ASSAM / MEGHALAYA: BORDER DISPUTES

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Blood spills at Lampi
Four Khasis perish in the violence that rocked the area

The border dispute between Assam and Meghalaya has been resolved. But before that the Lampi area of Boko town in Lower Assam was rocked with violence in which at least four Khasis lost their lives and more than twenty people, including four police officials, sustained injuries.

This was not a one-off incident. Border disputes exist in several places of Assam mainly at Merapani area of Golaghat district and some places of Sivsagar district in Upper Assam area. The locals in these areas don’t know when violence will erupt. However, the Lampi incident that took place on May 15 grabbed headlines. More than hundred Khasi people armed with sharp weapons attacked the local Nepalis of the Lampi area. Besides, they also attacked a battalion camped in the area. “When the Khasis didn’t surrender after several warnings, the Assam police opened fire to control the situation. The government has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the incident,’’ says revenue minister of Assam Dr. Bhumidhar Barman, who visited the violence-hit area with state health minister Himanta Biswa Sharma to convince the locals to end violence.

Also, the disputed area of Lampi was discussed with the deputy chief minister of Meghalaya and a few other representatives of the Meghalaya government. Though the hilly area comes under the Boko police station of Kamrup rural district, the Khasis of Meghalaya have been claiming Lampi as integral part of Meghalaya. The Khasis residing in 13 villages of Lampi area always identify themselves with Meghalaya. And they also force the local Nepalis to associate themselves with Meghalaya. Some locals said this creates rift between them.

Concerned with the development in Lampi, the Indian Government reviewed the situation and dispatched a senior officer of the Ministry of Home Affairs to the area to discuss the matter with both the Khasi and Nepali communities. Official sources say Union Home Minister P Chidambaram — scheduled to visit Assam shortly — is likely to discuss the Lampi issue with the government. Other officials who visited the locality included deputy secretary of Ministry of Home Affairs Ajay Kanojia and Deputy Commissioner and Superintendents of Police of both Kamrup rural and west Khasi Hills district. Kanojia said both the governments of Assam and Meghalaya are making efforts to resolve the boundary disputes. Besides, people of both the communities submitted a memorandum to the government. The Khasi people want the government to set up a police outpost of Meghalaya police for their security and safety.

Dr. Barman says: “The decision of the Supreme Court will be regarded as the final regarding the border dispute. Police presence in the area has been increased and two new police posts have been set up in the area to maintain law and order.”

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2010.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

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Building dreams & real(i)ty!!!

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4ps b&m talks to the man behind the omaxe dream about his perception and his growth strategies...

4Ps B&M: How do you see the current financial dynamics affecting the real estate industry?
Rohtas Goel (RG): The Real Estate market is experiencing some ups and downs. The situation for the sector looks very strained because of a combined pressure from rising input costs, escalation in inflation and rise in interest rates. However, the long-term forecasts for the sector continue to be good.

4Ps B&M: Do you think there can be more correction in the prices in times to come and why?
RG: The forces of demand and supply are the factors responsible for price correction. The clusters of small developers that have entered the industry very recently have substantially increased the supply level. However factors like inflation and costly home loans have given a setback to the demand. Hence the market has to reach an equilibrium which is only possible through a correction. But, the changes in prices wouldn’t be much because of the increasing increase in the input costs.

4Ps B&M: What are the key challenges for the industry and how can one address them?
RG: The Indian Real estate sector has emerged as one of the most dynamic sectors over the last couple of years with sustained growth. The price correction of inputs is the basic correction which will impact the overall cost of projects. Also a reduction in interest rates and check on inflation will give more purchasing power to consumers which can be diverted to the sector. Though inflation will put pressures on the purchasing power of the people, yet the high level of disposable incomes, easy availability of housing finance, and also the need for a housing unit for an individual will always remain high on priority. As a result of economic buoyancy, the developers will continue to offer projects to cater to the ever-growing demand for quality residential space.

4Ps B&M: In the recent past, formats of developments have undergone a complete change. How do you see the real estate market shaping up in the future?
RG: From our recent offerings of affordable housing and high end luxury projects, Omaxe foresees a good demand ahead. We have created a niche market for ourselves. But, the way forward is consolidation & innovation in products which can help a developer sustain himself in such dynamic market conditions. We believe that the real estate business will continue to remain a good medium for long-term investment. We are also coming up with a lot of luxurious projects in addition to existing 54 residential & commercial projects consisting of a Hotel, 24 Group Housing projects, 16 integrated townships, 14 shopping malls & commercial complexes. Nobody wants to compromise on issues related to lifestyle and housing.

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

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The Gurus... on how they cracked the Big Idea!

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Up next is the great Leo Burnett. While he totally endorsed Bernbach’s view on “saturating oneself with product knowledge,” he took it further. “I believe in solid, in-depth interviews of people I am trying to sell to. I try to get a picture in my mind of the kind of people they are, how they plan to use the product, what motivates their purchase-pattern and triggers their interest-area?”

Burnett then moves on to reveal a fascinating secret that even intrigued the likes of David Ogilvy… a great big folder tucked away in the lower left-hand corner of his work-desk, called the corny language dossier! “It’s like this. Whenever I hear a phrase in conversation – or any place – which strikes me as being particularly apt in colourfully expressing an idea, bringing it to life or accentuating the smell of it, I quickly scribble it down and shove it in the folder. Then, about 3 or 4 times in the year, I run through all the stuff, chuck out a lot of it and retain those that seem relevant to the kind of work we’re doing. I write a memo to inform the creative group and staff about this. So my ear is always tuned for putting usual things in unusual settings/relationships that – both – get attention and aptly communicate the big, core idea. I also have another bulging file. I call it ads worth saving and it’s an on-going thing, been with me for some 25 years! I go through them too. Extremely rejuvenating, both …”

Who better to round-off this amazing tell-all discourse than the legendary David Ogilvy. What did he do to make his stuff rock? “I try and loosen up if I’ve got to write some ad or get some ideas, otherwise there is a likelihood of feeling sterile and un-inventive. Many people – and I am one of them – are more productive and fertile when they’ve had a little to drink. I find if I drink 2 or 3 Brandies or a good bottle of Claret, I am far better able to write. I’ve also found the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, a useful start-up for ideas.”

He then warms up to present a fascinating insight. “The posture that I take when I finally close the door and have to write an ad is this: I always pretend that I am sitting beside a woman at a dinner party and she ask me for advice about which product she should buy, why and where she should buy it. So then, I write down what I would say to her! I try to make it interesting, engaging and personal – I don’t write for the crowd; rather from one human being to another in the second person, singular. And I try not to bore the woman to death by trying to make it as real and personal as possible. Incidentally, I have a theory that the best ads come from personal experience. My best ones certainly have. They have a sense of conviction, passion, validity and power of persuasion that is unquestionable…”

Right guys, got it? Thus spake the legendary gurus. Now, suitably inspired, get back to work. What? Starting problems? Oh God!

For more articles, Click on IIPM Article.

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
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They say fall of Wall Street giants will not have a bigger impact on Indian markets.

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They say fall of Wall Street giants will not have a bigger impact on Indian markets. But with a sectorial review things may sound different, says Sunanda Roy

A humorous Internet one liner says, “Evening news is where they begin with ‘Good evening’, and then proceed to tell you why it isn’t”. Well, see any edition of any business news these days and you would get to know how true it is. Moreover, down on its knees the global financial market is providing them more than enough events to further validate the hypothesis mentioned above. Back home in India the domestic stock market too is leaving no stones unturned to help the news channels. But then, blame the modern era of highly integrated financial markets for this, which have ensured a negative impact of the US turmoil on the Indian stock market. Fall of the Wall Street giants, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and AIG – as if they are exemplifying what the ‘Domino effect’ is all about – quashed whatever little confidence investors were left with after the mayhem that they witnessed earlier this year. But the million dollar question is, did it actually impact India enough to draw a prolonged red line on the Dalal Street? Perhaps, that’s the priceless answer all investors are looking for at the moment.

So far, the overall reaction is quite soft – nobody has predicted any long term harassment on the Indian capital markets. Going by the words of Sandeep Nayak, Senior VP & Head – PCG dealing, Kotak Securities, “The Indian stock market will suffer from the contagion effect of the global crisis and move in tandem with the American markets for the short term.”

But then, how can one forget that the Indian stock market is still a slave to Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs). They have always reacted to FII movements, be it when they have pumped in money or when they have sucked out. And currently, the global financial crisis has made them take a flight back from risky emerging assets (equities and commodities) to safe havens like the US treasuries and bullions. Pankaj Pandey, Head of Equity Research, ICICIdirect.com avers, “As Indian markets are too FII sensitive, this pullout, as already seen, will continue to suck out liquidity from the Indian stock markets. This year itself, FIIs have pulled out close to $8 billion from the equity markets and since then the Sensex has corrected by 30%. Hence, one can asses the impact of FII liquidly in the markets.” FII pull out will not only keep the downward pressure intact on the bourses, it will also keep them volatile. Chances of volatility being persistent also increases manifold owing to relatively low volumes, bad market depth and breadth and distress selling by retail investors. It’s simply for the fact that absence of foreign money will see the market trade range bound along with some nibbling done by the domestic insurance and asset management companies.

For more articles, Click on IIPM Article.

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
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It is not easy...

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Mahesh Chauhan,
President, Rediffusion

“It is not easy...”

“It’s not easy for a client to change his agency. He makes a certain investment in an agency and change means that he’d have to invest all over again in a new agency. It’s not easy. So, unless there is a strong cause for a change, led by maybe non-delivery or non-performance, the client will not change his agency. But on the other hand, the CMO is no longer under 1-5 year time cycles. He is virtually evaluated on a 1-3 months performance. The pressure is humongous. If an agency partner is not up to that speed then the CMO has no option but to look at other more promising agencies.

If you were to flip this argument and look at it from an agency point of view, I genuinely believe that the agency game hasn’t really evolved here. We have virtually become vendors of the creative product which is mainstream, traditional and not really hi-tech. Clients come to me for TV, print, radio, outdoor and go to somebody else for digital solutions. This de-bundling and media fragmentation, led to fragmentation of agency products too, which led to a lowering of the agency value, from a client point of view. So if the client is not ascribing so much of importance to you, as compared to a holistic communication consultant (as in the past), the threshold is lowered - agencies themselves have lowered it. Therefore you see that there are more pitches happening today than ever before, from a purely statistical point of view. But, the savvy marketer still believes in – and maintains a longer term perspective of his relationship with the agency.“

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

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Monojit Lahiri attempts a peep into male-zone to investigate the accuracy behind the projections and portrayals of this creature in today’s ad space

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Hey c’mon guys, everybody – and that includes screaming, fire-eating libbers and their docile, quaint, demented toothless aunts – has opinions about how women are portrayed in today’s advertising, right? What about ‘MEN’ … what’s their scene? Is the poor sucker also taken to the cleaners by a militant mob or the portrayals, generally perceived as realistic, honest and true-to-life?

Ad person Moon Moon Dhar believes the latter and for good reasons. “There is a sea change when you compare today’s guys with those of the last generation. The perspectives, mindsets and attitudes of my father, husband [and hopefully] my son are worlds apart! I think this has been captured, with reasonable accuracy, by today’s ad people. There actually exists avatars of the man-boy, spoilt brat, goof-nerd-dumbo, caring type, Mr. Responsible, the sexy hunk, the stylish dude… the range and bandwidth is there reflecting the gradual evolution of the male. The Dharmendra-type has been replaced by the sensitive, caring sort … and it shows.” Journo Sapna Khanna agrees. She believes that stereotypes cannot – be it Bollywood or Advertising – disappear or be wished away overnight. After all it is tried – and – tested seduction in the public space designed to single-mindedly trigger the purchase intent and therefore needs all the artillery [read: masala!] it can get. “However, within that framework, most of the recent male-centric ads appear spot-on. The era of the MCP’s and overbearing louts are over. Today’s males are sensitive, caring and involved with family matters. They take pride in sharing space in the kitchen, PTA’s and children’s functions at school. The boundaries are blurring.” She cites her own example where her boyfriend of six years is “today my husband of 16 years!”

Gorgeous theatre activist Lushin Dubey, however, begs to differ. She believes that today’s advertising sexily, glamorously, stylishly – with all the techno gizmos available at their disposal – pirouettes, preens and postures but doesn’t even begin to portray the real thing. And what is this real thing, Maam? “The simple fact that today’s men are schizos! They are struggling to find their space, define themselves, discover where they are coming from and where they want to go … in short, figure out who they really are or want to be!” She believes that today’s guys are trapped between yesterday and tomorrow and don’t quite know how to react. The advertising, hence, is superficial because if one were to scratch the glam surface, all the smart poses and pretentious, confused emoting would disappear revealing the real laadla, spoilt, mama’s boy. “This genre of advertising appears to concentrate more on entertainment than truth! Agreed not all of it is hogwash but its like Bollywood – heavy sugarcoating of the message!”

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
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Women on Top... Why not in Ad-Land?!

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monojit lahiri probes this mysterious imbalance and tries to figure out where the problem lies... and why

Once upon a time, Advertising was considered an arty-farty, boutique biz – a cosmetic adjunct of the FMCG universe mostly illuminated by English-speaking, theatah-loving, culture-vultures… Even back then, it attracted women, some of whom were extremely gifted creatures who distinguished themselves and made a name. Nargis Wadia, Tara Sinha, Nuru Swaminathan and Sayeeda Imaam come to mind. Today, as ‘woman-power’ zooms ahead (with an over-the-top media tracking and celebrating the movers n’ shakers like there’s no tomorrow) it appears strange, odd and inconsistent when one sees hardly a single woman gracing the top slot (CEO, President, Chairperson) of any of the big ad agencies around. Clearly it’s not about talent, drive, creativity, intelligence, focus or dedication. Then what is it? Vertigo (read: fear of heights!) lack of ambition? Reluctance to reach the top at any cost? Gender bias? Or the age old hassle of having to balance a career with home and family, with no prizes for guessing which way the cookie finally crumbles for her …?

The iconic Helayne Spivak (the celebrated worldwide Creative Director & Chief Creative Director, North America, JWT in the early nineties) when asked about the shortage of women in top positions in adbiz had (famously) stated that “no matter what you do, how many clients you impress, accounts you help swing, awards you pick up and respect you garner from peers – there are still those groceries you gotta pick up, remember?!” Ms. Spivak then goes on to add that women don’t really seem to be welcome to the top ranks. “Otherwise there would be more help for us – like childcare, flexible hours, things that help us with our extra responsibilities. Ultimately it’s a juggling act. Its trying to keep everything up in the air and sometimes it falls… and what usually ends up falling is the family.”

Sayeeda Imaam, who brilliantly fronted the creative department of JWT (HTA), Clarion & Contract across the seventies, eighties and nineties (and now operates in Consultant mode) has a different take. She believes that enough women enter the field of advertising, marketing and media. They enjoy their work and even excel in it, with the newness, creativity and absence of monotony providing them a continuing high. “However seniority and hitting the top slot messes it up because it comes in the way of things that excited them – the ferment of cracking a problem and honing an idea. Suddenly delegation comes into play and there are fewer situations to go hands-on. This leads to a boring sameness”. The other reason is that there is nothing to prove in terms of scoring over a man. “Being better in the area of professional excellence is not a big deal any more. It’s happening around us, all the time (Lynne D’Souza of Lintas being the latest example), everywhere. Women basically come into the business for the joy of it. They quit when the joy has lost its edge – or has to be relegated to others as she (yawn) moves up!”

Grey Worldwide’s NCD Priti Nair comes next. The tattoo-flashing hottie, without fuss or frippery, comes straight to the point. “It’s a very personal, difficult and complex call that women have to take; men (usually) have no role in it. Whether the total priority is with the job, a balancing act of fifty-fifty or a part-time assignment is completely a woman’s call. Once the children come, it gets even more difficult.” Nair believes that advertising today is a hugely high-pressure profession with travel, late night shoots, deadlines and constantly having to deliver the goods in a frenetically competitive space, coming with the territory. In this kind of an environment, playing a caring wife, devoted mother and sharp ad-woman together can be mission impossible! So, sadly, there are dropouts. What about madam Nair, herself? She has survived seventeen years, even after marriage. “Sure, but I don’t have kids, no? If I did, I am sure I would have pulled out (pauses) and, gawd knows, made life hell for people in the house! C’mon yaar, after almost two decades of working in such a fast-paced, creative and exciting environment, sitting at home and changing nappies or – whatever – would definitely drive me nuts!”

The still-gorgeous Nargis Wadia, (who headed Interpub through the seventies, eighties, even nineties) and who turned a zillion heads during her hey days with her chutzpah, glamour and intelligence – rounds off this debate on a personal note. “Speaking for myself, although we did quite well, I could never step on the gas like, say a Tara Sinha, because I definitely lacked the killer instinct! Also (you’ll laugh) I frequently felt awful for the agency who’s business we took away!” The other reason was that most men who were bright and talented, refused to work in an agency where a woman was the Boss! “There was a definite gender bias with the result that we could only hire fresh talent. Has it changed? I don’t know … maybe a little, but …”

So what’s the score? A recent survey indicated that women make better leaders than men in strategic drive, risk-taking, people skills and innovation; where – alas – they lose out are command and control of management operations and focusing on financial returns. Women are bold, ambitious, mischievous, colourful and imaginative. They can also be competitive, visionary and have a strong presence. Men were seen to be more task-focused and concentrated on getting the job done rather than dealing with relationships. They believe that revenues, budgets and profits are the only game in town. Financial hits is what it’s all about. Hence, they are more comfortable with hierarchies; title silos and processes … touché!

For more articles, Click on IIPM Article.

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
Now IIPM's World-Class Education... for everybody!!
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