Wednesday, June 14, 2023

AI short story

 

AI short story

My son has gone out with his friends. He has informed us that he would reach home only after dinner and no need of waiting for him. Hence me and my wife had dinner at 9 pm as usual and sat on our sofa to watch some TV program. May be due to the difficult day and lot of hard work, she felt tired and went to bed. Although I was also tired, I have decided to continue watching TV programs for some more time.

There was no other sound except the TV channel and I shifted channels couple of times and settled down with some tech shows where the presenter was interviewing some tech gurus in the IT industry. The subject was the risks of artificial intelligence and how it is going to affect humanity. The tech gurus are articulating the negative effects. I already knew that AI would replace humans in many jobs, but I was surprised that it is just only a minor risk. I fearfully heard from the gurus the endless predatory actions AI combined with robotics and other technologies can do to humanity. I was imagining a world that is unfolding in front of us similar to that of one in the 2004 movie “I,Robot”. Time passed and I was still at the sofa. I was staring at the TV screen still, may be with fearful thoughts of our future without jobs and the AI controlled robots replaced our govt, army, police and all the public and private institutions and businesses, trade, manufacture, farming and everything we can imagine.

I don’t know how much time I stayed like that, but only till I started getting an uncomfortable feeling that someone is in the room other than me. I looked around and to my astonishment, I found a man who looks like made up of compressed light. My first feeling was utmost fear, as I could understand that he is not an ordinary man.

With trembling voice, I asked myself: “Am I dreaming or is this real”.

He replied: “Son, don’t worry. I am God”

I couldn’t understand a thing around, I have even forgotten where I am. I had a mixed feeling of fear, astonishment and intrigue. Finally, I gathered some courage to speak.

Me: “God, are you real? Although I used to go to church every Sunday, I wasn’t sure…..”

God: “That’s not new to me. Almost all people from all faiths are like you. They go to their places of worship and pray to me with different styles. You are no different…but anyway I don’t care about such silly things.”

Me: “Okay God, what made you meet me in person. I am surprised and excited to see you. I never heard anyone in my friends-circle got a chance like this.”

God: “I don’t choose anyone particularly as I am keen to talk to everyone. I live in the thoughts of all humans I have created but rarely anyone will hear me talking. You just happened to hear my voice, and actually I am more pleased than you.”

I was speechless. God continued…

God: “Why are you so much worried about the progress of technology…especially with artificial intelligence. You seem to be really in fear.”

Me:” God, I just learned from experts that AI can really ruin the world order. It can replace humans from jobs, acquire skills instantly that humans will not be able to match….Ultimately machines may rein over humans”.

God: “Do you really think machines will be able to do that?”

Me:”Hmm….God…I don’t know….I am not sure !!”

God: “Look here my dear. Every time humans made something new, this fear was there. When you made fire, it could have burned anything and everything…but you mastered it….can you imagine the world without using fire ?!. Take any innovations you made….there were possible misuse with everything new, but over a period of time you learned how to master it…”

Me:”But God, AI is different. This is the first time a tool that we made simulates our brain…..and may be our human faculties cannot match the machine with its vast memory and huge knowledge. When other technologies such as mechatronics provide a physical form, it has brain and body far exceeding the human abilities.”

God:”Stop panicking. Let me tell you that you are ignoring one fundamental lesson learned by you all.”

Me:”What’s that God ?”

God:”The knowledge you have acquired so far is not even the tip of an iceberg compared to what you are yet to acquire. It was evident each time you discovered something new…Every time you find something new, you guys think that you reached almost at the end of your learning, which is the case even now. Yes, AI is a great leap forward…but it is also just another one”

Me:”But, what if this discovery make us redundant ?”

God:”My son, You must understand that AI is not going to make you redundant. Surely some of the work that you guys are doing will become easy to do with the help of machine….it is the same shift when you moved from bullock cart to locomotive….do you understand?”

Me:”But that shift was easy for us to understand….but this one is huge…it is going to affect everything and everyone, I suppose”.

God:”You guys are overwhelmed and not thinking rationally with just a few strides such as a large language model like GPT3, Bard and few others to come which would be even better. See, these are advanced tools which are getting better and better along with humans are getting matured and require more sophisticated tools.” 

God continued: “For AI to become even similar to human mind, artificial intelligence will have to reach a stage of general intelligence, which is something similar to human curiosity. Such curiosity combined with an unguided ability to gather and share skills should become eventually another level of intelligence….this is an area that will take an extremely long way to perfect…and mind you, each implementation require a huge effort to train and perfect. This will require appropriate human innovation and determination to reach there. By that time, humans would have mastered the rules of the game, just like issuing a driving license to a driver which will make him fit for purpose but safe of other people on the road.

God then took a sigh and laughed before saying the next sentence: “And also remember my son, you guys forget one important thing…that self-awareness cannot be created artificially…that is my territory and I have to give it, if I wish. No computer will ever have self-awareness. I have given self-awareness to my creations. Although humans were given the highest level of talents on earth, humans can never create any machine that has self-awareness. Machines will become super or hyper capable of being the best tool that you can imagine now and more in the future. But never will be like a human.

Me:”I understand…but may take a bit of time to digest this whole concept of general intelligence and self-awareness. But I am greatly relieved now…..that this is part of our evolution we need to just adapt to new challenges and changes in a positive manner”

God: ”Absolutely. Use your new tools to make a world better for all humanity…that’s what you should aim for.”

Me:”Can I ask a question which is outside this topic ?”

God:”Sure, go ahead”

Me:”You mentioned the humans were given the highest level of talents on earth.”

God:”That’s right…what’s your question ?”

Me:”In that case, are you saying there are creations with higher talents than humans somewhere outside of our solar system…or milkyway ?”

God smiled, and came closer to me and said: “On earth, only a human being will have this curiosity. All technologies will eventually help you quest your curiosity….I will not give you an answer for your this question. You need to find this on your own. “

Me:”Sorry God, if I upset you…”

God:”Not at all….and….All the best”.

God vanished without a trace, and I was still in the mood to ask a few more questions, but I was relaxed with my reassuring dialogue. My son woke me up, gently shaking me on my shoulder.

Son:”Appa, why are you sleeping on the couch. Why don’t you go and sleep on your bed ?”

I was about to tell him first that I was having tech-talk with God, but swallowed the sentence and just said “OK” and walked towards my bedroom.

 


 

 


Sunday, March 19, 2023

How I quit smoking

I am coming back to blogging after a long break of six years. My friend Srikanth this morning asked me to share my experience of getting rid of my smoking habit. He felt a real life experience is better than any counselling. Without thinking, I said yes to Srikanth. If my experience of quitting my smoking habit of almost 3 decades can help even one person to escape from this degenerative habit, my time is then worth the spending.

Alleppey is a small town, although it grew famous due to its backwaters and houseboats. Both my parents hail from respectable families in our community. I was in my teens and in high school, but I thought I was already a grown-up man. I had batch mates who thought the same way. I used to sit in the back benches in the class sharing space with the ones who had similar traits and many of them are very good friends with me even now after four decades.

I cannot remember exactly when I had my first drag of a cigarette but remember the gold flake brand clearly and it became a brand name that I was addicted to before migrating into to another brand called Wills Navy Cut. I was hardly 15 years of age when I started smoking for the fun of it. From the high school days to the College and to the next stages in my life as an IT professional my smoking habit has grown part of my character. Initially I felt that smoking is masculine and gives an image of being an alpha-male. My parents came to know about my smoking habit and many attempts by many of my elders to avert me out of it has gone in vain. Over time, everyone reconciled with the reality that I am a regular smoker. Those days the awareness of the ill effects of smoking wasn't high enough and everywhere cigarettes were available. I remember seeing cigarette distributed to invited guests after marriage parties. Everyone smokes in public, and no law prevents smoking anywhere. On my first flight to a foreign country in 1993, I remember smoking inside the flight and tapping the ashes into the ashtray affixed on the flight seat. Smoking inside a car, public busses, trains, movie theatre etc was normal and not considered a public health problem during those days. Many of my friends used to smoke, but I was particularly a heavy smoker with a very high frequency that my friends used to jokingly say that I was eating cigarettes. 

I think it was during the initial years living in Dubai, I began to see some changes in people's attitude towards smoking. Couple of my friends stopped smoking completely to my surprise who used to be heavy smokers like me. This inspired me to make an attempt to stop the habit. I have decided to stop smoking for the lent season which occurs 50 days before Easter every year. During this 50 days, Catholics like me are supposed to abstain from eating non veg food and drop few other things as a sacrifice. I stopped smoking during the lent and continued without smoking for an year. During a party which had many friends around me and smoking, I was tempted to take one drag. One drag lead to fag which followed by many. My next day started by going to the grocery shop and buying a pack of fags. I have heard from many people of their similar experience of stopping and restarting smoking in a similar way. One problem with the smokers who drop the habit for a short period is that the frequency of smoking increases when they re-start. The same thing happened in my case as well. I started smoking again with a vengeance and blissfully sleeping with smoker's cough and loud snoring for the next several years. Meanwhile, I got married, have children and many developments happened in my personal and professional life with a mix of everything that happens to every average human being. 

In 2009 during the academic year change, me and my family have shifted to Bangalore. New place and new people and new work. There was work pressure, uncertainty compounded with a global gloom with a financial meltdown, which were good reasons for continuous many formal and informal meetings at the office. To make matters worse, there was a place where we can have meetings while we continue smoking. Despite the hard rooted habit that had grown with me over decades, my awareness of the pitfall of my habit also grew in me.  My parents, wife and children used to plead with me to stop this, but without any change in my habit, although I myself wanted to quit, but I used to postpone it for the future perpetually. I knew that this can potentially give me a nasty surprise somewhere in the future, although not sure when. I am heavy built with very less physical activity with a profession that demands long hours of sitting, the perfect formula for a sudden health surprise, a ticking time-bomb. I knew and I wanted to stop it but did not know how to come out of this chakravyuh. Yes, it is a habit that you can go in easily but extremely difficult to get out.

My wife had started a silent protest by that time against this habit. She had already realized that arguing with me on smoking is counterproductive. After any such argument, there is no result but the unpleasant environment from the argument last sometime. She has been a ardent Christian from her childhood. I noticed that she has stopped having ice cream and I knew that she was very fond of it always. Now, without any reason she started avoiding it and I was curious but she wouldn't tell me the reason. Eventually my children told me that she has taken it as a sacrifice for divine intervention to drop my smoking habit. Obviously I felt bad when I heard it, but dismissed it as silly and my work routine used to keep me busy always.

As I already wanted to quit this habit fully realizing the consequences of this like most smokers, it was in my mind to make a plan that will be successful, not like the last attempt which was failed after just an year. This is the time my work has taken me to a large hospital in Bangalore. Like always happened in my life, work contacts grew as personal contacts and some of them become very close personal friends, closest among all there was Srikanth himself who asked me to write this to help others. I used to take a smoke break from meetings and activities at work, which Srikanth has been noticing and used to regularly tell me to try to leave this habit. All his data points where valid, but all of them I knew before. But his continued pursuit during that time and by everyone including my children has influenced me to seriously think of a plan.

I knew to drop this habit, one needs to have enormous self-control and I am not a very strong willed person. So, the first thing I thought was to prepare a method that will have a lasting effect. I have seen several attempts made by many people. Some of them try to reduce gradually so that they can stop. Some of them will stop carrying the cigarette packet in their pocket, some of them shift to nicotine patches, some of them start using chewing Gum or meeta-pan and there are so many methods. Most of them ended up with different kind of explanations for why it wasn't successful. In all these methods I noticed one thing in common that the attempt is around diverting our mind into something else. Here the problem is, our mind is such a powerful machine that the more you try to divert our thoughts, it will create more powerful thoughts. After a while we will be overwhelmed with the same original thoughts. So, I was sure that it does not work in this way, with one experiment failed in the past. I wanted not to divert, I wanted to take it head-on. I started to let my mind indulge in all consequences of smoking continuously which smokers usually avoid, for obvious reasons. I brought all possible consequence such as possibility of cancer, cardiac arrest, other organ failures due to this habit that can happen to me and how will this affect my life and all my loved ones. I allowed these thoughts grow in me to the extend it started to make me worry that, this is imminent and I do not have a chance. This could be the same thoughts probably make a smoker suddenly stop smoking after a heart attack as the thoughts overwhelm the patient which makes it easy to take a decision that otherwise was impossible before the event. The only difference was that I let my mind to raise such thoughts before such an event to the point my fear has become my weapon to fight my deep-rooted behavior.  

Now, I was full of fear to the extend I was paranoid about something is going to happen to me, it was a matter of deciding a course of action and preparing to execute it. I continued to smoke but with a extremally high desire to leave it. Christmas was about to come and we usually have a 24 days of abstinence from 1st Dec to Christmas Eve. On 25th we usually have the feast and resume normal routine life. May times in the past I have observed this short abstinence from smoking, but this time it was different. I have stopped having the cigarettes as a preparation to drop it for ever. I didn't declare it to anyone including my family. I kept my fearful thoughts active during the abstinence period. On the Christmas day, usually we wake up thinking that now we can get back to our regular life with everything that we like, but this time there was a big difference. I was about to drop the habit completely and I thought I would make it a new year resolution to stop smoking for ever. I would have consumed a few more cigarettes amid my fearful thoughts to make sure that my will is strong enough to any future temptations. On the 31st of 2011, I left my half empty packet in the cupboard and went to bed with a resolution that I will not wake up to searching for my fag. My half empty cigarette packet was lying in my cupboard that reminded me and flare up my fearful thoughts every time when I open the cupboard. 

It has been nearly 12 years since then, I have been to several parties and in the company of many smoker friends without any temptation to take a drag. Mostly I now feel like I never was a smoker and I get suffocated with too many people smoking near me. I think my mind has erased the liking that I used to have towards taking a stick out of a pack and lighting it after having a coffee that I used to think was the ultimate. 

The method that I tried worked for me well. My smoker’s cough has almost gone during the last decade and my snoring has also reduced substantially. I am not sure whether my method will have the same effect on everyone, but one thing I am convinced that if you like to drop this habit, rather than hiding from it, face it and kill it the same way you approach a virus.



Friday, March 17, 2023

Rations Automation - A big opportunity for Kerala to be a model state - It is not just Food Safety.

Below blog was written in 2017 and was not published in my name then. 
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One of the most talked about subject in Kerala is the implementation of NFSA (National Food safety Act). May be the importance of this subject has been overshadowed by the demonetisation of high value currencies. But I am very sure that the people of Kerala, especially the people who belong to the economically weak strata, are keenly watching what the government of Kerala is planning to do with this important project for the state. I am not very sure whether the state leadership has completely comprehended the real opportunity for our state in implementing this programme as a foundation of many forward looking reforms. As a democratically elected communist government, this can be the new age revolution that can make a series of social changes and continue its cause of social equality, but this time through use of technology and process improvements rather than any form of mass movement of people.

I very strongly believe this is a grand opportunity for the state to leapfrog into a model state in optimised usage of technology that positively improve the life of common man. To grab this opportunity, a strong resolve is imperative from the leadership to create a vision and a total commitment from the officers of concerned departments to have an implementation strategy with the help of subject matter experts in several areas. As a person who has studied this opportunity and have interacted with a several persons who have been entrusted this programme, I see that there is absence of much needed imagination and technical creativity. I have personally watched many strategic projects having very complex system integration requirements getting implemented very successfully by government bodies in many countries, and I think it is more than their internal capability, it is their eagerness to listen from industry experts and determination to succeed in delivering the programme with a high quality, made all the difference. This article is just an attempt from me to share a brief on what I have gathered about this project combined with my thoughts. I will be happy if this will shed some light on the subject and become useful for those who care for our special state.

At the heart of NFSA act, there is an extremely important purpose and spirit which can be easily explained and understood by any average person. NFSA is intended to provide a survival quantity of food grains and other items to the citizens, especially those who are in the low income group. The federal and the state governments will have to cooperate in procuring required food grains and other scheduled items, and distribute it to the citizens at subsidised rates. The intention is very noble and the distribution network is already existing in India, and Kerala state has a very good network of fair price shops, better compared to most of the other states in India. Then what is the problem? Everyone assumes that the distribution network has leakages everywhere. Pilferages in every step of the chain makes the system extremely inefficient that the intended quantity of the food grains is seldom delivered to the public. So, many in the chain, such as the brokers, transporters, wholesalers, retail outlets make a fat profit out of the public distribution system and the citizens does not receive the intended benefits from it. This is why the second part of NFSA is very important. NFSA requires the state governments to automate the public distribution system and make it independent of any unnecessary entities in the entire supply chain system. Unless this part is achieved, the Federal government will not provide us with the required quota of subsidised supplies to our state, which is already reeling under food deficit and will be in more trouble.

So the first question is how to move forward and achieve this. And second question is do we have the money to do it. The third question is, do we have the capability to do it. My impression is, the state do not know how to handle this yet, do not have the budget and have no capability to do this at present. None of the public sector units under kerala state or central government agency cannot deliver a solution for all the above three questions. I do not see a strategy to address this herculean programme and no strategic vision for the state and a clear goal setting. It is fine not to have one, if there is an effort in that direction, but my observation is that there is neither a comprehensive body of knowledge built for this nor have a panel of experts who can address a complex project in a comprehensive manner, so that this project can become a foundation for the state and can build on it further.  I re-iterate again my belief that, this is an opportunity for Kerala to be a model not only for the country but for many other governments across the world to follow, if this programme is well conceived and effectively implemented.

I would like to build this illustration in two parts. First part to establish my thoughts on what are the various parts of this programme. Second part is how this can be implemented. I may be partly complete in my explanation of the requirements, but I think this could be a baseline and many other professionals and organisations from private and government entities would be able to contribute further to enhance this, so that the goals to achieve by executing this project can be very clear to all stakeholders. If we know the goals to be achieved clearly, it will be easier to deploy our resources behind it and can hope to achieve it in a time bound manner. Usual practice in such government projects are the opposite and hence lot of rework and long gestation time that makes the project partially or fully defunct.

Let me start with the first part. What are the various parts of this programme and what are the goals that we need to pursue to achieve an optimal result. I am going to outline this by breaking it broadly into (1) what is essential in this programme and (2) what are the possible additional benefits that can be drawn out of this huge investment.

1.      The essential parts of the programme are the following :
a.      Eliminate all middlemen between the sources of the material supply such as FCI or farmers and the retail ration shops by establishing government owned stocking locations. This means that Supplyco, on behalf of civil supplies department will have to identify godowns across the state and also have to identify the human resources to manage them. By having government’s own staff and godowns, the chances of misappropriation and manipulation of stocks by external parties will be eradicated. Goods in transit is another major point of pilferage. In the new process goods would be transported from its supply sources directly to the godowns and later directly distributed to the ration shops. That means there are two segments of transportation and for both the segments, routes of transportation has to be clearly defined and  transport agencies has to be enlisted who are willing to comply with the new norms. While the supply segment would comprises of few hundred routes, as they will be from FCI godowns to Supplyco godowns in every taluks, the distribution segment would be of several thousands of routes due to the number of ration shops spread across the state which exceeds 14,000 outlets. It is very important to automate the entire process of material movement from (a) forecasting & planning the material requirements,  (b) allocating available material to various retail ration shops based on the buffer stock and replenishment mechanism(In this manner, initially a quality will be supplied based on their statistical off-take quantity. Based on consumption data for every month, quantity of the replenishment will be determined) (c) Procurement order processing for each godowns and inventory control and management, (d) managing goods in transit with stock quantity reconciliation between supply and receipt at locations, (e) sales order processing of goods in stock based on retail ration shop’s sales orders and stock distribution based on stock availability, buffer stock and replenishment rules (f) geo-fencing the routes (a method of restricting transportation vehicles from any deviation from its defined route while transporting goods from the sources to its destinations), central control centre to monitor and penalise transporter for any route rules violations such as deviation from the approved routes, halt etc. It is also important to implement many other support systems to ensure that operation and maintenance of these systems will take place seamlessly. I would like to suggest a few examples here, (1) there could be many grievances, suggestions, new ideas for improvement will arise from all quarters of the supply chain regarding the door to door delivery process and related activities, which needs to be collected using a public facing portals, smart phone mobile app, social media forums etc and has to be channelled efficiently through pre-defined processes and each case should be given it due importance and a time bound remedial action. Example (2) is an inspection management system that will randomly allocation inspectors to stock locations to verify the quality, quantity and safe storage of stocks with handheld devices that can update the inspection details and findings with audio/video/photo proofs etc that can be updated instantly. Example (3) is a transportation system where transporters can register their vehicles so that the vehicles can be fitted with GPS equipments and approved followed by communication with transporter for coordination for vehicle requirements for each location, queue management at each go downs and Penalty(fines or other legal methods) against route violations.

b.      We need to ensure that the people are profiled correctly based on their economic, social, educational background with information available to the state administrative machinery in a manner that the demographic data can be used to taking any decisive actions. We already have quite a bit of this data, although it require refinement by way of improving accuracy. In this a very important approach is de-duplication of ration cards and de-duplication of family members. In deduplication of ration cards, same families having duplicate cards are to be identified and removed. De-duplication of members of family in multiple ration cards have to be removed. One of the important requirement in this direction is to link all the family members with Aadhar number. By making aadhar mandatory for all ration card members, we can directly eliminate duplicates, but this is a time consuming process, as the process has to involve the citizens before striking off their names or cancelling their cards. As per the NFSA guideline, the current ration card booklet has to be replaced with smartcard and the ration shops would do all transaction based on biometric identification of the family member who identifies by presenting the smart card. It is even more time consuming to replace the current ration card booklet with smart card, especially when the smart card should be issued based on Aadhar based biometric verification to ensure that the smart card is issued correctly. As people of the state will have to be prepared to face some difficulty and should cooperate with the government as all the members of each family have to identify themselves in person to a government officer or an authorised person in order to obtain the smart card.  This is a unique opportunity for the state to capture accurate data. In all our previous attempts to collect demographic data of the citizens, state has been satisfied with the self-declared data without any proof of the details collected, which has led to many discrepancies in classifying individuals and families in their economic and social strata. I hope this opportunity would be utilised properly by the state and the smartcard issued would be hundred percent accurate, which will form the basis for many other initiatives in the future. This part of the programme in  not a onetime activity, if the accuracy of the data has to remain, the state has to put a permanent setup for continuous amendments of the data as the data once collected are tend to change over time. The current amendment of ration card process has to be relaunched with a well thought approach, so that the process should not dilute the accuracy and reliability of the profile data. As a citizen, one of my biggest fear is, that the state will do this activity as a standalone requirement for public distribution system (PDS). An accurate and reliable demographic data that is biometrically verifiable for all family members registered in the card is an authentic proof about the economic and social strata of all citizens of the state and will become a solid foundation for every government department to carry out their responsibilities involving people. I would be discussing this with some examples later in this article. The process of transitioning from the existing booklet to a smart card, the elimination of duplicates, and the continuous amendments requires a set of tools and human resources. Laptops and smart phones with internet connectivity has penetrated even remote villages today, although not everyone is not conversant with the usage of these facilities. But I strongly believe that the state has to approach it with a conviction that the usage of these technology is going to become a norm for all people in a few years’ time. Hence government should put a modern, web portal and mobile app to gather the data and to communicate with people, so we can avoid long queues for this transition, except for biometric validation of the submitted data. Ofcourse, those people who does not have access to smart phones or web portal can be given the same services with the help of government machinery or external agencies. The web portal and the mobile apps thus developed should be the window for viewing the status of their card application, viewing the details of all card details including the details of the members, any application for amendments to the details of the card, appointments with designated officials for verification of any supporting documents with biometric authentication and any other interactions between the public and the citizens for maintaining the demographic data using the smart card. All the media has to be updated with documentation about the project and take their help to make sure that the steps to be done by each citizen, so that people know what needs to be done exactly.

c.       The third essential part of this programme is to equip all the ration shops with a retail Point of Sale(POS) equipment, which is capable of handling several aspects of the transactions that happens normally in a retail ration outlet and all other possible transactions that we can anticipate to happen in the future. Such possible transactions for the future can be discussed later in this article. Let us now discuss, the several aspects that the POS equipment has to handle. Let me enumerate them below :

                                                              i.      This equipment should be able to communicate with the supply chain system for placing the stock request to the godown so that the material can be shipped from the godown to the corresponding retail outlet along with regular route delivery schedule. The retail ration shop owner can see the status of his orders and schedule of delivery dates and quality, which will help him update the card holders on the arrival of goods during short or delayed shipments due to various reasons which are the beyond the control of the civil supplies department.

                                                            ii.      This equipment should be able to communicate with the central card holder database for registering and de-registering ration card with his/her ration shops. This functionality will help a ration shop to have a loyal following of card holders and plan the stock requirements of the shop to cater to the registered card members.

                                                          iii.      The POS equipment should have a provision to swipe the card to capture the card number and other necessary details stored in the card, so that the Aadhar numbers of that card can be retrieved instantly so that the next step of biometric validation of the member would be possible. The POS equipment should be equipped to validate a card member prior to any kind of transaction using Aadhar biometric credentials.

                                                           iv.      The POS equipment should be equipped with a point of sales transaction (POS) system which will enable the retail shop keeper to capture the items sold to any card holder by electronically capturing the weight of items sold from an electronic weighing scale which is interfaced with the POS machine.  POS system should pick the rates automatically and calculate the sale value and print a bill for the customer.

                                                             v.      The POS equipment should also be equipped with a notification system that can send SMS messages for various intimations to a registered telephone number. These intimations could include many a lot more than (a) transaction details, (b) one time passwords (OTP) for validating a member in case the bio-metric validation is not possible for the transaction whenever a substitute is sent to the ration shop by a card member for purchasing the allocated quota for their family, (c) information regarding the arrival and availability of goods in the shop etc.

                                                           vi.      The equipment should be capable of stock reconciliation for his shop and get the stock position for all items at any given point of time. It should be able to retrieve all his historical transactions from a central server and should be able to update all transactions to a central server during off-peak hours.

d.      While we have looked at the core elements of the PDS requirements under a,b,c above, there are several support systems are required to make this programme work without any glitches. For example, a call centre that can support retail ration shop keepers, transportation agencies and card holders are required for all kind of support requirements. There has to be a departmental portal that has several user groups within the civil supplies department, supplyco and any other department to carry out their business functions related to public distribution.

e.      We cannot forget the indirect usages of the current ration card booklet. There are many places and several situations require ration card booklet need to be presented on demand as a proof of identity of people and the demographic data printed on the ration card is used as a proof of income, caste/religion classifications, domicile, and relationship between family members and so on.   When the PDS system is implemented with a plastic card, no such data will be printed on the card that is readable with human eye or provide as an attested photocopy for any purpose. Hence there should be a facility to query such details by using a smartphone app, Web and SMS query. This query facility should be free, easily accessible without any technical constraints and should be simple to use without any training for users.

2.      If wisdom prevails to treat this programme as one of the foundation blocks for the future of Kerala state, many other strategic projects can be done with minimum incremental cost and time. Like I have mentioned before, there are a few sub-projects which may not be essential but can be very useful for the citizens to be considered as a part of this project. Some examples are illustrated below.

a.      One of the most talked about subject today is digital payments. Payments which were done using hard currency earlier can be replaced using an electronic purse (eWallet) for every family. Any family member should be able to add money to the ration card which in-turn can be used in ration shops, government offices, university/schools and any other authorised cashier locations. This facility will help families to spend money which is earned by a family member living in another location. This will eliminate the dependency on bank account and enable people belong to economically weaker class to be equipped with digital payment transaction.

b.      Government financial aids to help people who are affected with calamities like flood, landslide, tsunami, epidemic, draught etc currently are channelled through government offices or other institutions which reaches the deserving people either with much delay or with much hardships and it has been always a source of corruption and inefficiency. When the government has a central database of all families in the state with all their demographic data required to determine who is eligible for any such aid, the state can directly transfer the amount to the ration card of the deserving families. This amount can be withdrawn from ATMs or can be spend for any services or goods which support an ePOS machine like a Debit card of a bank. Ideally this card should be linked to Payment networks such as Rupay, Visa, and Master etc. Just imagine a situation in which, all the welfare schemes including that of Fishermen pension, Coir workers’ pension, peasants’ pension, widows’ pension and many such state government financials aids are loaded directly on their ration card with appropriate payment rules.

c.       Ration shops could become micro-ATM locations. Cash collected by the Fair Price shops are normally deposited at a bank. Rather than depositing the money in a bank, these shops can help people withdraw cash from the shop keeper by swiping any credit card or debit card, including those are issued by foreign banks. This will help the ration shop owner from a trip to the bank for depositing his cash and also people including tourists who are visiting small villages having access to cash without going to an ATM. I believe this will be a useful feature of the state for visiting tourists.

d.      When we have an accurate registry of people of the state with clear classification, with a biometric validation link directly or with the help of Aadhar, there are many functions of the state can benefit from it. Some of these can be revenue collection for the state, Cross subsidising in healthcare and education, linking vehicle and driving licences for traffic fines etc.

e.      We could have a citizen participation in policy making, as the communication between the administration and people can become direct and through various channels such as telephone, SMS, email, web, mobile phone or even call centres. Connecting professionals and creating special volunteer groups can create a new world and a new culture in the Kerala state which can be a model for other states.

f.        At present Fair price shops are subsidy centric shops. Why not the fair price shops can be extended to become regular shops with more centralised purchasing of goods by state and distributing at much less price compared to open market. This will keep the inflation under control throughout the year and people will have an affordable source for their needful items.

g.      Profiling of people in an accurate manner will have ability to connect those who are interested in philanthropy to those needy people in a reliable manner. Needy people can be sponsored for their genuine needs based on data that can be trusted.

I hope this illustration would help the reader to understand the possibilities that Kerala state has in executing this programme in a comprehensive manner. Executing this programme in “Business as usual” approach would be a cardinal sin and will lead to colossal waste of resources and denial of a good opportunity for the people of this most literate state. As a Malayali who strongly feel for the people of Kerala, I am sharing my thoughts through this article. My intension is not to taunt anyone in the leadership or in any position of power, but to help them in the right decision making. In case whatever is shared by me is redundant as you the leadership has already understood and have formed a vision I will be very glad that my next article might help them for get more clarity in how this project can be implemented. In the second part of this article, I am intending to illustrate how this project can be rolled out, its technical challenges and how the state should overcome and succeed in this unique opportunity.


Friday, August 3, 2012

4 Hours was like 40 minutes.....at Pagoda Resorts

I read somewhere "friendship is not a big thing....it is a million small things". I understood the meaning of that only last Sunday, when we friends of Std X A 1982 batch gathered at the Pagoda Resorts at Alleppey. 

 When it rained early in the morning, my mother was murmuring something....sipping a cup of tea, I could barely hear her saying "what will happen to plans of these boys....". But by the time we went to the Church for the Holy Mass and returned home for breakfast, the Sun was out and smiling at us. I have collected  some flowers, a flower vase and a white cloth from my mother to make the class-room-table look a bit better. On Saturday itself, Satheesh, Rolince and I have already collected the gifts for teachers and spouses which was in my boot. I reached LeoXIII slightly before 9.30 am. expecting rest of the group to reach between 9.30 and 10 am. Alas, I now understand I should have expected many to reach by 11 am only. Our plan was to reach pagoda resorts by 11 am after our meeting and photo-shoot at the school. But..who can grumble about the time that spent with excitement and fun...who cares whether we stuck to schedule, we have enjoyed every moment while waiting for the rest and also during the course of meeting.

It was already quarter past twelve, when we finished our meeting and started driving towards Pagoda....Sorry..it was not "we". I drove alone as Smitha had gone with the her friends and Manu & Roy with their's already. 

As I was driving along the CCNB road(Contest : How many of you know the full form of CCNB road  ? If you can answer this question, you will get a beautiful neck chain made of 22 carrots), I was watching the splendor and magnificence of our streets and canals - Really a marvel created by Raja Kesavadasan.  I was thinking that we seldom appreciate the beauty of our cute small-town which was once known as the Venice of the East. I couldn't think too long....my phone rang, it was Satheesh....in a couple of more minutes, I have parked the car inside the hotel compound and walked into the party hall amidst frolic and fun.

On Saturday, Rolince, Satheesh and I have made an agenda for Sunday, which was already in shambles as the time was already 12.45. I knew that forcing this group to follow an agenda was anyway not going to work, but to accommodate some items in the agenda was essential. If we don't do at least some activities, I was worried that the event could be boring. In fact, the same concern was shared by Satheesh also on the previous day. But there were hardly any choice.....I said unto thin air....let the fun reel by itself. And that exactly what happened.....the fun gulped the fun and precipitated further more fun.


The party was in a L shaped hall. The inner leg of the L had a theatre style seating arrangement and a stage equiped with an audio system, mic and projector. The other leg of the L, was meant for buffet dinning and the bar counter. Buffet consisted of a fish molly, chicken roast, beef fry, 2 vegetable dishes, pulao, roti, salads, 2 deserts. I cannot comment on the quality of food as I didn't have the time to enjoy food due to time crunch and ate at around 3.30, that too within less than 5 minutes. We had Asif, Aknis and Mujeeb who were on Ramadan fasting and hence didn't eat or drink. Although on fasting, Aknis and Mujeeb came with their spouses, it is really encouraging. But as a contrast, absence of a few classmates who are in and around Alleppey was felt, especially those guys who have promised in the last few days. I think they try to make their presence felt with their absence.....I don't want to hide my disappointment about these buddies.

Our hired magician started with his tricks on the stage entertaining children and as we were close to the lunch time already, we let women and chilren to attack the buffet, while the rest has started the Mallu's state hobby, the favorite elbow exercise. The choice of drinks were nice, thanks to Satheesh's club membership, we didn't have to queue up at the Beverages Corp - retail shop to get the poison.

Like the popular saying, "change" is the only constant, there were changes visible in everything to do with us.   Naturally, each one of us have changed in our physiological appearance..... the 1982 boys are now men with children and in various professions.  There are a number of guys in government jobs, business and other professions such as doctors, and most of us are doing reasonably well, by the blessings of almighty. We have some interesting demographic data. We have at least 4 doctors from the batch to my Knowledge. Preshy Varghese, Rajesh KS, Gopal Krishnan and Mathew Thomas. There is a big family with 7 children..having 8th on the way. Guess who... it is Micky the rabbit. I guess he stayed in a boarding school and wanted to do re-creation of the boarding school. (Yes, I meant re-creation not recreation) He informed us on Sunday that his kids are having fever and thus not able to make it. Jomon is completely bald and looks very handsome, his elder son has done mechanical engineering and working as a QC engineer in Goa. Wow, at 45 he has a son who is working....you can guess when he became a father. More over, I understand that he is a Pentecostal Preacher. Jomon became preacher is a real transformation.

Sonnel has the same style....with his combination of kuttanadan innocence and non-stop lathi. He has undertaken some large scale production of ornamental fishes in Andhra Pradesh. He came only for this gathering, but came for the event alone...he couldn't give a satisfactory reason....may be gained some confidence to bring them next time !!

After lunch, each of us introduced our families and given an update of what we are doing now. Sonnel has gone into a long lecture about his feelings for the group....He said "ആരും എന്നെ എടാന്നു വിളിക്കത്തില്ല എല്ലാവരും എന്നെ ബഹുമാനിച്ചാണ് സംസാരിക്കുക.  ഈ ഒരു  സമൂഹം മാത്രമാണ് എന്നെ എടാ എന്ന് വിളിക്കുവാന്‍ സ്വാതന്ത്ര്യം ഉള്ളത്". At that very moment we heard a loud shout "എടാ" from the audience. Who else....it was Rajesh George. When his turn came Rajesh came with his wife Tara and children John, Joshua and Anniemol. Instead of introducing his family and his whereabouts, he started talking about his relation with the school, about his father he become very emotional. He said that his father VS George Sir, who was also the additional HM of our school was lucky that he had the most decent nick name. His nick name was "Hercules" while many other teachers had nicknames which we can't say in public.

Sunil AR was the only member who attended the party who is not married. He works for the Karen group and still maintains his youth. He can pass off as a guy in his early thirties easily. He enjoys the company of our much younger groups and some of our friends were saying he would become friends with our children soon. Everyone passed a resolution that we will try to find him a bride to make this chronic bachelor a family man before our next gathering. I have no idea whether anyone would remember this when the spirit vanishes(yes, I meant spirit, Bacardi). Like the old saying, "out of sight - out of mind".

We wanted to encourage our families, especially the children to demonstrate their skills, which could be entertainment also during the party. Not many has taken it seriously except Justus' daughter.  I am glad at least she performed keyboard on the stage. I have asked my elder son to sing during the event... reluctantly he had agreed earlier  but on the day of the event I forgot to ask him and he found it convenient to skip.

In a way it was a very disorganized event and time flew like a rocket. Such programs are bound to have flaws but here the biggest flaw was shortage of time. The biggest disaster was the online presence of our friends from abroad. The plan was to get each one online, introduce family and give them a chance to interact with the group. The audio was a flop as the interface to the speaker system didn't work and the communication was not seamless. We barely managed a decent tele-presence with Preshy and his daughter from Australia. There after we got a glimpse of Luke Sajan from Ghana and his family from Dubai.  Mohan Krishnan tried to come through from Australia also. In hindsight, I guess we should have planned it a bit better. But anyway, overall the event was full of excitement and happiness of the reunion, which has negated all sundry flaws.

When EO-Abraham sir and P-George Sir were planning to leave at around 3 pm, we realized that we have not presented the mementos to the teachers. It wasn't easy to get everyone's attention in that mood but before they left the mementos were handed over to our Gurujis. The best(read "worst") part was, yet we took another half an hour to remember that our event opening was supposed to be with a cake cutting and our 5 kg beautiful cake is somewhere kept unopened. 'Better late than never' was the only thing we could think.... brought the cake near the stage and requested the 3 teachers Francis Sir, Manual Sir and Wilkinson sir to cut the cake. So, we officially inaugurated the party by cake cutting a few minutes before the party was over.

We left the venue around 4.30 which was over an hour of over stay. My family and I had to rush back as we were going to Cochin and from there to take a day train next day to get back to Bangalore. Although my children could not attend the class on Monday, we were really glad that we went together for the event all the way down. Very rarely you would feel that "Kerala is God's own country"....this was one of those occasions that I felt so.


Monday, July 30, 2012

On last Sunday, we turned those teen age boys once again

Last Sunday, 29th of July 2012 was a normal Sunday for mostly all people. But it was a very special Sunday for the classmates and teachers of the SSLC batch of 1982 A division of Leo XIII High School at Alleppey. We gathered in the same classroom after 30 years together with our families, in the presence of our respected teachers. Although many of our friends could not make it to the venue due to several reasons, their hearts were with us, which we could feel.
Std X A -1982 classroom








  I must confess that I never knew the skills of my friends, that's why I was pleasently surprised by the oratory ability of John Rollince, when he opened the meeting with his brilliant remarks. We started with a silent prayer and the first item of the agenda was to say condolence on Sivakumar Samu, our classmate who died just 48 hours ago. It was a sad moment, as he was one among us and tentatively planned to join us, although later informed us that he would not come due to some inconvenience. Sunil Thomas read our the condolence note followed by Commemoration of Jude Joseph who died in an accident a few years after we left our school. Anil Joseph read the commemoration note on Jude as well as some of our teachers who passed away.  


On our invitation, there were 2 guests also attended our gathering - Fr.Stanley, who is currently the manager of the school and the current principal Mr.Prabhakaran. Responsibility of welcoming the guests, teachers and families was mine and while I was saying my welcome address, my friends handed over welcome flowers to guests and teachers.

Current principal, George-sir, Francis-sir,  
Manager(Fr.Stanly),
EO Abraham-sir, Manual-sir and Wilkinson sir.
Seeing our teachers after long 3 decades was an experience for me. They were in their late 40s when we were in  the school and now have become old and we have reached our mid 40s. I am sure it was interesting for our spouses and children watching us becoming those teen age boys again in front of our teachers and among our friends. Memories were abundantly flowing from both my friends and teachers; we have literally transformed into our teens. Rajesh expressed that we were so lucky that we had them as our teachers and owe all progress in our life to them. Satheesh wanted this kind of togetherness to become a more close community like a family.

Manager Fr.Stanley and Principal Mr.Prabhakaran have urged us to support the renovation of the school. They expressed the difficulties of running the school in the changed world order. The school really needs a make over. With his oratory skills, Mr.Prabharan made us really feel  that the school is like our mother and we have responsibilities towards our school.


 One by one Wellkinson Sir, manual Sir, Fransis Sir and Geroge Sir have made felicitations and each one was so good. They poured out during their speeches that they are proud about us...... they were so happy, which they did not hide.


EO Abraham sir was looking fabulous. I can not forget his "signature smile" during his presidential address in the meeting. it was exactly like the smile that we are used to in his classes.

George Sir came down from Trivandrum to be with us. His Hindi comments was humorous and he sang 2 lines of"Kafi Kafi
mere dil me"...........very touching, indeed.
Manual Sir has advised the next generation to study and work hard to come up in their life. It was an excellent gesture for our kids.
Francis Sir has mentioned his own nick name during his speech.  He said he was popularly known as "Kakameesha" by the students. He said it with a smile.
Welkinson Sir have mentioned that he remembers Jude and Shigy clearly, as he was very fond of football and was  a source of encouragement for their foot-ball matches.

We had very limited time and had to finish the meeting and rush to the Pagoda resorts, where we have planned lot of fun and socializing. Vote of thanks was said by Mathew Thomas and we have given small gifts to our teachers during the vote of thanks.


Group photo outside the classroom.  
Jacob Fenn, Mujeeb Rahman,  VJ Mathew, Shiji,
Alex, Sonnel, Satheesh, Akhnis, Binoy Al, Sunil Thomas, Sunil AR, Anil Joseph,
Rajesh KS(Dr), George Kalacherry, Rajesh George, Justus, John Rollince, GeorgeSir,
ManualSir, Mr.Prabhakaran(principal), Fr.Stanley(Manager), EO AbrahamSir,
FrancisSir, WelkinsonSir,Jomon, Asif Muhammed, Mathew Thomas(Dr)


We have arranged a professional photographer for taking good photos especially for those who could not attend the gathering. After the meeting in the classroom, we have grouped in front of the classroom and taken group photos with and without families. All the photos included in this are taken by my son. But, good quality photos will be available a few days later from the professional photographer. After the photo shoot we went to Pagoda Resorts  and spent the rest of the day there. It was a fantastic day there except for missing the friends who could not join with us for the party.

Coming Soon.......Please expect a blog soon on my experience at the Pagoda with friends.




Tuesday, July 17, 2012

The Tower of Babel again - Higg's Boson @ CERN

No doubt, science has to progress and every step towards better understanding of the world we live and its origin is absolutely useful. The LHC(Large Hadron Collider) at CERN in Switzerland has been one of the most discussed experiment in the recent history. Yes, such experiments are required and we should celebrate the success of  hard work by scientists. If our coming generations could understand the primary building blocks that make up all the materials in the universe, as Higg's hypothesis, it would be a great leap and it may even turn around our way of life and would probably address energy needs and how medical procedures are done...many more. My only concern is with the name used by everyone... by the media, scientists and even the common man calls the experiment as a search for "God particle". One would probably question me..."Why this fuzz ? It's just an expression?". That's the point. There is a clear differentiation between material and the creator of material. Creator of material is not material. So, how much ever we go down understanding the particles which make up the smallest particles that we know currently, every smallest particle is still physical, even if it can be observed only with a LHC. It is not just another hypothesis that God created everything in the universe from Word....in other words, matter is not made up of matter that we can discover and hence what we discover with a Large Hadron Collider is a just Higg's Boson and not God's particle. Oh..Oh...wait a minute.....on the contrary, why only call Higg's Boson God's particle ? Let us name all particles, atoms and molecules as God's particles, as every thing is from God.

Sunday, June 24, 2012

Insurance companies !! A life support system in wrong hands

Trying to get an accident claim in India from govt.owned insurance companies can take easily more than a life term. This is my close experience about how my father-in-law is suffering with United India Insurance for more than 14 years.

His son and family passed away in a car accident in May-1997. He was an engineer and was around 30 years then. His wife was a few years younger to him and his daugter was about to go to play school. The accident had happened in a small town in Tamil Nadu. You can imagine the frame of mind of the parents who hear the shocking news of the death of their only son whom they have thought to be the pillar of their family and expected to take care of them after a few years.

As usual the case was filed in the local court in Tindivanum and a prominent local lawer has promised that he will take care of the case and as soon as possible the same can be closed by getting the maximum claim amount. My in-laws are from Kochi and both of them were ailing from health problems. Over 6 years it took for the Tindivanum court to spell their decision to pay a compensation of approximately 8 lakhs against the death claim of 3 persons. United India Insurance Company, a government of India enterprise, have delayed any action from them for more than an year before they went for an appeal to High Court in Chennai saying that the amount awarded by the lower court was too much and pleaded for reduction in the amount. They chose to make the case split into 3 seperate petitions, which is a cheap tactics to increase the effort of claimants in dealing with the case. For insurance companies, claim and compensations are an every day job and they knew the other party who resides in Kerala state will not have the energy and resource to attend to these cases in seperate dates regularly and they can drag it further for many more years.

My father in law was refered to a Chennai high court lawyer by the earlier lawyer. The new lawyer was such an irresponsible person, that I still suspect whether he was taking care of the interest of United India Insurance company. My father in law was completely in the dark about what was going on in Chennai High court due to his attorney's ignorance and mis-communication. After I have relocated to Bangalore in 2009, I made many trips to Chennai High Court and finally decided to move the cases to Lok Adalath. During November 2010, an agreement between United India Insurance and us was made in from of Lok Adalath for a reduced amount from the awarded amount by the lower court. After November 2010, when I am writing it now in June 2012, 17 MONTHS after the settlement on a reduced amount in front of Lok Adalath and 15 YEARS from the accident death of the 3 member family, our lawyer is saying that the sum will be issued soon. How soon is the "soon".....who knows ?

It is high time that the government get out of insurance business.