Turn Around India (Through Inclusive Governance and Team Spirit) by R P Gupta

The book was released in January 2013 by Sri. Narendra Modi, Chief Minister, Government of Gujarat INDIA.

Need for tax reforms: Total individual tax payers in India is hardly 3.5 crore out of 120 crore population. It means tax compliance is barely 3% as compared to 45-50% in the USA.With such massive non-compliance, it is better to amend the law instead of converting everybody as law violators. It is therefore, recommended to replace 'personal income tax' through expenditure tax and then merge it with GST (Goods and Services tax) which will be revenue neutral. It will not violate legislature intention to tax rich persons and to re-distribute among others.

There is general reluctance from unorganized sector for keeping themselves within the net of indirect taxes like VAT and service tax. This is mainly due to tax hazards, compliance cost and fear arising out of compliance formalities. Introduction of GST will be a good solution, provided it is simplified for SMEs. Merger of multiple taxes will become an incentive for compliance. Some special provision may be incorporated for small enterprises such as self assessment and exemption for maintaining books of account.

High rate of Stamp Duty is a deterrent in land and real estate business for disclosing full value of the transaction which should be slashed down to 2% on uniform basis in the country. Some tax incentive may be extended on long term capital gain arising out of sale of land and real estate. This should convert majority of real estate transactions into its full value. Therefore, deployment of black income on real estate shall also reduce.

If the Government hence, takes a bold step to merge personal income tax into GST, the result could be astonishing on the front of savings and investments without any loss of revenue. In addition, government borrowing cost is likely to reduce by about Rupees one lakh crore. Non tax revenue and capital receipts should be increased with similar innovations.

Quality Management by Bindiya Goyal

ISO 9000 Standards:
The focus of ISO 9000 standards is on the generation of confidence in product conformance and on process management with customer as the main driving force.

ISO 9000 series consist of five individual standards of which three are quality management systems and the other two are guidelines for selection and employment of quality system.

ISO 9000 - Quality management and Quality assurance standards - Guidelines for selection and use
It focuses on rigorous auditing during the certification process. For eg., quality system, process control, management responsibility, quality rewards and statistical techniques.

ISO 9001 - Quality System - model for Quality assurance in design, development, production, installation and service
It includes all documenting operations like design, production, service inspection, testing, installation, training etc.

ISO 9002 - Quality system - Model for Quality assurance in Production and Installation & Servicing
It is used for detecting and correcting problems in contract negotiations between the supplier and purchases. This is often employed by the manufacturers.

ISO 9003 - Quality Systems - Model for Quality Assurance in Final Inspection & Test

ISO 9004 - Quality Management and Quality System Elements - Guidelines
It provides planning and implementing guidelines for managing producers goods and services

Quality Management Principles

1. Focus on customers
2. Leadership
3. Involvement of Employees
4. Process Approach
5. Interrelated Approach to Management
6. Continuous Improvement
7. Objectivity in Data Analysis for Effective Decsions
8. Mutually Beneficial Relationship

Benefits

1. Strengthens the relationships between suppliers and customers
2. Reduces dependence on individuals
3. Institutionalize training throughout the organisation
4. Reduces customer auditing
5. Fewer external audits
6. Optimum utilization of resources
7. Compliance to trade regulations at National and International Level
8. Company certified by quality systems will strengthen customer confidence by assuring excellence

Open Access movement in the Age of Innovation and ICT

Copyrght: is the exclusive right to publish and distribute a work. Copyright is a bundle of rights, automatically assigned to the author(s) by legislation in most countries. Copyright is the exclusive right of the author to derive economic benefits from his own writing or artistic performance or creative work.
      The infringement of the copyright in a work occurs if one or more of the following acts take place without the aurhtorisation of the copyright owner
1. Reproduction of the work in the material form
2. Publication of the work
3. Communication of the work to the public
4. Performance of the work in Public
5. Translation of the work.

Digital copyright protection technologies

Digital water mark technology is the form of stenography in which copyright and other source information is hidden inside a document, image or sound file without the user's knowledge, but copies will retain the information.

Cryptography involves encryption of information to render it unreadable or not understandable language, which only the legitimate user can decrypt.

Electronic Marking is generated by the computerthat is tagged to each of the digital object. The computer also registers the recipient of an illegally copied digital object.

Digital Signature, also known as electronic signature is an electronic data attached to associated digital object and serves as a system of authentication. This concept is to make the data illegible for everyone else except those specified.

Plagiarism

"to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own; to use without crediting the source; to commit literary theft; in other words, an act of fraud.

Types of Plagiarism as listed by plagiarism.org

• The Ghost Writer
• The Photocopy
• The Potluck Paper
• The Poor Disguise
• The labour of laziness
• The self-stealer

Other types of plagiarism not listed by plagiarism.org

• The Unintentional
• The Unconscious
• The Photographic Memory
• The Archives Digger
• The Inspired

Also, there are other forms under situations cited to be plagiarism

• The forgotten footnote
• The Misinformer
• The Too-perfect Paraphrase
• The Resourceful Citer
• The Perfect Crime

Editors: Dr. Ancy Jose; Dr. Prathiba A. Gokhale; Santosh C. Hulagabali published by HIMALAYA PUBLISHING HOUSE PVT. LTD.

J R D Tata by M A Shewan

Jehangir Ratanji Dadabhoy Tata was a legend in his life time. Under him Tata group diversified into a large number of sectors from airlines to hotels, trucks to locomotives, heavy chemicals to pharmaceuticals, financial services, tea, information technology, etc. He was also the longest serving member of the Atomic Energy Commission.

Quiet spoken, with piercing green-blue eyes, and acquiline nose and an aristocratic air, JRD remained a much revered figure within the Tata organization and some what of an Institution abroad. A casual dresser, he refrained from the ostentatious lifestyles of many Indian industrialists, preferring to live in a rented bungalow surrounded by skyscrapers in downtown Bombay.

JRD scoffed at the idea of being characterised as the Rockefeller of India. "I have never had an interest in the accumulation of wealth". He says, 'I have always been more interested in what wealth can do for the betterment of society.'

"I suppose the big difference between the Tatas of India and the other great founders of trusts and foundations is that, while the Fords and the Rockefellers have remained very wealthy, the Tatas have retained very little individual wealth".

He reckoned that this personal wealth was probably just over $.200,000, noting: "I am not even close to being a dollar millionnaire because whatever I inherited I put in a charity trust many, many years ago".

JRD entered the Tatas as an unpaid apprentice in December 1925. His mentor was John Peterson, a Scotsman who had joined the Group after serving in the Indian Civil Service. At 22, soon after his father passed away, he was on board of Tata Sons, the Group's flagship company.

At the age fo 34, in 1938, JRD was elected Chairman of Tata sons making him the youngest head of the largest industrial group in India. His leadership at Tata Sons, at the beginning had 14 enterprises which half a century later had expanded to a conglomerate of 95 enterprises.

Breaking from the common practice of having members of one's family run different operations in a business, JRD urged to bring in professionals to the table. He turned the Tata group into a business federation, where enterpreneurial talent and expertise were encourage to flower.

He for the first time, pioneered the system of developing 'employee welfare schemes' in corporate India and steered the principles of an eight hour working day, free medical aid, workers' provident fund and accident compensation schemes, which were later, adopted as statutory requirements in India.

Self effacing, modest, wistful and endearing are a few of the (adjectives) laurels used to describe JRD.

In 1992, because of his selfless humanitarian endeavours, JRD Tata was awarded India's highest civilian honour, the BHARAT RATNA. In the same year, JRD Tata was also bestowed with the United Nations Population Award for his crusading endeavours towards initiating and successfully implementing the family planning movement in India, much before it became an official governmental policy.

JRD never forgot these words uttered by his father, the Founder:
"We do not claim to be more unselfish, more generous or more philanthropic than other people. but we think we started on sound and straightforward business principles, considering the interests of the shareholders our own, the health and welfare of the employees the sure foundation of our success."

-Jamshetji



Sarojini Naidu by M A Shewan

The respect and dignity of Indian womanhood lives throuth the names of Sita, Savitri, Draupadi, Damayanti & Shakuntala. Referring their glorious names and comparing them with fragrance of nasturtiums is really an outstanding achievement

"Your(Nasturtiums) leaves interwoven of fragrance and fire
Are Savitri's sorrow and Sita's desire
Draupadi's longing, Damayanti's fears
And sweetest Shakuntala's magical tears.

In praise of Rajput Queen, Rani Padmini of Chittor:

What can rival the valiant joy
Of your dazzling fugitive sheen?
The limpid clouds of the lustrous dawn
That colour the ocean's mien?
Or the blood that poured from a thousand breasts
To succour a Rajput Queen
                                                   ...In Praise of Gulmohar blossoms

The song of Radha-the Milk maid

These curds that are white as the clouds in the sky
When the breezes of Shravan are blowing?

But my heart was so full of your beauty, beloved
They laughed as I cried without knowing:

Govinda! Govinda!
Govinda! Govinda!

How softly the river was flowing!

The beauty of the Indian village in verse:

A brown quail cries from the tamarisk bushes
A bulbul calls from the cassia-plume
An oxcart stumbles upon the rocks
And awistful music pursues the breeze
From a shepherd's pipe as he gathers his flock
Under the pipal trees
And a young Banjara driving her cattle
Lifts up her voice as she glitters by
In an ancient ballad of love and battle
Set top the best of a mystic tune
And the faint stars gleam in the eastern sky
To herald a rising moon

To the flower girls:

What do you weave, O ye flower girls?
With tassels of azure and red
Crown for the brown of a bridegroom
Chapelts to garland his bed
Sheets of white blossoms new gathered
Tp perfume the sleep of the dead.

The Bhagavad Gita by Dr. S G Mudgal

On seeing all the kinsmen or relatives, thus standing in battle order, Arjuna, the son of Kunti was overcome by great compassion and said this in sadness: O krishna, seeing my friends and relatives standing before me ready for war and eager to fight, my limbs are quivering and they have lost their strength, my mouth has become dry. My whole body is trembling. My hair is standing on its end. The great bow (Gandiva) is slipping from my handand I am getting feverish. I have no strength to stand. My mind has become restless.

Krishna replied: Arjuna, In this hour of crisis, wherefrom has this dejection overtaken you? It is a disgrace to leave the battlefield and give up fighting. Do not yield to impotence and recall all the many battles you have fought and your spirit of adventure and success stories are quite well known. To bring back Arjuna to his senses and stiop him from committing an infamous act of quitting the battlefield, Krishna preached Arjuna to the Celestial Song of the Gita:



Jiva(life) is nitya(eternal) except that it is perishable in all forms. Krishna says that the material body of the indestructible eternal living entity does come to an end and urges Arjuna, who is the descendant of Bharata, to fight the war. It is said that jivas as reflections of the all pervading and imperishable God, the jivas are embodied and the gross bodies of the eternal jivas which we see are subject to destruction or come to an end. Therefore, Arjuna, fight.

Arjuna, whenever there is decline of righteousness and when there is rise of unrighteousness, I send forth myself, I descend myself-The mission being to lead People towards God and appreciate doctrines of religion.

For the protection of the good and for the destruction of the evil or the wicked and for the establishment of law of righteousness, I come into being aeons after aeons. This is referred to as the Incarnation of the Lord.

He who works giving up attachment to fruits offering them to God, with the belief these works get performed by him for his own welfare, is not touched by sin, like the lotus leaf which is not affected by mirth of water

He who is steady and unmoved by opposites like heat and cold, honour and dishonour, he who is satiated with the objects of senses and to whom the clod of earth, a stone and a piece of gold are equally insignificant, is the truly liberated one.

He who is equal minded about the indwelling God among friends, companions and enemies, the indifferent and the impartial , the hateful and the related, saints and sinners, is said to be the enlightened one.

God is indwelling in all these People and knowing that there is no difference between God as he is and his various forms and attributes. Having obtained this level of Yoga, he thinks that there is nothing greater to gain beyond it. And once established in it, not even by the heaviest of the sorrows. he is shaken.

Hence, Arjuna, FIGHT! 

ASHOKA the Great

'satyam brruyat priyam bruyat, ma bruyat satyam apriyam'. According to the Indian notion, the truthful speech carries with it pleasant, sweet and appealing, so as the adage goes. Devanampriya Priyadarshin was the title bestowed upon Ashoka from the edicts found in the brahmi script. Ashoka - the beloved of the gods. His life's message is ' P R E V E N T I O N   O F   W A R

When Chanda Ashoka (Ahoka the Fierce) reflected upon  the scene of carnage and bloodshed and after effects of the aggressive war waged on Kalinga, it occurred to him, the painful guilt of having slain a vast majority of people in pursuit of winning over an unconquered country. Many other Rulers have also felt the guilt after seeing the devastation and ill-effects of war. But, it was only Ashoka who openly admitted to it and devoted his life to spread of BUDDHISM He took on to Buddhism and reigned upon the vast country of Indian continent that stretched from Afghanistan to Kashmir in the North, uptil the foot of the Himalayas in the east and the Deccan Plateau in the South.

Tradition ascribes to Ashoka the foundation of 2 cities, the first being Srinagara, the capital of Kashmir. He built 500 Buddhist monasteries together with other edifices. The second city is the Devapattana (Deo-Patan) in Nepal and four stupas still standing in the archaic style.

Here's the excerpt from Sid's blog: http://sidshome1.blogspot.com/2006/09/king-devanampiya-piyadasi-and.html

The Ashoka Chakra and the Lion Capital – these symbols of modern India connect us to our glorious past. They arouse in us a sense of pride and grandeur, reminding us of our long and magnificent heritage. Mahatma Gandhi, commenting on the national flag, said, “looking at the wheel some may recall that Prince of Peace, King Ashoka, ruler of an empire, who renounced power. He represents all faiths; he was an embodiment of compassion. … Ashoka’s Chakra represents the eternally revolving Divine Law of Ahimsa.” And according to Jawaharlal Nehru “we have associated with our flag not only this emblem but in a sense the name of Ashoka, one of the most magnificent names in India’s history and the world.” Today every school child in India learns about Emperor Ashoka's righteous rule over a vast empire, and about the Maurya and the Gupta dynasty, now referred to as the Golden Age of India. 

Asokan Edict - Delhi Inscription

Transliteration

devānaṁpiye piyadasi lājā hevaṁ āhā ye atikaṁtaṁ
aṁtalaṁ lājāne husa hevaṁ ichisu kathaṁ jane
dhaṁmavaḍhiyā vāḍheya nocujane anulupāyā dhaṁmavaḍhiyā
vaḍhithā etaṁ devānaṁpiye piyadasi lājā hevaṁ āhā esame
huthā atākaṁtaṁ ca aṁtalaṁ hevaṁ ichisu lājāne katha jane

Translation

Thus spoke king Devanampiya Piyadasi: "Kings of the olden time have gone to heaven under these very desires. How then among mankind may religion (or growth in grace) be increased? Yea, through the conversion of the humbly-born shall religion increase"