Blog@GraceJunction

The Manmohan Singh government seeks a trust vote in the Lok Sabha today and the political drama in India has managed to attract widespread attention worldwide, as it will decide the fate of the Indo-US civil nuclear deal. Under this bilateral pact, the United States will provide India access to civilian nuclear technology and fuel in exchange for IAEA-safeguards on India’s civilian nuclear reactors.

A lot of time and energy was spent behind the passage of the Hyde Act in 2006. The leading opposition party BJP which laid the groundwork for the deal criticized the deal and does not want the government to accept the deal without a vote in the legislature. The Left too had withdrawn its support. The nuke deal has been scripted by Manmohan Singh but the political risk is almost that of Mrs. Gandhi. The possible UPA meltdown will be a hard blow for the party to bear. The loss could be terrible and a win might have a few downsides. (more…)

Few men sat together and played with the LIBOR rates in the wake of the US funds crisis and this has allowed in artificial interest rates into the world economy which could have serious ramifications very soon. LIBOR rates are used as benchmark for over 300 trillion USD worth of transactions worldwide!

Few men sit together at the OPEC and decide how much you and I will pay for our petrol or diesel. They decide the production limits of its constituent countries and this gives them large control over the prices of crude. The crude cost per barrel is estimated to be around 15 USD per barrel, that however is now selling at 130 USD per barrel or even more. (more…)

Out of the total arrests made in the country, 44.6% belonged to the 18-30 year age group. Many of them are novices and are not hardcore criminals. Most of them engage in crime for easy money, money they use to fulfill the aspirations raised in them by the “glamour” they see around.

The police and experts feel that these should be given “a second chance“, and they are sure that most of them will reform. Well, might be.

Many youngsters are increasingly being attracted to the word ‘hack’. They sleep during the day, chat with the world at night and make money too! Using ‘keywords’ and ‘codes’ and help from others across the world, they hack into servers of multinationals and payment gateways and make money through online fraud. It has changed their social life, made them happening and cool and also equipped them with the right gadgets! Another chance? (more…)

The Reserve Bank of India came out with advertisements titled ‘Know your Bank Note’in newspapers across the country to educate people in spotting counterfeit currency. Indians were exposed to terminologies and technologies there were unaware about earlier like watermark, latent image, micro lettering, see through register, optically variable ink, security thread, intaglio printing, omron anti-photocopying feature, flouresence et cetera. Most people never knew that the note in their hand had so many in-built security features. Most people, even now, do not understand the need for it!

Why should Reserve Bank be so concerned about counterfeit at all? Are these notes a threat at all? (more…)

It been some time since I blogged. Well, I didn’t have any withdrawal symptom for sure. I wanted to ensure that too because of the way I was blogging, I had a feeling, whether it was becoming a compulsion. Gladly, all is fine.

During the time of this hiatus, however, I did have my urges to blog over certain issues that came up, but then I was really held up with some or the other work.

During the week, two figures firmed up significantly enough to impact thousands of people.

One is the inflation in India. It is almost becoming a sinful indulgence to buy simple fruits and vegetables. The Alphonso Mango has become unapproachable. The vendor showed me four pieces and said with absolutely no feelings at all, “one hundred fifty”!! I mean, almost 38 for a mango! Gold is firming. Good. Realty is firming. Good. Deposits in bank are firming. Ok. What about liquid cash? We need cash for our regular routines and its power is surely draining away. We can’t sell gold everytime and eat the profits! Inflation is hitting everyone hard. I am buying Kesar and Badaam mangoes to make up for the Alphonso vacuum! (more…)

It was mid April when I read about the elaborate plans of the Chinese government, on how they are preparing themselves for the upcoming Olympics. Frankly, I was quite impressed about the level of thought & effort they are putting in, to make the event a success. If you’ve ever been to China and if you had a glimpse of what they have built it to be, you would surely bow down to their achievements. In everything that they did, they’ve shown it to the world.. what sheer human grit could achieve!

The news article read something like this “The Chinese government hopes launching shells containing silver iodide pellets into clouds will curb rainfall and ensure clear skies for the 2008 Summer Olympics opening ceremony in Beijing. According to the plan, 100 staff at 21 stations surrounding the city will have 10 minute window to blast away at the clouds so that they can be dispersed before they come near the stadium. Three aircrafts will also be on stand-by to drop catalysts on the clouds…!! (more…)

The economy is troubled. The US Fed has cut interest rate by another 25bp to 2%. Markets worldwide are worried by this trend. Prices of food and gas are rising. But a growing population is almost oblivious to these realities.

They are looking forward to the release of “Grand Theft Auto IV”, a fourth generation videogame release of ‘Grand Theft Auto’ series, known to have sold 70 million copies since its launch in 1997! And GTA 4 is expected to be the biggest videogame debuts ever. I know this is news to many of us! But the videogame market is excited, as it has countered the general negative economic trend of the US and infact the industry has registered a 63% growth in softwares and 46% in equipments! I mean, salary or not, increment or not, let’s game! (more…)

Picture this: A young marketing manager in his early twenties living in a posh locality and earning a handsome Rs 60,000 per month (and thankfully a bachelor) is contemplating suicide.

And why not? The guy just finds out that he is supposed to pay equated monthly installments (EMIs) worth Rs 80,000. No wonder, the very thought of burly collection executives thumping at his door might be giving him sleepless nights.

But who is to be blamed? The one who takes such loans or the one who gives?

From the time when applying for a loan was an ordeal to a time when it has been made a child’s play, the sheer availability of money has led many to take the plunge. From the time when providing all the right documents to assure your credibility to the bank or a financial institution was like walking through fire, to a time when one can avail credit even through a phone call. (more…)

The 80’s to the early years of the 21st century has seen the most happening time in history and I am privileged to have witnessed it all. Mankind has seen many changes in and around him. We have seen rapid strides being taken in education, technology and research. Communication has become faster and information is flying. Things which looked impossible in history are a reality today, what could not be achieved in centuries is getting achieved in a short span of time. Everything is measured in speed and size. Gone are the days, when parents used to tell their children that slow and steady wins the race, the fast and furious have taken over. The rabbit is worth emulating and he wins over the tortoise every time, or so it is believed to be!

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The Hadron Collider is not just bent on changing the basic laws of Physics, it is already paved the way for dismissing the current worldwide web and its outdated components such as routers and cables as jurassic.

When the ‘red button’ of the collider will be pressed this summer, this particle accelerator will not just give a preview of the origins of the universe but will also generate annual data that would require 56million CDs. That is a stack almost 50miles high!

The only option before them was the internet but then, the speed was crippling and therefore necessity forced another child to be invented, ‘The Grid’. The Grid uses state of the art fibre optic cables and some 2,00,000 servers interconnected to form a parallel internetwork connecting various nations. And the fascinating thing is that, it is almost 10,000 times faster than the internet! (more…)