O Captain, My Captain!

Robin Williams as John Keating in Dead Poet's Society

I did not think that the death of a man would affect me this much. An actor, no less! And yet, I can't bring myself to work, even when I really should be. So here's my ode to my favourite actor, Robin Williams and my favourite movie, Dead Poets Society. People who know me, know that I do not have a favourite anything. so why a favourite actor and movie? It is because of a character called John Keating that Robin Williams played in the movie. That character and the movie comforted me and gave me strength when I was very vulnerable and it literally changed my life. It is not an overstatement. Let me explain.

When I was a kid, I was acutely asthmatic. I could not run or hop even a few steps. If I did, I would have an attack which spanned 3 days in the worst cases. In those days, there were no inhalers, and I can't tell you what kind of hardships my parents went through because of me. Since I could not play till I was 12 years old, I used to spend my time observing and thinking about the wonders of nature. Why was a droplet rising from the water surface round, while a rain drop was not? How does an aeroplane stay in the air when it was not apparently pushing down on anything? How does a top stay upright when spinning?

In contrast, the books were so bland. I never read them. I used to write exams out of memory of what I had heard in class. I was okay in my exam scores, probably in the top 10% in the class, but not the topper, which my teachers repeatedly told my mother I could easily be. I must commend my mother for her never ending motivation in trying to make me "study". It was a futile one, I had no aspirations for it. Thankfully, my father did not care. He bought me two volumes of encyclopedias, and I loved pouring through them: Just learning about beautiful people and places, art and literature, instruments and machines. I built all kinds of small machines. My father would probably know only through this post that I had replaced the fuse of our house with a thicker wire because I was fed up of changing the thin ones that kept burning out.

My entire school life passed this way, and I did not care. But when it came to getting into a college, I always wanted to be an engineer and I wanted to go to the IITs. At that time, I thought I could easily get in based on my scores in preparatory mock exams. However, when I did not get through in the actual exam, it stung. I realized getting into top schools requires rigour and conformance to the education system, and I, foolishly did not want to compromise on my way of learning. More importantly, it broke my father's expectations. He never said it or ever let me feel his disappointment. But in a moment of weakness, my mother told me that my father had a secret wish. He wanted to serve tea to his friends while letting them know that his son had got into an IIT, the school he went to. This hurt. I had failed the one man who had always stood by me.

What had I achieved through my non-conformance? What good is potential, when not utilized? Was I doomed to mediocrity just because I did not want to bend? What good does it serve? And would I ever get another chance to prove to the world that I was not mediocre? And all this was made worse by a girl, whom I dearly loved. She was beautiful, talented and one of the toppers of our class. In two years of college, we had come close and drifted away. And now there were rumours that she liked a boy who was also one of the toppers. It was in this moment of self-doubt and misery, that I had found Dead Poets Society!

John Keating had taught me that it was fine not to conform, to find our own ways to learn, and draw our own conclusions. That it is in some way more honourable, more brave, more rewarding to find our own way. Most importantly, I learnt to make peace with the fact that not everybody will see a value in that. In him, I saw my favourite teachers who passionately taught about the meaning and beauty of the subject, not the subject itself. In the students, I saw various aspects of me and my struggles of coasting aimlessly through textbooks. I cried at the end of the movie, with agony, with pride, with rebellion, and with respect! It had instilled self-belief back into me.

Carpe Diem!

P.S. This post would be incomplete without paying respects to the best teachers in my life. First and foremost, to my father who instilled natural curiosity in me at a very tender age. For teaching a 4 year old kid that a wall pushes back as hard as one pushes against it. And, that a man's behaviour is his true ornament. To Maurice ma'am, my primary school teacher that I could trust and love a lady other than my mother. To Biren-da, my rickshaw puller, to show me that kindness is an attribute of human beings and not the wealth they possess. To Shalini ma'am, my high school history teacher, for showing that a subject can be as boring or as beautiful based on how it is taught. To Dr. THS, my HOD in college, who on noticing everybody stand up when he entered his first class asked, "Why are you standing? What have I done to earn your respect?" He continued, "This class will have no marked attendance. Come if it is worth your time. If you stay out of my class all semester and write the same answer as the guy in class, you will get more marks". I did not miss a single class in 3 semesters. And finally to my friend Anand Vivek, that in true friendship, it is about giving and truly expecting nothing back in return.     

An unknown girl and an unknown mountain.

This blog entry is about a girl called Geetha, whom I never met, and who doesn't know about me. Unfortunately, Geetha is no longer with us and this story is about my struggles to reach Leatherman peak, a climb I dedicated to her memory, getting lost on the way, and climbing another mountain called White Cap peak thinking that it was Leatherman.

Geetha and I went to the same undergraduate school, she four years after me. Beyond this, we have no connection. Recently, she was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia. I don't know what that means, but she needed to undergo a bone marrow transplant to live. The medical bills were really hefty, and I was hoping to help her family and friends towards footing some of them. Although, I had never done this before, I decided to raise funds through a weekend climb to Leatherman peak (12,228 feet, the second tallest mountain in the state of Idaho, USA). The fund raising was going on well. The target was to raise  $25,000 in a month's time. We were starting to gather momentum, and together with efforts from Geetha's other friends, we raised upwards of $5,200 in about a week.

However, things did not work out the way we all hoped and prayed for. Geetha is no more! She developed an infection which spread to her heart. As a result, she could not eat much orally or tolerate injections. Worst of all, some respiratory side effects led to her chemotherapy to be momentarily suspended till the infection got cleared. Unfortunately, she passed away before that could happen. So I decided to climb the peak in her remembrance.

Personally, I needed the break too. This past week was a bit dramatic. I was planning to climb Leatherman peak last Sunday. In hindsight, it would have been impossible because I miscalculated the time required to reach the base of the mountain. Anyways, I hurt my toe last Saturday and had to postpone the climb to this weekend. Geetha passed away Monday night. Then on Wednesday, two friends, Nate and Ellen (who was supposed to climb Leatherman with me) were involved in a terrible car accident. Thankfully, they walked out of it relatively unharmed, but Ellen suffered trauma to her left shoulder which was already hurt from a previous incident. Ironically, I was supposed to be in the same car! Due to a series of follies, I made Matt drive another car to pick me up. Matt and I actually drove past Nate and Ellen's upturned car and I even joked about it. We felt sick about it afterwards, but at that time, we had no idea that it was their car. Besides, we were on a different highway to stop even it was somebody else. Then on Thursday, I was biking to Pranav's and Nayan's home. It was very windy that evening and I noticed two people running around a big fallen tree. I soon realized there was a 4-5 year old child underneath the tree. I joined the other two in pulling her out. Thankfully, she was not pinned under anything, but she was bruised at multiple places and was having problems in breathing. She kept saying her back hurt a lot, which was a real worry. We got her parents and called 911. Before the responders arrived, we were pretty sure that she had not broken a rib and that she had sense all throughout her back (meaning her back bone was relatively unhurt). But, she was definitely in shock, and her playmates kept crying. This was really agonizing to see a sweet kid like her go through this.

So, on Saturday, I was more than eager to get away. Leatherman Peak is in the Lost River range. To get there, we can drive around another range called the Pioneer range or drive through an unpaved road though it. Having time on our hands we chose the later, stopping at the beautiful city of Ketchum for some coffee and ice-cream. Once, we passed the Pioneer range, the Lost River range lay right in front of us. I had never been on this road before, and I must say that this road probably presents the best view of the range. It is quite a lofty one containing 7 out of the 9 tallest mountains in the state of Idaho. Besides, there is something very majestic and beautiful about its peaks. They are just solid jagged rocks jutting 4000 - 6000 feet out of the ground. For the route that we had decided to climb Leatherman peak, we had to drive around the range and into the beautiful Pahsimeroi river valley. It was incredibly scenic and bone-rattling at the same time.

The Pioneer range as seen from Doublesprings road.

Mount Corruption from N-117.

The Lost river range as seen from the Northwest side from N-118. (L to R): unknown, Leatherman peak, White Cap Peak, Mt. Idaho and Sacagawea peak).

After 2 hours of this bitter-sweetness, we were at our campsite by about 8 PM. It was beautiful. The west fork of the Pahsimeroi river ran right next to our campsite and the tent site was just like a soft bed of pine foliage. Pranav and Gavin started setting up the tents and foraging for some dry wood, while Michael went about cooking dinner. I got down to starting a fire. It was a long time since I had started a fire with just a few match sticks, and it was a great feeling when the fire finally got going. We had a wonderful dinner; I must say one of the best I have had since a long time. We had forgotten to carry plates and Gavin improvised by using part of a trunk of a tree as his plate. It looked incredibly fancy with small servings of rice, garbanzo bean-curry, and fresh salmon on it. We did consider opening an outdoor themed restaurant where food will be served this way.

Our campsite

We were planning to leave camp by 6 AM. But we were so enamoured by the luxurious camping, that we stayed up till 11 PM by the fire and even had a fire for breakfast! We left camp by around 8 AM :-). The trail was beautiful to begin with. It was flanked by mountains on both sides and crisscrossed many small streams which were tributaries of the Pahsimeroi river. At this time of the year, the entire forest is littered with thousands of wild flowers. Just when I started absorbing the beauty of this trail, it disappeared altogether. To add to the adventure, Pranav and I got separated from the Gavin and Michael. We tried looking around for them and/or the trail for about half an hour, but in vain. So, a decision was made to first break the tree line and then try to find out the trail with the advantage of clear sight. Thankfully, when we came out of the trees, we were not very far from a faint trail which lead up to Leatherman Pass, which I thought was on the way to Leatherman peak. This was a big mistake.

The trail that we lost shortly.

The beautiful hike.

Leatherman Pass: Leatherman peak to the left, White cap peak to the right.

There are two mountains on either side of Leatherman pass. The one to our left was Leatherman, the one to our right was White Cap peak(11,899 feet). Unfortunately, both of us were confused on which one is what. One person came down from White Cap peak and we asked him, which one is Leatherman, and he pointed towards White Cap. We asked another man climbing up, and he also pointed us in the wrong direction. He said he lived in the valley and climbed the mountains almost every weekend. He was a strong climber, based on what we saw, and when he started from the base camp (two hours after us). So we started going up White Cap mountain. It was not a scary climb. But it was difficult. There was a lot of screeing. Every three steps one climbed up, one would slide down one step. There was one more problem. As you climb up White Cap, there are at least 3 places, which look like the summit from below. You get to the point and realize that the summit is 500 feet higher. It does tend to have a demoralizing effect.

Do you think this is the summit? No, it was the first time we were fooled.

We finally summitted White cap at around 1:00 PM. It was evident to us that we were not on Leatherman. Also we could see the silhouettes of Michael and Gavin on the summit of Leatherman peak. It was a good relief for us, because we were not sure of what happened to them till then. We set down a picture of Geetha at the top of the mountain and ate our sandwich. However, we did not have much time at the top. A thunderstorm was rolling in fast. We could see some lightning on the Pioneer range. I wanted to be back to at least Leatherman pass before the rain hit us. There was no time for me to set up my DSLR for some shots. So we decided to head back at the earliest.

This climb was dedicated to Geetha.

I did carry the DSLR to the top. In vain!

Pranav and me at the top of White cap mountain.

We got back to the pass in the nick of time. The winds had picked up considerably. We couldn't hear each other from 10 feet away. We just kept walking and were soon back in the trees again. I generally don't like climbing down a mountain. One is tired and walks for hours to get to a car! Thankfully this time, we did get to see some wildlife on the way. A big group of mule deer ran away from us, from about 100 feet away. Unfortunately, they were too fleeting for me to take a picture. We met up with Michael and Gavin at almost the trailhead. It was about 4 PM. We had a small snack and headed back home.

 Pranav calls this mechanical walking, i.e. don't think, don't talk, just walk.

Leatherman Peak: http://www.summitpost.org/leatherman-peak/152079
White Cap Peak: http://www.summitpost.org/white-cap-peak/154011

More pictures: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/nra736usx5iwqhf/AAA73CTJv2fmapJ3jW8vWHHqa

A life well lived

The news about an amazing tale of a desperate WWII pilot’s encounter with a German flying ace reminded me of Grace, a 92 year old woman I met recently. She is an American, but here parents were of Japanese origin. 

During WWII America wasn't very kind to people of Japanese origins. When she is now asked what she feels about it, she always says "I forgive them". But the big story is yet to come. So at the end of WWII, she was given the job as a nurse at a military hospital. But they were worried about the reaction of the injured American soldiers returning from Japan towards a nurse who looked Japanese. So the hospital provided her an escort between some places in the hospital. When the soldiers whom she was nursing came to know about this, they volunteered to be her escort.

She told this in the most stoic manner(I am sure my jaw was on the floor), And then it continued. She mothered a special child. The doctors said he wouldn't make it beyond 4 years. He made it to 49. Not only this, she has been a volunteer at the special Olympics for close to if not over 50 years now, winning the best volunteer award.

I stood there, tears running down my cheek. Tears of joy on meeting a person, who could not have lived a better life. I really wanted to hug her, but I just shook her hand and childishly congratulated her over the life that she had led. I wish at the end of my life, I can look back at my life with half this much pride.

Terrorism and our response to it!

Last week, the world encountered yet another hate crime. A trigger-happy white supremacist walked into a place of worship, a Sikh Gurudwara at Wisconsin, and killed 6 people and injured many others including a police officer. A lot has been written about this deplorable act. I can't condemn it enough, so I will not try to. I will only share an interesting view point of a friend and leave you to draw your own conclusions.

Driving to the courts, he suddenly asked me, "Roy, are there a lot of Sikhs in India?". I knew where he was coming from. So after answering his question in the affirmative, I asked him for his reaction to the event.  He expressed his displeasure about the heineous crime, but said that the government should not call it an "act of terrorism". I revolted! I said, "If a bearded Muslim youth would have done this, you would have no qualms about calling this an act of terrorism!". He said this is a "hate-crime". I said "So is any act of terrorism". To this he had no answer and he agreed with me.

He corrected himself and finally got to what he wanted to say. He said, look at the response from the government and the community. It is unequivocally deploring the act and speaking out against it quite loudly. The same is not true about other communities, whose youth, though isolated, commit acts of terror. The response is not strong and sometimes even borders on tacit approval. Now he had a point, which I could not counter!

The response of both the communities involved  in the aftermath of this incident is extremely laudable. The US flag will be flying at half mast till 10th August (an entire week). The FBI has conducted hundreds of interviews with the family and associaties of the gunman. The Times of India reports that it (FBI) has issued 180 federal subpoenas and is following 101 leads worldwide. Even the mother of the gunman has expressed her disgust publicly and apologized for her son's act. The Sikh community on the other hand while bemoaning the act has strongly commended the act of the gallant police officer who put his life on the line, even after being shot multiple times, to try and protect as many people as he could. This is how communities should react to an abberation of human conduct.

In stark contrast is the violence of Bodo-Muslim tensions in Assam, India. 77 people have died. Millions have had to flee their homes. There is a media blackout in the region and a strong curfew has been imposed. However, voices from both camps condemned attacks ONLY from the other group and justified acts of their camp by means of "retaliation" and/or "self-defence". Not one waited for peace to be restored first. And those who spoke against their own camp where branded as "pseudo-secular"!

My friend's words, though said in some other context does provide some scope for introspection. I ask the Muslim community. I understand that most Muslim people are peace loving people. And that a handful of "extremists" carry out acts of terrorism which has to be borne by the entire community. But has the Muslim community been sufficiently vocal against its youth who have/are carrying out these horrible acts around the world? The same question can be asked to many Hindus about rising Hindu extremism. Aren't we as  communities too docile towards the handful of youths who bring bad name to our own community?

P.S. Before you start judging my friend, let me tell you a little about him. He is man of Russian origins, in his late 60s who migrated to the US about 20 years back. From my long discussions with him, I can tell you that he is a very liberal man from any point of view, be it race, religion, politics or economy.

The curious case of the India's best engineering students.

Ask any engineering student from any college in India. What do you want to do after you graduate? The answer is generally prompt and more often than not has nothing to do with engineering. Most of us want to do an MBA or an MBA after 2 years of a job, join a financial institution, and some want to become a chartered accountant. Can you remember the last time an engineering student told you that he wants be an innovator or a very good engineer in his field?

I did not study in the best engineering colleges of India. Somehow, my expectation form the students there were also not very high (the fault here lies with me and nobody else. Anyways, moving on) My lament is on the state of premier engineering colleges in India. In this blog, I have spoken about by experiences at IIT Bombay which is undoubtedly a very prestigious engineering college in India. I am actually hesitant to generalize my observation to other premier colleges, but there is a good chance that this is true for many other institutions as well.

First, some context. I am a gradute student. Last year, I had the wonderful opportunity to stay and work at IIT Bombay for 5 months. I like almost every Indian child interested in engineering wanted to go to the IITs. In my childhood, I was surrounded by IITians (including my father) who I looked up to and aspired to be an IITian one day. That day never came. It is the biggest lament of my entire life. Something which I think will take a lifetime to overcome.


However, the IIT that I had imagined and the IIT that I saw was completely different. I had imagined the best brains in India (and indeed the world) striving to become the best engineers in the world.  Most of the people wanted to get the best financial jobs or into the IIMs or CAs and the likes after they graduated. Nothing related to their 4 years of training as an engineer! What a waste of 4 years of training of the best minds of India!!!

I had expected an IIT campus to be full of innovators. Unfortunately, what I saw was nothing but the ubiquitious rat race which is present in any other engineering college in India. Albeit, the goals were higher. But without exception, I did not speak to a single student who wanted to become the ultimate engineer in his field. In fact if I ever brought up the topic, I would immediately get long faces. And what about giving back to the country which spends so much for their education.  I only got huhs- and huhs. I might be wrong here but from my personal experience, the amount of engineering innovations coming out of the IITs for the betterment of poor and the needy is seriously questionable. I follow many blogs on grass-root innovation in India. Very rarely do I read anything from the premier institutes. 

My professor also noticed this. He is an endowed chair at IIT Bombay. His opinion on this was: "Double-triple the intake of IITs. After one year, have a placement round with all the financial companies. All those students who want to go into the companies should do so. The rest should be trained for the remaining three years. The placement round after going through the three extra years should have no financial institutions. This is a win-win situation for everybody. Students who want the highest pay packages in the country need not waste 3 years, earn hefty salaries instead. Industry also doesn't need to wait. And the country truly gets to train the students who want to be engineers". 

I am sure that the quality of education provided in the IITs is world class. However, the management of IITs should seriously consider how the IITians should be oriented. Should it stay the provider of a shining badge which is a stepping stone to everything but engineering. The placement cell should not boast of what is the highest salary or average salary of every student. It should rather publish figures as: The highest and average pay that an engineer from X field got while staying in the X field. Or should it become the gurukul which produces excellent engineers and innovators who by and large stay true to the profession that they were trained for. The goal of IITs as I undertand is not of a placement agency. It is the ultimate gurukul where one goes to in order to become the ultimate engineer. I hope in days to come IITs get known for that tab and that tab alone and not the most difficult institute to get into from where you get the highest paying jobs.

P.S. I understand, for this to be viable we need industry to absorb this engineers as engineers. But remember, I started this blog by saying that this is just a lament because I respected IITs very highly and the present state which I saw saddened me greatly.  

A call for action!

THE ULTIMATE GOAL
I have been shouting at the top of my lungs that Lokpal act (in any form) is not going to help us in completely eradicating corruption. Neither is it going to help in developing our country. We need to demand for reforms and policies, elect the person whose election manifesto is to provide those reforms and track if he or she is delivering on it.

As daunting as this task looks, I have found great heart in the way the common man has taken to the streets for the right cause. This was not possible earlier. Earlier information was not so easy to find. One would have to find the right piece of paper copies of which were rare. Even if someone did come across the information, there was no way to disseminate this news and his views. There was no forum for him to discuss. This has quickly changed in the last five years or so. Information flows freely through TV, radio, print-media and most importantly over the internet. If you have the right cause, you can spread the word through social networks in a matter of days across tens of millions of people.

Earlier reforms and policies where left to the echelons of the intellectual elite. I want to aid in the growth of a critical mass of common people who understand through common knowledge what is best for them and the country and then press for it.

THE FIRST STEP
A critical aspect of raising awareness is letting the youth read worthwhile news. How many of you give a damn to what Amitabh Bachchan tweeted about his pregnant daughter in law or whether Deepika Padukone is uncomfortable with her tattoo. Yet every morning you have to rummage through news channels, news papers and e-portals for morsels of information that you really care about. I am not saying entertainment is not important, but that is not supposed to litter 50% of the real estate of a news medium.

I am trying to build a portal where there would be sections like "national", "international", "sports", "business", education", "entertainment" etc. Any member of the portal can add a link to a news under the suitable section. The forum will be moderated by the members on the forum. However, no member can alter the post of another member. If a member finds that a piece of crap or advertisement has been put up by some member, he can report it to the forum-moderators. The forum-moderators will take suitable action. If required, the poster of a "non-news" may be warned by the moderators. The membership would be terminated if a member receives more than 3 warnings within a space of 3 months. The same rules apply for false reporting.

The portal will also have a discussion forum. The discussion forum will have sections for discussing pertinent topics.

Please let me know what you feel about this idea.

I already came in contact with a guy who has the domain space for this and is willing to do some development. Is there anybody else interested in providing an helping hand?

As an example of this portal have a look at a similar defense: http://www.bharatrakshak.com/

JAI HIND!

Prevent rather than cure corruption

Is Jan lokpal the answer to widespread corruption in India today? One might argue "this is how work gets done in India. People work if there is a sword hanging around their necks". Besides, Jan Lokpal is more than just a bill. It is a huge momentum with which the civil society is trying to reach a corrupt-free Indian society.

Unfortunately as justified as this goal is, and as lucrative as the Jan Lokpal bill sounds, it will not get us there! Questions still exists on:
1. Approx. how many officials will be part of the Lokpal office to handle over 2 crore government officials? How do we find so many non-corruptible people? I know we are speaking of self regulation and ability of a citizen to complaint against a member of the Lokpal or it's decision. But when the police doesn't act against police and judges don't act against judges (when provisions are in place), why will a Lokpal member act against a Lokpal member?
2. In the case of most whistleblower cases, it will be one whistleblower against a complete nexus. This will often end up with the nexus drying the whistleblower's evidences up and will finally lead to the whistleblower's word against the nexuses words in court. What will the Lokpal do then?
3. It is not clear what happens to the whistleblower's protection after the case is over?
4. It is not clear how the Lokpal will handle petty cases. Say for example, I go to the Lokpal and say policeman X asked for a bribe from me. The Lokpal will have no way to help me as it will be my word against the policeman's word! If it still takes days to provide justice, it will still stay lucrative for a lot of people to pay 50-100 bucks and be done with it! Won't it?
5. The Lokpal's office has to work within the ambit of the same law of the land. The proposed way to speed up judgement specifies setting up of more special courts if need be. Setting up a special court would need officials of the Lokpal. It is not clear how we can get officials for that court who fulfill all the criteria as laid down in at such short notice. How would it be miraculously successful and faster than our present courts.
6. Point number 33. of version 2.3 speaks about "immunity to a bribe giver". Sir/madam, there are innumerable cases in Indian where the giver actually instigates the bribe? People pay bribe to the guy who reads their electric meter for a lesser reading, to the customs officer to bypass high customs fees, to the traffic police to not write a chalaan, don't they? I would go one step ahead and say it is often a way of getting things done cheaply for many. Who will report those cases where the government and society is the only loser?
7. In the section, "Punishment for false complaints", the maximum punishment seems to be Rs. 1 lakh. This will be pittance for parties involved in even medium-sized projects. Is this deterrent enough for parties which would like to stall proceedings of important projects for benefits through re-tendering etc.?

Unfortunately, Lokpal or Jan Lokpal bill doesn't solve any of the above-mentioned problems. The people of India are fed up of corruption and they feel the need to do something. Lokpal seems to fit the bill. However on close inspection, it seems to miss the very root of the problem.

ROOT OF CORRUPTION
An absence of Lokpal is not the reason for corruption. Why does the man on the street offer a bribe? Because he wants to get a service and the bribe is the shortest way to get there. Atanu Dey in his book 'Transforming Indian' expresses this as "rent". You pay rent for getting an otherwise hard-to-get service or to speed up the process which is otherwise laced in bundles of bureaucracy. Indeed , the root of corruption in India is excess of convoluted laws and procedures which forces the people to pass a quick buck to get their work done. Until that's removed, you won't see a reduction in corruption. The Lokpal bill unfortunately adds one more process and will only add to the existing mess. It will paralyze the Government even more. Nothing would move because the decision makers would be accused of corruption at every step and would have a Lokpal breathing down their neck. A pertinent example provided by a fellow thinker was: suppose Lokpal was present when Dr. Manmohan Singh opened up the Indian market, there would have been hundreds of socialists who would have gone to the Lokpal and the reforms would have never been passed! We would not have grown at nearly 10 percent a year for the last two decades.

THE SOLUTION
1. Call for minimal rules and red-tape
The solution to corruption is to eradicate the root of the problem. Any service should be made available with minimum red tape. An example for this would be the Indian railway reservation system. Getting a ticket is an uncomplicated single window system, there is no corruption. However, getting a confirmed seat from a waiting list means running around the TT, there is corruption there. An often cited example in this case is that of the telecom revolution. Not too far back you would pay a bribe to get a phone. However today you would go to any shop which sells you a sim card and a phone. The whole process is so simple and the service so accessible that there is no room for corruption.

Imagine if the same was true about getting a gas connection, ration card, PAN card, electric connection, passport, driver's license etc. i.e. these services could be made readily accessible. Once we get our UID, we should need to go to (say) a ration card office and get a ration card in 2-3 hours. If the service is an uncomplicated single-window instant system, then why should anybody pay a bribe? This is certainly do-able and has been done in numerous (relatively) corruption-free countries. We already have the resources to achieve this too. The government would do well to come up with UID-like projects for each of the services it provides and our huge IT-sector would be only glad to take up the opportunity to implement these. The government surely has the money to fund such projects as we are only speaking about a few billion dollars. What's more this money stays within the country and is partially recovered by the government in taxes! This also would provide employment to thousands of youngsters. Such domestic projects are symbiotic for everybody especially in the coming decade when we are going to witness a decline in out-sourced projects.

This mantra of minimum laws has been aptly captured by Mr. Narendra Modi in his motto, "Minimum government and maximum governance". This is the reason why Gujarat and Bihar is marching forward today as the most lucrative destination for both domestic and international offices. Not just private investment, government projects of unmatched scales are taken up, and finished before time and under budget. This unprecedented, often unimaginable and yet replicate-able feat is achieved because the bureaucracy is threadbare and thus inherently transparent mitigating the need and opportunities for corruption.

The true solution for corruption is prevention and not correction!

2. Regulation
No matter what kind of systems we put in, we would never be able to do away completely with personal interactions between the a official and member of public. For example, we would always need a person to go down to read the electricity and water meters or a customs officer for that matter. Unfortunately, these interactions would be the seat of corruption. The threat that people might complain to a regulatory office has not proved to be an effective deterrent because of the red-tape I discussed above. Besides, how does one ensure that the member of public does not voluntarily offer bribe to a officer for benefits. How does one punish such bribe-givers?

Instead of people reaching the regulatory office, the office should have auditing and raiding parties in plain clothes. If one sees it, this comes at the same institutional cost as the Lokpal's office. A raiding party should be made up of a number of officers high enough to make paying the fine more lucrative than bribing everyone of them. Successful examples of the working of such bodies can be found in the bus ticket checking raids in major metropolitan cities like Delhi and Kolkata and also in magistrate level checking in the Indian Railways.

3. Call for middle class to exercise their right of vote
The middle class of India is a huge section of the Indian population and is often most affected by reforms. It is one of the most educated sections of the society. What's best, is that the middle class vote cannot be bought! As an example if the middle class really constituted a big chunk of the ballot, Karunanidhi won't have famously promised TVs to every households for every vote!

Yet nothing explains the abysmal voting rates of the middle class. Apparently only 40% of south Mumbai voted after 26/11. An interesting read here is "Frankly, we don't give a damn!". Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan hits the nail on the head with his call for electoral reforms for transparent candidature and election-expenditure. In his speech at the 'Round table conference on Parliamentary affairs', he asks, "Why should a good man run for elections when he is guaranteed to come last?". He goes on to explain the logical solution that if we have to get right people and the right policies, we as a society must provides incentives for the same.

We the middle class need to give a damn! It is not un-cool to discuss politics or policies. It is not the domain of the corrupt. Neither is it boring. It is only when we discuss them in isolation does it become overwhelming to comprehend. We should elect a man or woman whose policies we have discussed and found pertinent. We should root him or her out if he or she doesn't deliver. Are these discussions really more boring than following an actor's pregnancy or tattoos? Or can't it be done in conjunction?

4. How to use the present momentum?
Like it or not we are going to have a Lokpal bill. The government proposed Lokpal bill is quite toothless and arguably deliberately so. The Jan Lokpal is quite impractical to implement. For prominent differences between both please refer here.

We should use the present momentum to force a parliamentary committee consisting of members from all parties ( I know it has been tried ) to the table with the leaders of the civil movement. We should try to push the points on the Jan Lokpal bill, except for:
i. We should leave the PM and the CJI outside the purview of the Lokpal. Afterall, the PM is the elected head of state of a democracy and the CJI is the head of the judiciary. By bringing the same under the purview of a Lokpal, we would be questioning the very base of our democracy and constitution.
ii. We should only consider the Class A government officials under the ambit of the Lokpal bill. It is going to be infeasible to provide swift yet correct judgement for every case that could come up with every possible government official. Lokpal needs to take care of the Raja-s and the Kalmadi-s. The class B and Class C officers would be automatically taken care of if we do the following:
iii. Press for government offices to provide an outline to provide simple single-window solutions.

I am hoping that the GOI releases Anna Hazare and the others at the earliest and come to a discussion table at the earliest.

Jai Hind!

Suggested reading:
1. Jan Lokpal is no solution by Nitin Pai.
2. Transforming India, a book by Atanu Dey.
3. FAQ: Why is Anna Hazare wrong and lokpal a bad idea.
4. Pragmatic Euphony » Frankly, we don’t give a damn.
5. Time to step back by Pratap Bhanu Mehta.

Suggested viewing:
6. Dr.Jayaprakash Narayan, Round table conference on Parliamentary affairs
a. part-1
b. part-2
c. part-3