Wednesday 31 October 2012

Cycle of interest rates in banks:

The first preference of an investor or a depositor is the final yield he gets on maturity of his principal amount. The banks, like several other financial agencies, also permit overdraft to its depositors against their investment besides several other modes of borrowings. In most of the cases, the borrowers are unaware of the impact of interest that is charged from them, say for instance it is quoted as 12%, whereas it is much more when calculated in terms of compounding interest, as the bankers do. It is okay if the interest is charged in a simple manner annually, there is no compounding. But if it is charged with rests, say monthly, quarterly or six monthly, the interest rate grows much higher as a result of charging interest on the interest already charged earlier. In longer terms, the overall principal amount grows to two times or even three times on account of interest having been charged on compounding basis. It is for the borrowers to carefully go through this sort of an interest and think twice before going for a loan. Interest on compounding basis is quite in the interest of the investors and depositors, but in the case of borrowers it is a great pinch for them.

Monday 29 October 2012

Competition is the key note for any market:

These are the days for every day soaring prices for every  thing. The only factor which keeps it within control at least to some extent is the element of competition. If this element is not there, no body knows where the price rise could have landed by now. Take auto vehicles for instance. It’s a scooty, motor bike, or a car, they are all available at quite reasonable a price. So are the other products including food items which too are procurable at their barest minimum. Be it in the name of some festival or some other significant event, or some special week or month, there is a concession allowed for all this, and the concession counts much from over all cost point of view. Credit for this sort of some respite goes only to this very element called competition. More the competition, more is the relaxation in overall prices. Competition is an inbuilt phenomenon, which lays down a curb on rising tendency of the prices, and no credit for this is attributable to any external agencies.

Saturday 27 October 2012

Priorities on domestic economies:

It’s not just a problem, it is rather a gigantic sort of task to  fix necessary priorities on economy front of domestic needs. How to decide on different outlays with their proportionate weightage in terms of the requirement, or one has to go by weighted index instead of a simple one as per definition given in Economics. Going for shopping, how to fix up their serial order in terms of the need and weightage of the respective items, etcetera, etcetera. The problem is of more worsening an order in respect of those whose income is too meagre to meet their requirements. For them, it is not just a difficulty in fixing up the order of priorities, more than that their problem is to trace the very resource for the purpose. In a country like India, where poverty ratio dominates that of rich ones, the task gets further worsened. Fixing up the priorities on economies is, thus, more related to the resource factor than merely serialising it. I only wish that poors in the country some day grow rich enough to have necessary resource at their command  capable of enabling them to feasibly pick up and fix their priority order like the elites do.

Thursday 25 October 2012

Relevance of holidays:

Holidays are there for different purposes starting from statutory obligations to religious and functions of national importance. Most of the holidays are there as a matter of political compulsions. In New Delhi, there has been a demand to declare Harchhath as a holiday. This time it is falling due on 19th of the next month. Political parties, particularly Bhartiya Janta Party, are hell bent to get it done positively before the festival takes place. This is purely for the reasons of securing majority votes in favour during the next available chance. Harchhath is observed by the women folk, and women voters in New Delhi out beat the  strength of male voters. If Harchhath can be listed as a holiday, why not other festivals like Karwa Chauthh and several other festivals varying from religion to religion, one political party to another, and the list becomes unending if all requisitions in this connection are duly (or even unduly) entertained. Holidays from workers point of view are alright as they are done on the basis of a dire need for rest and relaxations to the employees, but any thing beyond that should be done strictly on the basis of the required need like national holidays. This is unfair that every thing in our country assumes, sooner or later, the colour of a sheer politics.

Tuesday 23 October 2012

Writings are OK, but there has to be no repetition!

There are great pundits who always and unfailingly advise that no writing of any kind should have any repetition. In other words, this should be unique. What does all this mean? Are there some sort of godowns available on earth from where originals could be traced, or even if they are traced as such, who can guarantee their originality, as the moment they are traced and used, they lose it. Bloggers very often receive a caution as from their hosts that whatever is written as a post should be just something uniquely fresh. The bloggers write their posts based on what they receive from outside including books, magazines and the news papers. They have their own perceptions which form the very theme of a write-up. If some body writes on corruption or law and order situation in the country, it just can’t be original as there are thousands of people who are expressing their views on these problems, and such views are obviously supposed to tally with each other in many ways because no occurrence ever changes its very characteristics so far as the material is concerned. Copying something verbatim is not at all desirable, it is well understood, but the ideas and the substance behind a particular theme can not be altered altogether, nor they can be replaced unless there is some story deliberately concocted for the purpose. The idea of ‘no repetition’ in the manner it is put forth is, accordingly, nothing but utopian only.

Sunday 21 October 2012

Do more of medical tests really ensure a better health?

Go for regular medical check-ups as a routine is the advice all the doctors unfailingly give to their patients. Looks alright apparently, but if the study conducted by Cochrane review is to be taken on its face value, it is not necessary, as the result, more or less, in all the cases is the same. Those who go for regular medical check-ups, and those who don’t hardly make any difference the review so made indicates. This is somewhat strange in the sense that after all check-ups are the ones which candidly reveal the deficiencies and the defects in the body system enabling the concerned patients to feel alarmed if there is some major health problem with them. If the patients opt for not going to get themselves medically checked, they are just unable to know as to what sort of a medical problem they are suffering from. It is accordingly safer for every body, particularly those in an advancing age bracket, to ensure a regular medical check-up from the health point of view.

Friday 19 October 2012

Clean the Ganges before it is too late!

There are many a movements launched by several organisations in the country to cleanse the holy river Ganga. They are fighting to seek an immediate remedy to save the holy river from different pollutants which have spoiled it to an extreme level. Nothing has happened as yet, nor there is any sign of any improvement in any manner any where. Promises after promises are there but to  no avail. We were told in our childhood that the water of Ganga is purest in the world with the saying that one dip in the river is capable of enhancing the life span of the person who does so. We were also told that the water of Ganga is such that it can never be polluted. What we see now is just different. Pollution in the river is every day increasing by leaps and bounds, and if there is no check on it immediately, the problem is likely to aggravate to the extent that at some stage it may not be reversible at all. The study conducted by the National Cancer Registry Programme under the Indian Council of Medical Research reveals the alarming signals indicating that those living by the side of river or those using its water for drinking purposes are more prone to fall victims as cancer patients. It is high time that the needful be done on urgency footing failing which the menace so indicated may assume graver proportions.

Wednesday 17 October 2012

Vendors–Many of them are better placed in a way:

Apparently they are a poor lot earning too meagre an income to manage the sustentation of themselves and their families, but it doesn’t apply to all of them. Many of them are rich enough to compete with those, who are much better placed financially. You move any where in the city, or even in some rural areas, you may hardly come across a single vendor without a mobile phone. The washer man who serves at my house has two sets of mobile phones –one for self and the other one for his wife. I know one Thhela walla who deals in waste material moving from one house to another collecting and purchasing the wastages like worn out utensils, broken furniture, other raddies besides used news papers and old clothes. His school going children, 4 in number, are studying in different English schools in the city with 2 of his sons owning a motor bike each for the purpose. He himself transports the material he collects using a thhela but owns two cars at his house. He owns 3 well built 3 rooms flats locally with 2 of them fetching a monthly rent of 6,000/ each. He has his own godown, a sprawling one, by the side of a park, of course un-authorisedly encroaching the space of the park with almost half of the road in front of it remaining in his use all the time for the purposes of dumping his material including the garbage. He has no dearth of money to oblige the municipal authorites whenever they venture to launch some raid (of course a fake one) on his shop and godown. There are several others like him in the town flourishing in a business what apparently looks like some thing too small and too low. It sounds well if a poor man prospers at his own doing hard labour, but when it comes to adoption of nefarious means like encroachment and bribing, it appears that all are the same, be they rich, or be they a poor lot, on the face of the fact that all the poors are not what they look like.

Monday 15 October 2012

Indian nurses still an exploited lot: Study - Indian Express

Indian nurses still an exploited lot: Study - Indian Express

There can't be any two opinions on the fact that nurses in India are most suffering a lot. Their union(s) have been agitating on various issues they are confronted with but nothing like any remedial measures are there as yet at the level of the Government. They have to spend a lot on their  training before they join the service, and what they get as their salary is too meagre an amount to meet their sustentation needs. The conditions, as per necessary study conducted for the purpose, are worse in New Delhi. Why New Delhi alone, the conditions are much worse in different towns of the country particularly for those who are working in private hospitals/ nursing homes. They are exploited on all counts. As per study, even their co-workers, mainly males, ill treat them. It is actually the responsibility of the government(s) both at the level of the Centre as well as the States concerned. This is a burning problem. An immediate remedial a measure, sooner the better, is the need of the day.

Saturday 13 October 2012

It looks like a sheer case of witch hunting:

Although released now, Arvind Kejriwal, a member of IAC (India Against Corruption), was arrested and put behind the bar in a New Delhi Jail the other day. The offence he committed was that he staged a protest demonstration against the Union Law Minister, Salman Khurshid, demanding his resignation for his alleged involvement in running a trust jointly with his wife with some deal which was not above board. What’s wrong if some one launches a protest against a minister, or any body else, against some thing he feels as unjust and unfair. There are several legitimate means which the governmental agencies can adopt for solving the issues, alleged or otherwise, leaving the decision part of them on the relative channels so harnessed for the purpose. Same thing appears now likely in the case of Baba Ramdeo with an attempt to frame him on some allegation or the other including the one relating to disappearance of his Guru from the Ashram. The case, as is the talk of the people, is an old one, and if there is any truth in it, the action in the matter might well have been taken long back. Why the need for such an action arose only after Baba Ramdeo became an staunch supporter of the movement against corruption and black money. The government’s approach in the whole episode is based on thoroughly pre-conceived notions and, taken in totality of it, it looks like nothing but a sheer witch hunting.

Thursday 11 October 2012

Demat to include Insurance and Post Office also –Does it mean any thing?

As per latest news, Insurance and Post Office accounts can now find place in demat, known otherwise as a platform for transaction of shares, mutual funds, commodities, and the like. Dealers in stocks have since acquired a complete proficiency in transacting them online and necessary software for the purpose is available in an ample measure making the whole process quite compatible with the very nature of such transactions. In the case of Post Offices, the online operations are not yet in vogue. Major business is still transacted on a  manual basis, particularly saving banks accounts where the account holders find it much more convenient to handle them manually at the local level of a post office. In their cases, withdrawals are frequent ones which may not be that easy when operation takes place online. There, every transaction is transfer based. For Insurance, it may work to some extent but not fully as there again person to person service on individual footing is more acceptable to the insurers. In such circumstances, as it appears on the face of it, handling of the accounts pertaining to Insurance and Post Offices may not prove feasibly convenient to the customers. May be, it is made possible in days to come but certainly not at present.

Tuesday 9 October 2012

Watermelon could help prevent heart attack, curb weight - Health - DNA

Watermelon is a normal big sized fruit very commonly used in summer with people in general relishing its juice and fabric laden stuff with taste. As revealed in a recent study, a slice of watermelon taken daily reduces the cholesterol in human body, and thus it helps eradicating the amount of risk involved in the cases of heart disease. The study was tested on mice and there it was found working alright. Watermelon also helps in reducing the fat in the body also. The link given below explains more details in the matter.

Watermelon is a seasonal fruit and it is not available round the year. Those, who take the advice as suggested above, and prefer to go for its intake daily, may not find it feasible to afford the regular intake. They may of course depend on watermelons preserved in  the godowns of cold storages. May be this alternative is not that effective compared to fresh ones, but for regulars round the year, this is the only remedial measure available.

Watermelon could help prevent heart attack, curb weight - Health - DNA

Sunday 7 October 2012

Erratic behaviour of Sensex!

Nothing new, it happens in a volatile market like that of stocks. It is soft at a moment and the next minute it goes hostile. This is like sea waves –running smoothly but getting immediately followed by wild ones. Hopes on reform measures took the Sensex to 19,000 plus for the first time in nearly last 15 months on 4/10. On 5/10 the gaining trend so indicated turned into a freaky Friday. I have gone through the opinions of some of the experts in the field predicting that the Sensex is most likely to gain healthier grounds particularly because of hopes on reform measures, but if it was like this, there is no reason for the Sensex level to dwindle down by losing 120 points on Friday. Experts also say that Sensex is most likely to cross 20,000 figure in next few coming months for which there appears to be no tangible a sign. None can claim accuracy of a prediction in the matters of behaviour on the part of Sensex. It has its own pattern of moving side ways –at times right, at times left. Share market after all is a gamble only.

Friday 5 October 2012

Ban on Gutka (a tobacco product)–a welcome move!

It’s undoubtedly a welcome move on the part of the Uttar Pradesh (India) government to have banned the use of gutka in the State, of course in compliance to the orders of the Allahabad High Court. The Court passed this order on a PIL (Public Interest Litigation) filed by the Indian Dental Association. Gutka is already banned in 13 other States of the country. The order so passed by the State Government of Uttar Pradesh is implementable with effect from a future date i.e. April’ 2013. This, as the State Government says, has been done with a view to giving time to the workers engaged in gutka factories/ companies concerned to seek an alternative employment some where else before the ban goes effective. The fact is some what otherwise. Gutka has been a massive revenue earner for the State Government, and that is the real reason why they have been reluctant to ban this product all these years. So far as the time given for securing some alternative employment is concerned, such opportunities are badly scarce in Uttar Pradesh unlike Narendra Modi’s Gujarat, where such avenues are available in an ample measure. What was expected in a normal manner from the government of U.P. was to themselves generate such opportunities within the State itself instead of leaving the workers to run helter-skelter in search of some source to their alternative sustentation.

Tobacco products are a great menace to health mostly responsible for deadly diseases like cancer where gutka is the worst contributor, besides of course pan masala, bidi, cigarette including oral chewing of tobacco, and obviously the ban so imposed now is matter of a hearty welcome, but this is what must have been done much earlier.

Wednesday 3 October 2012

Yoga–It has some problematic areas too:

I have written number of articles on Yoga in this very blog highlighting the advantages side of it in many ways, which it definitely has, and there is no point in disputing them. The very saying that it suits every body in any age group ranging from 5 years to 105 years too is true. What is typically significant is that a better health through yoga warrants some basic strength for the persons who practice it. For example, pranayam or anulom vilom are forbidden to those who have some sort of heart problem or the other. Similarly those who suffer from Asthama need not go for these exercises. Those who have pain in their back or knees are always advised not to go for the yoga asanaas involving stress on the body joints. Persons having any kind of breathing problems are advised to avoid stress. If yoga is practiced with such problems existing, it causes difficulties for the persons concerned, and what happens as a result is that instead of any improvement in their health as such, their problems compound in various dimensions. Too much of practice even in the normal cases is also not advisable, as excess of any thing is bad. If these precautions are meticulously followed while practicing yoga, yoga is certainly the one therapy that benefits the human body system in thousands of ways. The very thinking on the part of several individuals that yoga is something to be practiced in any situation is actually not correct.

Monday 1 October 2012

If there was a shop in the market selling happiness!

Like there are many a things in the world which can’t be purchased against any price, happiness too is something which one can’t buy as a composite item from any shop in the market. Happiness is a combination of several factors. It’s just not like going for some purchase of a laptop or a car that gives me a satisfaction of owning them, or it’s not like seeing some movie and draw a frugal momentary satiation. If heart works virtually in a coherent collaboration with mind and mind itself is free from any strain or tension, the newly acquired things mean a double pleasure. If mind is not free from several encumbrances like pre-occupation by other extraneous factors like worries on different counts, the pleasure I may draw from acquiring some thing or the other, it just fizzles and fades out miles away obliviously going into nullity. Good health, a sound mind free from any kind of strain, and a heart that has no malice or a false prejudice, are the factors that bountifully attract happiness and peace. These factors have to be brought into a combination through the efforts made by the concerned person himself/ herself. Happiness is thus a phenomenon not just purchasable from the market, but a matter of self generation of the required situation for the purpose by the individuals concerned.

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