Question: Why aren’t the long periods of great prosperity between wars undocumented in Indian history.

We have studied major events in history books. Most of the events are recorded around major wars and change of power. In Indian history, we remember Alexander’s (Sikandar) war and the birth of Chandragupta and then Ashoka Kalinga’s war which was in 2 BC. Then lots of wars between the 11th century till our recent independence.

Between these invasions there were long periods of great prosperity for 300 to 600 years (12 generations to 24 generations) which are not at all documented in our history. These periods are much longer than the entire industrial transformation over the last 175 years.

What were those successes?
A. Systems – Political, Economic, Social
B. Processes – Education and Health
C. Governance – Empowerment and conflict resolutions

The modern ‘ism’ like Communism and Capitalism have completed just over 150 to 200 years and they start showing that it’s cracking.

How do we retrieve those knowledge systems that may have possible learnings of holistic happiness built around spirituality, expertise and interdependent livelihoods with lesser greed, selfishness, ego and violence?

May 10, 2018

Fight scenes even in animated movies – responses

Yesterday, I questioned the fight scenes even in animated movies made for children on Facebook and LinkedIn. I received a lot of insights from your comments. I am documenting a few of the observations here.

1. Fight scenes train a child’s mind for better defence.
2. Fight scenes build ‘violence’ as a key method of resolving any difference of opinions/perspectives/expectations.
3. Violence sells better among audiences which means we as developed human being still love ‘animal’ instinct of physical force over logical conversations (dialogue) to resolve difference of opinions/perspectives.

Somewhere I am confused with our ‘expressed’ behaviour i.e. we must live with love as a key uniting force of humanity vs. ‘suppressed’ behaviour of liking physical dominance.

Please share your thoughts on this dichotomy of our behaviours.

May 10, 2018

25th anniversary of Polaris/Intellect

It was on 24th July 1993, when we started Polaris Software Labs from a small office at Carex Center, Chennai. We were a very small outfit with a small capital of Rs. 10,000/- (USD 200) but with large dreams of contributing in small focussed ways in FinTech space. Polaris/Intellect got its public listing within 6 years of its inception in August 1999. In 2002, Citicorp Overseas Software Ltd (Orbitech) merged with Polaris and strengthened our foot print. Lasersoft, Indigo TX, SEEC further made Polaris a dominant specialised player in the FinTech space. Ullas Trust is another important initiative which worked with young achievers since 1997 by all of us. In 2014, we decided to rebrand the core part of our business as Intellect Design Arena Ltd. and let go of Polaris’ services business.

Today, we are celebrating the 25th anniversary of Polaris/Intellect. I must thank and congratulate all the Polarites who contributed to building an institution of eminence in the FinTech space.

Happy Foundation Day!

May 10, 2018
May 10, 2018

Gems from the Turkish poet Rumi!

What is poison?
Anything which is more than our necessity is poison. It may be power, wealth, hunger, ego, greed, laziness, love, ambition, hate or anything.

What is fear?
Non-acceptance of uncertainty. If we accept that uncertainty, it becomes an adventure.

What is envy?
Non-acceptance of the good in others. If we accept that good, it becomes an inspiration.

What is anger?
Non-acceptance of things which are beyond our control. If we accept that, it becomes our tolerance.

What is hatred?
Non-acceptance of a person as he is. If we accept that person unconditionally, it becomes love.

May 10, 2018

Three new things that I learnt today…

  1. K-pop – Korean pop is getting to the world stage. They used structure to bring a cultural shift within Korea and then made it an exportable industry since 1992. Today it’s a 5 billion dollar industry.
  2. I normally see documentary movies around positive creations or impact. I bumped into a series, “Worst engineering accidents”. Gained some interesting learnings from the stories on anti-patterns of Design Thinking.
  3. In animal species, male can also give birth. With a sea horse, it’s the male who gives birth.
May 10, 2018

Intellect has launched Xponent

Intellect has launched Xponent – AI based underwriting platform in the US with built-in Risk Analyst on Big Data and Cloud. A fully cloud native platform with continuous integration and continuous deployment capabilities connected to over 500 structured and unstructured data sources to drive higher quality decisions for underwriters and efficient systems.

The first of its kind where machine learning algorithm has been translated into decision algorithm, after 3 years of extensive research by the ISEEC team. It’s time to move away from complex rule-based systems to real-time machine learning systems.

Already 7 insurance companies in the US and Europe have signed for the platform on AWS cloud and have over 50 companies areevaluating it.

May 10, 2018

My diary – Biases

I believe my mind is very fair and unbiased. I was watching an IPL match between Hyderabad and Kolkata. I thought I was just enjoying the cricket match but my mind wanted to enjoy the winning of one specific team. Why such a bias when both the teams are not Chennai based?

Where does this bias come from? Does it come from the place or ownership of the teams or captains or players in the team or just to support the underdogs?

But because of this bias, the beauty of the game of cricket was lost somewhere.

May 10, 2018

Prohibition

I was reading the US Constitution and just 27 amendments have happened during the last 200 years.

One of the Amendments 18, in the year 1919 caught my attention. It reads:

“Making, selling and transporting alcohol within the United States, as well as importing and exporting alcohol to and from the United States and its territories, will be forbidden”.

It was implemented for 14 years and repealed in 1933.

I was surprised that a western country like America did it despite the cold weather. ‘Dry’, the Group linked it to human development and religious values.

May 10, 2018

If you can dream it, you can do it.

Girls from government schools can do it too!

Poorna is the youngest girl to climb the Everest at the age of 13 years and 10 months. She did this feat in 2014. It’s unimaginable to even think about such a feat.

Now, Rahul Bose had made a movie on Poorna – a must watch!

There is a story of the Secretary of Social Welfare, Praveen Kumar who believed in education and Poorna. His single act helped inspiring thousands of school students in Andhra Pradesh.

You may like to watch the movie. It’s like Dangal but not made by Aamir Khan.

Take a look at this video on YouTube: https://lnkd.in/fw_4Fbu

May 10, 2018