Ray captures Tagore’s protagonists on celluloid with loving sensitivity and insight, probing the theme of love outside marriage and women’s understanding of their own emotions and sexuality. Is it wrong for a married woman to lose control or is it wrong for her to endure a sanctified yet unexciting relationship? Does she really have a choice or are the options mere illusions? Continue reading

It is difficult to practice leadership if one is not authentic but manipulative. It is easy to engineer favorable first and or mass impressions but in a globalized world with access to multiple channels of data, those aren’t the impressions people are falling for anymore. Continue reading

How often have we seen leaders who do not quite measure up? They may be holding the highest offices but fall short on desired behavior and attributes. They are leaders by definition and role and yet not quite there in essence. Continue reading

The unrest that civilized societies have to now contend with is the symptom of a deep malaise; the bruised parts have turned malignant! Millions on the dark fringes stand radicalized; with many indoctrinated to believe that a heavenly afterlife is the real reward. Continue reading

We live in times of mindless violence and extremism, much of it caused by racial and religious hatred. When faith becomes a conduit for obscurantism and turns men into beasts, it is time to separate the seed from the husk and embrace the essence of the highest spiritual thought. INDIE... Continue reading

Organizational culture and organizational emotions are closely related but are not interchangeable. The culture is developed through observation and mass following (active or passive) of a largely unwritten code of workplace behavior and decision-making exhibited by the majority of key influencers in any organization. The dominant emotion of an organization is the manifestation of employees’ response to that culture and its impact on their key motivators. Continue reading

Last week, Cate Blanchett won the Oscars for her role in ‘Blue Jasmine’. Back in India, Kangana Ranaut and Aliya Bhatt, the two leading ladies of their films – ‘Queen’ and ‘Highway’ have turned in spectacular performances that could pit them against each other for the coveted national award for best actress. While Kangana plays a simpleton dumped by her fiancée a day before marriage, Aliya plays the stifled daughter of a rich industrialist who is kidnapped by a killer. Continue reading

Whether it was the struggler of Saath Saath, the devastated lover of Bazaar or the loafer of Shatranj Ke Khiladi, Farooq Sheikh essayed his roles with ease and conviction. To many of us, he was the lover boy without biceps and a smartphone. Usually, he had no or little money and lived off friends’ grants and tuitions. He could be seen walking in the streets, bag of vegetables in hand, wearing old slim fit shirts and bell bottoms. He could also be spotted singing in college canteens and waiting in long queues for sales jobs. And yet, he never failed to charm with his disarming smile and Nehruvian ideals. Continue reading

The fantastic success of the Aam Aadmi Party (ordinary people’s party, also called ‘mango’ for the Hindi word ‘aam’) is a result of its ability to capitalize on the fashionable wave of cynicism sweeping urban India, harnessing a Gandhian movement for an anti-corruption law and drawing legitimacy through subtle but firm media endorsement. But let’s hope that our mango men don’t go the Arab Spring way! Continue reading

As people seek out the more righteous among the two – Devyani and Sangeeta, famous prosecutor Preet Bharara plays out his defense of the marshals while our politicians tread carefully in an election year. The moral of the story is that while one may be anybody in Manhattan, it generally pays more to be a maid in the U.S.A. Continue reading

In acknowledging his wife Anjali in the way that he did and apologizing to his children about not being able to spend time with them over the past 16 years, Sachin did something that Indian men hardly every do, especially in public. And it is this balance between tradition and modernity that positions an emergent India to succeed in the new millennium. Continue reading

India’s mid-day meal program is one of the largest such schemes in the world, serving almost 107 million children in about 1.2 million government and government-aided schools in the country. Free and wholesome food is certainly the greatest reason why many impoverished parents send their wards to school. So compelling... Continue reading

The image of a resurgent, nuclear-powered India is at complete odds with horrifying tales of pedophiles striking at will, vultures riding public buses and cops who support crime. The international business community is perplexed and confused; wondering how they can do business in a city like Delhi. Continue reading

In the moneyed neighbourhoods of Delhi lies a deep-rooted bias for the male child. Inheritance laws and centuries of subjugation have relegated women to being second class citizens. Things are changing but social change has not kept pace with the economic boom. Arranged marriages are still the preferred choice and boys don’t work in the kitchen or sweep the floor. India’s middle classes live in Victorian England! Continue reading

The mechanical, hierarchical corporations of the last century did not afford opportunity for discretion and role refinement but they were effective in their own right. New age companies, on the other hand, pride themselves on an entrepreneurial workplace. But what happens when employees define their own agendas based on weighted needs of certainty, growth or success? Continue reading

Sixty five years after independence, Gandhi’s dream stands hijacked as India's polity is held to ransom by a powerful few who have reduced democracy, through careful and calibrated subversion, to a mere spectatorship. This is even as a new class of ruling elite has emerged in the land, adding more dynasties that stake claim to political inheritance and entitlement. Continue reading

Germany’s defeat to Italy in the semifinals of the Euro Cup 2012 on 27 June 2012 reminded me of its defeat to Spain on 6 July 2010 at the World Cup in South Africa. The Germans are known for dedication, precision and discipline. With time, their inexperienced football team will surely mature and bring home a major trophy. However, they would do well to learn a trick from the sheer daring of Prandelli’s Italy. Continue reading

Vietnam has conquered its past and is set to carve a rich destiny for its people. It will grow at 6% in 2012, not far behind India’s dodgy 6.5% and China’s 7%. It is true that full civil liberty and democracy still eludes the nation, but the pictures we now see are not of crying children running to escape bombs. Continue reading

What gets us so hooked to social media in the first place? The technology may be new but it appeals to the basic human psyche which remains unchanged from the Stone Age. Just like narcotics, social media creates a compelling pseudo-reality that redeems our innermost desires and fantasies and lifts our self-esteem. Continue reading

While the upper middle class is upgrading from LCDs to LEDs, India's political parties are building voter constituencies with the promise of free tablets, colour TVs and subsidized rail tickets. Bereft of any core ideology, these parties have found mass populism to be a convenient route to power. Continue reading

As bank loans become scarce and expensive and governments balance inflation and liquidity, Asian giants harvest the bond markets. Continue reading

Indian cricket ignores change at its own peril. In quite a turnaround, the Oz media has now branded the losing guest team as a ‘heap of rubbish!’ We hope that the team turns it around at Adelaide but know very well that those who fail to plan are planning for failure. Continue reading

The worship of the divine Mother is not confined to the Hindus alone. Various cultures across centuries, have at some point of time or the other, affirmed the presence and benevolence of a supernatural feminine force. Continue reading

From buying US bonds to bailing out Italy to doling out soft loans to MNC customers via state-owned corporations, China is the messiah of our times. Continue reading

One wishes that the industry in Britain would emulate the success their dairy farms have had. Because in terms of the current recession, the average Brit is left wondering, “Who moved my cheese?” Continue reading