All abt AIR_FORCE ONE

United States President George W Bush, for his visit to India and Pakistan, leaves Washington on Tuesday on a Boeing Air Force One aircraft.
The presidential air transport fleet, one of a kind, consists of two specially configured Boeing 747-200B's modified to meet presidential requirements.
When the President is aboard either aircraft, or any Air Force aircraft, the radio call sign is 'Air Force One'. Principal differences between the VC-25 and the standard Boeing 747, other than the number of passengers carried, are the state of the art navigation, electronic and communications equipment, its interior configuration and furnishings, self-contained baggage loader, front and rear air-stairs, and the capability for in-flight refueling.

While on the aircraft, the President and his staff have access to a full range of services, including communications systems, secure and non-secure voice, fax and data communications, along with access to photocopying, printing, and word processing.

The 'flying Oval Office' has 4,000 square feet of interior floor space, including a conference room, and living quarters for the President and the First Lady and can accommodate 180 people.

The living quarters for the President include an executive suite consisting of a stateroom (with dressing room, toilet and shower) and the President's Office. A conference/dining room is also available for the President, his family and staff. Other separate accommodations are provided for guests, senior staff, the secret service and security personnel, and the media.

Two galleys provide up to 100 meals at one sitting. Six passenger toilets are provided in addition to a rest area and mini-galley for the aircrew.

The aircraft also has an office that doubles up as a medical facility when necessary, fitted with medical equipment and supplies for minor medical emergencies. It is fitted with multi-frequency radios for air-to-air, air-to-ground and satellite communications.

The colours on the first Air Force One VC-137C were selected by former President John F Kennedy's wife, Jacqueline Kennedy. The 707s served as Presidential aircraft until they were
replaced by 747-200s designated VC-25 in 1990.

According to White House sources, the special aircraft to carry the US President and his delegation was first created in 1944. Former president Franklin D Roosevelt called for the creation of the Presidential Pilot Office and a C-54 -- dubbed the Sacred Cow -- was put into service for Roosevelt.

For most of the next 20 years, various four-engine propeller-driven aircraft were used for Presidential air travel.
Then came the Independence, a DC-6, which transported former president Harry S Truman from 1947 to 1953.
Former president Dwight D Eisenhower used the Columbine II and Columbine III from 1953 to 1961.
The call sign Air Force One was first used in the 50s and president Kennedy's VC-137 (Boeing 707) was the first aircraft to be popularly known as Air Force One.
In 1962, a C-137C specifically purchased for use as Air Force One, entered into service with the tail number 26000. It is perhaps the most widely known and most historically significant Presidential aircraft.
Tail number 26000 is the aircraft that carried former president Kennedy to Dallas, November 22, 1963, and returned the body to Washington, DC, following his assassination.
Lyndon B Johnson was sworn into office as the 36th president on board the aircraft at Love Field in Dallas.
This fateful aircraft also was used to return Johnson's body to Texas following his state funeral January 24, 1973.
In 1972 president Richard M Nixon made historic visits aboard 26000 to China and to the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republic.
Tail number 26000 was retired May 1998, and is on display at the US Air Force Museum, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio.
Tail number 27000 replaced 26000 and carved its own history when it was used to fly former presidents Nixon, Ford and Carter to Cairo, Egypt, October 19, 1981, to represent the United States at the funeral of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.
The first VC-25A -- tail number 28000 -- flew as Air Force One on September 6, 1990, when it transported president George Bush to Kansas, Florida and back to Washington, DC.
A second VC-25A, tail number 29000, transported Clinton, Carter and Bush to Israel for the funeral of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. The VC-25A will usher Presidential travel into the 21st century, upholding the proud tradition and distinction of being known as Air Force One.
Historically, several US presidents have flown on Boeing aircraft.
In 1943, president Franklin D Roosevelt flew to Casablanca aboard a Boeing model 314 Clipper. In 1962, Boeing introduced US presidents to modern jet transportation with the introduction of the Boeing model 707-320B.
In all, seven presidents were served by the 707-320B. Today, the chief executive flies aboard a specially configured 747-200B, the newest and largest presidential airplane.
Its capabilities include: longer range for presidential travel, aerial refueling and self-sufficiency at airports around the world.
These aircraft are flown by the Presidential Airlift Group, and are assigned to Air Mobility Command's 89th Airlift Wing, Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland. - UNI

Dhirubhai gave management a whole new 'ism'

A G Krishnamurthy in New Delhi | February 03, 2006 06:06 IST - Apprearedin Business Standard

Dhirubhai Ambani was no ordinary leader. He was a man who gave management a whole new "ism".

There is a new "ism" that I've been meaning to add to the vast world of words for quite a while now. Because, without exaggeration, it's a word for which no synonym can do full justice: "Dhirubhaism".

Inspired by the truly phenomenal Dhirubhai H Ambani, it denotes a characteristic, tendency or syndrome as demonstrated by its inspirer. Dhirubhai, on his part, had he been around, would have laughed heartily and declared, "Small men like me don't inspire big words!"

There you have it - now that is a classic Dhirubhaism, the tendency to disregard one's own invaluable contribution to society as significant.

I'm sure everyone who knew Dhirubhai well will have his or her own little anecdote that illustrates his unique personality. He was a person whose heart and head both worked at peak efficiency levels, all the time. And that resulted in a truly unique and remarkable work philosophy, which is what I would like to define as Dhirubhaism.

Let me explain this new "ism" with a few examples from my own experiences of working with him.

Dhirubhaism No 1: Roll up your sleeves and help. You and your team share the same DNA. Reliance, during Vimal's heady days had organized a fashion show at the Convention Hall, at Ashoka Hotel in New Delhi.

As usual, every seat in the hall was taken, and there were an equal number of impatient guests outside, waiting to be seated. I was of course completely besieged, trying to handle the ensuing confusion, chaos and protests, when to my amazement and relief, I saw Dhirubhai at the door trying to pacify the guests.

Dhirubhai at that time was already a name to reckon with and a VIP himself, but that did not stop him from rolling up his sleeves and diving in to rescue a situation that had gone out of control. Most bosses in his place would have driven up in their swank cars at the last moment and given the manager a piece of their minds. Not Dhirubhai.

When things went wrong, he was the first person to sense that the circumstances would have been beyond his team's control, rather than it being a slip on their part, as he trusted their capabilities implicitly. His first instinct was always to join his men in putting out the fire and not crucifying them for it. Sounds too good a boss to be true, doesn't he? But then, that was Dhirubhai.

Dhirubhaism No 2: Be a safety net for your team. There used to be a time when our agency Mudra was the target of some extremely vicious propaganda by our peers, when on an almost daily basis my business ethics were put on trial. I, on my part, putting on a brave front, never raised this subject during any of my meetings with Dhirubhai.

But one day, during a particularly nasty spell, he gently asked me if I needed any help in combating it. That did it. That was all the help that I needed. Overwhelmed by his concern and compassion, I told him I could cope, but the knowledge that he knew and cared for what I was going through, and that he was there for me if I ever needed him, worked wonders for my confidence.

I went back a much taller man fully armed to face whatever came my way. By letting us know that he was always aware of the trials we underwent and that he was by our side through it all, he gave us the courage we never knew we had.

Dhirubhaism No 3: The silent benefactor. This was another of his remarkable traits. When he helped someone, he never ever breathed a word about it to anyone else. There have been none among us who haven't known his kindness, yet he never went around broadcasting it.

He never used charity as a platform to gain publicity. Sometimes, he would even go to the extent of not letting the recipient know who the donor was. Such was the extent of his generosity. "Expect the unexpected" just might have been coined for him.

Dhirubhaism No 4: Dream big but dream with your eyes open. His phenomenal achievement showed India that limitations were only in the mind. And that nothing was truly unattainable for those who dreamed big.

Whenever I tried to point out to him that a task seemed too big to be accomplished, he would reply: " No is no answer!" Not only did he dream big, he taught all of us to do so too. His one-line brief to me when we began Mudra was: "Make Vimal's advertising the benchmark for fashion advertising in the country."

At that time, we were just a tiny, fledgling agency, tucked away in Ahmedabad, struggling to put a team in place. When we presented the seemingly insurmountable to him, his favourite response was always: "It's difficult but not impossible!" And he was right. We did go on to achieve the impossible.

Both in its size and scope Vimal's fashion shows were unprecedented in the country. Grand showroom openings, stunning experiments in print and poster work all combined to give the brand a truly benchmark image. But way back in 1980, no one would have believed it could have ever been possible. Except Dhirubhai.

But though he dreamed big, he was able to clearly distinguish between perception and reality and his favourite phrase "dream with your eyes open" underlined this.

He never let preset norms govern his vision, yet he worked night and day familiarizing himself with every little nitty-gritty that constituted his dreams constantly sifting the wheat from the chaff. This is how, as he put it, even though he dreamed, none of his dreams turned into nightmares. And this is what gave him the courage to move from one orbit to the next despite tremendous odds.

Dhirubhai was indeed a man of many parts, as is evident. I am sure there are many people who display some of the traits mentioned above, in their working styles as well, but Dhirubhai was one of those rare people who demonstrated all of them, all the time.

And that's what made him such a phenomenal team builder and achiever. Yes, we all need "Dhirubhaisms" in our lives to remind us that if it was possible for one person to be all this and more, we too can. And like him, go on to achieve the impossible too.

The Nehru-Gandhi dynasty forever

The young MP was speaking off the record and therefore one should not take seriously all that he said is little short of fatuous. Since he was speaking off the record, all the greater reason to believe he spoke his mind, he meant every word of his utterances.

He claimed he could have been, had he so chosen, the country's prime minister at the age of twenty-five. He suffered no embarrassment in making the statement. On the contrary, a trace of arrogance adorned his diction.

It did not matter to him that this great country was a democracy and a prime minister must enjoy the confidence of the one billion and odd people constituting the nation. It did not bother him either that, at the time he thought the prime ministerial slot was his for the taking, his credentials were zero, barring the fact that he belonged to a dynasty, correction, the dynasty.

And yet, it is pointless to be excessively harsh towards the young man. Howsoever obnoxious one judges its content, his statement bears the hallmark of truth. In the first few years following his father's assassination, had the youngster's mother expressed the wish, he would of course have been ordained as the leader of the Congress and therefore, automatically, the nation's prime minister.

There is also a great deal of substance in the near-hypothesis embedded in his Tehelka interview: it was only a matter of time, Mummy would see to the arrangements, one of these days in the not too distant future, he was going to take over as prime minister.

We do not blame a carnivorous animal for its predatory nature. The Nehru-Gandhis will be Nehru-Gandhis and will continue to take this nation for granted. The nub of the issue is the background of circumstances which inveigles the nation into being taken for granted by the dynasty.

Way back in the late Fifties, J B Kripalani used to take agonising pleasure while narrating an incident. He was addressing a village crowd somewhere in eastern Uttar Pradesh. Indira Gandhi had very recently been installed as Congress president and had just made a statement on a matter of considerable national importance that was full of hauteur and presumptuousness.

Kripalani complained to the crowd: 'What does she take herself to be? Is she the princess of the country?' The moment he spoke the words, thundering response from all sections of the crowd: 'Of course, she is our princess.' Kripalani beat a hasty retreat.

True, that mindset is no longer a ubiquitous phenomenon. The halo of the Congress is much dimmed. In last year's Lok Sabha election, the party failed to secure beyond 23 per cent of the total votes cast. Although the Congress continues to have its presence in all parts of the country, it has ceased to be the indisputably number one party in most states.

In Uttar Pradesh, the country's most populous state, it is reduced, in electoral terms, to the fifth position. These facts notwithstanding, within the party, the Nehru-Gandhis still maintain their absolute dominance.

How this had come about is easily explained. Excluding the dynasty, the Congress is an uneasy, unstable coalition of a number of feuding groups and individuals prone to constant factional fights. To bring them together, it is crucially necessary to introduce an external force. The Nehru-Gandhis are filling that role.

Given the patent ordinariness, in terms of talent, of its present generation, the dynasty is incapable of exuding a charisma. A charisma has nonetheless been sought to be thrust upon it by Congressmen to ensure the party's survival, and, hopefully, its electoral success. The supposedly magical charm of the Nehru-Gandhis is now a non-starter practically everywhere in the country, with the possible exception of the two districts of Amethi and Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh. Even so, the survival of the Congress depends on the continuance of the dynasty and the attribution of charisma to it.

No running away from the fact, the Nehru-Gandhis are the be-all and end-all of the Congress. They preside over the party and its destiny. Since the party is the major constituent of the United Progressive Alliance, the dynasty has come to preside over the alliance too. More for the sake of politeness than anything else, the rest of the alliance has gone along with this arrangement.

The alliance must, for dear life, be preserved, otherwise, the argument is mounted, the fundamentalists might return to power. To preserve the alliance, it is considered necessary to humour the Congress and put up with the lurid idolatory that party has been habituated to indulge in: the head of the dynasty as the head of the UPA.

It is an absurd set-up, it is still the hard reality. As long as the equation or non-equation of the existing political arrangements in the country persists, the UPA will have to stay together so as to foil its bête noire, the religious bigots. The rest of the UPA, it follows, will have to take the Congress as it is and accept its leader as the leader of the alliance.

The Congress will remain a conclave of devout practising theists, and the dynasty will keep furnishing its gods and goddesses on a regular basis. The young MP speaking to Tehelka thus knew what he was talking about; even though he did not say so openly he has every right to conclude that the present incumbent in the office of prime minister can be removed at a moment's notice, and mother will duly arrange to transfer the occupancy to him, the MP from Amethi.

The young MP may be brash, he may be cheeky, but nobody can say he is wide off the mark or is being non-objective.

Those who think a ruling dynasty in the 21st century in the world's largest democracy is a scandalous anomaly may attract sympathy from diverse sources. That, however, will not change the face of reality. What could change it is the arrival of a situation in which the other partners of the UPA have the guts to argue as follows: while, given the relative voting strength of the constituents of the alliance they were perfectly willing to offer the prime ministerial slot to the Congress, they would still enter a caveat; just as they were against religious fundamentalism, they were equally against medieval feudalism; the Congress must henceforth therefore pick a prime minister from elsewhere than from within the dynasty.

There should per se be nothing unreasonable in putting forward a demand of this nature. According to reports, the Congress and its other poll partners in Bihar have coaxed Laloo Prasad Yadav to accept the proposition that, should they emerge victorious in the forthcoming elections in the state, the chief minister of Bihar must be someone other than the railway minister's life consort.

If, at the level of a state, such a condition can be imposed, nothing ought to stand in the way of a similar contractual arrangement at the national level.

Perhaps, played into a difficult corner in this manner, Congressmen might put forward a plaintive plea: have a heart, were such a condition insisted upon and the dynasty made to withdraw from the scene, the Congress was bound to disintegrate, and what would then happen to the United Progressive Alliance?

We thereby arrive at the mother of questions: are we, who constitute the nation, the Congress's keepers for eternity?

Ashok Mitra
As appeared in rediff.com

Heros

When the nation failed a martyr

August 29, 2005

It was the morning of September 1, 1999. Like always, I made myself a cup of tea, picked up the newspaper and sat down to read what all had gone wrong around the world the day before. As I read the headlines, my heart sank. The news report was about 'one Captain and five other ranks of the 3 Rajput Regiment missing from sub-sector Haneef in the Turtuk sector.' My first thoughts -- 3 Rajput! Suneel! God!

Suneel -- Captain Suneel Yadav -- was one of my closest friends. We had been classmates, bench-mates, bus-mates, team-mates, and neighbours from the 8^th grade at Kendriya Vidyalaya, Picket (Secunderabad) to the last day of our Bachelors degree at Nizam College, Hyderabad.

Suneel was the eldest son of Subedar Major (later Honorary Captain) Ram Singh Yadav and Shakuntala Devi. Although, Suneel was an average student (Math being his Waterloo!), he was an outstanding sportsman. Be it cricket, kabaddi or football, he always took the honours.

Suneel was always the fauji types. So he joined the National Cadet Corps Air Wing while pursuing his BA at the Nizam College and represented Andhra Pradesh at the NCC Republic Day Camp in New Delhi.

He now had just one aim in life -- to join the Army. Clearing the Combined Defence Services was a little difficult for him, what with his 'command' over Maths. But he had a clear goal in mind and he worked hard and qualified for the OTA (Short Service Commission in the Army).

It was quite a proud moment for all of us but more so for his parents. For his father the equation was simple: He had joined the Army as a jawan, his son would do so as an officer! Nothing gave him more satisfaction. Suneel was commissioned into the 3 Rajput Regiment in 1997.

The newspaper report did not mention any name. It just said 'a Captain.' So many thoughts raced through my mind at that moment. Should I call Suneel's parents? Would they have seen this report? What if they hadn't? I would end up disturbing them too. I just told myself that it couldn't be Suneel. The suspense however didn't linger for long though. I got a call from Suneel's father on the 3^rd morning. He told me in Hindi "Beta Suneel nahin rahe." My worst fears had come true.

It all began one June evening in 1999. Suneel called me up from Bareilly and told me that his unit had been asked to move into Kargil to relieve those who took part in Operation Vijay. I wasn't too perturbed because 'officially' Op Vijay had ceased. However, the ground realities were quite different.

Kargil's first hero

Quite a few strategic heights were still under the control of the Pakistanis. The Reshma Post in Haneefuddin Sub-sector was one of them and 3 Rajput was one of the battalions entrusted with the task of re-capturing this post. The attack was planned for the night of 29-30th August 1999. Two groups were made which were to attack Reshma Post from different sides and take the enemy by surprise. Suneel was leading one group.

Sometime during the early hours of 30th August the teams started zeroing in on Reshma post. The time of attack was fixed at 0400 hours. At the fixed hour Suneel along with his party of 5 men scaled the rocky mountain and were waiting for the other party led by a major from the Kumaon Regiment to come into contact. But something unfortunate had happened. The other party got lost in the darkness. By the time they got back on trail and reached the foot of Reshma Post, Suneel and his men were up there already, only silhouettes visible against the skyline. Suddenly there were gunshots. Suneel and his men had been spotted by the enemy! The gunfire was fast and furious but Suneel and his men decided to go on. He was here to fight.

Suneel got hit on his left palm in the first burst of fire. Two of his men also died. The next burst caught him on his left shoulder. But he did not give up. He lifted his Medium Machine Gun and was placing it on the rock in front of him and taking aim when a bullet hit him on his forehead. It is ironical that Suneel was not carrying a helmet because he found it too heavy and in its place preferred to carry his MMG instead of a lighter weapon!

Suneel collapsed on the spot. Too much for even the bravest of the brave to take I guess. Two of his men were captured by the Pakistan army (and they were amply put on PTV for 17 long days to show that India was violating the Line of Control). None of the bodies could be retrieved. The bodies of Suneel and three of his men lay buried under the snow for the next 11 months before they were recovered and handed over to their respective families.

The Army denied the attack launched on August 29 to recapture a position in sub-sector Haneefuddin. Instead a statement was issued saying that the Indian patrol 'may have inadvertently strayed into Pakistan-occupied Kashmir' and that the 'Director General Of Military Operations had contacted his Pakistani counterpart to ask for their return.' Importantly, that statement had made no mention of any casualties.

Suneel was 22 when he died. He had his whole life ahead of him. He could have turned back and maybe lived to fight another day. What prompted him to stay firm at 17,500 feet and fight on in the face of sure death? Was it the lure of a petrol pump, a plot or flat in a big city, a couple of million rupees in compensation? Obviously not! A soldier fights and dies for the honour of his country and the only befitting reward for this supreme sacrifice is a medal. Why then has Suneel been denied this honour by his country and Army, I ask?

The soldier who became a legend

Suneel's family is distressed by the treatment meted out to him by the Government of India. Since the past seven years Captain Ram Singh Yadav (himself a Sena Medal awardee) has been running from pillar to post, meeting officers concerned and asking them to recognise his son's bravery and sacrifice.

"Suneel's co-officers in the regiment, the soldiers who fought under his command, the senior most officers of the Rajput Regiment, all personally acknowledge that Suneel fought bravely till the very end. Why then has Suneel been denied a medal?" asks his father.

"Take away everything that has been given to us but give my son the medal he deserves," says a tearful Shakuntala Devi.

"Main ab Yadav nahin Rajput hoon" (a reference to his Unit), Suneel once told me. He stood there, fought like a true warrior till his last breath. Not for a moment did he dither when the nation needed him most. Why then has India failed her martyred son? It's still not too late. I sincerely hope those who matter up there give justice to Captain Suneel Yadav. Till then his soul will not rest in peace.

Salil Kader is a Doctoral Research Scholar in History at the University of Hyderabad.

Lt. Col Rathore in conversation on Rediff.com

It came as no surprise when Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore was selected for the country's highest sporting honour -- the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna -- for 2004.

Exactly a year ago, the unassuming hero had lived a nation's dream by finishing second in the final of the men's double-trap shooting at the 28^th Olympiad and winning India's only medal at the quadrennial sports jamboree.

Before that magical evening in Athens few knew about the major from the Indian Army; what followed was instant stardom.

In an exclusive interview with Special Correspondent Harish Kotian, Rathore, who has since been promoted to lieutenant colonel, discusses how life changed after Olympic glory.

It's been a year since winning the silver medal at the Athens Olympics. How much has life changed since then?

If at all life has changed, it is in terms of the availability of time, which has reduced drastically. As it was in the preparations for the Olympics, the time spent with the family was ever reducing because of the long hours of training. Now after the Olympics it's also due to training.

I can see an increase in the quantum of training; if I would compare it to pre-Olympics, I think it is nearly double of that.

Right now we are in the first year of post-Olympics and we still have another three years to go for the next Olympics. But the intensity of training has increased a lot, and I am very happy for that. So the time spent with the family has further decreased, which is also because of some other things, like the time I spend talking to the media. So because of these two reasons, time is at absolute premium; this has changed the most.

How different is the training now as compared to a year back?

I was a rookie pre-2004 Olympics, as I had just started. Normally people spend at least 10 to 12 years before they start giving top international performances. So my time spent in shooting was very, very less compared to all the top athletes; that's why I am saying I was a rookie before 2004.

But now I know what has to be done and how much hard work needs to be put in a sport where every mistake is counted. It's not like volleyball or basketball, where if you make an error your opponent also makes an error.

In shooting any error that you make is immediately put on the board, and these days the margin of error is reducing because of the number of competitors around the world and the very high professional manner in which they (other shooters) are training.

So, therefore, if you want to continue giving high results, you have to be in training. Now, since I know what training it is that I need to put in, I am putting as much time as possible; I am giving it my best.

Everything else remains the same for me. I am the same person, having the same friends, the same belief.

Can you tell us about some memorable moments after winning the silver medal?

Most of these moments have to do with emotions being displayed by the people. There cannot be different episodes from anywhere else, but it was generally to do with the emotions of the people. The way I was received at the airport, the way students or some corporates listen to me when I really get in to the mood of talking, when my thoughts flow without of hesitation of where I am speaking. That's when they feel thrilled about listening to me and are full of praise and support. That's been the most memorable part of my victory, especially comments like, 'You have done us proud' and 'We can hold our head high'; all these things are absolutely wonderful!

The point is that when you train for a long period, especially in our sport, there are less materialistic things in it. If you compare it to cricket, tennis, boxing or golf, there isn't huge amount of money as prize-money. Compared to that, our sport has more of respect; the national flag going up, the national anthem playing, you wearing the national colours, because you are truly representing your country and you are not a professional.

The feeling of the people when you win or lose -- that's the highlight and the best part of this sport.

And which were the most embarrassing ones?

Everything went on very well; there was nothing wrong spoken. But a particular incident that I still remember is one which happened at the airport when I returned from Athens.

There was confusion that took place at the airport. The National Rifle Association and the sports ministry had organised a big press conference at the airport after consulting me. The Army, on the other hand, works with its own motives. The Army had planned that they would immediately take me out of the airport and take me straight to the Army Chief's office.

So, at that place, the Army was trying to take me out, while the press and public were trying to stop me from going. So there was a huge tussle that was taking place between the Army and everybody else.

Finally, I realised that there is no way out if you don't speak to the journalists and the people who had come to receive me. And the only place where I thought of standing was the top of a Gypsy (the Maruti vehicle). I told the Army guys that there is no way they would let me go, so I must get on top of the Gypsy and talk to them. So that is how the pictures of me on top of the Gypsy came out.

Later people asked me, 'What were you doing on top of that Gypsy with a sea of people around you?' (laughs)

Another incident that comes to mind was when the chief minister of Rajasthan called me for a reception at Jaipur. Well, I normally thought we would have the reception at Jaipur, so I would go to my house, change and then go to Jaipur and meet the chief minister.

But the moment I reached the Rajasthan-Haryana border the reception started. The reception party met me there and took me around to meet people en route to Jaipur, which is about 200 km away. We started at 10 in the morning and reached Jaipur at six in the evening.

Now I am not a politician, but everywhere I went I was garlanded and given a microphone to speak. Everyone wanted to hear me, and there were groups of 30 to 40 people at all the places I visited. That was something I was not prepared for.

Do you think your silver medal has helped the sport of shooting in India? Has the government come forward and tried to improve facilities?

It has to be seen on two fronts. I have always stated that the entire Olympic movement in India is alive because of government support, and that stands true. And I further can say that a lot that I have achieved is courtesy due to the funding provided by the government.

Yet, a lot needs to be done to improve not only the sport of shooting, but other Olympic sports also. The progress towards improvement is slow and at this speed it will take us ages to win the number of medals that India should actually be winning.

A lot of things need to be done, and need to be done faster. There are a lot of policies, a lot of directions, which are in place, but the execution is lacking.

What improvements need to be carried out in shooting so we can do well at the 2008 Olympics?

As far as the 2008 Olympics are concerned, I think the plan should be very, very clear and simple. 2008 is just three years away and in three years you cannot churn, or rather you cannot catch people young, train them and make them Olympic champions.

To do well in 2008, you must already have some of your shooters who are at the top international level, and who you feel have the potential and age to do well in three years' time and thereafter. Give these select few people the funding that they need, have somebody responsible for producing results out of them.

What I mean is that there should be a set of people who should be entirely coordinating with these top few shooters where they want to train, how they want to train, with whom they want to train, which competitions they must shoot as training and which competitions they must shoot to win.

If they are having problems at home those problems must be sorted out, because sportsmen, especially shooters, would not be able to concentrate if he has got a family problem. If there are any administrative problems, then the government can easily solve them.

For example, it could be related to somebody's posting. An athlete may not be happy at the Railways; then move him to where he wants, because this is for a national cause. This is just giving an example of how the government can come forward and help.

It has to be a concentrated effort behind a select few shooters as far as the 2008 Olympic Games and the 2010 Commonwealth Games is concerned.

Do you think we have shooters who can win medals in 2008 at Beijing?

I will feel very happy to name these shooters, because they are doing well and will do well in the future. Let's start with rifle: Gagan Narang from Hyderabad is a very good shooter and he will do well.

Abhinav Bindra should do well, so will Suma Shirur from Mumbai.

Poornima Gawhane, a rifle shooter, is an up and coming shooter and one for the future; Deepali Deshpande is also doing very well.

Zoravar Singh Sandhu, in trap, is a very good shooter. He recently did well in the World Cup in May this year, finishing fifth, which is his best-ever finish at a World Cup.

Manavjit Singh Sandhu, in trap, is also another good prospect. Amit Singh, in skeet, will also do well.

And what about Anjali Bhagwat?

The reason I am not mentioning Anjali's name is because she has taken a break from shooting. I don't know why she has taken a break, but it could be because of personal reasons. So I am not sure for how long she is going to take a break; but if she comes back she is a great potential.

There were reports some months back that you would do advertisements and promote products? What is the latest on that?

I still haven't got the permission. It's been a year now, but I understand why I haven't got it. To some extent I do understand it, because this is the first time in the history of the Indian Army that a serving officer would be permitted to do commercials, permitted to appear on television.

It's a great step forward. It has taken more than the time it should have, but everyone feels positively about it and that's why I am happy.

I think this week I should get it (the permission), and that's the great part. Lot of people still tell me that you should have started straightaway doing endorsements, but I have no regrets. I have got good commercial offers, with huge amount of money.

I think it was good of me, becoming an officer and a gentleman, especially from the Indian Army, to follow the rules to the best of your abilities. Money wasn't going to lure me into breaking the rules and the code of conduct.

Like a good soldier I waited it out and my efforts are going to bear fruits now. If you ask my choices, I would not do advertisements, like alcohol and tobacco, that lead the youngsters astray.

You were honoured with various civilian awards during the last year. You were selected for the prestigious Padma Shri and also received the Ati Vishisht Seva Medal -- the second highest military award for serving officers. How did it feel?

It's undoubtedly a great honour receiving such a high award from the President of India. Receiving both the awards -- Padma Shri and the AVSM -- felt very nice. It is a great feeling to receive recognition for all the efforts that you have put in.

Lot of people still ask me, 'How many hours do you train?' I always tell them: I fall short of time; 24 hours is too less for me.

I am gradually cutting down my sleep, which is not good because you need to recover, recoup your energy. In Delhi, lot of my time is consumed in travelling, which is the biggest waste of time.

These awards are fantastic and you feel good because there have been many, many months and many, many hours when you trained alone against various odds. There is a huge amount of risk, as there is very little at the end of the tunnel in terms of materialistic gains. But if you do well and the country feels proud of itself, that's when these honours start coming. They are not the goal, certainly, but they are good encouragement to carry on giving your best for the country.

How has your role with the Indian Army changed after the Olympics? You were promoted to lieutenant colonel. What additional responsibilities has it brought along?

No, my role with the Army has not changed. People feel that I have become a lieutenant colonel; well, that's only because the Indian Army wants to become young. All my batch mates have become lieutenant colonels together. The Indian Army does not promote officers based on sports performances. Officers will get promoted only because of their normal routine career advancements.

This is the first instance in the Indian Army's history that an officer below the rank of brigadier has been awarded the country's second highest military medal in the distinguished services series. The highest award is the Param Vishist Seva Medal.

Narayana Murthy's dream for the future

India's software giant Infosys Technologies Limited has entered its 25^th year of existence. In these 25 years, the company has scaled many a peak, making the nation proud of it.

N R Narayana Murthy, Chairman, Infosys, however, has plans to turn the company into a bigger, stronger, and global player.

At an analysts' meet, held to mark the silver jubilee celebrations of Infosys in Hyderabad, Murthy spoke about his future for the company.

Here's the speech that he delivered.

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We start our 25^th year celebrations today. It is indeed laudable that we have run this marathon so far. Several happy thoughts come to my mind as I stand here. But, the most important one is our meeting in January 1981.

How Infosys began

It was a wintry morning in January 1981 when seven of us sat in my apartment, and created Infosys. We had lots of hope, confidence, commitment, energy, enthusiasm, hard work, passion and a sense of sacrifice.

We were short of one thing, money. We managed to put together just $250 in seed capital.

We never dreamt about size, revenues and profits. Our dream, right from day one, was to build a corporation that was, above all things, respected.

From the beginning, our team was unique in our commitment to a strong value system. We believed in putting the interest of the company ahead of our own interest. We believed in legal and ethical business.

We believed in respect and long-term gratification. And each of us brought complementary strengths to the company.

'Entrepreneurship is a marathon'

To me, entrepreneurship is a marathon. I believe that the key to a successful corporation is longevity – my heroes are companies like IBM, Levers, and GE. These firms have shown growth in earnings quarter after quarter, for a long time.

Infosys itself has seen consistent growth in revenue and profitability for over 49 quarters, since it got listed in India. We have institutionalized performance and accountability in our systems and processes, and through the empowerment of our employees. Let me talk about some of the generic lessons we have learnt.

The name of the game is: predictability of revenues; sustainability of the prediction; profitability; and a good de-risking model. Measurement is key to improvement.

Value system

A sound value system is what differentiates long-term players from others. Putting the corporation's interest ahead of personal interest will advance personal goals in the long term.

No single person is indispensable. It is important that you give challenging engagements to deserving people, whether they are young or new in the organization. Youth and empowerment are the keys to scalability and longevity.

Every situation is what you make it to be. Confidence is half the battle, and leadership is making the impossible look possible. Speed, imagination and excellence in execution are the only three context-invariant and time-invariant attributes for success.

Trust of employees, investors

The trust of employees is the most important ingredient for successful leadership. To gain the trust of people, there is no more powerful leadership style than leadership by example. The world respects performance and action, not rhetoric.

It is better to obsolete our own innovations, rather than allowing our competitors to do it. A healthy sense of paranoia and respect for competition is an absolute must for success. It prevents complacency, and ensures that the organization is learning continuously. The ultimate test for customer satisfaction is making our customer look good in front of his / her customer.

I have realized that if you want to look smarter, you must surround yourself with people smarter than you. Everybody needs incentives to perform. Money is not the only motivator; respect, dignity, fairness and inclusiveness are essential to get the best out of employees. Every employee must feel an inch taller when talking about the company.

Being transaction-oriented in every decision avoids groupism. An emphasis on meritocracy and data-orientation enhances the confidence of employees in the fairness of the corporation. We believe in the adage, In God we trust, everybody else brings data to the table.

To retain the trust of your investors, it is better to under promise and over-deliver. Investors understand that every business will have ups and downs, and want us to level with them at all times. They want us give them bad news pro-actively and as early as possible. Therefore, When in doubt, disclose.

We have realized that we should never take any decision with the stock price in mind. The day we do this, we will ruin the company. Finally, we have realized that we can shortchange investors if we want to make Rs 1 crore (Rs 10 million), but if we want to make Rs 1,000 crore (Rs 10 billion), we have to play the game straight and honest.

We have realized that longevity requires that we follow every law of the land, even if we do not agree with it. We should work hard to change laws that hurt the progress of the corporation.

Unless we make a difference to the society and earn their trust, we cannot be long-term players. Therefore, in everything we do, we must ask ourselves whether we are adding value to the society around us, regardless of where we are -- US or India.

'What I want Infosys to achieve in 25 years'

What do I want to see this company achieve in the next 25 years? I want this to be a place where people of different races, nationalities and religious beliefs work together, in an environment of intense competition but utmost courtesy and dignity, to add greater and greater value to our customers, day after day. Just like we have received respect in India, I want Infosys to be the most respected company in every country that it operates.

But, to achieve these dreams, we have to be in existence over the next 250 years. I know we can do this for the following reasons:

• We have an extraordinary leader in Nandan (Nandan Nilekani, Infosys CEO), a man of great vision, values and dynamism. He is ably supported by the best management team and professionals in the industry.
• We have a depth of leaders within the organisation, with over 500 leaders being part of our leadership training and mentoring programme.
• The de-risking strategy at Infosys ensures that there is a backup for every position, and that decision-making is participatory across the company. In other words, it is not one person, but a team that looks at every decision. Thus, at Infosys, it is the leadership of ideas and meritocracy that drives every decision.
• Every decision is supported by a strong portfolio of systems, processes and technology.
• The value system of the company is time and context invariant.
• We will continue to have the mindset of a small company even as we grow and scale.
• Finally, and most importantly, I see youth, the feel-good factor and confidence around me.

This is why I am confident Infosys will continue to serve the society as a long-term player.

Thank you.

N R Narayana Murthy

-As appeared in rediff.com 12th August

'A little old man who has renounced personal possessions, walking with bare feet on the cold earth in search of a great human ideal'

Phillips Talbot, South Asia correspondent of the Chicago Daily during Independence, was an eyewitness to history. He traveled to Noakhali, West Bengal, and spent time with Mahatma Gandhi during the communal violence there.

In a fascinating letter to a friend in New York, he conveyed his impressions of his encounter with Gandhi. Currently president emeritus at the Asia Society, New York, Mr Talbot granted Rediff On The NeT permission to use this letter from his archives in the Freedom section.

22 Ferozshah Road
New Delhi, India
February 16, 1947

Mr Walter S Rogers
Institute of Current World Affairs
522 Fifth Avenue
New York 18, New York

Dear Mr Rogers,

Two weeks ago I traveled for five days in order to walk for an hour with Gandhi.

The journey was worth the effort. It was revealing to watch Gandhi throwing himself during this critical season into the remoteness of East Bengal's Noakhali district for a barefooted village-to-village pilgrimage in search of Hindu-Muslim amity. Here was a 77-year-old ascetic, rising above the physical ordeal, immersed in a peculiarly Indian approach to the cleavage that threatens the country.

The region in which Gandhi has secluded himself is deep in the Ganges-Brahmaputra delta; one of the least accessible flat lands of India. To reach his party, I traveled by air, rail, steamer, bicycle, and on foot.

Hardly a wheel turns in this teeming, jute-and-rice-growing delta. I saw no motorable road. The bullock cart, one of India's truest symbols, does not exist here. The civilisation is amphibious, as fields are always flooded between April and October. In the wet season little remains above water except occasional ribbons of bund and isolated village clumps marked by coconut palms, bamboos, and betel trees. People stay at home or, at best, move about in hand-hewn skiffs. Though some of their crops grow under water, they farm mostly in the winter dry season.

Here, in an entirely rural area about forty miles square, are jammed nearly two and half million people: 1,400 per square mile or more than two per acre. Eighty per cent of these peasants are Muslims. Apart from a few wealthy families they "have nothing but their numbers", in the words of one senior Muslim official.

Impoverished cultivators racially indistinguishable from their Hindu neighbors, they suffered severely in the 1943 Bengal

The momentum of social reforms was lost by the early 1950s

Bipin Chandra, the eminent historian, evaluates the achievements and failures during these fifty years of freedom.

Celebrating its Independence on 15 August, India was faced with immense problems posed by the transfer of power, Partition and Partition riots and the immense refugee exodus from Pakistan to India. Still the Government of India and the Indian people set out to develop an independent modern economy and a secular, democratic, civil libertarian and socially just polity and society.

The newly framed Constitution came into operation on 26 January 1950, establishing India as an independent republic based on a system of representative parliamentary democracy. An outstanding feature of the new political system was adult franchise for all men and women. The Constitution also established an advanced system of personal and civil liberties to be enforced by an independent judiciary. The workers, peasants, agricultural labourers and clerical and other lower middle class employees were given the right to form unions and associations and to organize movements of social protest.

The Constitution guaranteed equality before the law to all citizens, prohibited any discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth, and assured full freedom of religion. It also provided for a federal structure with a strong centre but also a great deal of autonomy for the states. Parliament was made the institution where basic and ultimate power resided.

India's all-India services like the Indian Administrative Service and the officers and ranks of its armed forces are recruited from all the the regions and linguistic areas of the country. The armed forces and the central services are highly professional and non political and execute the orders of the elected government.

India's democracy came into its own with the first general election held in 1951-52. These elections were the biggest experiment in democracy in human history. The fair and peaceful conduct of the poll showed that the democratic system had taken roots in India. The effort to build a democratic and civil libertarian political order in a socially, culturally and economically backward and highly unequal society was unique by any historical standards. And India is the only Third World Country to have a continuous record of political democracy and civil liberties for a long period of 50 years after Independence.

A major problem India has faced since 1947 has been that of national unity or consolidation of the nation. Perhaps being culturally the most diverse country in the world, it has been open to continuous challenges to its unity. The founders of the Republic realised that the Indian people had to be unified by accepting its immense diversity. And so they began the consolidation of the nation around the concept of 'unity in diversity.'

A major aspect of the territorial and administrative unification of India was the integration of more than 560 large and small princely states, which occupied nearly 40 per cent of the territory if colonial India. With great skill and masterful diplomacy using both persuasion and pressure, Sardar Patel, the home minister, succeeded in integrating all but three of them -- Junagadh, Hyderabad and Jammu and Kashmir -- with the Indian Union by 15 August 1947. Firm action against the Nawabs of Junagadh and Hyderabad, and the armed defence of Kashmir against a Pakistani-sponsored invasion led to the merger of these states with India by the end of 1948.

By 1953, the problem of the rehabilitation of the refugees from Pakistan and their full integration with the Indian people had also been successfully tackled.

The language problem was the most divine issue in the first 20 years of Independent Indian -- one language problem was that of the official language of the country. It was, of course, accepted by the Indian leaders that Indian was a multi-lingual country and it had to remain so. The Constitution, therefore, recognised all the major languages as India's national languages. But it also decided that Hindi would be India's official language, with English being used for official purposes till 1965 when it would be replaced by Hindi. But as time for the changeover to Hindi came nearer, there were agitations galore and even occasional violence by both the supporters and the opponents of the changeover.

Fully aware of the danger that the controversy could pose to Indian polity, the central leadership worked for a compromise. In the end, the entire issue was defused when Parliament adopted a bill in December 1967 providing that the use of English as an associate official language would continue as long as the non-Hindi states wanted it.

The reorganisation of the multi-lingual states of the Union on the basis of language was another contentious issue that came on the agenda very soon after Independence. The leadership was reluctant to disturb the status quo for some time to come, but it soon yielded as public opinion in the country was overwhelmingly in favour of linguistic states. Today, nearly all the Indian states are formed around a dominant language.

The task of integrating millions of tribal people, divided into hundreds of tribes, constituting over 6 per cent of India's population and dispersed all over the country, was extremely complex. The Indian leadership rejected the two alternative policies of letting the tribal people stay more or less as they were or of assimilating them completely into the neighbouring Indian society in the name of 'uplifting' them. Instead, it adopted the policy of making them an integral part of the Indian nation even while maintaining their distinct identity and culture. As Jawaharlal Nehru, the architect of India's tribal policy, put it, 'The tribal areas have to progress' and 'they have to progress in their own way.'

The tribal people in North-Eastern India demanded greater autonomy and in case of the Nagas and the Mizos even started insurrectionary movements for independence. The Government of India responded with a two track response. While willing to extend greater autonomy, it would not tolerate secession from India, nor would it give way to violence. In the end, four tribal states were formed in the North-East: Nagaland in 1963, Meghalaya in 1972, and Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram in 1987.

A major national task after Independence was to undo the damage done to the economy by colonialism and to initiate economic development on the basis of the most advanced technology in agriculture and industry.

Land reforms had been one of the major promises of the national movement. In the early 1950s, the different state governments framed laws abolishing the zamindars, landlords, and other intermediaries between the state and the cultivators and made the existing tenants the owners of land. While hardly benefiting the landless agricultural labourers, agrarian legislation did mark a basic transformation of agrarian relations. The semi-feudal agrarian structure has disappeared from most parts of the country. Moreover, zamindari abolition put large chunks of land in the hands of the old rent-paying tenants many of whom, along with the erstwhile zamindars, have taken to capitalist farming as rich peasants or as large-scale farmers. Increasingly, over the years, political and social power in the rural areas has also passed into the hands of these new strata of capitalist farmers and rich and middle peasants, who, along with the urban capitalist class and the middle classes, constitute the political ruling class of the country.

Along with the land reform, the most urgent task was to overcome India's industrial backwardness -- the share of modern industries in national income at the end of British rule was only 7.5 per cent. In 1950, the central government took the most important step of setting up the Planning Commission and initiated other active measures for planned economic development. With the Second Five Year Plan, from 1956 to 1961, emphasis of government economic policy shifted to rapid industrialisation - based on the development of heavy, capital goods industry, even while encouraging small scale industry, and state ownership and control of the commanding heights of the economy.

The private sector was, however, not to be eliminated. Under government direction, regulation and licensing, it was to play an important role in economic development. India was thus to have a mixed economy, with the public sector gradually dominating it. There was, however, a major shift in the government's economic policy in 1991 when liberalisation of the economy, initiated in 1980, went full speed ahead. The system of controls and licence was mostly disseminated and the public sector started retreating.

Indian agriculture has made sturdy progress since 1950, growing at a slightly higher than 2.5 per cent rate per year. The Green Revolution, based on new seed-fertiliser technology, was introduced in the 1960s. It has gradually spread to all parts of the country except the rain-fed non-irrigated dry land areas. Industry has grown nearly 12 times since 1950. The annual rate of overall economic growth has been 3.75 per cent between 1950 and 1980, about 5 per cent between 1980 and 1990 and nearly 7 per cent since 1994.

It is on the front of greater economic equality and the removal of poverty, illiteracy and disease that India has faltered since 1947.

All the major political parties in India have been committed to the eradication of social inequality, discrimination and oppression. The Constitution provided for reservations in educational institutions, legislatures, and employment in government service for the scheduled castes and Scheduled Tribes. The provision of reservations in educational institutions and government employment was extended to backward castes and classes first in many states and later at the Centre.

In 1955, the Hindu Code Bill was passed enforcing monogamy on both men and women, permitting divorce to both and granting women equal rights with men in inheritance of property. However, Muslim orthodoxy succeeded in preventing the passage of a similar law for the protection of Muslim women.

Unfortunately, however, no social movements against the hierarchical caste system or for gender equality were organised, and the momentum of social reforms was lost by the early 1950s. The result is that the scheduled castes and women continue to suffer social and economic oppression especially in the rural areas.

Independent India has been committed to secularism. Despite the Partition of India in 1947 and the attendant communal riots, Indian leaders did not give way to communalism and made secularism a basic pillar to India's Constitution as also its state and society. They were helped in this by the revulsion in the country against the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi in January 1948 by a Hindu communal fanatic. After 1986, communalism has had a certain resurgence because of the feelings aroused by the Babri Mosque-Ram Janambhoomi dispute. One result was the destruction of the mosque on December 6, 1992.

From the outset, India has followed an independent foreign policy based on non-alignment and anti-colonialism. Foreign policy has been used to defend and strengthen India's Independence and to promote world peace. During the Cold War, India firmly refused to get involved in it and opposed the policy of dividing the world into hostile power blocs. It also tried to lessen the mutual antagonism of the big powers. During the Nehru and Indira Gandhi years, India's foreign policy also contributed to a sense of national pride among the people and thus contributed to national cohesion.

'Years of meandering gave us a land without direction, a people without purpose'

Ashwin Mahesh takes a closer look at the generation that has guided India through these last 50 years

The 50th anniversary of Independence has brought forth a number of opinions on the viability of the Indian state. From Shashi Tharoor's eloquent musings of a nation that never should be but somehow is, to the damning indictments of a country ravaged by unparalleled corruption, the opinions are a confusing collection of hope and despair, of promise and failure, of vibrant vitality and pallid morbidity.

In our land of contradictions, where castles and sewers mix with the easy familiarity of lifelong friends, a few disparate judgements should hardly be surprising. Somehow, it seems, India has seen it all before. We seem to perennially fly planes over the land with long banners that scream "THIS TOO SHALL PASS".

Strangely, those who have observed this resilience the most are, in the same breath, lamenting its imminent death. Read the opinions and the polls that sometimes go with them. The constant thread that runs through them is that an untenably large population, driven by completely contradictory needs and ambitions, manipulated by scheming politicians and straining under the weight of Hindu resurgence, is bound to collapse.

About a third of the people in the polls are convinced that India is on the brink of implosion. Somewhat more interestingly, almost all the columnists are certain of it. Either the political commentators and interviewees are incredibly clairvoyant or something is amiss. Somehow I don't think the predictions are particularly prescient. Nor do I think that the luminaries of the land, from freedom fighters to prime ministers past and present, to established political observers, are any better.

A little more controversial to swallow, perhaps, but I think that the overdose of pessimism is nothing more than a gnawing sense of failure masquerading as opinionated wisdom. To put it plainly, all these writers and leaders going around with their doomsday convictions are mostly -- old. The polls are split about evenly because they also include the confidence and optimism of the young, something the opinions and interviews clearly lack.

The memory of the movement for Independence, and the horrors of Partition, still live with us. Although the overwhelming majority of us have experienced neither, we continue to be ruled by those whose own lives have been shaped in part by these scars.

Some of them, like the PM, move with dovish inertia towards a dream that they hope will restore the brotherhood of the subcontinent. Others bare the fangs of hatred and division with just as much feeling. Sadly, it seems, we are waiting for the current crop of leaders to die.

A political establishment that lives with the nightmares of its own past can hardly display the eagerness about the future that we so need. We have had only two prime ministers who were not particularly involved with Independence. The Gandhis were too closely tied to the liberation for Rajiv to be unaffected by it. And his all-too-brief forward looking world collapsed in a contortion of shame and mismanagement. And V P Singh perished in trying to address the very issues, that the founders, with proper purpose, should have first tackled.

Our society, deeply rooted in respect for age, has not learned to discriminate the wisdom of the elderly from the senility of the aged. Recently, it was suggested to me that my youthful enthusiasm smacked of silly notions that had all been seen before, and that with time, I too shall become sensible. I hope the day never comes when I become sensible enough to suggest that the way forward for my country lies in implosion and divisive separation. The wisdom of the years seems as nothing more than a heavy shroud, one that I, if I had it, would wear with such burden and shame as to render it meaningless.

Every generation blames the one before it. It is a rite of passage in modern societies to contend that the aging leaders are completely out of touch with the needs of those who form the majority, those who still have their lives mostly ahead of them. I remember a time, a few years ago, when my father wrote me a letter and said that the things he had hoped for me, I had accomplished, and the rest was up to me.

If our leaders had shown half the wisdom that parents show in rearing their sons and daughters, half the confidence that they invest in them, and half the promise to be there when we needed them, we would be a pillar of democracy and prosperity, a justifiable bearer of the mantle of the world's great exception.

Instead, 45 years of meandering gave us a land without direction, a people without purpose. Indeed, wallowing in the shame of their own actions, our political masters, often the very ones that institutionalised the decline of our nation with bureaucratic policies that shackled the will of the people, quietly switched gears and abandoned their long held ideas.

Even the Communists, that most egalitarian of Indian political birds, have now ditched their stated promise of equality in the rush to embrace the free market. Not surprisingly, neither they nor anyone else has accepted any fault for the many years that our nation labored in squalor under misguided policies and outright fraud. Whether this new-found faith in the market works, or remains another chapter in the seemingly endless struggle out of poverty, remains to be seen. But it is clear that the wisdom of the aged, if it exists at all in those who guide our national policies, dawned too late to be of much use.

Some would suggest that in 50 years, we have a come a long way. But it escapes no one that many others have gone farther still. And the task at hand lies in looking forward to the things we can accomplish, to erase the disdainful record of the first 50 years.

We seem to be divided between those who grudgingly accept that these first fifty years could have been better and those who cling to the shrines of past heroes and worship them as towering figures who stitched our national fabric together against incredible odds. Of late, the latter group, caught up in its own exaggerated visions of accomplishment, is beginning to wonder how we shall ever manage without their visionary guidance and leadership.

If we could manage in spite of them, it is certain that we shall do quite well without them, thank you very much. Their accomplishments, if they are a yardstick to measure our own, will soon be surpassed and lie far behind. As for us, let us look forward instead. And if the day shall come to pass where our beloved nation no longer exists as we have known her to, then it shall be in spite of our generation, and not because of it.

Perhaps we lack the stoic affirmation of our fathers, perhaps we have too much materialism to value the things that last, but god forbid that we should ever acquire the defeatism of the generation that failed us. From where I stand, it is hard to see what the founding fathers and their followers have accomplished that we might not far exceed in the years to come. And if that seems like an unfair indictment of the generation that gave the nation shape, I can only counter that it is the truth.

How B-schools create leaders

When recruiting young MBA graduates for my organisation, I don't consider their domain specialisation or even high marks: I look for one key quality. Leadership. My thoughts are on creating leaders within the organisation -- people who can lead other people, companies and society.

A leader is someone who can influence the thoughts and behaviour of people. Leadership isn't an inherent trait; it comes from practice and can be nurtured. And that is what B-schools need to do -- help students develop their leadership potential.

When I visit B-school campuses during placement week, I seek several attributes that point to good leadership ability. The first is personal integrity -- someone with a sense of honour. I want people who can speak the truth, even when telling the truth can go against them.

I look for someone who is an excellent communicator, and who intuitively understands how to interact with people. I want an uncluttered mind -- he should be able to see the larger picture and simplify complex issues. And last, but definitely not the least, he should be able to inspire people to work together.

The trouble is, no management institute is focusing on creating these attributes in its students. MBA programmes create leaders in spite of themselves, simply because they admit high-calibre students who go out and actively seek leadership qualities.

That's why B-schools need to spend even more time on their selection process. More personal interaction with the applicants will ensure that they admit only the cream of the crop.

B-schools also need to remember that leaders beget more leaders. So while they should ensure increased interaction for students with industry leaders, they also need to make sure that the faculty possesses qualities of leadership.

Not only do they need to be at the top of their respective fields, they should also be able to inspire their students to work together and scale new heights of excellence.

Raja Shekharan is senior vice president, Caritor India. He graduated in 1989 from Jamshedpur's Xavier Labour Relations Institute.

-- As told to Meenakshi Radhakrishnan-Swami.