#12.1 Kerala

• The red flag flies still over the state of Kerala. However, it seems this has little to do with the state’s world-renowned high literacy rate, whose history can be traced long before Independence and the beginning of independent political parties. For instance, the female literacy rate was “31.5% in Kerala in 1951 as against just 7.9 in India as a whole.” Much as in West Bengal – the other Indian state with periodic bouts of quasi-Marxist Government - it seems more likely that a literate population created the conditions for successful communism, rather than the other way round. [see here for some relevant-ish background]
• Instead, the difference seems to be routed in a different aspect of its history: Kerala's Christianity. More than 1/3rd of the state is Christian, most of that catholic. Early literacy programmes were begun by Christian missionaries. Latterly the State - unable properly to fund education - left it relatively open to the private sector (specifically NGOs in the school sector) to fill the gap. Christian groups were better able to raise funds for schools (largely from abroad), especially compared to Hindus groups in other states who lack an organised church, an active buearocracy and, perhaps most importantly, a body of rich people from whom they could solicit donations.
• A practical consequence of Kerala’s high literacy rate: people asking for money on the state’s train system carry printed cards explaining their reduced circumstances. The cards are double sided: English on one side, local language on the other.

• There are lots of good book shops here too. How sad that my bag never grows bigger.
  
• Unusually pointless Indian regulations, a continuing series: the government bans its airlines from using derivatives to hedge against fuel price fluctuation.
• Last year Indians bought 5m PCs, and 1m Laptops. In the US annual PC sales are roughly 60m. I can’t quite decide, given that, if 5m is a lot, or not.
• Sun Microsystems last week held its largest ever software development conference in Hyderabad, India’s second most successful IT hub. The sold-out event was held in the country’s largest conference centre, and more than 10,000 developers paid R1000 to attend. It was described in one paper as “the largest gathering of ‘Indian techies’ ever.”

#12 Kerala

• In India it isn’t rude to stare. More interestingly, people quite happily stare at others using gadgets in public places, in this case a (fairly loud) five minute hindi music video on a commuter train.
• Between 25,000 and 100,000 Indian farmers commit suicide annually. [Report in The Hindu].
  
• Wal-Mart is keen to open stores in India. Yet logistical bottle necks resulting from poor infrastructure are sufficiently severe to lead some to question whether the business model of big-box retail can even function here. For instance, the average western hypermarket carries at least than 35,000 product lines. No shops in India yet carry more than about 10-15,000. [Story in the Business Standard, they of the previously remarked upon unfortunate by-line policy.]
• Likely silly Indian regulations, the first in a series: "The Indian government did somewhat relax its FDI rules earlier this year, allowing "single-brand" retailers such as Nike or Gucci to own 51 percent of their business operations in India. However, this still precludes Wal-Mart, since the retailer sells a variety of brands in its stores." [Article on CNN.]
  
• As previously reported, India has only 35m income tax payers. However, in 1990, they had only 4m. 35m, out of a population of some c1 billion+, is good.
  
• Kerala. Upside: Pleasing beaches, sleepy canals. Downside: tedious westerners in indian garb - patterned tops, flappy orange trousers, head scraves, etc - going on about ashrams, and needing a foundation for their yoga practice. Its enough to make you yearn for palid twenty somethings in sharp glasses talking earnestly about social capital. Hang on. Perhaps I’ve found myself after all?

#11, Bangalore

• Bangalore has lots of shiny new malls. Most of have a large, noisy power generator outside, to cope with the region’s frequent power cuts.
• Female infanticide in India is now so common that the government is beginning to open pre-emptive orphanages for girls, to persuade parents to orphan rather than kill their daughters. At present it is thought that many thousands of Indian girls may be being killed every day:
  "Recent estimates of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in India reveal that out of 71,000 babies born every day in India, only 31,000 are female, with a ratio of 882 females for every 1000 males. According to the global average of 954/1000, at least 38,000 girls should be born every day. It is believed that this shortfall of 7,000 girls a day is due to the widespread use of female foeticide by parents." [Article in the Times of India, yesterday]
  
• There are 33 million Hindu gods, although a much smaller number are well known. Generally people have a favourite god, or gods.
• 75% of young Indians say they would prefer arranged marriages to “love marriages.”
• Taken together, these two facts mean that most Indians chose their favourite god but not their wife, broadly the reverse of what is true in the west.

• The percentage of Indians below the poverty line has fallen by half in the last 25 years.
• There are about 100m cell phone users in India. Amazingly, Nokia has 92% market share in the handset business.
• Roughly 4.5 million people in India are employed in the business process outsourcing (BPO) Industry.
• There is a mall in Kuala Lumpar which requires patrons to present either a credir card or a mobile phone to allow entry.

10.3 Bombay

• Cows without carts roam freely in Bombay. Cows with cars are sometimes restricted
• Indian women have on average 3 children, while those in developed countries have slightly less than 2. Those rates will converge by around 2030 as Indian fertility rates fall by a third. [XX Factor, a report by Roopa Purushotthaman, of The Future Group, Bombay.]
• 30% of Indian women work, compared to 70% in China. [ibid.]

• Tax collection rates in India are famously low, with roughly 1% of Indians paying Income Tax, and 40% of that number being found in Bombay. However, following tax cuts three years ago and because of strong growth, tax receipts have almost doubled in the last 3 years. Art Laffer should investigate.
• Indian airlines have hired more than 500 foreign pilots this year to satisfy a boom in regional air travel. Around 25 have since been sacked for poor English. [Report in Times of India]

• "Freedom fighters" get a discount on Indian railways.
  
• Roughly 10 people are killed on Bombay’s commuter trains daily, many simply from falling off. With 3500 deaths annually, Bombay is thought to be the most dangerous urban transit system on earth.
• Bombay is the world’s fifth most expensive city for office space, knocking New York out of the top 5. London’s West End, however, remains top with prices roughly twice that of either city.

10.2 Bombay

• What? You mean I really can't take guns into the bank?
  
• Executives at Cap Gemini have strings attached to their bonuses. One of these strings is how many seats in Indian call centres they help open. No more seats, no bonus. [Conversation with Cap Gemini executive at a party.]
• Many Indian child beggars are actually not from destitute families, but from working families in the suburbs. They are sent by their families to beg on the street in order increase the families income, normally to afford more expensive consumer durables. [Expose in this morning's Times of India.]
• 90% of Indian youth do not think it is appropriate for women to smoke. 85% do not think it is appropriate to smoke or drink with their parents. 75% of young indians would prefer to live with their families after marriage, rather than on their own. [Survey in India Today magazine].

• The Business Standard is among India's leading business papers. It is even pink, like that FT. However, unlike the FT, the contraction of their title introduces a credibility problem in their by-lines. They should think about fixing that.
• A 29' flat screen Colour TV costs $300 in India, but only $150 in China.
  
• Indians take cricket very seriously. A case in point, this conversation with Narriyan, our driver:
  

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"My friend's mother - she is indian - she lives in Florida; she says many people comit suicide if India lose at the cricket."
"Florida?"
"Yes. It's in America."
"No, this is not true Sir. No. "
"Really? She said it was true. She said many people."
"No. Many people? No."
"Really? "
"Oh yes. Perhaps only two or three per match?"
"Two or three? That is quite a lot? In England, we leave our suicide for the tail end batting." "Well, you see sir, there is choice. Some people, if we lose, they do the suicide. More go to player's house and throw bricks, or burn cars."
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10.1 Bombay

• There is a Lord Krishna Bank.
  
• A city block of buildings was today sold in Bombay. The Times of India reports: "In a price unheard of so far in the city, each shop owner in the society is expected to be paid at the rate of Rs 95,000 per square foot, while those owning flats will get Rs 38,000 a square foot to move out permanently.” Rs 95,000 is about $2150 By way of contrast, New York’s Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estates Manhatten Market Report for 2005 notes a bumper year in the Big Apple with “average price per square foot set a record at $965.”
• India’s GDP per capita is $705. The same figure for the US is $42,000.

• Bombay’s rush hour is 8 hours long. It goes from 7am to 11am, and 5.30pm until 9.30pm. [Conversation with a friend’s driver.]
• The commute between Bandra (North Bombay) and Colaba (South Bombay) normally takes 2 hours. Estimates now suggest that has increased by 15 minutes in around the last 8 months. This implies congestion growth of 25% roughly every year and half.
• India is 134th on the World Bank’s list of countries by “ease of doing business.”
• Sometimes translations in Indian papers don't quite hit the mark. An amusing case in point:
  
  "The “mysterious” girl who was molested and harassed by a group of hooligans at Gateway of India on the New Year’s eve has finally been identified. She is an American national, who has returned home since then….. “So far, we were groping in dark. Now at least our investigation has got definite direction,” said an official of the Colaba police station where the matter is being probed." [From the Mumbai Mirror, apparently in all seriousness.]

#10 Bombay

• Housing in Bombay is more expensive than New York. Legislation is so biased in favour of tenants, rather than landlords, that those seeking apartments are often asked to pay an 11-month deposit, on a 12-month lease to try and persuade people not to squat.
• Total energy demand in Mahrastra, the large state around Bombay: 15,200MW. Total supply: 9,5000MW. Result? Up to 18 hour a day blackouts in some rural areas. And riots. Who is to blame? Enron, claim the credulous authorities. They so looked forward to being able to benefit from Enron’s efficiency gains they forgot to build any new power stations in the late 1990s.
• Every Indian national election ever held has, at the time of its happening, been the biggest election ever. [from Edward Luce's book, Against the Gods.]
• Sachin Tandulkar has a restaurant in Bombay. It is called Tandulkars, and does lovely curried baby corn.

• Hotels I have stayed in whose names appear to herald great promise, but ultimately disappoint: the ocean view hotel; the lake-side inn; the rose garden house; the inn-crowd. [View above from the window of the "ocean view", Negumbo, Sri Lanka.]
  
• Thought: I am now in India. My USB Ports on my laptop are broken. If i call an IBM helpdesk, will it be a local call? Or, will i be put through to someone in Dublin, or Austen, pretending to put on an Indian accent? And if not the latter, how long until that actually does happen?
• People in India talk about the nuclearisation of the family, a rapid process ongoing process occurring simultaneously with the entry of women into the Labour force [conversation with Amand, the Herald Tribune’s South Asia correspondent.]
• The Indian national cricket team has a think tank.
  

#9.1, Colombo, Sri Lanka

• Sri Lanka’s President Ratapakse (ab0ve) is a strong man. It is said he can wrestle six men, possibly even eight. [Conversations with various taxi drivers.]
• Until very recently Sri Lanka had no restrictions to stop its female population working abroad. As a consequence large numbers move to work as domestic servants in the Middle East and elsewhere in Asia. Remittances make up around 10% of Sri Lanka’s GDP.
• At the time of the recent Lebaonon conflict, an estimated 40,000 Sri Lankan women working as servants were stranded in the country.
  
• As of last week, Sri Lanka has the world’s largest Cabinet. This followed a series of defections to the ruling party, partly encouraged by the creation of a dozen new cabinet positions for the defectors to fill. [Reports in Sri Lankan press]
• Different numbers divide Colombo, like Paris, into districts. Colombo 7, otherwise known as Cinnamon Gardens, is an upscale neighbourhood near the centre of town. Its residents are publicly derided as “Colombo 7 liberals”, giving it the same reputation as Hampstead, or San Francisco.

• Pinnawela Elephant Orphanage houses 85 parent-less elephants. One of them has only three legs. It stepped on one of the many mines that litter the north of the Island.
  
• The average tourist in the Maldive Islands spends $300 a day. [Economist Christmas edition article.]
• Updated. Dove adverts in Thailand use beautiful but naturally Thai models, because such modesl are the cultural equivalent of a “normal” looking female face. Almost all Thai adverts feature female models who are ethnically only half Thai: either Thai / Caucasian or Thai / Chinese. [Update to this post]
  

#9, Colombo, Sri Lanka

• Until the Friday before last, Bangkok was officially under martial law. This wasn't at all obvious if you happened to be there at the time.

• Thailand’s new Bangkok airport, Suvarnabhumi, is glorious to look at, but cracks have been found in some runways. This caused an understandable controversy, with delayed flights and embarrassment for officials. The ruling military Junta, however, actually seem to be playing up the problems in order to discredit, by association, former President Thaksin, a major advocate for the project. As a consequence, what should be a major source of pride for the Thai people is being deliberately turned into a national embarrassment – by their own government.
• Dhubai is building the world’s largest airport, Dhubai World Central. When completed the airport complex will have a permanent population of three quarters of a million people.
• Shanghai airport has a mono rail that travels at 450 kph. The journey, which used to take over an hour by road, takes roughly 10 minutes. [Conversation in Singapore Airport]

• Items for sale on a street market outside Bangkok's royal palace: post-cards, trinkets, bad food, and second-hand dentures.
• There were some bombs in Thailand recently. No one is sure who did them, but suspects include the Government. The Government is now ask Thai people to send their dogs to bomb training school.