Women's Day - One day is not enough

Reader alert: This post will sound one-sided (like this one)since its a woman's perception on how she feels in India today. One may argue that its not a tale that applies to all women.. I agree and I know India and Indians have come a long way in improving conditions for the women, but still there are a lot of unwritten rules and perceptions about women in India that need to change before we, women feel the playground is leveled.

While there is gender bias and other gender inequality issues elsewhere in the world, here in India we are a step or rather many steps backward in even showing basic respect to the woman in our day to day lives. I am not at all surprised by this article that says India is in the top 5 worst countries for women.
I watched this debate on NDTV this past week and it made me think deeper on why it is so hard in India to change peoples' perceptions and how our age old cultures and rituals are being conveniently used against our women. While it was heartening to listen to these ladies, it is quite obvious that all of these are not our conventional or typical Indian women, they are still very much a minority. To me personally, it has been extremely disappointing to still witness this kind of behaviors towards women in India which is being touted as an emerging economic superpower.

Looking back, for many previous generations the role of women in the house was pretty clear cut.. she was intended to be the homemaker, the man was supposed to be the bread winner who works outside the home. Women never questioned much, never asked for a different role and never thought they could do anything differently. There is really nothing wrong in such role definitions, but what one will also notice is this perception that grew over the years that women were inferior and household work/bringing up a family is a much easier/inferior job. Such beliefs and perceptions defined women's status in the society. While there were some non-conventional women who broke this mold and went out to actually get educated and build an outside home career, those were very small exceptions.
Gradually, starting somewhere in the early 70s or so, our society and families started actively sending their daughters to school, supporting them to get a higher education and take up jobs, build careers. But, even until early 90s or so, the general acceptable norm was that the woman's career or job would and should take a backseat as soon as she gets married unless she is extremely lucky to get a 'Forward thinking' and 'supportive' husband and in-laws.
As the economies started progressing and lifestyles became more and more luxurious, it became imperative for both husband and wife to be earning members to lead a "comfortable" lifestyle. This was also the time when more and more women started getting into workforce not just out of need, but with just as many goals and ambitions as their male counterparts. It is at this time, that we started hearing more and more about the issues women face on a daily basis at work, at home and in short everywhere.
I am going to try and wear my logical hat and not get too emotional about this subject and will just explore three aspects of our life and the kind of issues women face to make my points clear. By the end of this all, my intention is to point out that it is not just the big reforms and reservations that will make women feel empowered and safe in India, but the simple, smaller changes in behavior and perceptions that can go a long way in her day to day battles.

Day to day: Women being treated as inferior beings is deep rooted in our society and this is apparent when you deal with anyone (auto drivers, support technicians, bus drivers, clerks, etc, etc)... their starting assumption is that women are weak, dumb and merely useful for mundane household work or as objects of pleasure. From a very young age, it seems like an uphill battle for women in India to just be treated with respect and as equals.They will have to prove to be smarter, louder or richer than the fellow-male to be taken seriously. You go to a Govt office or any office for that matter, women are not taken seriously, they are assumed to be doing whatever they are doing for 'time pass', they are pushed around and someone who stands up and pushes back is termed 'fighter cock'. There are a number of other limitations(big and small) women run into day to day like for women using public transport is not safe at all times of the day, getting license renewed in the local RTO office by yourself will mean dealing with lot of stares and inappropriate comments and gestures.

At work:  While there has been lot written about the glass ceiling, etc, I think the issues that irk women lot more is the day to day bias they feel at every step.
First of all, when you start a job or any career path as a woman, you have to work doubly hard to prove your worth. This used to be lot more prevalent before and is slowly changing for the better now in some industries like healthcare, IT, etc. But, in some others like politics, government service, police, military, etc., there is definitely a bias and still very hard for women to even get in.
Second is this general perception that women are not as dedicated or committed since they have too many family responsibilities that compete with their responsibilities at work. Most companies hesitate to put women in leadership tracks assuming they will not be as committed or competent  once they get married or have kids. 2 things I want to highlight here:

• First, I completely agree that it is infact true that women tend to bear lot more of their family/household responsibilities and also in most cases tend to be the ones who will opt for a slower pace at work or drop off midstream. But, if the same people who accuse women of not enough commitment at work, think for a moment and ponder themselves as to why they cannot also share those 'family' responsibilities, that would be a good beginning and we would probably not have this inequality in the first place. 
• Secondly, we know that most careers are becoming very demanding with little or no regard given to proper work-life balance. This demanding work place cultures, coupled with diminishing support systems, means its very hard for two thriving careers in one family. So, in most cases its the women who are expected to slow down or take a break. Empowering and encouraging women doesn't happen by having reservations for them or hiring a certain percentage of women, but it will happen when companies are willing to introspect and create a truly family friendly work culture in which both men and women are encouraged to have a good work-life balance.

At home: It has been an age-old norm that women are responsible for all the household responsibilities. While this expectation was ok many years ago when most women were homemakers, it is surprising how, especially in India, this expectation from women has not changed one bit even if they are now also going out and working equally hard outside home. Its almost like a curse in disguise for educating our women because they are now most of the time confined to double duty. For example, once a working lady is married and/or has children, somehow the responsibility of finding appropriate domestic help or finding proper child care, etc, etc., becomes primarily the woman's responsibility. All this juggling between the home and work does take a toll on such women and they are often faced with the tough choice to choose between family or career.
I agree, there are now, increasing number of men participating and sharing the burden of the household, but they are still far and few in-between.
 For example, our maid who works in 2 houses is out of the house working very hard and spends about 6-8 hours working to make few thousands of rupees each month. She tells me how her husband works in the construction sites and his work is seasonal and doesn't work all the days. But, even on days he doesn't work, he is expected to relax, go out and do 'his' thing while the responsibility of her 4 children, the household work, cooking, cleaning, etc is entirely on her for 365 days/year. She is scared to ask her husband to do any more in the fear that he will blame her nagging and stop coming home in the evening/night.
While you may think this is because of lack of education and exposure in them, the situation is no different even amongst the educated families. You may find 1 in 100 families, where the husband and wife truly share the responsibilities of the family. In India, these expectations about women come not just from your husband or family, they come from the milk man to maid to driver to watchman and if they see the man of the house in the kitchen or god forbid near the sink cleaning some dishes.. the woman of the house is labelled as "Rebel", "Different" and the man is ridiculed to be "hen pecked".

Bottom line is, once we, as a society learn to respect our women and recognize them as equals, we will begin to see true women empowerment. Respect does not mean Worship, just recognize her as a fellow human being with, just as much potential as you do and all else will follow.
So, I think as a mother of 2 boys, the best I can do is to train them to treat their women well and with respect.

Can we have it all?

Can we have it all? It is like asking 'Can I have the cake and eat it too?' So, the obvious answer seems to be 'No'.. yet, we seem to believe it's an 'yes' and continue to strive for it. Oh well, what is life without an aspiration and without it 'all'... but, are we forgetting to live in the name of aspiration and in the name of this quest for 'all'?
Most of my recent conversations with friends made me wonder if and why this whole issue of work-life balance or lack thereof is a new-age problem? Growing up, I don't seem to remember hearing this term nor have I seen or heard as many stress related issues as we see, hear and experience these days. So, I began to wonder..

While we can have it all... Why can't we have it all? Lets not go into the deeper meaning of what really 'All' entails and if that 'all' is really everything that is needed to fulfill you, etc, etc., I just want to define "All" as 'Work' (Satisfying Career) and Life (Family, Friends, Community, Spiritual). It seems more and more families are struggling to strike the balance between these two and are always complaining about 'no time', stress, busy, etc, etc.,
While I don't have the answers, I have been pondering about this for quite sometime now and here are some of my observations:

• Working Parents: This is a no-brainer. Compared to our previous generations, there are now, lot more families where both the parents are working outside home. So, obviously once such a couple have children, there is bound to be the question of "who takes care of the children while the parents are at work"? This is when the couple's support network comes into play. I often question, is this how it is meant to be? Are we just trying to do too much and in return complicating our lives.. Our previous generations seem to have been lot more at peace, at accepting that one of the parents needs to be a full time parent, and did that wholeheartedly and happily.

• Support system dwindling down:  While, initially (when the trend of both working parents was catching up) large number of families depended on grandparents and other family members for child care and other physical and emotional support and having such a network is truly fortunate, since hired help is not as predictable (you have to be lucky to get good ones that share the same core values as you and your family) and not always reliable. 

But, now a days it is true that this support network is also slowly dwindling down for a variety of reasons - People moving away from hometowns for better opportunities, people getting married and having children later and later so grandparents are older and not as fit, etc., etc.,

• Work life is all consuming: In the name of globalization, fierce competition, lack of proper planning and a number of other reasons, our work lives have definitely become lot more demanding and have begun to eat into rest of our lives so much that sometimes, there is no 'rest' of the life that exists. Atleast in the IT industry, I have not heard of anyone who has both a satisfying career and decent work-life balance. I hear this is the same in many other industries too. Growing up, I don't remember my mother or father complaining about too much work or no time or work related stress or anything like that.. that doesn't mean my father was not ambitious.. in fact, he was one of the fastest growing employee in a large company and then ventured into being an entrepreneur. Yet, there always seemed to be a healthy balance between work life and personal life and people (at all levels) respected it. Is the current situation because we have lost the time management skill along the way or have lost touch with our priorities and feel 'work' is life (confused with work is workship :) ) or have become overly ambitious and lost the power to say 'No'? (read this harvard business review blog about the power of saying 'No')
• Sky is the limit, Endless quest: Compared to our previous generations, it is truly amazing how our career ambitions and life goals are set at a higher and higher level. Most of us truly feel, sky is the limit to what we can do, achieve, earn, etc., While there are opportunities everywhere, we have also become ambitious/enterprising enough to grab them and continue to look for more. We do, and the world around us also does, make us believe that there are no limits and so we try to keep stretching and stretching until we are stretched thin in every aspect of life. Compare this to our previous generations, there were many things they could only dream about, they were very practical and pragmatic about their limits and so, that made them reach and stay-put at a steady state soon enough to build the rest of their life around it. I feel if we don't/can't put a boundary or a limit to how much we can stretch, somebody else will do it for you and you end up living somebody else's life.
• Living somebody else's expectations: Building up on the previous point, our generation has leaped forward many strides compared to our previous one. The generation gap between our parents and us is perhaps the most drastic so far in terms of progress. Along with this, come expectations, dreams, aspirations from not just you, but people around you. Trying to fulfill all these to look good in front of others, sometimes means, we don't know where and when to put a break or slow down.. so, we continue to be on this never-ending quest.

Now, you must be wondering where I am headed given that I have made all these observations...I, obviously have not cracked the nut, am just trying to make some sense of it all and juggle as best as I can.
I don't think there is a secret sauce for work-life balance and neither do I know whether we can have it 'all' or not have it 'all'. I just think each person and each family needs to define what this 'all' is for them and truly understand their aspirations (try not to have sky as the limit), priorities (what you cannot compromise/give-up), resources at hand(support system that you trust) and the limits/constraints you have to deal with, and build a life balancing it all... else, imagine this, you will be aspiring for something you probably will never get, or will never enjoy getting, you will be expecting too much from the limited resources you have, causing daily stress while, somebody else is stretching you in a direction you are not sure of and finally you may lose touch with what really matters to you or worse, may never know what really matters to you.
I would love to hear from all those who are going through this juggle day in and day out and want to hear what works and what doesn't. 

The Great Education Inequality

Like I mentioned earlier in the context of finding like minded people here in India, there is not only a wide gap between the have’s and have nots, but the same inequality exists in the education field too. In the last few months, I happened to witness both ends of the spectrum while taking my son to participate in some competitive exams outside his school.

Group A: Last month, I took my son to one of the nearby ‘international’ schools to participate in the final rounds of Math and Science Bee. Most of the kids here were also from international schools. Most notable fact was that there were hardly any dads present. Most kids came with either their drivers/maids or moms. Dr. Chalasani (Director at NSF, USA) was present and he even remarked how this was very typical and how they see very little or no involvement from the parents here in India. (I wish I could send him to the next exam we went to …see below).  He said most (most not, all) parents in this strata seem to think that either the expensive international school education or the personal tutors they get for their kids will get their kids ahead . What was also striking to notice here is how “chilled” the kids were and how some of the older kids even walked with this attitude like they were doing somebody a favor by attending the exam. Lets just call this “Group A”

Most in this Group A are somewhat affluent and/or with some western exposure and they generally prefer to bypass the Indian college admissions and wish to send their kids abroad for college and beyond. While the kids were inside taking the exam, most of the parents (the few of them that were) were complaining about how their kids lack the seriousness and seem chilled out most of the time and felt they lacked the drive because they were getting whatever they wanted too easily. They were worried that the kids were perhaps not ready for the real world….very true.

Group B: Last weekend, I took my son for his second round of Math and Science Olympiad. Spending about 4 hours in that school amongst many other parents like me was truly an interesting experience and I got to see a different end of the spectrum this time.

On a side note, one thing that ticked me off completely was the lack of common sense amongst the group and how they behaved like they were in some serious fight for survival at every step.

The (un)common sense:  The school had arranged big boards which had the kids’ names by grade along with the room number they were assigned. I expected people to form a line and quickly check their child’s room number and move on. Ofcourse, this didn’t happen. Somehow as soon as people see something like this, I think they get this irresistible urge to just compete and reach the board first and in the process the men were just pushing people around ruthlessly and pouncing on the board and, finally toppled the boards. Why people why? Did anyone say you have to fight your way to the board and did they announce any award for the first person who can get to the board? It just boggles me why they didn’t think forming a simple line would be simpler, faster and calmer.

This time most of the kids were accompanied by both parents and in some cases grandparents, uncles, aunts, etc.,.While one parent was busy pushing and pulling towards the said board, the other was busy feeding the child while making him/her study last minute. Either I am too easy on my son or they are too serious.. but, it was surprising how you could see scores of parents shouting and scolding their children for forgetting something or having them ‘memorize’ some math or science stuff in those last 30 mins before the exam. Why? Why? Is this much pressure necessary? Wasn’t this exam supposed to test the kids’ concepts and if they didn't "get" these concepts throughout the year, will these last 30 minutes make that much of a difference? There was so much pressure created for the child with the parents furiously asking them questions, feeding them and some grandparents praying and putting some prasadam …literally, creating an atmosphere of some serious battlefield. Not only were the parents all worked up and nervous, they were making the kids all worked up too. Lets just call this Group B

Once the kids were sent off to the battlefield to fight, I saw all these Group B parents in some intense conversation.  Most parents were comparing their kids’ ranks in various exams and once they were done inquiring, they reported the ranks to their spouse with such negativism/sarcasm. It appeared as if any child who did better than their own was positioned as the villain or bad guy. Why, but why? Is this the way to teach kids healthy competition? Your competition is not evil, they are perhaps, just better.. so, teach your kids to improve and be inspired by the competition not, be intimidated

Finally, when it was time for the kids to come back from the battlefield (aka class rooms), all the parents were pouncing on the door/gate and crushing the kids when they are walking out. Don’t we all know that every single child has to come out or rather will be sent out, why couldn't they just let the kids walk out calmly and pick them up when they came out?...display of fighting/survival instincts again for no real reason There was so much pressure in the air as each parent received their child and bombarded them with questions on how they did, what the questions were and what their answers were. The children were, I think expected to not only do well in the exam, but also remember all the questions and answers to recite back to the nervous parents waiting outside.  

Now, imagine how the competition will be when these two groups come together to compete for college admissions and such. Only very few from both the groups get through meritoriously and the others either get out of the race or get through by hook or crook. This inequality between the two groups is less in the actual content and curriculum being followed and more in the methods of teaching and the standards set. With the groups being so disparate, it is becoming increasingly difficult or rather impossible to clearly gauge our children on a level playing field. 

I think there are some strides being made in leveling the playing field by the introduction of common entrance exams across the country, introduction of a common curriculum framework for the various education boards across the country, etc.,While all these are certainly valuable steps in the right direction, what the education industry in India is lacking is fresh, young, passionate blood with a global vision, grounded in reality, innovative teaching methods and a passion for educating. We need to make education in general, and teaching in particular a glamorous profession. Organizations like Teach for India and several other NGOs are doing a commendable job in sending quality teachers to underprivileged schools, but a lot needs to be done and done quickly for us to see some real change in our lifetime...until then, all I can say as a parent, is that its not easy to focus the kids on concept based education and imbibe the right amount of competitive spirit to prepare them for the real world. 

Letting go, what do we fear most?

It's been 3 years, 4 months and 3 days since mom passed away. For one reason or the other, we left all her belongings pretty much untouched all this while. I am not sure why we were holding onto her stuff while, we knew first hand that we couldn't hold onto her when the 'time' came. Somehow now, we finally gathered the strength and will to de-clutter dad's house and that naturally meant 'settle' mom's stuff.

The last few days have been extremely emotional for us and today, somehow I felt like I was losing mom all over again.
For me, all these years I didn't have the nerve to touch mom's stuff because I wanted to perhaps preserve a piece of her by seeing and feeling the things she left behind, the stuff she last touched, last settled... Looking at her sarees and touching and feeling her warm shawls helped us remember her in those sarees and feel her warm presence and touch.
Although, we took them out many many times in the last 3 years, we promptly put them back in their place because that is where mom kept them and we just didn't want to change that. I think somewhere in our heart of hearts we wished, by keeping her things as is, unchanged, our lives would remain unchanged too.
Mom was very meticulous even in collecting her memorabilia, she had a keepsake kept safely for every little or big event in her life. So, looking through her things we almost always relived our times with her. Does that mean we started getting attached to her stuff like we were attached to her?...I do not know..
I do not know the ways of the heart and why we feel certain way about certain things, but settling mom's stuff now, even after 3 years, has been very difficult and even discarding otherwise trivial stuff, like her rubber bands, old clips, etc., felt almost like we were losing her all over again.
I started missing her even more now and started suddenly feeling a bit possessive over her things. Is it fear that I may forget those memories that these things rake in me? May be?
Since, I have been away during the last 14 years of mom's life and spent time only in bits and pieces during those short trips to India, I feel most of my strongest memories of her are from the time before that and so I tend to look for things like things I brought for her or the stuff she gifted us in the last few years to remind me of the times I spent with her recently. I think that's perhaps the reason why I fear losing those memories when the 'stuff' that rakes so many of them is taken away. Do I really need this "stuff" to remind me of my mother? I hope not. I know my mother, my dearest mommy is locked up in a special place in my system and she will, forever be a part of me and part of everything I do and do not do.
Love you so much mommy and miss you even more, we 'settled' your stuff, but that doesn't mean we are settled without you...we are still just learning to live without you and what really gets us going is this belief that you are watching over us from wherever you are.

Our Annamma, a second mother to me

What an year it has been for our family....my last post has been an eulogy for my uncle, Rammavayya and this one is for my grandmother, Smt Kilaru Annapura Devi who passed away on Dec 13th, 2011. Needless to say, it has been a rough few months for us, but I don't want to make this post a downer and want to try and commemorate my grandmother and celebrate her life.
She has been a very important, influencing and contributing chapter in my life and I can say confidently, in the lives of many others in our family.
My grandmother, Smt Kilaru Annapurna Devi, true to her name (Annapurna is the Hindu Goddess of nourishment) has always been the caretaker of the family. Kilaru Annapurna Devi to the world, but Annamma (technically Ammamma - Amma's amma - mother's mother, but we call her Annamma - probably because she played the role of Amma to our brother- Anna) to me and many others. As people from far and near got to know the news of her passing away, they started contacting us and remembering her and it is amazing how all of them universally remember her as a hard-working, strong, resilient, care-taker who always put others first and quietly assumed the various roles that others needed her to.
When life threw curve balls at her, she showed her resilience and each time drew strength from the added responsibilities she took on due the circumstances. Having lost her husband, my grandfather (Tatagaru) at a very young age of 38, she drew strength from her responsibility to raise her young children. Then later, she faced the most dreaded loss of her elder daughter and quietly assumed the role of the mother to her grandchildren. Eventhough she was already at an age when a lot of her contemporaries were enjoying retired life and responsibility-free fun-time with their grandkids, our Annamma took on the responsibility of raising her grandchildren as their mother and more than fulfilled this role of hers. At the same time, due to the health issues that my mother faced, she even tried to extend herself to care for us as and when needed. All of this she did without ever complaining or feeling sorry for herself. She made us feel special as though we were the world for her.
To me, my Annamma has been a symbol of warmth and comfort. We always looked forward to visiting her home in Vijayawada during our holidays only to be pampered and spoilt by her. She was the quiet organizer at home who somehow knew all our little whims and fancies and quietly just fulfilled them for us. We looked forward to her coming to our home so we could sleep with her at night and listen to her tell us about her childhood and about her times with our grandfather. She often told us how her memories of the times with Tatagaru were enough for her to live even after his passing. We knew our grandfather only through her recollections of him and she made sure all of us, his grandchildren knew him and are also proud of our lineage and our grandfather, Sri. Kilaru Gangadhara Rao.
To me, my Annamma has been a symbol of strength and support. She was always part of any occasion big or small in our family and she was not just a part, but the one that we relied heavily on for either advice, physical help or emotional support. She was always there to celebrate with us, support us through difficult times and worry for us and with us. She always worried about us and tried to think two steps ahead to arrange things for us.
To me, my Annamma has been a symbol of selflessness and continuous accommodation. I have never ever seen her put herself first, she has always been accommodating and thinking of others first. I have never seen her even enjoy her favorite fruit, Mango without checking on everyone else in the house first. She was very adaptive to new places and conditions and open-minded to learn and appreciate varied cultures and customs as she welcomed grand-daughters-in-law and grand-sons-in-law from various cultures and beliefs.
To me, my Annamma has also been a symbol of wisdom. Her wisdom comes not from any formal education, but from her life. She was an avid reader and strongly believed God is within us, especially in our good deeds and good intentions. She was amazingly broad minded and worldly wise for her age and times and always willing to learn from her life experiences. She taught us how to make most of our life experiences, how to be strong and how to accept any situation and move right on without spending too much time brooding over it.
In short, I feel very lucky to have had a grandmother like Annamma who was and is a second mother to me. Although, I miss her terribly and miss talking to her, miss her pampering and fussing, I am happy thinking she is in a better place now, reunited with her loved ones.
Annamma, after all that you have done for all of us and everyone around you throughout your life, you deserve nothing short of a heavenly life now, and I hope that is what God has in store for you now.

To our dear Rammavayya

I never even in my wildest dreams or rather nightmares imagined I would be writing this some day. Here is an eulogy I wrote for my uncle, Dr. Prasad R Kilaru, who for the world retired as the Chairman of the Department of Anesthesiology, Baystate Health Center, Springfield, MA
Here it is:

Dr. Prasad Kilaru, to the  world he was a physician, friend, mentor and many other things, but for us he is our dear Rammavayya - we know him as our mother’s best friend, closest brother and our dearest uncle whose annual visits to India we used to look forward to.

Although he was always on the other side of the globe for us, he made sure he never made us feel the distance and always assured us and was by our side lending his strong shoulders to lean on whenever needed. He was always just a phone call away and just listening to his voice on the phone gave our mother and our grandmother a lot of energy and optimism. Rammavayya, was our mother’s younger brother. But, we saw a different side of him when he was with our mother. He was everything to her - a friend who always listened to her, a brother who consoled and comforted her and even a father at times to pamper her. He showed us what it is to be a loyal brother, loving son and an excellent husband and father.

Any crisis in the family, we always turned to Rammavayya since he always knew the right way to handle any situation. He never ever shyed away from taking on any responsibility and he never said ‘No’ to anything we asked or didn’t ask and quietly assumed the different roles that people around him needed him to.

He was the hardest working individual we knew and taught us how to build the mental strength to accept any situation and deal with it head-on. He protected us with his energy and positivity even while fighting his own battle with this dreaded disease.
We feel truly blessed and proud  to have shared whatever little time with him. The world has been impacted in many many positive ways by him and he is leaving behind a legacy that is hard to emulate.

While I was writing the above, it made me wonder why we don't often appreciate or make an effort to think of all the positives in a person while they are here and why we do all that when they are not here anymore. A popular telugu saying: 'Poyinollu andharu mahaanubhaavulu'... Does it have to be this way?


Leaving you with this thought: What if we could: 
Dream like you'll live forever, live like today is your last day....you'll then find the courage to chase your dreams and the heart to forgive and appreciate others

My relationship with God

To be honest, my relationship with God is still relatively un-defined and flaky. Going by the textbook definitions of the terms, the best I can describe myself is that I am perhaps in a very early stage in the spiritual path and still ways away from being termed 'Religious'.

Spirituality can refer to an ultimate or an alleged immaterial reality;[1] an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of his/her being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people live.

Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and moral values.

Being born in a Hindu family, I was exposed to a fair amount of religious practices and scriptures. I remember asking questions like 'Why do we have so many Gods?, Who is the strongest of them all, etc etc.,' and used to have my share of favorite Gods and favorite festivals. That's about it and I never really took the time to establish my beliefs or lack thereof and pretty much just went with the flow. But, throughout something that Mom and Dad said struck a chord with me which was 'Hard work will never go wasted, God takes care of those who help themselves'. I took this piece of advice very seriously and from time to time when I saw Daddy's work issues or Mommy's health issues, I started wondering 'So, why is God not taking care of them now?, they are working hard, taking care of themselves... then, why is this God not doing good to them?' Whenever such questions cropped up, I heard answers like 'Whatever happens is for our own Good only' or 'God knows when to give you what', etc.,.. So, with these and other such adages like this that are routinely used in any typical Indian Hindu household, I got away with just brushing these questions away without digging deep or questing further to build my beliefs or foundation. I perhaps, never needed to get these resolved since life was just going on...

Another thing that I noticed and perhaps emulated myself is how one remembers God mostly during festivals or difficult times.. I also wrote in my earlier blog about 'Why I pray' and confessed there that like many others I too used to think or turn towards God mostly during those trying times. That said, thanks to the upbringing and the constant exposure to various hindu religious books, etc I felt I had the necessary foundation from all those scriptures (myths or realities) and from watching people around me to be able to choose between right vs. wrong.  I was able to get away with this extent of religion and belief for many years

Once I had kids of my own, I started thinking about what part of religion should I teach them and what the purpose should be. I felt and still do that, irrespective of whichever religion, it is quite important for kids to have a foundation of some religion, more to instill discipline and provide them with a moral guidebook.

As years passed by and as I was experiencing life's ups and downs, I somehow drew strength by finding some logical reason for the incidents. But, witnessing the passing of my mother was somewhat of a life changing experience. While it is impossible to describe the pain of the loss we experienced, what it made me do, is question the very essence of life and I started wondering what it is we could do to make the seemingly inevitable death less painful. Like before, I tried to find solace by logically explaining it to myself that Mom's heart was too weak and having seen the pain she was in, I felt she was in a much better place after passing away. I tried to explain this to my then almost 7 year old son and he asked 'Mom, But didn't God also have the choice to make her better?' I didn't know how to logically explain this and that's when  I also started wondering if it was indeed God who plays through the various life screenplays or if there is any part we indeed have or don't have in this life.

Now, I still keep questioning... 'Who am I? What is the soul? How am I different from my soul? What did I do to deserve what I have or don't have? What part does God or Fate or some other superior (or external) force play in my life, do I really control my destiny, are the choices I make really mine or is it something else that makes me choose those?
Asking these questions and trying to find answers seems like a life long journey and I think I am still close to the starting point only..until then there  continues to be turbulence in my heart and restlessness in my head. So, as I said before my relationship with God still remains undefined and perhaps, I need to build a relationship with my true self before I can understand God well-enough to build a relationship or not.

Building Leaders for a Better India

In the recent months, in line with the India 2.0 aspirations, a friend and I have been trying to figure out how best we can contribute and participate in the various citizen movements mushrooming in India everyday. As part of this, we got introduced to JP garu who directed us to this non-political group, Foundation for Democratic Reforms (FDR). We were very glad that he took interest in our interest and spent time with us to properly guide us and even went as far as assigning a single point of contact for us to help us navigate through the systems and sub-systems as we figure out where best we can contribute. That said, to be honest for one reason or the other, although we had no dearth of ideas, we couldn't put things into action on our own.

Incidentally, we got introduced to Youth for Better India group (YBI) since FDR was supporting them in their efforts to mobilize youngsters and train them in various aspects of citizenship, good governance and leadership. As we got to know about YBI and its mission, vision, etc we got involved in helping them prepare for their first ever leadership camp they were organizing for 40 volunteers from across the state.
These 40 trainees were selected based on previous events that YBI organized in various colleges across the state. The objective of the training was to train these youngsters in the areas of good citizenship, good governance, rights and responsibilities of a good citizen and leadership skills. Here are some highlights from the preparation, the session and the small talk with the participants:

• Average age of participants was low 20s  (no, I didn't feel old :)). They were mostly from Engineering and other degree colleges and interestingly none from medical colleges
• It was very refreshing to see their energy levels, awareness about whats happening in the country and dreams of how they can make a difference
• Although most participants were from Engineering colleges, they have future plans in very disparate fields like movie production/direction, animation, social service, civil services, politics, etc 
• Just like there is a divide between the 'Haves' and 'Have nots', there seems to be a even wider divide between the 'Cares' and 'Care nots'.. meaning people who care about the country/society vs. those who don't. Even among those who care, there seem to be broadly two sub groups:
• The lower middle class and below poverty line: These are people who are struggling just to make ends meet and for them whoever satisfies those basic needs are heroes and that's all they think about or care about.
• Middle class and upper middle class: These are people who can more or less think objectively and make decisions based on their opinion (if they have one). The problem here seems, most people in this group don't care enough to think through and have an opinion too.. This training is intended to catch this group when they are relatively young and moldable to give them enough knowledge so they feel motivated to participate and understand what they need to do as good citizens and think clearly and have an opinion about at-least the issues that concern them day to day
• Participants were sent 4-5 questions prior to the session for them to survey about 10-20 people each. Some interesting findings from the survey 
• Top problems affecting India - Corruption, Illiteracy, Political System, Inefficient Leadership, Braindrain
• Main reason for increase in Corruption: No enforcement of rules, Lack of citizen participation in policy making or enforcement, Lack of transparency, Compromising Attitude, Getting used to bribes to avoid delays/inconveniences
• Who is responsible for corruption in India - (percentages here mean % responsibility each group has towards corruption)
• Politicians - 25%, 
• People - 25%, 
• Govt Officials - 50% 
• This was interesting. When the class was asked this question, 90% initially said '100% - People', but upon reasoning and thinking through with examples, most concluded that it was more a systemic issue and difficult for the common man to avoid bribes these days unless he is willing to sacrifice his personal life a lot. One person asked 'How do you separate people from this system?' A good explanation for this was given by the facilitator: System is People + Policies + Execution of Policies (Governance). So, as an example: having a rule that one needs to get his income certificate in 7 days from application-time without enforcement or penalty for not adhering to this timeline doesn't do any good and it is such lapses in the 'system' or 'governance' that creates room for corruption.
• Do you think we can still change and reduce corruption - 52% thought we still have a chance which is encouraging
• Brainstorming question - How does one define corruption: 

• Expecting a favor(monetary or other) to do one's job
• Accepting a favor (monetary or other) to not do one's job
• Accepting a favor (monetary or other) to break/change the rules for someone's convenience
• The group was also asked to brainstorm tools they knew to combat different forms of corruption
•  Refer to Citizen's charters, Tatkal schemes and hold officials accountable
• Govt/Policy makers to create more accountability for each role at every level
• Penalty (monetary or other) for not fulfilling one's responsibilities - E.g., Penalty for each day's delay in the rendering of service as defined in citizen's charter
• Use Right to Information (RTI) Act - Powerful tool in the citizens' hands
• RTI: Right to Information Act was particularly fascinating to learn about. I also realized just passing this act is not  enough if the Govt cannot put people, processes and tools in place to execute it efficiently. 

A conclusion that the class came to is that by and large our constitution and the policies in place are very comprehensive and forward thinking, but what seems to be lacking is the tools and processes necessary to put them into effect effectively. So, the end result is that the execution of such policies and procedures is left to the discretion of the person in-charge. Giving powers in the form of spending power or discretionary decision making power without proper checks and balances in the system creates the room for Corruption.
So, to summarize the key takeaways for me and hopefully the other participants: There is a direct correlation between effective policy making and governance/execution to creation of more transparent and less corrupt government, system and nation. While there is lot that needs to be fixed systemically, there is also a lot in our hands to help make a difference - e.g., Start caring, thinking, forming an opinion, choose your leaders from amongst you, but choose the one that is ahead of you in their thinking, in their vision for the country. A leader doesn't necessarily have to support/follow a majority opinion, but should be able to build the majority consensus towards his vision.
Finally, I want to end by saying.. my time spent in the preparation and the training was very useful in just being able to connect with these youngsters, learn from them, and just be encouraged to see their interest and energy.

Imagine a world

• Where getting answers to your health queries does not start from google.com
• Where your data sources for every day health information is not limited to your friends and family members
• Where you have access to real-world “hard data” and not “generic information”

There is a lot of health information available but no real and reliable, accessible and actionable health data. In today’s scenario if one had a medical query (for e.g. what is the cure for tendonitis), one would start with a google search and come across multiple websites offering basic to specific information which is disorganized, unstructured, difficult to manage and even difficult to validate. The end result of the query currently depends on the perseverance, patience and competency of the user to navigate the information generated by the query. The resulting conclusions drawn by the user is inconsistent and in most cases leaves users with more questions than answers. In all cases, users are left to the mercy of their current health service providers.

There are a number of case studies that friends and family close to us have experienced in the recent past and if we had a fully loaded myMEDistry to access, their and our health journeys would have been a bit more smoother and less nerve-wrecking.
Here is a recent experience we went through with a close family member:
A close family member who is now 33, had been perfectly healthy, married and mother of 2 wonderful, healthy children. 2 years ago she suffered cardiac arrest with symptoms of nausea and blackouts 3 times in 24 hours. Luckily for her, she had one of the episodes while under observation in the ER and the doctors noticed her heart rate dropping to 30 and so they immediately implanted a pacemaker. She has been prescribed to have this pacemaker for life now. Up until now, nobody knows the reason why her heart skipped beating at that time and why she needs a pacemaker for life. To make matters more complicated, doctors apparently don’t often see these symptoms or episodes in people of her age, gender and demographic and so do not have much idea on what to expect here onwards. Now, our quest on the world wide web has been a test in patience. There are a number of forums and support groups for people with pacemakers and other heart ailments, but it has been extremely time consuming and still impossible to find cases of patients who have had a pacemaker from such an young age and to find out what the long term side effects of having pacemaker in the body has been. The reason for this is there is lot of ‘generic’ information describing types of pacemakers, their pros and cons and ‘generic’ efficacy and reactions. For example, during the first 6 months after having the pacemaker, the doctors were monitoring how much the pacemaker was being used, the usage was ranging from 20% to 40% and we didn't know what was expected and if the range was normal or not. Different doctors opined differently and different doctors gave different care instructions. There were few ways to find other people like her whom she could connect with, but there was no structured data that could be used to put 2 and 2 together in these cases. Imagine if

• We could go to a site and find others who had a pacemaker implanted at a relatively young age and
• We could contact them to interact directly and
• We could find real data on their symptoms and side effects monitored over a period of time
• We could find real data on what the most common operating usage percentage is for pacemakers overtime

What we found in our quest is that after the initial readings, all the information on the web is too generic and hard/impossible for non-medical people like us to infer anything useful from it. There were lot of forums and blogs which described what people were going through, but it was not always complete information or structured enough for us to piece their journeys together. These were great ways to read and feel connected and feel assured that we were not alone. But the information was not something we could use effectively. Given that we were surrounded by medical professionals in our family, we were able to weed through all that we found on the web and decided finally to just give up. 

From such personal experiences was born the idea of myMEDistry, the goal of which is to help people around the globe capture their medical journeys in a structured manner to help others easily find them and more importantly use them. We believe such sharing of real world experiences makes it possible to collaborate in a global level and make breakthroughs in newer treatments possible. myMEDistry doesn’t intend to be a source of medical advice or treatment, it is a place for people to share and find others’ medical experiences that they can learn from and be better prepared in asking the right questions and be better equipped in making their healthcare decisions.

Come, join myMEDistry today and help us make a difference in global healthcare experiences.

College Admissions and Corruption

The recent WSJ article on the millions of graduates in India who seem unfit for employment has hit the nail. I have been wondering how the standards of education have changed since our school days in India. Since I have a close association with Engineering and Medical colleges, I will use those as examples. At the time I was getting ready to get into Engineering college, there were only 3 choices - a) Score well in the tests and get into one of the public colleges either in my state (AP) or other states. b) Pay up a premium fees and get into 'private' college and c) Forget the idea of Engineering college and either retry the following year or choose something else. Since my parents were against 2 and I was against 3, it was very clear to me that the only way to get into a reputed engineering college was by doing well in school the previous years and doing well in the admission tests.  I remember at that time in the entire state, the top 700 or so EAMCET rankers got into medical college and the top 1000 or so got into Engineering college (note: I am not counting the others who get in based on various other reservations). So, end of the day if someone got into a medical college or engineering college, it was mostly on their own based on their "merit".

Fast forward about 10 years since, and I am surprised to see how there are so many Engineering and Medical colleges mushrooming all around and how the 'premium fees' a.k.a donation amounts have sky rocketed as well. It seems kids who didn't even score the minimum to get a EAMCET rank are also able to get into some medical/engineering college if their parents can afford it. The money power doesn't stop here. I have also heard first hand accounts where desperate students(who are unable to cope with the course work) and parents are willing to pay up money to clear the exams and graduate from these colleges. Would you want a Civil Engineer who earned his degree this way to design and build your next home or would you want a doctor from such a college treat you or your child? I am not saying all students from these colleges are not good, but what has happened due to this large supply without proper quality gates, is that its hard to objectively assess quality and so we/corporations tend to become cynical about the whole lot.
Gone are the days when parents are pushing kids to study hard and prove their mettle in the exams.. instead they seem to be too busy trying various means to make enough money in time for the donations. As my friend, Sujai says, they do all this in the pretext of 'Competition is tough'.. so, they are teaching their kids to circumvent this competition by coughing up huge amounts in the name of donation. I know a lot of kids and parents alike get caught in this viscous cycle and often dare not to say 'NO' to this donation in fear that they may be putting their children at a disadvantage as compared to their friends.
It is because more and more parents are willing to pay this fee, there is a new market booming in India in the form of these Private Education Institutions. So, after all this, where did we end up.. we have millions and millions graduating with a professional degree and sadly a large percentage of these millions (75% of technical graduates and 85% of general graduates) are unemployable. There is now yet another market created in the form of 'Finishing schools'... basically, institutions that make these unemployable graduates employable. So, the parents now are hit by a double whammy.. pay for the degree once and then pay again to make that degree useful.
Since we are all talking about Corruption in India, isn't this Corruption? What are we teaching our children when we decide to circumvent the system that clearly needs to be meritorious and decide to 'buy' a seat.  The last 15-20 years in India has been a period of phenomenal changes (both good and bad) and while we progressed in many ways and have become an important destination on the globe, this has also been the time when India saw rapid growth in corruption of all forms and shapes. People started becoming more aggressive, ambitious and in the pretext of 'global competition', started getting used to shortcuts, quick money while gradually breeding the corruption animal into a monster of its own. While India has been touted as the outsourcing pioneer, the reputation of our Indian consultants and outsourcing partners is not all that rosy and its because of the quality issues and inconsistencies we run into. There have been cases similar to the ones quoted in the WSJ article, that a person with a fancy "computer science engineering degree" on paper cannot construct a full sentence that sounds coherent.
What we need to develop is a balanced and broad perspective towards education, jobs, careers, etc. We need to stop chasing the next hype, but instead learn to harness our strengths better. We clearly need to invest in our children and start recognizing children as unique individuals, nurture their talents and help them make the right career choices based on what they are good at or interested in. This is one area where we can definitely learn something from the western world. Lets stop pushing kids into fields they are not necessarily good at or interested in and create this unnecessary mad race. It all starts here when over-enthusiastic parents want to see their child in a certain college/profession and are willing to do whatever it takes including coughing up crores of rupees for the 'donation'. Our job as parents is not to do whatever it takes to get that admission, but instead to provide the most optimum environment for our kids to perform their best and  keep our expectations in line with our child's capabilities and guide them in making the best out of the opportunities available to them.
If you compare the situation to the US for instance, the education system and expectations don't revolve around just a handful of fields and kids are encouraged to explore different fields before making up their mind and parents are also more open to all these varied fields. Not to generalize or overly patronize with the west, but that kind of broad exposure if used properly with proper guidance can help in developing much more well rounded personalities.