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Living in Jugalbandi:Ten of the Most Incredible Parallels in the Lives of Aabid Surti and Iqbal Rupani from Sufi-The Invisible Man of the Underworld

Posted on by Penguin India

Both of us grew up in the same ghetto and studied in the same school. Both of us struggled against hunger. Yet we parted ways and made tracks in diametrically opposite directions. Iqbal says that it is destiny. I have already stated earlier that I chose my own path, my own battlefield, my own destiny.

Sufi is the story of two boys who grew up playing in the alleys of Mumbai’s infamous Dongri locality.

One of them, Iqbal Rupani, aided and abetted by a corrupt policeman, is drawn towards criminal activities in his teens. As he becomes powerful and influential as a racketeer and smuggler, he creates a puritan code of conduct for himself: no drinking, no smoking and no murders. The other boy, Aabid Surti, grows up to become a famous author.

‘Sufi’ is a unique autobiography, a ‘jugalbandi’, rather than a ‘one person’s life sketch’-detailing the extraordinary parallel trajectories of two extraordinary men—Iqbal, a juggernaut during the golden period of gold smuggling in India, and a man who paradoxically comes across as a Sufi ‘an enlightened soul’, in his disciplined personality and his philosophies— and the other, Aabid who is a creative powerhouse, an author, comic book creator and artist.

Read on to trace some of the most incredible similarities in their lives.

Their education and their early ambitions were starkly similar.

Both of them completed their education from Dongri’s renowned Habib High School. Its distinguished principal Padma Shri awardee Sheikh Hasan, considered both among his favourite students. Both boys had a sincere desire to study hard and succeed in life.

 

Their early aversions to marriage came to naught, as they end up marrying women from the same close-knit clan, and who share the same first name.

As they grew into adults, neither was interested in marriage. They knew that young men struggling to make their mark in the world were not able to shoulder the responsibilities of married life. However, both were compelled by the twists of destiny into wedlock. Not only did their wives belong to the same family clam they even had the same first names.

 

Their places of residence from birth to the present remain in close proximity.

Today both of us live in Bandra, an affluent cosmopolitan suburb in Bombay. Back then we lived near Bhendi bazaar in the squalid Muslim ghetto known as Dongri.

 

Their early struggles were without the backing of their fathers who both fought their personal demons, but in different ways.

 Before Sufi’s birth even his father Husain Ali had fallen prey to the affliction of alcohol…Hussain Ali’s alchoholism was sparking its final blaze. The more he strengthened his resolve to quit, the more he ended up drinking. Defeated by life, my father, Ghulam Hussain too made a last-ditch attempt. While Sufi’s father had turned to smuggling because of his wife’s disease, my father had turned to propitiating spirits as the last resort to end his suffering because of his poverty and hunger.

 

Their earliest forays into earning a semblance of a living were the same.

I started selling chikki (sweets made from nuts and jaggert), peppermint and sweet-and-sour candies. I used to sit with my cookie-candy basket on the pavement of Dongri’s main road. Iqbal would emerge  from his house in Munda Galli, come to Pala Galli and sit near Khoja Masjid. His basket would contain berries, amla and other wild fruit besides candies. Sufi is the story of two boys who grew up in Dongri, Mumbai.

 

In a mysterious co-incidence, both their fathers announced their deaths beforehand.

Like Hussain Ali, my father. Ghulam Hussain, too announced his end beforehand. Not with an ambiguous statement like, ‘My time is up’, but with a calm yet explicit warning: ‘No one should leave the house tomorrow else you won’t see my face ever again.

 

The mentors found them at a vulnerable time but were of a very different nature —Dr RJ Chinwala, the famous art patron, and the corrupt police officer, Inspector Bharucha

 I became a member of Dr Chinwala’s extended family. Dhala was to become my guru in the field of art , while Mushtaq Ali taught me the art and craft of storytelling. Dr Chinwala was to play an important role in shaping my life. Inspector Bharucha meanwhile would chart out a new course for Iqbal, but there was a difference between the two courses. One was positive while the other was negative. One led to creativity, beauty and progress, while the other led to destruction, deception and ultimately, ruin.

 

They experienced their first romantic awakenings in the same year.

 Iqbal brutally uprooted the sapling of first love before it could bloom. The same year love sprouted its tiny leaves for the first time in my life. I had time to nurture this fragrant plant. There was peace in my life.

 

The ambitions of their first loves remained unfulfilled but in very different ways and for very different reasons. Iqbal made a conscious decision to leave the woman he loved, while Aabid’s romance with Suraiyya ended abruptly when she was forcibly deported by her family.

Where the heart rules, the pain is always intense. The seed of Iqbal’s and Kiran’s love may have sprouted but it progressed only after a careful consideration of all aspects of life, and its end too was to come after much mental deliberation. Our love had been blind because our wild hearts ruled over our minds; their love could see all too clearly because their minds examined everything, kept everything in check. Both couples dived into the ocean of love, but one took the plunge with eyes closed while the other kept everything in check.

 

After years of hard work both ended up failing their examinations. This put a premature end to their promising academic careers and launched them even more firmly on their chosen paths.

 Upon its publication, the novel Tutela Farishta (Fallen Angels) became the talk of the town. But before that I had failed in my final-year art examination. Like me, Iqbal too had always been a first-class student. But his tragedy unfolded differently. In those days conjunctivitis had seized Bombay. Just two days before his final examinations. He fell victim to this epidemic. He did not lose hope. To fulfill his father’s dream of him becoming a doctor, he put eye drops and sat for the examination, but failed to answer any of the questions. He couldn’t read a single line.  

Sufi is the story of two boys who grew up in Dongri, Mumbai whose paths diverged drastically. 

Meet M.N. Buch, the author of An India Reimagined

Posted on by Penguin India

An India Reimagined by M.N. Buch, is a well-thought anthology of the many aspects of governance namely IAS, reforms (police, judiciary and electoral system), economics, social challenges (health corruption and reservation), and environment. Giving a holistic idea of the management of India in the present day, the well celebrated author and administrator M.N. Buch provides though-provoking ideas and issues concerned with India; and how change can be brought about.

Here we list a few things about the author, who was well-respected and appreciated for his work throughout the country:

M.N. Buch is a former Indian Administrative officer and had joined the service in 1957.
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M.N. Buch graduated in Economics from the Delhi’s St. Stephen’s College in the year 1954.
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M.N. Buch is known to be the architect of new Bhopal and was instrumental in founding of the National Centre for Human Settlements and Environment in Bhopal.
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M.N. Buch was conferred with the Padma Bhushan award in the year 2011.
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An alumni of Pembroke College, Cambridge University, M.N. Buch was also a Fellow at the the prestigious Woodrow Wilson School in Princeton University.
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After assuming the post of principal secretary at the government of Madhya Pradesh, M.N. Buch opted for a voluntary retirement in the year 1984.
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M.N. Buch was made the Vice President of Urbanisation Commission with the late prime minister, Rajiv Gandhi giving him the rank f a cabinet minister.
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M.N. Buch was known for his acumen in the field of housing, forestation, town planning and environmental protection.
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In the year 2002, M.N. Buch was accorded with the title of Doctor of Science (DSc) from Rajiv Gandhi Technical University of Information Technology and Management, Gwalior.
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M. N. Buch was also awarded the UNEP award in the year 1995, for the implementation of desertification control program.

An India Reimagined by M.N. Buch is a collection of twenty articles that have been divided into six major themes. Get your copy today!

If you are Facing a Burnout at Work (or ever have), this Article is for You

Posted on by Penguin India

Almost all leaders go through a phase in their career where they feel demotivated, uninspired, lost and not on top of their game. This could be triggered by various internal and external reasons like lack of stimulation in their roles, misalignment of their goals versus the organization’s goals, resistance to unlearn and relearn, personal factors, and so on. If this phase is not addressed, it has a negative impact on the leader, his or her team and the organization. An uninspired leader cannot inspire others.

The purpose of this book is to give a name to this phase—leader’s block— and to help leaders recognize and acknowledge these patterns, and work on overcoming this phase and preventing derailment and burnouts.

Read what leaders have to say about their experiences of leader’s block.

  1. Karen, senior manager of a boutique risk consulting firm shared, ‘It was the time when I was really frustrated in my job and wanted to get out of it somehow, and when my prospective employer came with a fancy designation and lucrative offer I couldn’t resist. Looking back, that was a temporary fix, as that decision was not made with the right mindset or frame of mind. And I do regret it!’
  2. ‘I think my combative nature was probably new to me. I was not only defensive but also combative at work. It was one of the few times in my career when I took home very negative feelings. What you take home are the things you talk about, and if what you are talking about is all negative, you build up a significant amount of animosity towards the individual and environment.’- Frank, the executive vice president of a midsize energy company in Europe
  3. ‘It was not my usual style and the team expected me to behave as per my reputation of a fast executor. I was more circumspect during this time and there was a little uncertainty for everyone.’- Nancy, a senior leader at a fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) company.
  4. The product head of a big technology major, said, ‘I feel that some of the structures or approaches that I took and some of the messages that I delivered were not allowing those around me to succeed, and it really stifled creativity; it became all about executing a plan and not about achieving excellence in the business. It created a culture where we were managing expectations versus excelling, not being transparent about our business and not being inclusive about how we managed our business.’
  5. ‘Honestly, I think externally nothing is visible, my team doesn’t see anything, they see me as engaged and focused, but that’s because this is a practised skill. The dilemma is inside, it’s all internal to me, and I wonder how much I am challenging myself intellectually and how much I want to learn something new. I feel like there’s a strong yearning in me to learn new things,’
  6. ‘The big disconnect was that I didn’t feel I was trusted or valued for my contribution. I felt that instead of positive reinforcement, there was more of a fear factor that was instilled in the relationship around performance. Those things, over time, drew energy away from me, and my inspiration and my commitment to my job at the time was probably less than optimal.’
  7. ‘My new role had a lot of personnel challenges where we performance-managed people. It’s never easy to fire someone. Even if you have done it before it’s hard. But if you haven’t done it before, it feels almost impossible. I had to make business decisions which had a direct and significant impact on the business and the people. That got me very nervous. I was leading a division of 300 people and the feeling of being watched closely was quite overwhelming! I started to doubt myself and felt totally blocked.’
  8. ‘My internal talk was am I being too neutral, am I not taking a stance? It was like my confidence was shaken. I also knew that I didn’t have the cover from either of my bosses, so I was constantly convincing both of them about what I wanted.’
  9. ‘I couldn’t believe I was doing this—I was snoozing my alarm a couple of times every morning and would refuse to get up till my wife would literally pull the covers off. My wife started to get worried; she thought I was not well. It felt like the days when I didn’t want to go to school. You wouldn’t think you would hear this from a senior vice president of a multibillion-dollar company.’
  10. ‘I felt as if one of my bosses was waiting for me to fail, so I had to constantly prove otherwise. I became quieter and more cautious as I didn’t want to be proven wrong, I was not being myself. It was affecting me personally, my confidence was shaken. I was afraid to try new initiatives or take risks as I didn’t want to fail.’

Identify when you are getting into Leader’s Block and learn how to break out of it in Ritu Mehrish’s book, Leader’s Block!

Dreyer’s English – An Excerpt

Posted on by Penguin India

As Random House’s copy chief, Benjamin Dreyer has upheld the standards of the legendary publisher for more than two decades. He is beloved by authors and editors alike—not to mention his followers on social media—for deconstructing the English language with playful erudition.

As authoritative as it is amusing, Dreyer’s English offers lessons on punctuation, from the underloved semicolon to the enigmatic en dash; the rules and nonrules of grammar, including why it’s OK to begin a sentence with “And” or “But” and to confidently split an infinitive; and why it’s best to avoid the doldrums of the Wan Intensifiers and Throat Clearers, including “very,” “rather,” “of course,” and the dreaded “actually.” Dreyer will let you know whether “alright” is all right (sometimes) and even help you brush up on your spelling—though, as he notes, “The problem with mnemonic devices is that I can never remember them.”

Here’s an excerpt from the book!

I am a copy editor. After a piece of writing has been, likely through numerous drafts, developed and revised by the writer and by the person I tend to call the editor editor and deemed essentially finished and complete, my job is to lay my hands on that piece of writing and make it…better.

Cleaner. Clearer. More efficient. Not to rewrite it, not to bully and flatten it into some notion of Correct Prose, whatever that might be, but to burnish and polish it and make it the best possible version of itself that it can be — to make it read even more like itself than it did when I got to work on it.

That is, if I’ve done my job correctly.

On the most basic level, professional-grade copyediting entails making certain that everything on a page ends up spelled properly. (The genius writer who somehow can’t spell is a mythical beast, but everyone mistypes things.) And to remind you of what you already likely know, spellcheck and autocorrect are marvelous accomplices—I never type without one or the other turned on—but they won’t always get you to the word you meant to use. Copyediting also involves shaking loose and rearranging punctuation— I sometimes feel as if I spend half my life prying up commas and the other half tacking them down someplace else—and keeping an eye open for dropped words (“He went to store”) and repeated words (“He went to the the store”) and other glitches that can take root during writing and revision. There are also the rudiments of grammar to be minded, certainly—applied more formally for some writing, less formally for other writing.

Beyond this is where copyediting can elevate itself from what sounds like something a passably sophisticated piece of software should be able to accomplish—it can’t, not for style, not for grammar (even if it thinks it can), and not even for spelling (more on spelling, much more on spelling, later)—to a true craft. On a good day, it achieves something between a really thorough teeth cleaning—as a writer once described it to me—and a whiz-bang magic act.

Which reminds me of a story.

A number of years ago I was invited to a party at the home of a novelist whose book I’d worked on. It was a blazingly hot summer afternoon, and there were perhaps more people in attendance than the little walled-in garden of this swank Upper East Side townhouse could comfortably accommodate. As the novelist’s husband was a legendary theater and film director, there were in attendance more than a few noteworthy actors and actresses, so while sweating profusely I was also getting in a lot of happy gawking.

My hostess thoughtfully introduced me to one actress in particular, one of those wonderfully grand theatrical types who seem, onstage, to be eight
feet tall and who turn out, more often than not, to be quite compact, as this one was, and surprisingly lovely and delicate-looking for a woman who’d made her reputation playing, for lack of a better word, dragons.

It seemed that the actress had written a book.

“I’ve written a book,” she informed me. A memoir, as it turned out. “And I must tell you that when I was sent the copyedited manuscript and saw it all covered with scrawls and symbols, I was quite alarmed. ‘No!’ I exclaimed.

‘You don’t understand!’ ”

By this time she’d taken hold of my wrist, and though her grip was light, I didn’t dare to find out what would happen if I attempted to extricate myself from it. “But as I continued to study what my copy editor had done,” she went on, in a whisper that might easily have reached a theater’s uppermost seats had she wanted it to, “I began to understand.” She leaned in close, staring holes into my skull, and I was hopelessly enthralled. “ ‘Tell me more,’ I said.”

Pause for effect.

“Copy editors,” she intoned, and I can still hear every crisp consonant and orotund vowel, all these years later, “are like priests, safeguarding their faith.”

Now, that’s a benediction.

Get your copy of Dreyer’s English today!

Beyond the Popular Stories: Hidden Tales about the Elusive but Much-loved God of Gods,the Mahadev

Posted on by Penguin India

A little girl asks who Shiva is and it is the beginning of a family journey through stories and incidents across the expanse of Shivbhumi.

Writing in the Harikatha style of traditional storytelling, Renuka Narayanan weaves story after story from across India takes us closer to this elusive but much-loved god of gods, the Mahadev.

The Mahadev doesn’t have straightforward, linear stories with a beginning, middle and end like Vishnu has in the Ramayana, Mahabharata and the Srimad Bhagavatam. Instead, like our religion itself, Shiva has no parents, no beginnings. He always was and is. He has “incidents”, he dances in and out of a whole lot of stories.

Read on for delightful, hidden glimpses of the Mahadev behind and beyond the more popular myths!

How the famous ‘Nilakanth myth forms one of the backstories to the Mahabharata

“The vish purush or spirit of Kalakuta sprang out of Shiva weeping in shame at the outrage he had involuntarily committed by burning Shiva’s throat and in despair at the ferocity of his substance. So the Lord, who wanted nothing for imself but gave things away to others, blessed him with a boon, for it was not Kalakuta’s fault that it was so deadly It grew fierce only when fiddled with, and brought out just as so many other things are poisonous if we stir them up ourselves. ‘Lord Shiva granted the vish purush the boon that he would return to Nature by being born on earth one day as the son of Drona and would kill his father’s enemies. So the vish purush was born as Ashvatthama; and Vishnu himself, as Sri Krishna, had to fend him off. Ashvatthama’s spirit is said to still wander the earth, quietly and is called out only if and when we stir up terrible world-destroying poisons . . . like nuclear bombs, I should think.”

 How the Mahadev played with the very idea of  the creation myths

“Very long ago, Brahma the Creator was given the task of making people inhabit the three worlds, which were well connected to each other then. For Bhulok, the earth, Brahma first created four handsome young men to be the ancestors of mankind and they sat down to pray for guidance on the shore of Manasarovar. Suddenly, a great white swan swam up before them.’ ‘It was Shiva, the ultimate free soul or “supreme swan”, the Paramahamsa. The swan swam all over the lake to warn the four young men that the world was merely maya or illusion, and that the only way to escape its bonds was to refuse to become fathers. Shiva did that because he felt that it was only fair to warn them that creation was just a game for the gods.

How the tragic story of Sati became the source for the revered Shaktipeeth

 “Shiva’s fury and sorrow plunged the whole world into deep gloom. To save the situation, Vishnu repeatedly flung his discus at Sati’s body. He cut it up into fifty-one pieces that fell on earth and became high-energy points called Shakti Peeth, places of goddess-strength. The farthest one north-east is Kamakhya in Guwahati in Assam. The farthest one north-west is Hinglaj Devi in Balochistan.”

 How the sacred feminine forms the basis of all Mahadev lilas

“As Dakshinamurthi, He had retreated from the world with no thought for this maya-engulfed universe, its inhabitants or their troubles. Ambika (Shakti) became Kameshvari, love incarnate, and made him Kalyana Sundara to change Him from an ocean of knowledge (in the form of Dakshinamurthi) into an ocean of compassion(in the form of Kalyana Sundara).  Though we say She is instrumental in making Him shower blessings on this world, in reality, it is She who does it. To remain unmoving and static is His nature. All actions are Hers. Still, She made it appear that He was the one doing everything.”

How the stories about the Mahadev’s entourage become the source myths for one India’s most beautiful topographical features

“The story goes that Shiva once spent a night in the hills of Unakoti in Tripura on the way back home to Kailash,’ said the guru. ‘With him were 99,99,999 followers, one short of a crore or “Unakoti”. Wanting to get home soon, Shiva asked his followers to wake up well before dawn. However, not one was awake on time except for Lord Shiva himself. So Shiva went off on his own, leaving them behind. When they woke up and realized their mistake, they were too ashamed to move and turned to stone, deciding to stay forever at the place where they had last seen Mahadev. The rocks on the Unakoti hills are said to be the remains of that entourage.”

Read more such facts in Renuka Narayan’s Mahadev

One Story. Two Characters. Many versions.

Posted on by Penguin India

A Tale of Wonder is the translation of the little-known Sanskrit verse epic Kathakautukam, written by the poet-scholar Srivara in fifteenth-century Kashmir. The original text consists Kathakautukam of over 1300 verses, narrative and descriptive. The story of Yusuf and Zuleikha has been told and retold many times in different cultures and in different languages.

This listicle highlights some of these more well-known versions of the story:

 

 

 

A Tale of Wonder is a timeless story that challenges the insidious notion that India has always been dominated by one faith only and insular to other cultural and religious influences.

Meet the Characters of ‘House of Stars’

Posted on by Penguin India

House of Stars by Keya Ghosh, is a riveting tale. Kabir and Diya are trapped in a mall due to a terrorist take-over. As Kabir follows the most beautiful girl he has ever seen into the mall, suddenly a group of terrorists barge in. Making Kabir, Diya and the other people present at the mall their hostage, the terrorists make their demands clear. They come out with an ultimatum that until their demands are met, one hostage will die every hour.

As the situation begins to unravel in an unfavourable manner, Kabir and Diya are faced with the possibility of this being their only chance at love. However, they both have their fair share of secrets that might prove to be a hindrance to their love.

Here we tell you a little bit about the characters from the book:

Kabir

Kabir is a young boy, who comes to Mumbai with a specific aim. Burdened by a turbulent past, he has decided to forge a different path in his life which draws on amending a few mistakes that he committed earlier. Moreover, he has never gotten the chance to dig deep into the matters of love and romance, which is why he tends to be shy around girls. He is made to grapple with his affections when he comes across Diya. Taken in by her beauty and kindness, Kabir finds himself at a complete loss as to how he should be handling these feelings.

Diya

Diya is at the crossroads of breaking away from a domestic mould that confines her and debating whether it is the right thing to do. A timid girl with a domineering father, Diya has grown up in a strict household where everything that was thought to be right for her was imposed on her without any regard to what she thinks of it. Over the years she has learnt to remain silent and sacrifice the things she likes to the will of her father. As she begins her college life, she briefly encounters a hint of individual freedom, which forces her to contemplate on the things that make her happy and set her free. Coming from an influential family background, there are many limitations on Diya that weigh her down.

Aman

A lover of art and poetry, Aman is most interested in singing and writing songs. He is the lead singer of his college band and is adored by his friends. He is a gentle soul who advocates for the happiness of the people around him and consequently, helps Diya realise the true source of her happiness. Even in the face of adversities he never forgets his humane virtues and makes a conscious effort to make things pleasant for the people around him.

Mahendra Shyam Bhonsle

An old, retired school-teacher of political science, Mr. Bhonsle is a highly idealistic man. His strong belief in his ideals lead him to become disillusioned by the corruption that is widespread in the workings of the state. Although he is a patriot at heart, he dismisses the nation as a doomed country where the government and the state have fallen into ruins due to the shortcomings of social and political spheres. Resorting to alcoholism to abate his disappointment, Mr. Bhonsle becomes a bitter misanthrope.

Bhai Thakur

A power-crazed politician, Bhai Thakur actively encourages stringent patriotism in the country. He is shown to move the public with his highly polarized speeches, in order to gain the support of the community in majority. Time and again, in the novel, it is told that he has worsened the fabric of the society by giving out accusatory comments against the minorities.

Get to know more about their story in House of Stars by Keya Ghosh

Meet the author of ‘The Travel Gods Must Be Crazy’, Sudha Mahalingam!

Posted on by Penguin India

Dreaming of glorious sunrises and architectural marvels in exotic places, Sudha Mahalingam often landed up in situations that were uproariously bizarre or downright dangerous.  Punctuating her droll stories with breathtaking descriptions and stunning photographs, in her book, The Travel Gods Must Be Crazy, Sudha invites readers on an unexpected and altogether memorable tour around the world!

Get to know more about the author of this exciting travelogue, Sudha Mahalingam!

 Sudha Mahalingam has travelled to 200 places in 65 countries over 25 years.

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Sudha is a self-confessed middle-aged, middle-class mother of two from a conservative Tambrahm background who began travelling solo, long before solo travel became fashionable among Indian women.

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Sudha Mahalingam has two sons, one of whom has been a reluctant travel companion on some of  her trips.
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Sudha is a travel fiend masquerading as an energy professional and has been specializing in India’s energy security for over two decades.
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Sudha’s perceived expertise on energy matters even bestowed her with membership of the prestigious National Security Advisory Board, ostensibly to advise the Indian prime minister on energy-related issues.
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Virtually always on a shoestring budget, rushed for time, and with the destination determined by conference invites, Sudha’s trips are often eclectic and eccentric.
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Sudha chooses her conferences with care, based on the locations in which that are held. She dislikes package tours and family trips.

 

Read Sudha Mahalingam’s The Travel Gods Must Be Crazy for a funny yet realistic take on travel!

Eight reflections and questions about the self from ‘Ib’s Endless Search for Satisfaction’

Posted on by Penguin India

In Roshan Ali’s debut novel, Ib lives with his schizophrenic father and his ‘nice’ mother, negotiating life, not knowing what to do, steered by uncaring winds and pushy people. From his slimy, unmiraculous birth to the tragic death of a loved one, Ib wanders the city, from one thing to another, confused, lost and alone, all the while reflecting on his predicament, of seeking meaning where there is none, and ultimately contemplating the futility of the seeking itself.

In this journey of sadness and self-reflection, Ib transforms into an ordinary man from an ordinary boy and along the way, tries to figure out life and understand himself.

In this audacious debut that is insightful, original and deeply disturbing, the various characters that Ib interacts with, and his own consciously assumed position as an observer, create reflections about the ‘self’. The answers to these, like Ib’s quest for satisfaction are endless.

 

Why is there so much pressure on the self to be purposeful, to be successful, to be able to ‘fit into’ the abstract idea of society?

Maybe it’s the density, the fullness, stuffed with people of such lofty stuffing that the natural technique of nature to empty the filled and to fill the empty is reversed by this overdose of man and his mischief; and thus a thin man like me gets the stuffing sucked out of him, till he is hollow and restless. So it is necessary for any objects that move about a city to have these lofty notions of man and society, to contribute, to fit in and thus avoid the mad dissatisfaction of being hollow.

 

Are experiences only significant to the self in retrospect, as the minds seek comfort in imagined connections and created meanings?

It was one of those days, the kind of day that feels strange in retrospect, because our minds are made in such a way as to see connections where none exist and to see coincidence in randomness, meaning in meaninglessness. Such as it was, I had no feeling of strangeness on that day, but now after all these years, coloured by the sepia lenses of nostalgia, that melancholy of oldness, a yearning for lost things, all combined in fateful ways to produce the kind of feeling that makes you think the past matters more than it actually does.

 

Is adulthood not a maturing of the self, but simply the self-learning the struggle of performing in a callous world?

Once school ended there were supposed to be some things happening in and around your life—freedom and college, drinking and coming home late. But if you stayed at home, like I did, nobody came into your home and took you by the hand and led you out into the world. You had to do this yourself and this somehow I wasn’t taught, and was taught instead that the world was a wonderful place full of happiness and helpful people, but in truth it was a cruel and rude place and nobody looked twice if you fell from your cycle and nobody helped you.

 

Why does the self seek validation in sacrifice, even if it is the pettiest kind of sacrifice?

When he wanted things, he would put it as if he didn’t really want them for his personal satisfaction, rather he wanted them for the general good of humanity as a whole, as though everyone would benefit if he was given a fried egg for lunch. Everyone knows the truest sacrifice is the one that is not talked about. But when he was inconvenienced in any way, he would make it out to be great sacrifice, never once saying either that he had sacrificed something great, or that he was upset by the sacrifice, but saying too many times exactly the opposite, saying, ‘It’s OK. The food was less tasty, but it’s OK, I don’t care about taste anyway, I eat for nutrition. A man must be simple and not have desires.’

 

 Is it possible for the self to constantly and persistently monitor and balance the choices that shapes it?

 It’s not easy to tell which moment shaped your life, or steered it in any one way. Life forces are like a potter and life is clay and there is a gradual moulding that takes place, and the faster the wheel spins, the smoother you become. But suddenly, one force becomes too much and the clay is torn from the wheel and rips apart, flying everywhere, or is grotesquely deformed. So one must balance the influences that come from everywhere, all trying to mould you, all trying to spin the wheel faster and faster.

 

Does the death of a person close to us come as liberation not only to them but to our own selves freeing us of their expectations, of the weight of their personalities?

 It felt strange after that; that a creature so powerful could dissolve into ash and have no influence any more on the world, even on its closest people. And maybe death was just the beginning, not for the dead, but for the people the dying weigh down. And once dead, the body sinks to the earth and the ones around are cut off and set free like helium balloons.

 

Is the whole process of ascribing significance to things or events simply an exercise for the self to convince itself that it is special?

 And so there was a lesson to be learnt, not in everything, but in some things and one must be careful in choosing what lessons one learns. Everything sometimes has the appearance of specialness but look carefully and you see it’s just a stupid coincidence; a chance happening that has no significance for you or the universe. The credulous see meaning in everything…

 

In moments of grief why does it come as a shock to know that one is alone in the experience, that the world does alter itself significantly for one’s essentially egocentric self?

 At first there is a numbness, always, when such things occur. Then the thunk! between the chest and the stomach. Then we look around, perhaps outside the window, if there is one, to see if anything else has changed, but the trees continue their merry dance with the wind, and traffic flows according to old rules and new haste, and the sky looks on with that wide idiotic smile. And inside, everyone goes on with their dinner and drinks, laughing and talking.

 

Read Ib’s Endless Search for Satisfaction for a soul-stirring experience of life.

Six Proven Principles that Indian Entrepreneurs Can Use to Co-create Frugal Solutions

Posted on by Penguin India

The groundbreaking new book Do Better with Less by the bestselling authors of Jugaad Innovation—Navi Radjou,  and Jaideep Prabhu is here to show how India can harness the three megatrends — the sharing economy, the maker movement and the circular economy to drive inclusive and sustainable growth in the coming decades.

The world faces a stark challenge: meeting the needs of over 7 billion people without bankrupting the planet. India, with its large population and limited resources, offers a creative response to this. Its resilient jugaad mindset, dynamic entrepreneurial ecosystem of start-ups and NGO-government collaboration promises to meet its own requirements, and those of the world, in a sustainable way.

Read on for six proven principles that Indian entrepreneurs and businesses can use to co-create frugal solutions in education, energy, healthcare, food and finance!

Principle one: engage and iterate

Rather than using insular research and development (R&D) departments that rely on educated guesses about customer needs, E&I starts with customers, observing their behaviour in their natural environment, and then considers how products can be made as relevant as possible, going back and forth between the customer and the lab to refine designs. As former CEO of Intuit, Brad Smith says: ‘If you never lose sight of the customer problem, how you attack the solution can remain more flexible and iterative and ultimately be more likely to succeed.’ This innovation model is based not on pushing new technologies onto customers, but on starting with customer insights and looking for ways to solve their actual problems.

 

 

Principle two: flex your assets

Customers are becoming ever more demanding. They increasingly want tailored products and services where and when they desire. The trend towards mass customization,  new tools (such as robotics and 3D printers) and new approaches (such as social manufacturing and continuous production) can help operations and supply chain managers ‘flex’ their production, logistics and service assets to satisfy demanding customers better and more cheaply. The goal of flexing assets is not only about saving resources, such as carrying less inventory, but also about saving time—a business’s most valuable resource.

 

Principle three: Create sustainable solutions

This demonstrates how companies can implement sustainable practices such as cradle-to-cradle and the circular economy (where components and materials are repeatedly recycled) to design and manufacture waste-free products of value to customers. It shows how the sharing economy—in which customers share products as pay as- you-go services rather than own and consume them—can boost customer loyalty and generate new sources of revenue. And it explains how some pioneering firms are using techniques such as upcycling to combine and integrate the principles of the sharing and circular economies, thus paving the way for the ‘spiral economy’: a virtuous system that generates evermore value while reducing waste and the use of natural resources. Thus R&D and manufacturing managers can develop self-sustaining solutions that help both businesses and the environment



Principle four: shape customer behaviour

 Companies can influence consumers into behaving differently (for example, driving less or more safely) and feeling richer while consuming less. Marketing managers can improve brand loyalty and market share by tailoring frugal products and services more closely to the way customers actually think, feel and behave—and by properly positioning and communicating the aspirational value of these frugal solutions. Indian brands can use clever design and marketing techniques to encourage Indian consumers to adopt a healthy and sustainable lifestyle.

 

 

Principle five: co-create value with prosumers

Consumers want a ‘conversation’ with their brands. Consumers now design, build and sell products themselves especially the tech-savvy millennials and Generation Z (those born between 1981 and 2012)—are evolving from passive individual users into communities of empowered ‘prosumers’, who collectively design, create and share the products and services they want. Sales and marketing managers can build greater brand affinity and deepen their engagement with customers by co-creating greater value for all.

The horizontal economy which allows consumers to design, build, market, distribute and trade goods and services by and among themselves, is being encouraged by Fab Labs and maker spaces, the low-cost building blocks of DIY products, Peer-to-peer sharing platforms, collective buying platforms, and crowdfunding platforms that finance new ventures.

 

 

Principle six: make innovative friends

R&D and operations managers can develop frugal products, services and business models more efficiently by collaborating with diverse external partners (such as suppliers, universities, venture capitalists and start-ups) than by working alone.  In addition, makerspaces can connect large companies and nimble inventors and enable them to co-create new products faster and cheaper using digital prototyping tools.  Brands must increase the breadth and depth of their partnerships in order to understand the real nature of the so-called wicked problems and solutions. Companies must also transform themselves from within by setting up an innovation-brokering function, increasing internal agility, and monetizing, intellectual capital beyond just protecting it.

 

Do Better With Less is India’s guide to claiming global leadership in frugal innovation.

 

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