religion is madness.
Prophet Muhammed prea ched universal brotherhood, “You are all children of one parent and, therefore, must live with each other like brothers and sisters.“ So did Christ. Yet, there is discord instead of unity; hate instead of love. It's time to deploy an `army' not to attack military targets but to destroy ignorance and wrongly held beliefs.

Andaman tribes may've a new human ancestor

Subodh Varma





Indian-Spanish Study Says Jarawas, Onges Evolved From 3rd Branch Other Than Neanderthals & Denisovans

Two tribal communities of the Andaman Is lands, Jarawas and Onges, may have evolved from an as yet unknown human ancestor, according to latest genetic analysis done by a joint team of Indian and Spanish scientists. This claim, although not yet backed by any fossil evidence, is sensational for it will add a new, unknown branch to human ancestry.Scientists at the National Institute of Bio-Medical Genetics (NIBMG), Kalyani, West Bengal, working with those from the Pompeu Fabra University , Barcelona, Spain made this discovery after analysing ten genetic samples derived from Jarawas and Onges in the Andamans along with 60 samples drawn from different ethnic groups across India. The study has been published in the scientific jo urnal Nature Genetics.
Why is this claim of a new ancestor startling? From what is known of human evolution, an ancestor of modern humans arose in Africa and migrated west towards Europe and east towards China and India about 400,000 years ago.Those that went west evolved into the Neanderthals while those that migrated east formed the Denisovans.
Meanwhile, ancestral humans continued to evolve in Africa and about 50,000 years ago modern humans too started spreading out of Africa. As they spread to all corners of the world, they encountered earlier species like Neanderthals and Denisovans and interbred with them. All this shuffled up the genomes considerably but modern technology can tease out the intermingling. This is what the research team has done.
“In addition to the Neanderthal and the Denisovan, an extinct hominid also contributed to the ancestry of the Jarawas and the Onges,“ Partha Majumder, NIBMG director and a co-author of the research told TOI.
Earlier research by different scientists has shown that most people outside Africa ha ve 1-4% of their genetic material derived from Neanderthals, except in communities in Pacific Islands and Australian aborigines, which instead have up to 6% genetic contribution from Denisovans.
But the new discovery is being questioned by other genetic historians. Harvard professor David Reich, one of the lea ding scientists in the field who has also researched Indian genomes, told TOI that the new ancestor theory of Majumder and his team is “unlikely to be correct“, attributing the error to statistical methods. “When we and others have computed similar statistics, we obtained results that are statistically inconsistent with Mondal (the lead author) and colleagues, and that do not require the surprising hypothesis of new archaic admixture,“ he said.
But there are other aspects of the NIBMG's research that are new and free of controversy. They have established that the Andamanese are closer to Indians in their genetic makeup and likely came in the same wave of migration from Africa as others in the region.They also found that the short stature of the Jarawas and Onges is likely due to natural selection and not just because their founders were short.

Source: Times of India, 27-07-2016

Hot bath as good as a vigorous exercise: study

Findings suggest that increased sauna usage reduces the risk of death from stroke or heart attack..

In some good news for people who do not exercise but still want to stay fit, researchers have claimed that taking a hot bath has similar benefits as workout.

During vigorous exercise, the body gets hot. The same thing happens while taking a hot bath, researchers have said.

Steve Faulkner from Loughborough University in the United Kingdom followed 2,300 middle-aged male participants for 20 years on average.

More sauna, less death?

Among the men who visited the sauna once a week, half died within the time period. Among those who visited the sauna two to three times in a week, only 38 per cent died, Tech Times reported.

The findings suggest that increased sauna usage reduced the risk of death from stroke or heart attack. This could be because of the increased blood flow and reduced blood pressure that people get when going to a sauna, researchers said.

Comprehensive study

In a different study, Mr. Faulkner recruited a group of participants to test the effects of a hot bath. They were fitted with monitors that recorded levels of blood sugar continuously as well as a rectal thermometer to measure the body’s internal core temperature.

One of metabolic fitness’ important measures is the body’s ability to keep blood sugar levels within a normal range, Mr. Faulkner said.

In the first part of the study, participants took an hour-long bath in hot water which had a temperature of 40 degrees Celsius. They were given a light meal after the bath.

The second part of the study was a one-hour cycling session to see how the hot bath’s effects fared with exercise.

Akin to a 30-minute brisk walk

The findings showed that taking a long, hot bath burned 140 calories, which is equivalent to a 30-minute brisk walk.

Cycling burned 630 calories on average. While a hot bath did not burn as many calories as exercise, the study showed that it can burn a lot of energy, Mr. Faulkner said.

“What we found was that peak glucose was actually quite a bit lower after the bath, around 10 per cent lower compared to exercise,” said Mr. Faulkner.

According to him, this could be partly because of the heat shock proteins release. “These proteins are released by the body in response to heat, though the discharge can also be triggered by other stressors such as exercise, inflammation and infection,” Mr. Faulkner said.

Keywords: Hot bath, sauna bath, vigorous exercise

Source: The Hindu, 24-07-2016

SCs, STs, OBCs with 50% marks in Master’s eligible for NET: Govt

The HRD ministry today said that the candidates belonging to the SC, ST and OBC categories who have secured at least 50% marks in Master’s degree from recognised institutions are eligible for appearing in the National Eligibility Test (NET).

This information was shared by minister of state in the HRD Mahendra Nath Pandey in a written reply in Lok Sabha.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) has informed that the candidates belonging to the Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs) and Other Backward Classes (OBCs) categories, who have secured at least 50% marks (without rounding off) in Master’s degree or equivalent examination from universities or institutions, recognised by UGC, are eligible for appearing in NET, he said.

The UGC (Minimum qualifications for appointment of teachers and other academic staff in universities and colleges and measures for the maintenance of standards in higher education) (4th Amendment), Regulations, 2016 prescribe 5% relaxation in minimum eligibility marks of 55% marks for candidates belonging to SC, ST and OBC categories for direct recruitment to teaching positions, he said.

Source: Hindustan Times, 25-07-2016

IIT-B rises to 13 among 250 varsities in BRICS rankings

Mumbai Mirror Bureau mirrorfeedback TWEETS @MumbaiMirror





The institute was placed at number 16 last year, while Mumbai University has dropped by 10 spots to 68 in Quacquarelli Symonds University Rankings

The Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT-B) has gone up by three places to be ranked No 13 in the Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) University Rankings: BRICS 2016. On the other hand University of Mumbai has fallen 10 places to settle at No 68. The rankings were released on July 20.QS, a global higher education and career information and solutions provider, bases its ranking on eight parameters -academic reputation (30%); employer reputation (20%); faculty to student ratio (20%); staff with a PhD (10%); research papers per faculty (10%); citations per paper (5%); international faculty (2.5%); and international students (2.5%).
IIT-B displaced IIT Delhi which held No 13 position earlier. It scored 84.4 out of 100. IIT is also a hot favourite with employers, who gave it a perfect score in the employer reputation category. The institute which was established in 1958 with funds from UNESCO, was the first IIT to be set up with foreign assistance.
Expressing his pride, IIT-B Director Devang Khakhar said, “The improvement in ranking is a reflection of the progress made, particularly in the field of research.“
Mumbai University's dismal performance in academic reputation, among others, relegated it to No 68.
M A Khan, the registrar, attributed the relegation to “miscommunication of data“ to their end. “They did not consider the number of students and teachers working in colleges affiliated to the university. This error was promptly rectified and passed on to the concerned authorities, but this did not reflect in the rankings,“ he said.
The highest ranked institute from India is the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) Bangalore, which is perched at sixth position, while IITs from Delhi, Madras, Kanpur, Kharagpur, and Roorkee, along with University of Delhi, feature in the top 50.
This year, 44 Indian institutions, out of the total 250 universities (17.6 per cent) were selected compared to last year's 31 out of 200 universities (15.5 per cent).
However, India still lags behind China, which has a lion's share of the representation with 86 universities, Russia with 55 universities, and Brazil with 54 universities.
QS University Rankings: BRICS is an annual publication of university rankings by. Launched in 2013, the QS Rankings are an annual ranking of the top universities in the five BRICS countries ­ Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. It is one of the most widely followed university rankings in the world.

Source: Mumbai Mirror, 26-07-2016

Indians Happy at Workplace, But on Lookout

Varuni Khosla

New Delhi:





ATTRITION AHEAD? A Dale Carnegie study shows 71% workforce is eyeing new positions despite high job satisfaction levels of 88%

Early this month, a multinational firm based in Delhi took on the mammoth task of relooking at why its staffers wanted a promotion every 18 months. For this company , and a few others, it has become a type of “syndrome“ they have to deal with.If the employees don't get promotions, they move on to other avenues.This could be attributed to the fact that in its first 25 years, the company grew so fast, it was promoting employees at this rate. Today , growth is slowing down and the company is unable to promise as many promotions.
A study , which was shared exclusively with ET, by New York-based leadership training company Dale Carnegie has found that even though level of job satisfaction in India is extremely high at around 88%, as against the global average of around 56%, about 31% of employees in the country are looking for a job right now and nearly 40% will look for one in the next one year. This means nearly 71% of the workforce is either thinking about or actively looking for new positions.
A part of this has to do with the age of the workforce -that is fast-moving, dynamic and ambitious. This phenomenon is very different from elsewhere in the world, said those behind the `Global Leadership Study 2016.' “It would make you think that it is fantastic that Indians are happy in their jobs,“ said Michelle Bonterre, chief brand strategy officer for Dale Carnegie Training. “But this could be because there are so many fresh highly educated graduates being added to the talent pool every year as compa red to other parts of the world. For employers, that is a huge challenge and they have to come up with how to hold on to employees even though they are happy.“
The study found that behaviours of immediate supervisors across the world had a significant impact on job satisfaction and retention. It showed that an individual's reason to stay with a company depends on an internally and externally reliable leader. Consultants said both India and China are going through transition, unlike the rest of the world, where employers must get transparent with employees.
“In this part of the world, employees aren't just looking for work satisfaction,“ said Jappreet Sethi, co-founder of YoStartups.com. “Sculpting their career growth and money is more important and I think there's nothing wrong with this approach. All these years, employers played patriarchs but when it came to sacking them, they didn't think twice.“
The leader who follows principles or someone who walks the talk is internally reliable. An externally reliable leader is someone who can be honest open and trustworthy . It added that when employees had leaders that were both externally and internally reliable, the percentage of those looking for jobs dropped dramatically by half.
“India is this way also as a result of function of the number of job opportunities. Data here is very different form the US, Germany or the UK. The war for talent is long over and talent has won,“ Bonterre said.
Globally , the study found that about 17% of respondents were very satisfied in their jobs. When supervisors fre quently exhibited the most important developmental, interpersonal leadership behaviours, the number of employees reporting being highly satisfied increases by about two-thirds.
In Asia, employees of supervisors who consistently demonstrated the top five effective behaviours were nearly twice as likely to say they are “very satisfied“ than Asian employees in general (21% versus 11%).
In Brazil and Mexico, the absolute difference was greatest at 14 percentage points, with 43% versus 29% saying they are “very satisfied“, a relative increase of 48%.
In Europe, it was 23% versus 16% and in the US and Canada, 34% vs 24%. In both these regions, the relative impact was about a 40% increase.
Sethi said employees want to know where their career is heading since time is finite.
“In the West, it is a trend that people will not work in that one job that they had five years ago. A third of the US, for instance, is shifting to consulting and temporary assignments. The best talent will not be hindered with a full-time job. Employers must relook at the way assignments are given. Tie up compensations with success metrics etc,“ he added.

Source: Economic Times, 26-07-2016