Sathya sodhanai!

For those on the other side of linguistic barrier, the title translates to test of truth (lot of "T"s here :D, that was't intentional though). Everybody must have had that moment. Let me share one such moment.  It was during my Master's class. Our professor had explained a simple MATLAB program to plot a spline, the equation of which we had manually derived from given condition. To follow up with it, he had given us an assignment which was same problem but different initial condition.

I solved it, my friends too solved it. I did the program too.  A simple 10 line code. No big deal. However my friends naively believed that programming is not a required skill set for a mechanical engineer. Hence they never really cared to learn programming. It was the submission time and I had  forgot to save my program in cloud. We were all near the class, my friends struggling to complete the program. I helped them and we did it. I thought it was a simple program and frankly there was not many ways to write the same program differently. So I asked them to get me a copy of the same program. We all submitted it.

Next class, all our program red-flagged and we were all charged with group plagiarism. I tried too speak with the Prof that this was too simple a program and I know enough MALAB to write a longer program. However evidence was against me and I was indeed wrong in submitted the same program. In oriental philosophies there is a term called prayaschitta. I had to do something to prove my Prof about my programming abilities. And indeed I did it.

[Legend has it (:P) that Pavanesh sat continuously the whole night programming. The result was a 180+ line code that could directly generate any of the four types of spline that a user selects.  It would directly derive the equation from the initial condition input;  and no manual calculation was required. That was a month of course work, over night transferred into a program. The Prof was so impressed he asked a copy of the program used it in his later as part of his classes.] 

Hawks, doves, bears, bulls...

In the blog title, we have two animals and two birds. If you think, it is about the beautiful wildlife, with a scene of a bull grazing in the African grasslands with a dove feeding on the bull's wound or a hawk feeding on the dead bear, flashing in your mind, I would like to say, I am sorry. I mean business here, literally!!

Before we start meaning business, I have some consolation for Nature lovers. When ever I think about Hawks, I always had this doubt: "What is the difference between hawks, falcons, raptors, kites, eagles and vultures?". Since I tried to find about them, I would like to share them. The Raptor is general term used to describe a bird which feeds on other animals, so we need not worry about it. Of the others, Eagle and Vulture are quite easy to differentiate. Eagles are the more majestic ones with large wing span and powerful claws and beaks. The Vultures are the larger birds with the distinctive neck which are always shown in Discovery Channel or NGC or Animal Planet as eating the leftovers of preyed animals after a lion, tiger or a cheetah has finished its lunch. As for the rest of list, they are fairly similar and is hard to differentiate for an untrained eye!

So much for the birds; lets get back to business. In the end of May this year, the US Federal Reserve System (shortly referred to as Fed) chief Mr Ben Bernanke hinted that the Quantitative Easing (QE) tapering may soon be started. In market jargon he was said to have used Hawkish tone. For people who do not know what QE is, it is an unconventional monetary policy used by Fed since 2008 financial crisis (or Great Dispersion II). It is actually the third leg of QE or QE-3, which is currently in place. According to QE, the US Fed purchases $85 billion worth of bonds every month from the market, there by infusing liquidity into the market. More liquidity means the market interest rates move down. And lower interest have simulating effect on economy(at least theoretically), as people tend to spend more now, than hold to their money. Thus by buying $85b worth of bonds and assets, Fed is trying to simulate the US economy.

As Fed chief had used a Hawkish tone, it spooked the markets world over; especially the developing markets like India, which have been enjoying the higher liquidity driving their markets - a Bull run. So the Hawkish tone has spooked the Bulls and the Bears had captured the market. The result, the rupee plunged to all time low against the dollar, and markets feel to the lowest point for this year. Then Dr Rajan was appointed as RBI governor and he used his 'tricks' and 'magics' to stabilized the market.

Yesterday the Fed has actually announced, "A $10b tapering will happen from January". Does it mean Bears will jump in again and the drive the Bulls away? I think otherwise and I have my reasons. First, the market was expecting a much steeper tapering. Second, the Fed has announced that, further tapering would be considered only if the US economy continues to grow at a robust rate. Third, the Fed has decided to hold the short term interest near zero. All these reason has made Fed sound Dovish, which the markets love. Moreover, it removes a great amount of uncertainty affecting the market and will make space for market participants to worry about other factors!

To put in short, in May end, the Fed was Hawkish and Bears enjoyed. Now that the Fed had sounded Dovish, will Bulls enjoy? In US the answer seems to be yes, with both Dow Jones and S&P-500 hitting all time highs. Will Sensex and Nifty follow suit? Hopefully!!                         
         

Sachin... Sachin...

24 years and a day after his debut, Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar retired from international cricket yesterday. Frankly speaking I am not a die-hard fan of Sachin, as some of my fellow country men and women; but the event of Sachin retiring does kindle sadness in me. This is because the event that happened yesterday has much larger significance than just a cricketer's retirement. 

First and foremost, Sachin has been an inseparable part of cricket, from the time I knew cricket. Playing for 24 yeas, he has been playing along with three generation of Indian team. So it had created a psychological impression that people come and go but the little master will be always there. Only when Rahul Dravid retired, I had similar feeling, but even at that time, Sachin was still there. Also, Sachin is one of the stars who have been in Indian team, since I have started watching cricket; the others being Dravid, Kumble and Gangully. When these players were around, the Indian team seemed to be more familiar. When I watch the match, these players would bring back memories of old matches which I enjoyed, also featuring these stars. But now,when I look at the current team, every one is new. In fact all of the current members in Indian team were infants when Sachin made his debut. All the familiar faces have gone and Sachin’s retirement has an effect of 'the last straw'.

I have not been a continuous follower of cricket, but there was a brief period when I would do nothing else but watch cricket. And coincidentally it was time when the government imposed the Set-top box rule in Chennai (Why govt., only in Chennai??), which made all the sports channel ‘paid’ channels and were excluded from the list of channels provided by the local cable operator. During that time India toured Australia (2003 - 04). I would keep watching the news channel for the whole match duration, just because they used to display live scores at the corner of the screen. (Though I switched over to a more sane way of following cricket  after that series – radio commentary!! ) [For readers who think I could have used mobile phones or Internet, guys it was time when a black and white mobile was Rs. 15000+ and 64kbps dial-up connection were the most common network available!!). This period of my love with cricket, actually started because of India’s performance in the 2003 ICC world cup. India in their second match, were beaten by then world champion Australia, but after that there was no turning back and India had a great run in that tournament and ended up as the finalist (again loosing to Australia in the finals, there by crushing my hopes of an revenge!!). As India kept winning in the World cup matches, I caught the ‘cricket fever’. I watched the matches so intensely that I could remember most of the matches even now.[ I even started my own cricket rating after that world cup and kept analyzing all matches for the next one year!!]. Though it was a complete team effort, the backbone behind such a great run in the world cup was Our Little master Sachin. He scored close to 650 runs in the tournament with a 150+ score and two score in 90s (see,I still remember these matches !!!)  Had it not been the great performance at the world cup, I would have not been into cricket so much. That is way Sachin is so special and his retirement is very hard to digest!        

Now the final day had come and like so many, I too watched the final moments at Wankhede stadium (through telecast, though). I actually liked what Harsha Bhogle spoke the most, just after the presentation ceremony. There were many interesting points that he made. First, he said about Sachin being a true ambassador of Cricket – a gentleman’s game. Sachin has always played the game in good spirits and with principles. As Harsh said, Sachin had never been spotted losing his temper on field. And there were instances when he walked, when he knew he was out, without waiting for Umpire’s decision. Also he had made a promise to his father that he will not endorse any Liquor brands, a principle which he always followed.

Another interesting point that Harsha made was about why Sachin is special, about why Sachin is worshiped as god, while equally good players like Dravid did not have such a unprecedented fan following. As Harsha said, it is more because of the circumstances during which he started playing International cricket. Most of the 1983 World cup team have retired, and Indian team was in rebuilding stage. The other two star players of that time, Azharuddin and Jadeja were caught in nasty match fixing scams. Economically too India was at worst position. Also we had Babri Masjid issue and Mumbai bomb blasts. So India was down in all parameters and was trying to regain a position in world. At that time it was Sachin’s brilliant performances which lifted India, brought a sense of joy and pride and brought the nation together. Again quoting Harsh, he did what Sir Don Bradman did after World War II. It is hard to image for people who have not lived that time,to understand this, probably they never will; but for people who experienced that period, Sachin will always be God!

Thank you Sachin for taking Indian Cricket to great heights and being a true ambassador for this Gentleman’s game.