Kabir Bedi's Autobiography

 One thing that strikes you about his stories, is their honesty. He does not shy away from his failures.. like the stock investments in Netscape. Or his failure to stop his son from committing suicide. Or his multiple attempts to make his marriages work. Not everyone is as honest, when writing about themselves.

His spectacular success in Italy when he played Sandokan is quite unique to an Indian actor, because this was not Hollywood. He did play a few roles in Hollywood movies and TV series, and rubbed shoulders with the best. Some of those anecdotes are very interesting, like when he had to walk out of a dinner that Gina Lollobrigida was hosting, because Parveen Babi was offended. Her mental illness is also handled sympathetically.

Many unknown facets emerge, like his acting in Theatre due to Alyque Padamsee, or his learning Vipassana at a young age, or his meeting the Dalai Lama, because his mother turned into a Buddhist nun, or that he is a direct descendant of Guru Nanak through his father.

Interesting read, and something new for everyone, I am sure.

Gundappa Vishwanath's Autobiography

 There were many gentlemen cricketers in that era, which I had the good fortune to grow up watching. Vishy was one of them. Though he was not as big a star as perhaps Gavaskar or Tendulkar (later), he had a personality which stood out. Also known as the man of Cuts and Square-cuts, his autobiography is full of humility for all the well-known personalities of his era. 

This includes anecdotes about Jaisimha, Pataudi, Man Singh (administrator), Polly Umrigar, Vijay Manjrekar, and of course, Prasanna, Chandrasekhar, and Wadekar. Pataudi held a special place in his heart, as he was "spotted" by the former captain when he made a double hundred in a Ranji Trophy match, and nurtured into the Indian team. Full of unknown tidbits about the 1971 twin tours of West Indies and England which turned the course of India's cricketing fortunes, and much more. Well-narrated, and a must read for anyone who loves cricket and wants to know about the pre-Rahul Dravid gentle cricketer from Bangalore.

How to Write a Book

 Like everything else, you should want to write one, and badly. Motivation internally arising is what leads you into the exercise, in my view. For instance, a strong urge to simplify the concepts of Marketing Research had me motivated enough to pen my first book- on Marketing Research, now in its fourth edition and used by many B schools or research scholars. I wrote it in the style I taught- lots of examples, including cases written by past students. I might as well say that I am against the current trend to not use packaged software which is simple to use, and teach programming all over again to unsuspecting kids (of all ages).

The rest falls into place, unless it's fiction that you are trying to write. That I don't have any advice on, since I haven't tried writing it. Maybe other writers can offer some. The second genre I have tried is non-fiction, or autobiographical. I first wrote this autobiography around 2009, and it was entirely planned, written and (self) published within 8-9 months. Pothi was the platform I used, and my daughter did the cover design. Writing came easy, because all I had to do was pick on incidents from my own life, or events as they unfolded. 

Both types have found readers, and I got some feedback from readers, most of it positive. I also wrote a couple of other books- on Services Marketing with cases written by IIMK students, and one on Brand Management with Bhagyalakshmi Venkatesh, a friend and ex-colleague. More recently, a collated book of cases on Digital Marketing was published with Romi Sainy and me editing some original Indian cases sourced from both our alumni.

Pic from the launch of my autobiography, above. The publisher, Jaya Jha, and Sharu Rangnekar who launched the book, are with me.

My Autobiography

 The autobiography has had its origin in the urge to tell the world about yourself. Mine has had a few more readers than my estimate of four (the size of my family)- I distributed it to some too :)

It has had two editions so far, and it stops at IMT Nagpur, which is to say, around 2013. Here are the covers of the two editions, published by pothi.com, an online self-publishing and POD (print -on-demand) company. The first came out in 2009-10.

The New Cool

Earlier, there were three ways to be cool. Two of them involved travel. The third involved running- that started roughly a year ago.

Now, all three are out. Therefore, we have had a rethink, and had to re-invent COOL. So here are some new ways-

1. Try out weird yoga poses, either real or invented.

2. Try out new recipes. They should look good, no matter the taste.

3. Jokes and memes about staying locked up- I mean locked in. You forward them, mostly.

4. Take selfies, usually with disastrous results. You know why. What used to be super-cool, is , let's just say, lukewarm? Still, it keeps you occupied.

5. Take Balcony shots (if you have one- Rohit Srivastava, no offense). If you don't have one, well, sneak into the neighbour's and get a quick shot.

6. Write an autobiography..nobody's tried it yet, but would be Super-cool, if they did. It's not an option, coz I already did it many years ago.

7. Develop a sense of humour. Tough to do, if you didn't have one already.

Story of My Books

I have written a few books- pic below. So how did that come about?

Well, the first urge to write happened around 2000, when I was in Kirloskar Institute of Advanced Management Studies, Harihar. I taught Marketing Research there, and felt unhappy with the choice of books then. My librarian Manjunath (who went to TAPMI later) put me in touch with Tapas Maji at Tata McGraw-Hill, and I gave them a proposal. It went through after some changes suggested by them, and the book was completed with help from some staff and students who contributed cases to it out of their course projects. By the time it was published in 2002, I was at IIM Lucknow.  It is now in its 4th edition (just released in 2019), having become popular over the years. The latest edition has a lot of cases contributed by IIM Indore students. The Indian cases are a big draw (thanks to student contributors), along with the down-to-earth explanation of statistical techniques, according to feedback I have received from readers-many in person.

I have also written Services Marketing (3 editions), International Marketing, and a book on Brand Management (limited edition, with Bhagyalakshmi Venkatesh). Then, the bug to write an autobiography came over me, and I penned My Experiments With Half-truths, which I self-published with pothi, which had just started the trend of Print-on-demand (POD) in India-coincidentally, Jaya Jha, its founder, was an alum of IIM Lucknow. (Jaya appears with Sharu Rangnekar in the pic at Crossword below- the first pic is a launch of Digital Marketing Cases from India at IIM Indore with Subin Sudhir, Rishikesha Krishnan and my co-editor Romi)

Last year, along with Romi Sainy, I co-edited a book on Digital Marketing Cases with contributions from former students of IMT Nagpur, Jaipuria and IIM Indore, among others. Ambition? Maybe to compile one on Tourism or Services Marketing Cases. Any takers who wish to contribute?

I Wonder...

Sometimes, I wonder if..


1. I had not cleared that interview for IIM Bangalore admission into the MBA program,..

2. I had not got a scholarship to go do a Ph.D. at Clemson, USA...

3. I had not returned to India after a couple of years' teaching,..

4. I had not worked in Marketing Research and Advertising,...

5. I had not written that book..or those books..

6. If I had not started blogging,..

7. If I had not got a single friend request on fb,..

My life would have been poorer, for sure. I am happy it turned out the way it did.

Ambition

I was impressed by the play Julius Caesar which I studied in school-mainly, I was impressed by his ambition.

So I decided to be ambitious, like Big Bro Julius.

And got into studying like crazy, and maxed all my subjects in school. Almost topped my class in the board exams too.

After going into college, this translated into trying to watch all the (Hindi) films in town..and almost did that in the five years I was there. In my MBA days, looking at all the other smart and ambitious people that surrounded me, I decided to go slow, and concentrated on reading non-text books- Like PG Wodehouse and others.

During my stint in the U.S., my ambition changed to travelling to all the States that united to form the USA...well, I travelled to around 40 of the fifty states. Threw in a few European countries too, on a Eurail Pass.

Coming back to India, I concentrated on writing, mostly, and managed to write a couple of-horror of horrors- text books! That some people actually read them is a tribute to their patience. Blogging followed, naturally, thanks to being egged on by my BIL. That some people actually read them never ceases to amaze me.

Looking at every Tom, Dick and Harry writing his autobiography, I grew ambitious, and wrote My Experiments with Half-truths. Somewhere in between all this, I played Golf (starting at Harihar, continuing at Nagpur), and also created a small Golf course at IMT Nagpur.

Now, my ambition is scaled down, to meeting nice people, looking at Nice DPs (and awarding the good ones), and some good food and drink (like Vietnamese coffee), books, occasional travel, films, music (retro), watching my students do well in life..

Also visited the famous Saraafa in Indore, among other things..had been a long-time ambition.

Writing a Book Versus Reading One

Above-my autobiography (the second edition). Pothi.com is the publisher, and it's sold through the Flipkarts of the world.

Reading a book is far easier than writing one. But I have somehow written more than one. But when someone casually says, "Any new book?" to me today, I wonder how I wrote any of those.

My first was a text book. I had just begun teaching Marketing Research in Indian B Schools, and was struck by the need for one which used computerised data analysis rather than just theory. So I wrote one, with help from students of Kirloskar Institute, and staff there. Now, there will be a 4th edition this year, with cases written by IIM Indore students-coming soon.

Then, a Services Marketing text was born while I worked at IIM Kozhikode. The third was a book on International Marketing, and the fourth, my autobiography, which was published in the Print-on-demand mode by pothi, an innovation in India at the time.

Then came a book with Bhagyalakshmi Venkatesh, on Brand Management, a limited edition for IMT Distance Learning program.

Now there are plans for an edited book on Digital Marketing Cases from India. Some of my alumni friends from IMT Nagpur and elsewhere have contributed.

Octobered

The word is an original coinage, and though it rhymes with butchered, it is non-violent. It is usually in and around this month that a lot of people I know have their birthdays (including Gandhiji, to whom I owe special gratitude, having half-filched his autobiography's title for my own). Therefore, I am forced to think thoughts that I normally don't (some would say that I am forced to think, period). In other words, about life, and the long term. Beyond the week, at any rate.

I am not so good at thinking long term, I must admit. But I try. I am trying. No thoughts as of now, but one or two stray ones..

How do you make Gultis  (word used for Telugu people) lose their innocence?
You add an 'i'- makes them Guilty.

What would be the common problem faced by a  Verma?
Worms.

.....a Sharma?
Sharm. (this is a Hindi word meaning shame)

Which Indian State would William Tell settle in, if he had to?
Tel(l)anngana.

Naseeruddin Shah's Autobiography- A Review

I was excited when I heard this (And Then One Day) had been published, and even more when I found it  in a bookstore sometime ago- and this time, the excitement was justified.

It is like no other autobiography I have read (including my own, one that I like a lot). Particularly in the kind of self-deprecation it indulges in. Most autobiographies start out with the premise of the protagonist as hero, but this one rarely gets into that mode, if at all. It is honest, brutally so at times, and though initially he comes from a privileged family background, it takes you through tribulations of the worst kind that he suffers-mostly cheerfully.

The feeling of being perceived as utterly useless by parents, schools, and teachers is all-pervasive through most of his early life, and makes you wonder at our schooling system. But then, the same system provides him opportunities to watch some wonderful Hollywood films (in boarding school), and nurtures his interest. And guardian angels do appear when he needs them, like Purveen, his first wife, and teachers like Ebrahim Alkazi at National School of Drama, and Shyam Benegal, who gives him a break in films when he is not at all sure of how to step into them after his acting course at Pune's Film Institute.

His takes on popular films, actors and directors are absolutely hilarious, and his frank admission that he did not know how to act in them rings true. He is critical about most of his films, actually. Even the good ones.

His imitation of a Bengali director (of Sunaina, a re-make of Charlie Chaplin's City Lights)- 'Breeng me the shit (bring me the sheet)', asking his assistant to get him some working sheet, is also worth recounting as are his observations about Indian theatre (both Hindi and English). He sometimes performed his plays for audiences of ten or twenty, for the sheer love of it.

I will heartily recommend this book to anyone at all. Film buffs will find it even more enjoyable and enriching, no doubt. If you are considering writing an autobiography, do read it before you do. I wish I had!

Celebrations

 Vijayakumar, above and below. Dhanapal who was also a colleague at Harihar, and Gadgil, who I met later at IMT Nagpur.

 Some students of Batch 2, with my colleagues in front row-below.

 Nidhi from Batch 1, KIAMS,  at Indore recently with her Dad.

Celebrating 480,000 views of this blog with an excerpt from my autobiography. If you want to read more, you can download the free ebook version from the link at the end (though I cannot imagine why anyone would want to)-

Chapter 9:   Harihar: My Golfing Days

The Kirloskar Institute of Advanced Management Studies was a small but high quality residential place for training executives. It was on the banks of river Tungabhadra, in a two-street town. There were two factories there, one owned by Aditya Birla group, and one by the Kirloskar group. These were on either side of the river. An arc-shaped building was the hostel for executives, overlooking a cricket field. Our boss, Prof. Korgaonker, was an ardent cricket fan, and we played a lot of tennis-ball cricket on this ground with our visitors. They were usually twenty-over games, precursors to today’s Twenty-twenty cricket.

A lot of executives came there for the 30-odd programmes we ran through the year. They were from different companies of the Kirloskar group, and from all functional areas like materials management, sales, marketing, international marketing, production, strategy and maintenance. Most were engineers, with no formal management degree. Their work experience ranged from 2 to 20 years. Initially, we got visiting faculty from IIM Ahmedabad (India’s top B school) to handle many of the teaching sessions. They flew to Bangalore from Ahmedabad, usually after a change of flight at Bombay, and then drove about five hours to Harihar. They went back the same way, after a day or two of teaching. This was a difficult way to do things, but it created tremendous brand equity for the programmes we ran. No expense was spared to get the best training materials including cases from Harvard Business School, and training films on diverse subjects like Globalisation, Benchmarking and Business Process Reengineering. The library, though small, was of a high quality, and I have rarely seen such a good collection of intellectual resources in one place since.

We designed training programmes, coordinated them and ran them. Since we (resident faculty) lived on campus, a small walk away, it gave us lots of time to do other things. One discovery I made was that there was an 18 hole golf course in the adjoining campus of Mysore Kirloskar Ltd. And there were not many players. Making use of my FIL’s (Father-in-law’s) old golf set (he had been a long time golfer in Pune), and with a couple of friends, I started playing. The caddies (guys who carry your bag of golf clubs) were my main teachers, and Gaur, a general manager of the company, my usual partner. We made it a point to play at least a few holes everyday, and sometimes the full 18 holes on a holiday.

I did not have this easy an access to golf ever again. But those few years, we played almost every day. Dhanapal and Vijayakumar, my colleagues at the institute, were regulars. Visiting friends and some students were also introduced to the game, and were quite fascinated. My friend Gaur was a smoker, and I usually smoked one cigarette with him at the end of the day’s play- on a regular golf course, the 19^th hole is usually a bar! But the smoke and chat were a good substitute. I don’t know why, but socializing improves a lot when one drinks or smokes, at least for men. Maybe we need additional stimulants to awaken our non-existent social skills.

I re-read the P.G. Wodehouse golf stories after I started playing, and enjoyed them much more. “The Clicking of Cuthbert” was one of these. Golf is a serious addiction, but I must say that my wife and kids did not really complain. I played other games before and after this, but golf remains one of my favourites. It is fun to play, looks easy but is pretty tough, and teaches you that in life, you are really competing with yourself. It is also a great stress-buster, because it forces you to take a long walk in green surroundings. It cured the deficiencies in my eyesight as well, and I got rid of my glasses during that time. If you imagine the ball to be your boss’s head while hitting it with all your might, the game takes on a completely new dimension. This viewpoint is highly recommended, unless you are the boss, of course!

After some time, we decided to launch a regular residential MBA program there, as the training market in the group companies was getting saturated. We launched a program, interviewed students and started classes within a short time after the decision. Our headline was “World Class Management Program from the House of Kirloskar”. We did not find the need for AICTE approval, as the program was of high quality, and we were sure of acceptance from students and corporates.

We had a lot of new things to do, like hostel administration, solving student issues, placement promotions and so on, after the PGDM program started at Harihar. Separating boys’ and girls’ hostels became one of the major issues. Though opinion was divided, we finally bowed to convention in batch 2 and separated the two. Placements were a problem initially, and despite all the usual tricks of the trade being used, fell short of students’ expectations. Later, I learnt that they always fall short of expectations. Also, that a student rarely stays more than a year in his first job, even if he claims it is a dream job. In other words, I learnt to take everything with a pinch of salt!

Among the things we did for admission promotion, was making a film. Completely shot on VHS video, with the help of our resident Harihar videocameraman, and scripted by me and a colleague,  Dhanapal. We used interviews with students of batch 1 as our main theme. Many of them performed like pros, and we edited the material into a 15 minute movie. We rented a TV and VCP at each venue, and started admission interviews with a screening. The great location and infrastructure of the institute helped to attract the students, as did the Kirloskar brand name.

Some world class tourist places were within easy reach from Harihar, and we went there quite a few times. Goa was a 9 hour drive, and I spent three Diwali vacations there, with family. Jog falls, which were mesmerizing in the rainy months of June- August, Hampi, with its ruins of Vijaynagar empire, and Belur-Halebeedu, with the exquisite temple carvings, were all within 4-5 hours driving distance. Closer, there was a river bed in a village called Rajanahalli where we went for afternoon or evening picnics with our own food and drinks.

We also did onsite training programs for Kirloskar group executives, and I traveled to Pune, Nagpur and Jaipur for some of these. At Jaipur, among other things, we saw the movie Mission Kashmir in the palatial Rajmandir movie theater at Jaipur. Another program was done at a hotel next to the Osho ashram in Pune, and we heard the evening music and partying next door.

I got all round admin. experience as I coordinated almost every administrative activity, including admissions, placement, MDP and so on. One good decision we made was to align with CAT for our admissions. This gave us instant visibility in the ‘good students’ segment. SDM institute (at Mysore) started around the same time with their PGDM, and in one early survey of B schools, KIAMS and SDM were tied at rank 30. Later, with a proliferation of surveys, it was tough to keep track of ranks. Also, B schools started mushrooming everywhere, and of all kinds. KIAMS also never tried cashing in or scaling up, and it was both a plus and a minus. Minus because scale gives you visibility (like in the case of ICFAI), and plus because you can be selective about student intake. And, it is a pleasure to teach smaller classes.

Prof S.N. Chary was our director when we started the MBA, and stayed with us through the first year of the program. Then he went back to IIM Bangalore, where he had been our professor. The new director after him had no clue of how a great MBA programme is run, and the disillusionment forced most faculty to desert the institute. I think my first inspiration to head a B school came from him, because if he could do it, so could I, was my logic.

But the next move happened not as the head, but as a faculty member at IIM, Lucknow.

*****

 The promised link to the ebook.

http://pothi.com/pothi/book/ebook-rajendra-nargundkar-my-experiments-half-truths

Michael Caine- Autobiography

That was his screen name. He writes better than Bond- Roger Moore, that is. I read Moore's autobiography earlier, but found it mildly interesting or soporific depending on the time of the day.  This one is better-written; the humour is good. Sample this- he quotes a joke from a stand-up comedian- "I slept like a log. I woke up in the fireplace." And a couple of lines from an Austin Powers movie that he starred in-
1. explaining why he had a stiff neck- "I took a Viagra and it got stuck in my throat" (not Michael Caine's line, but the hero's), and
2. another line, his own-"There are only two things I hate in the world: people who are intolerant of other people's cultures, and the Dutch."

His own fondness for humour comes through in the book. Dirty, Rotten Scoundrels was a comedy he starred in and rates highly- it stars in my top ten Hollywood films too. Another favourite he and I share is the actor Humphrey Bogart, and two of his films- The Maltese Falcon and Casablanca.

He grew up poor, acted on stage, and struggled long years. Sean Connery was a co-struggler. But he got some lucky breaks, and finally made it to Hollywood, his dream. The Ipcress File and Alfie were the films that got him into the limelight (why is it called that?), and Shirley Maclaine adopted him and introduced him to most Hollywood biggies.

His wife Shakira is of Indian origin. He saw her in a Maxwell House coffee ad on TV and was besotted. He found she lived in London, sought her out and dated her, and married her. And stayed married across
continents and decades.

There's also a section on how  the name"Hollywood" came to be. Many anecdotes are interesting, like the kneeling rehearsal for being knighted. Most stars known to me feature in these. His take on social issues like racism, class prejudice, is also well-thought out.

Worth a read. Warning- this is the second of his two autobiographies. Title- The Elephant (a locality in England) to Hollywood.

Leela- Book Review

This is an amazing autobiography (with some contribution from Jerry Pinto to it) of Leela Naidu. She is not known much to this generation. I had only heard of her, because she was from an earlier period. Maybe seen a couple of her songs from a film called Anuradha.

She seems like a warm, caring human being, and dabbled in many things, including making documentary films, and acted in films too. But more than the skin deep beauty (she was listed once by Vogue among the world's most beautiful) of her radiant face, it is the radiant prose of the book that impressed me. It is indeed a chronicle of a life lived well, partly in India, some parts in France and Switzerland, and lots more travelling everywhere. From slaves in Africa to naxalites in Kolkata, she has met all varieties of people, and freely expresses her views.

Her observations on societies and humankind are generally spot-on, and I found myself agreeing with her on most. And that is a rarity, let me assure you. I rarely agree with anyone thus, man or woman. Anyway, that's a character flaw I will not dwell on.

A hilarious epsisode (there are lots) in the book tells of the quirks of our Hindi movie producers who decide the bust size of their heroines- she apparently received a box containing an inflatable device to wear on the first day of her shoot! And sent it back promptly.

Highly recommended, to anyone interested in life. There's so much of it here.

Sudhir Kakar’s Book of Memories

India’s best known psychoanalyst is good to read. He has recounted in this autobiographical book various episodes in his eventful life. One is about his growing up years and career choices- unsurprisingly, driven by his father’s ideas of what he should be doing. Which he did at first, under protest. But at some point, partly after his meetings with Erik Eriksson, the Harvard psychologist in Ahmedabad, he decided to follow his calling and go for it. His dad later admitted his mistake in driving him away from it.

He also recounts how Vikram Sarabhai prevailed on Nehru to set up IIMA at Ahmedabad instead of Mumbai and why. The reason was not entirely professional, he candidly admits. It appears there was a relationship between Sarabhai and Sudhir’s aunt Kamala, and both were at Ahmedabad. This was one reason that drove him to set up the institute there.

There are a lot of insights into how he set up, with great difficulty, a psychoanalysis practice at Delhi, and how entire families got involved in an individual’s case- particularly if the patients were women- daughters or daughters-in-law!

An interesting read, with many observations about Indian psychological and sociological predilections. Those with an interest, should read it for a look at these and more.

Book Launch at Crossword Nagpur

Yours truly in the middle, flanked by Smita Dabholkar, a colleague at IMT, and Mr. Phanshikar, editor of Hitavada, the widest circulated daily in Nagpur, who was the Chief Guest. The book we are holding (my autobiography titled My Experiments with Half-truths) was the reason for this. It was published sometime ago through pothi.com, an online Print-on-Demand publishing site. I had never thought about a retail launch, because it involved too much effort.

But thanks to Smita, who is a bundle of energy, this event happened yesterday at Crossword Nagpur. Well-attended (by an unknown author's standards), and well-compered by Smita, this gave me my hour of glory. Vijay Phanshikar (of the 3 'kars' fame- ha, ha) was very kind and very insightful in his comments on the book, which he seems to have enjoyed. It gave me new perspectives literally, adding four moons (char chaand) to the proceedings.

The audience ranged from 8 to about 60 in age, and patiently listened to my readings, including some Mallu jokes. All in all, a fun and enjoyable evening. Thanks to the audience. And Crossword, who did a wonderful job of organising it, including a mike that worked!

Julian Assange Autobiography- A Review

Just finished reading this. I think it is as important as the tale of Steve Jobs, both based in technology, and in their own way, liberating and empowering the common man- in Jobs' case, maybe a common man who could afford the hardware.

WikiLeaks is of course what made him famous (or notorious to many) but his story is fascinating for its Tendulkar-like single-mindedness about the cause of justice for common people, and beyond boundaries of nations. It also is a look inside the media giants (not to mention governments)of the world, and how they choose to play certain roles.

Recently, I also read Vinod Mehta's memoirs, Lucknow Boy, and both the books are similar in a way. But the crusading zeal is more obvious in Assange, whether you like crusades or not. It (his crusade) started almost like the hippie generation, but this had a clearer purpose, I think. And technology seems to have been used without too many finding out how they were doing it.

Engrossing, and better than a whodunit.

Anniversary

It was April last year that I published my autobiography through pothi.com, an online self-publishing outfit. As an anniversary reminder to myself, here are snippets from one of the chapters- 

                                                                              Chapter 17: My Students over the Years If thou art a teacher, thou shalt have students- Book of Socrates, XVIIII, page 2345. I run into them everywhere, from South Indian joints in Kolkata to alumni meets in Hyderabad, to the malls in Bangalore. Sometimes it appears as if I know half the management grads in India, and sometimes it’s a good feeling, except it makes me feel very old. Here is a brief intro to some of them. 

 Padmapriya: Now a heroine of repute in Mallu movies, was a great classical dancer, and teamed very well with Jimmy, her batchmate at Kirloskar Institute, for some great dance performances. 

 Joy: Was one of the really mature students, with a zest for life who did well for himself after the PGDM at Kirloskar Institute. Was from the City of Joy, too. Worked for UB, Himalaya and then, Coke. Married a batchmate, Alaknanda Dasgupta. 

 Jogeswari: A topper of her batch at Kirloskar Institute, originally from Guntur, which is hot, hot, hot. Had a fan club at the institute. Joined Google after a sabbatical from work. Given to long silences, broken after persistent emails. Attempted to get into the IAS, for reasons unknown, but fortunately remained a normal human being (non-IAS). 

 Manisha: A family friend who became a student (at Kirloskar), and found her match, Pushpendu, while at it. A trip to Japan with him, and she learnt to like India. 

 Shveta: Another bright Bangalorean from Mount Carmel, did (doing?) very well at her marketing job at the India Today group. A good example of a BA and MBA doing very well in a career. Are the engineers wasting their time? 

 Aditi Sood: She and I had a common interest in Deepak Chopra when she was at Kirloskar Institute. Met again at Kolkata until she got married and left for the land of milk and honey, and George Bush- the U.S., I mean. 

 Nidhi: My protégé at Kirloskar, she was a bubbly girl, all smiles, and we also met again at Lucknow (where her husband Milind hailed from) and Mumbai. 

 Aman Chawla: The high enthu man from Vizag, owner of a resort or some such thing at his hometown, happy-go-lucky student. 

 Gaurav Gollerkeri: At IIMK, a graduate of PESIT, which I later joined, and went on to do a Ph.D. in London. His idol was (no, not me) Raghuram Rajan of the IMF/ World Bank. 

 Sanjeev Undri: A guy from Belgaum (where is that? On the border of Maharashtra and Karnataka) who went beyond his potential in everything he did. The smile never left his face in any situation. Student at PESIM, Bangalore. One of the rare motivated guys in the university MBA system. 

 Anusha Ramakrishnan: a student assistant at PESIT, who kept in touch. Got into writing, and headed off to Finland post marriage. Her consolation may be that there is light at the end of six months. 

 Veena Singh: Helped me write a chapter on Indian brands for my book on Brand Management. One of the bright students of the International Business batch at IFIM which visited Grenoble en-masse. Now works for Unilever Research at Bangalore.

Bangalore Book Fair

The Bangalore Book Fair is an annual event that hosts publishers from all over. This year's edition is special, however, because pothi.com will have a stall there. What is pothi.com? It is a Print-on-demand (or POD) publisher based in Bangalore. So what, you may ask. They are also the publisher of my autobiography called "My Experiments with Half-truths". That's what makes this year's event special for me. It's from November 6th to 15th.

What makes the POD so attractive to fiction/poetry/non-fiction authors is that the content is entirely under the author's control. So a Michael Moore (whose Stupid White Men had some problems getting published) could use this form of publishing, and so could you or I, unknown authors to begin with, who may never get published any other way. Sales are usually slow, because it is sold online against an order, and the author needs to promote his book (as I am doing now), but there is no pressure on an author to buy a minimum number as with normal self-publishing/printing. It is deeply satisfying, for some reason, to see your thoughts in print even in the age of the internet.

My days at IIMK

Further excerpts from my biography on autopilot- sorry, autobiography. 

 Chapter 11: Calicut: Lola Kutty Land 

 There is an old joke about why mallus don’t get the time to work in Kerala. The explanation (according to the joke) is that they are too busy tying and untying their lungi. I presume it refers to the male mallus. But I think it is really unfair. I think the real explanation is that they are too busy teaching people the correct way to pronounce everything. Take the example of Calicut. Such a simple and uncomplicated name. But that would generate major unemployment in the state, because everyone can pronounce it. So, there is an official name change to Kozhikode. Even Vasco Da Gama would have lost his way, had this been done in 1498. Many people now happily spend hours, or maybe days, educating ignorant foreigners (non- mallus) on how to pronounce Kozhikode. Come to think of it, if a movie can be made about this education, it may beat “My Fair Lady” at the box office. 

 Jokes apart, one has to admit that Lola Kutty land is a unique place. These are some of its distinguishing features- 1. Almost total absence of any language other than the local 2. Amazingly green landscape 3. Almost zero industrial activity. Only West Bengal and the jungles of Amazon come close. 4. Almost equal split between Hindu, Christian and Muslim population 5. Correlated with above, beef, fish, chicken and pork sausages co-exist peacefully 6. Half the state works in the Middle East and remits money back home There could be a few more, but these are good enough to illustrate the uniqueness of the state. What happens in the state by way of economic activity is a mystery, because apart from fishing and some tourism, there are few visible signs of anything happening at all. It remains, as the tourist brochures say, “God’s Own country” in terms of nature’s beauty, but whether it can feed the population is a question mark. Probably the incoming dollars (or dinars) make up. 

 I have one major complaint about the average Malayali. It is that he rarely smiles. It may not matter to his fellow Malayalis, but I was taken aback by the apparent grimness. Maybe my sample was not representative enough, but I am fairly sure this observation is accurate. If it is so, then the reason should be found out, and a correction put in place. Anyway, I am digressing. I got a job at IIM Kozhikode (whichever way you want to pronounce it) and went there in May 2005. I just managed to beat the monsoon, and fortunately found a landlord who spoke English. He was very nice and helpful throughout our two year stay in his 4 bedroom house. The house had two halls, one on each floor, six coconut trees, one of jackfruit, and a few creepers with pepper pods on them. I really felt like a king. 

 We had a jet-setting director, who moved around as if he headed yatra.com. He was rarely in town, and we often joked (behind his back) that he spent more time with Jet Airways air hostesses than his own wife. Anyway, he was a true academic in the IIM A mould, and we got along reasonably well. As usual, the marketing area was in the doldrums with only three faculty members and many students (though less than Lucknow). My first six months at Calicut went in writing a new book (my second) on Services Marketing. I also taught the course, and students chipped in with some original case studies (at my insistence, of course) for my book. These became some of its highlights (USPs, or Unique Selling Propositions, for those of you in marketing). I think I must have inspired some colleagues to write books as well, because all the profs. around published a book in the next year or two (Suma, SSS Kumar, Tapan, Sunil Sahadev are some I can recall). I had always wondered why Indian management faculty did not write enough books. I found the explanation as I later pondered over the question. Writing something-anything- takes 100 times more effort than doing anything else. Maybe the pen is heavier, not just mightier, than the sword. Talking, sleeping, eating or traveling come to us almost naturally, but writing is an acquired taste (like Goat’s cheese or tequila). Many people come out with the weirdest excuses when asked to write anything, even their own CV. A case in point is MBA students. When asked to write a half page CV for a placement brochure, it takes some of them over a month to write it! For their own career! 

 I made a great new friend at Calicut called Ravi (it’s pronounced Revi, but I won’t go into that). He was a misfit, according to me, in mallu-land. He was open, outgoing, and he laughed a lot. Proof- a recent pic, shot in Bangalore when he visited. 

He also played cricket for the local club of which I had become a member. We played an inter club cricket match once, and I enjoyed the nets and the actual game tremendously. We won the match handsomely too. Ravi was also a cocktail enthusiast, and we spent a lot of time drumming up concoctions with whatever raw material we could find. Many exotic recipes were created and consumed. Feni, orange liquer, Bacardi, and the usual rum, brandy, vodka and gin were some of the liquors used. Pina colada was one of my favourites, and Polly’s Folly (vodka with lime, sliced green chilly and salt). We went on picnics with him and our families, and I went fishing with him too. A long boat was used, where only one of us could sit at one spot, so we sat one behind the other. We spent a quiet hour or so, and the experience was very soothing. 

 I conducted a conference along with an American association of marketing educators called NASMEI, and it proved to be a big hit. I was able to outsource the catering and venue arrangements to the local Taj hotel, which helped me to concentrate on the academic aspects. Tapan, my colleague, helped to coordinate the publishing of papers sent, and we published them in two edited volumes just in time for the conference. Gerard Tellis of NASMEI, USA, was very supportive, and got a few international delegates. A unique feature of this conference was that there was no (wasteful) inauguration or valediction ceremony-only working sessions with paper presentations. My director did not appreciate this much, but many participants did. 

 Casa Marina, where we had a couple of parties, was a beautiful seaside bungalow converted into a restaurant/hotel. It was owned by a German, and managed by a local. A little further up, P.T. Usha had her Academy where she trains girl athletes. A few hours drive up the coast is the town of Cannanore. Nearby, there is a beautiful seaside fort called Bekal. It has a magnificient view of the sea. On the way to Bekal, there is a drive-in beach. It has a tongue-twister of a name, Muzhappilangad. But it resembles the hi-flying Florida beaches in the Miami region, made famous by the partying students in March every year. This beach in Kerala is actually deserted, surprising considering its tourist potential. But we found this in many places in the state, and it probably speaks of lack of entrepreneurial effort. Maybe the entrepreneurs are terrified of the red flags that may greet him. Another lovely riverside resort in Calicut was Kadavu. This was a half hour drive, and offered luxury rooms, a nice restaurant, and boat rides in typical Kerala houseboats as well as regular motorboats. We took some of our participants from MDPs there for an evening party. Having prawn or fish with a beer in tow, gazing at the river, is a great experience indeed, comparable to some similar feelings one gets in Goa. 

 One memorable trip I remember from Calicut was to the Coorg area (now called Kodagu). Madikeri is the hill station that is a capital of the district. It is a quaint hill station, and has a very nice, quietening effect on the mind and soul. The only trouble is, the roads leading to it are soul-numbing. We traveled at around five kilometers an hour on some stretches to reach this place. But once there, it was delightful. Clean, reasonably priced, great food and lovely sights. One new activity that we tried at IIMK was conducting Faculty Development programs. We found there were lots of takers. The reasons are many. Our state-run university system leaves many faculty members disoriented and without proper mentors in teaching methods, research and publishing, and more. These gaping holes can be filled through faculty training programs, where they spend a week or so getting exposed to the best practices at a good B-school, in a non-threatening ambience. Another great learning experience at IIMK was the high tech distance learning program we had launched. This was delivered to 40 cities in India via VSAT by a company called Hughes Direcway, our technology partner. Students attended these classes on a computer terminal in their own city, with email and voice connectivity to the faculty. These were tremendous ways to bring mobility to education, and all IIMs later followed the lead of IIMK. We even launched a specialized Sales and Marketing program, and that was also a huge success. NIIT and Reliance later entered the fray as technology providers to some of the later entrants. 

 We also did a consulting project for Cochin Refineries on branding their petrol retailing efforts. This went down the tube, because the company was soon after merged with BPCL, ruling out any question of independent branding of its retail products. Mysterious are the ways some of our public sector companies work! Anyway, it was good to interact with all the officials of the refinery. We (my colleague Tapan and I) also found time to see ‘Hum Tum’ starring Saif and Rani (said to be a desi version of When Harry Met Sally) in a Cochin theatre during a visit. The monsoons in Kerala drive everything, it appears. Every Keralite worth his/her salt carries an umbrella all the time, maybe as a reminder that the rain god is just around the corner, and can open up in all his glory at any time. The buses in this communist dominated state are mostly privately run, and so is the case in Kolkata, another place with similar political inclinations. In other capitalistic states, the State transport is much more active. I once asked a friend about this contradiction, and his explanation was “They (the government) swallow all the money, and there is nothing left to run the buses with”. Don’t know if that’s the correct one, but it is an explanation. 

 A major difficulty (and a peculiar one) that I faced in Calicut was with regard to student projects. Being a strong advocate of student work right from my own student days, I came across a brick wall when my market research students came and told me that locals did not speak much English (if any), and therefore could not understand many of the questions in a typical (MBA generated) questionnaire. So we had to think of strategies like questions that had monosyllabic answers, and so on. But then, some of these problems occur in rural areas too, if you are trying to do research there. Graphics (figures etc. ) are better understood, and simple words without jargon are appropriate for these situations. Anyway, these were learnings for everyone. I also went with a student on a placement promotion trip to Mumbai, and that was another useful experience. We went to most of the big banks and a few consulting and FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods, like toilet soaps and toothpastes) companies. It was nice to see mostly positive reactions from many of the potential recruiters. Though students took care of the logistics and nitty gritty of the placement process, I think the faculty visits gave them some moral support. 

 During my days at IIMK, a controversy broke out between the HRD ministry and the IIMs regarding fees to be charged from the MBA students. The ministry was trying to dictate the fees and IIMs were resisting this assault on their autonomy. The following piece was inspired by this tug-of-war. The then minister was Murli Manohar Joshi. 

 Murli Meets Mughal-e-Azam 

 Murli was visiting IIM Delhi, trying to convert the institute’s logo into a colour recognised by all- saffron. His logic was impeccable, but he came up with an unforeseen obstacle. The Great Mughal, who happened to be the Chairman of IIMD’s board. This is how their conversation went. 

 

Murli: Hamein Bharat ki sanskriti ki raksha karni hai. Is liye naye electives ki khoj karni padegi… jaise ki…murli bajakar bakriyon ko Manage karna. 

 Mughal-e-Azam: Hamari saltanat mein …hamara matlab hai hamari Institute mein yeh gustakhi karne ki jurrat karne wale aap kaun hote hain? Kya bhed-bakriyon ko manage karne wale multi-million dollars ki Securities Transactions ko manage kar sakenge? 

 Murli: Kyon nahin? Kya Praacheen kaal mein Krishna Bhagwan ne Dwarka mein raj nahin kiya tha? Aur apni madhur murli ki dhun se gopiyon ko bhi mantramugdh kar diya tha! Management aur gopiyon ka madhur sangam…nahin nahin..mera matlab hai Mangement aur bakriyon ka…nahin nahin… 

Mughal-e-Azam (interrupting)…Saleeeem……roko ise. Is shakhsiat se hamein bachao. Chalo, hum mughal raj ki tauheen aur bardaasht nahin kar sakte. Hum is Institute ke Chairmanship se istifa dete hain. 

 Murli: Ek aur baat sunte jaiye, jahan panah. Is institute ka logo ab saffron yane bhagwe rang ka hoga, kyonki Bharat ki pavitra dharti par aur koi rang aam janta ko itna pasand nahin hai. 

 M-e-A: Nahin…hamaari aakhri saans chalne tak hum yeh nahin hone denge. Is mulk ki…matlab Institute ki Autonomy ko hum thes nahin pahunchne denge. 

 Murli: Magar ye logo to Ministry ki den hai…ise badalna hi hoga…. FADE …..to strains of hindi song…LOGO, na maro ise, yahi to mera…