Apparently, the bigger secret is that desi kids have their own national-level Spelling Bee preparatory network. Slate has an interesting article on the North South Foundation, a nonprofit byRatnam Chitturi which runs (among other things) a Spelling Bee league.   This is what Slate says about NSF:

The NSF circuit consists of 75 chapters run by close to 1,000 volunteers. The competitions, which began in 1993, function as a nerd Olympiad for Indian-Americans—there are separate divisions for math, science, vocab, geography, essay writing, and even public speaking—and a way to raise money for college scholarships for underprivileged students in India.

Kavya Shivashankar (Pic. courtesy Washington Post)

The NSF Spelling Bee competitions (Slate describes one in Kansas held at the local temple) are also at a national level and have some prize money, though nothing on the scale of Scripps. Slate estimates that about 30 desi kids from the NSF ranks will be among the 273 kids who participate in the Scripps National Spelling Bee which starts tomorrow.  The finals air on ABC on Friday, June 4th. Hopefully, at least a few of those 30 kids will make it all the way to the finals and perhaps even win.

Of course I will be watching – longtime readers know how much of a Spelling Bee fan – in 2007, I wondered about all the desi kids on the Bee and what their parents must be telling each other ,  in 2008, I hypothesised about why Indians do so well in the Bee (CBSE system? ancient gurukul tradition?) and about Sameer Mishra’s “numb nuts”.   It’s a fascinating phenomenon,  this abundance of desi participation, and I have never figured out why this is so.

But I will be puzzling over it some more over the next few days as I watch gawky kids in braces and pigtails mouth words I’ve never heard before.

I’m not sure why I watch.  I really don’t know why I find this such a fascinating competition.  Perhaps when I understand that, I will also understand what drives so many Indian-American parents to spend so many years teaching their kids, or so many kids to spend years learning words they’ll probably never use again.  The prize money is good – the winner got $40,000 last year, but desis have been competing in the Bee long before the prize money was anything great.

So why do you think desis like the Spelling Bee so much?  What could explain this phenomenon?

It is an easy read; you don’t need to know about credit-default swaps or collateralized mortgage obligations to understand this book (although geeks who dabble in CDSs and CMOs will find it interesting too).

First of all, there is Paulson, who would be a clear winner in the contest for Most-Likely-to-be-voted-Dr. Jekyll and Mr.Hyde.   There is Paulson the bird watching environmentalist, the Illinois farm boy who grew up milking cows and baling hay, there is the Christian Scientist who doesn’t take any medicines and believes in prayer for curing everything.  Then there is the multi-millionaire/ billionaire former CEO of Goldman Sachs.

There is also the ardent believer of work-life balance who believes in sleeping every night at 9:30 pm and talks about how, even in his early days at Goldman, always left work at 4:30 pm to spend time with his family.   If you wonder how he feels about making Goldman employees working all those really long hours (think 100 hour weeks, working Saturdays and Sundays), he has this to say:   “It’s not your boss’s job to figure out your life.” [1.]

Given this kind of double talk, you shouldn’t be surprised, perhaps, that he treated arch rival Lehman Brothers differently from Bear Stearns.  When Bear Stearns was failing, he was desperate to save the company for fear of the impact on the economy.  When J.P. Morgan initially walked away from the deal, he asked JPM CEO Jamie Dimon “Is there something we can work out where the Fed helps you get this deal done?” [2.]

And even though the Treasury had no powers (without a congressional allocation, which they didn’t have) to assist JPM or Bear, Paulson finagles a $30 billion non-recourse loan from the Fed.

Cut to when Lehman was collapsing.  Paulson suddenly finds his hands tied.  The framework that he created for Bear?  Mysteriously impossible now.  When Bank of America walks away from Lehman and its CEO Ken Lewis tries to bargain for some kind of government money, Paulson tells him it won’t happen. [3.] There would be no government money for Lehman.

Interestingly, Lehman was the only big Wall Street firm which was allowed to go bankrupt in the crisis.  All others either got bailed out (AIG, Bear Stearns) or bought (Wachovia, Merrill Lynch).

Paulson never comes up with a convincing explanation for why he let Lehman fail.  But he blames Lehman’s CEO Dick Fuld plenty:  “His ego was entwined with the firm’s” , “How far he was willing to go to protect his firm was another question”,  [4.] “Does he know how serious the problem is?” [5.] So there we have it, Paulson thinks Dick Fuld is arrogant, out of touch and doesn’t even care about the same firm that he soent 14 years rebuilding (as Paulson himself admits).  Paulson, on the other hand, claims to care deeply : “But AIG was not my foremost concern that night as I lay sleepless, wondering how Lehman would manage to pull through the weekend.  Three days was a long time.” [6.]

It’s not that Lehman’s demise was too swift or unexpected.  Paulson talks about how his  team (led by Neel Kashkari) always anticipated that Lehman would be next after Bear and spent  3 months planning how to ring-fence Lehman’s assets and insulate the economy from a possible Lehman collapse.  But it’s strange how somehow all their planning seems to involve what to do after Lehman collapses, not what to do to save it from a possible collapse.

So perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that Paulson finds $85 billion in a bridge loan for AIG even as Lehman was filing for bankruptcy. Sure, it was necessary to save AIG and Bear, but why did he think the economy would be unharmed if Lehman failed?

Oh, and Paulson never explains how he thought he could get $700 billion in bailout money from Congress with a mere three page proposal.  He doesn’t mention the three-pageness of it, and seems to wonder why it created such a fuss.  Clearly, owning up to his own mistakes is not part of this book.

He doesn’t explain why Treasury and the Fed kept changing the rules and treating each institution differently, why there was a complete seat-of-the -pants approach to each new crisis (what happened to the plan Kashkari had?).  This lack of consistency and unpredictability about how the Fed/Treasury would react was a big factor in spooking the markets.  I remember writing about the Lehman collapse and the bailout bill back in September 2008.

To my mind, the biggest mistake Paulson made was in thinking that Lehman’s collapse could be contained; that they could wind down Lehman without too much damage.  I think he panicked when AIG was in trouble because he thought it would create far too big of a ripple effect, but that sense of panic or urgency was always missing when he talks about Lehman.   He did not anticipate the kind of effect it had on the markets’ confidence, and on Main Street.  I suppose it did not help that there was a personality clash with Dick Fuld.   Not surprising in itself, considering what arch-rivals Lehman and Goldman were, but you would think personalities would be irrelevant at such a time.

Paulson was right in thinking Wall Street would recover – it has; but Main Street hasn’t.  All those people who had their lifetime retirement savings (401-ks) wiped out in the market crash aren’t going to get them back anytime soon.  I only wish Paulson could bring himself to see his part in all this.   The book doesn’t set any records straight; it only reinforces what we have suspected for a long time.

[1.] On Page 31, [2.] Page 110, [3.] Page 184, [4.] Page 123-124, [5.] Page 173, [6.] Page 179

They are all spam comments (of course, what else can I expect?).  Akismet correctly recognizes them nearly all the time, but occasionally, it lets a few slip by.  Maybe it knows how much I like readers’ comments (and how few of them I get).  Here’s a sample of the spam love I get, and note the .in web addresses of the authors.

Sample of Spam Love

So I wasn’t too surprised to read this article in the Hindu about how India is the second top spam generating country in the world.  This is based on a study by Sophos, and you can see the list on their website here.

Over at SpamHaus, they have a list of the top 10 worst spammers, and who do you think makes it all the way to #3?  Someone called Herbal King from India.

Pic: Spamhaus

You cannot imagine how happy it makes me to see Indians succeeding in one more IT related area.

Has any of you also noticed a sudden increase in spam-comment love on your blogs from .in websites?

The two bills were originally vetoed by the State Governor.  But then both the State House and Senate overrode the veto and passed the bills into law.

Here is a description of the two laws from the New York Times:

Though other states have passed similar measures requiring women to have ultrasounds, Oklahoma’s law goes further, mandating that a doctor or technician set up the monitor so the woman can see it and describe the heart, limbs and organs of the fetus. No exceptions are made for rape and incest victims.

A second measure passed into law on Tuesday prevents women who have had a disabled baby from suing a doctor for withholding information about birth defects while the child was in the womb.

The first law essentially tries emotional harassment and guilt-induction to get pregnant women  to abandon their plans to have an abortion.  This is bad enough, and in the case of rape/ incest victims who are already traumatized, completely callous.

But the second law is something you could never have imagined seeing in a Western, First  World country.  Basically, it says that if a woman goes for an ultrasound or amniocentesis (or any other test) and the doctor notices birth defects in the fetus but does not tell the mother because, gee, he/ she (the doctor) doesn’t like women having abortions,  and the baby is subsequently born with a birth defect, the doctor is not responsible. No malpractice suit can be filed against him/ her.

The NY Times quotes the State Governor when he vetoed the bill, and I completely agree with him:

Mr. Henry said, “It is unconscionable to grant a physician legal protection to mislead or misinform pregnant women in an effort to impose his or her personal beliefs on a patient.”

But obviously, the lawmakers thought differently, for reasons best known to them.  And now thousands of pregnant women are going to have ultrasounds and other tests which are as good as useless, because what’s the point when you don’t know if the doctor is going to hide information from you?

What happens if babies are born with Down’s Syndrome or some other disorder – will these lawmakers and the doctor take care of the baby all its life?

What about the emotional agony that the parents will suffer while binging up such a baby – will these lawmakers and the doctor share that agony?  Will they recompense the parents for it? (Not that any amount will compensate them fully).

Will the lawmakers and the doctor pay the medical bills for all the treatments for this baby?

And what happens if the fetus poses a life-threatening danger to the mother – will such a doctor go unpunished if he does not inform the mother even then, because she may abort the fetus?

Can anyone tell me just what these lawmakers are thinking?  Why is it becoming more and more accepted for people to superimpose their beliefs (religious or otherwise) on others?

A lawsuit has been filed against this law, of course, but for now, the law continues to be in force.  The lawsuit has been filed by a New York based abortion-rights group.

But here’s my final question – this bill has been debated for many months; it’s not sudden.  And lawmakers would not have overriden the veto if they weren’t sure their constituents would support them.  So how much have the women of Oklahoma been protesting these provisions?  Have they been writing to their representatives protesting the bill  (now law) ?

It’s not even an issue which affects women alone.  For too long, abortion has been seen as a women’s issue, and there can be some justification because the woman should have the ultimate say in abortion.

But when you get into the area of misinformation (or denial of information) on birth defects, this is not even just about abortion but about denial of medical care.

So what are the good people of Oklahoma – women and men – doing about these laws?  How did they allow their lawmakers to pass such a law?

At least one Professor at the University of Houston has taken the lead on this.   The Chronicle for Higher Education has an article on Ms. Lori Whisenant, director of business law and ethics studies at the University of Houston.  She teaches about 1000 students and has 7 Teaching Assistants (TAs) and outsources assignment grading to India (and other countries) through an outsourcer called EduMetry which is run, not surprisingly, by a PIO – Chandru Rajam.

The graders working for EduMetry, based in a Virginia suburb of Washington, are concentrated in India, Singapore, and Malaysia, along with some in the United States and elsewhere. They do their work online and communicate with professors via e-mail. The company advertises that its graders hold advanced degrees and can quickly turn around assignments with sophisticated commentary, because they are not juggling their own course work, too.

The idea behind this is that it frees Professors and TAs to do more research and teaching.  From a student’s perspective, though, this means very little feedback on his/ her assignment and the grade received.

Here’s an (imagined) conversation which is possibly happening right now at Houston :

“Why did you give me a C+ ?” asked the student to the TA.  “I thought, I did, like, quite well, you know. “

“I don’t know,” shrugs the TA. “I didn’t give you a C+”.

” ‘Course you did”, says the student. “Says here – see?  C+.”

“Yes, but I didn’t grade you”, says the TA.  “And none of the other TAs did, either.  Someone in India gave you the C+. And no, you can’t ask him why, because I don’t know  who that was.”

“What does someone in India know about my paper? “

“A lot, according to him.  He says you use too many apostrophes in the wrong places. He said your paper was “backwas”.  What’s backwas, do you know?”

Jokes apart, you’d think that the seven TAs should be adequate.  But as someone I know who has been a RA/ TA says:

If it were to take 5 mins to grade each student (and this is definitely on the low side, I would think), each
TA woud spend about 13 hours a week grading 150 students. Plus, say 3 class hours, so 16 hours right there. Plus hold office hours for 150 students: 20 mins each for the 10% of the students who actually come asking questions, and that’s another 5 hours. And undergrads can be insanely dense: I’ve spent an entire hour just repeating stuff for a couple of students …

The remaining 20 hours go towards taking classes (10 hours a week), doing homework (another 10 hours), so when does the thesis get done!

The key issue here of course is that a single Professor is teaching 1000 students.  That seems an unusually high class size.

But I wonder if, going forward, really large class sizes are going to become the norm.

Almost every US university has a funding shortfall.  They can only cut so many costs; they need to increase revenue too.  What do you think they will do?  Would it surprise you if they decided to admit more students (and even better, full-fee paying international students?)

But at the same time, they wouldn’t want to hire too many more permanent, tenured faculty, so perhaps they would resort to more adjunct faculty.  But you cannot have Adjunct Faculty teaching Econ 1o1, so what do you do?

Increase class size.

I suspect this will probably happen a lot more at second and third rung universities.  There used to be a time when any US university was a good university, and any US degree was better than an Indian degree – in people’s minds, that is.  But from an international student’s perspective in these financial-aid starved times,  one wonders if it still makes sense to apply to any but the top US universities.

Think about it, not only are you less likely to get a job after graduating from Tier 2 and Tier 3 US universities, you are now going to face the ultimate insult – the people grading your assignments graduated from the same Indian universities you rejected.

It is a fascinating acknowledgment of the continuous evolution of Indian emigrants.  The acronyms may be recent, but we have had PIOs  for centuries.

A few months back, I read “Sea of Poppies”.  It’s a great book at many levels.  I love the amount of research and historical detail that has gone into it, like the description of the Opium Factory, the setting itself – in a time and place that I wish we knew more about, and Amitav Ghosh’s writing style.   If I have one regret, it’s that the sequel would be published sooner; I cannot imagine waiting years for a sequel.

But the book shows how little we know about emigrant Indians.  Thinking about the subject also makes me realize that I am just the latest link in a chain of emigration that goes back at least to the 9th or 10th century, and possibly much earlier.  But who were all these people whose footsteps we are now following?

Which states did people emigrate from?  We know the story in patches – about Tamils  settling in Indonesia and Malaysia as early as the 9th and 10th century , about people from U.P. and Bihar and Bengal ending up in the Caribbean islands and Fiji, but it’s astonishing how much we don’t know.

What drove these people to emigrate?  Were the reasons always economic – like fleeing famine and poverty , or were they social – trying to get out of the caste system, say, or political – like fleeing an unjust king?

Was there a pecking order of preference in these destinations?  Was Mauritius preferred to Jamaica, or Kenya to South Africa? What kind of ships did they use, and what hardships did they face along the way ?

I am particularly interested in the earlier emigrants (i.e. before British times, like those Chola and Pandya era Tamils) about whom we know virtually nothing.  What did they find so compelling about the new lands that they decided to stay back?

There are books that describe the experiences of more recent emigrants, although these too are few and far between.  The history of emigration during British times is itself fascinating – you have the stories of how Sikhs went to Canada and the Komagata Maru incident, or how Indians ended up in Mauritius and the West Indies/ Caribbean as Amitav Ghosh draws on.  How much more fascinating would it be to look at the stories of Indian emigrants down the ages?

It would be great if someone could write a book describing the various sea routes Indians took over the ages, where they spread from their initial destinations, how they fared and if any returned.  Is some historian out there listening?  Can we have someone research the history of Indian emigrants, please?

I know of  one family who returned, though – mine.  Reading “The Glass Palace” reminded me of my own family history -  my great grandfather was a famous doctor in Rangoon.  The family returned to India during World War II, in a story that rivals any thriller you’ll ever read.

I’m sure many of us have more such fascinating stories tucked away in our family trees, of people who left, generations back and also much more recently.

All the more reason why we need an emigrant history edition.

I read your blog post on “bloggers and tweeters” with great interest, for I am also one of those people who blog and tweet.   You do both too, I notice, and some may think it is ironic that your own views were in the form of a blog post.  But perhaps you believe that blogging should only be done by journalists?

Let me introduce myself – I am one of those pseudonymous bloggers you mentioned, you know, blogging from the darkness of my room in my ivory tower.

You ask about me  and other anonymous bloggers :

I will wonder: just who do you guys represent? Are you speaking on behalf of viewers and readers? Or are you just another anonymous elite that feels emboldened to pass judgement on the rest of the world from the darkness of your rooms?

Perhaps you don’t understand this, but I speak for just myself and no one else.  I have not been elected by any one to represent them or their views.  What’s more, I am not even a self-appointed representative; I don’t delude myself that I speak for some silent majority of people who may or may not agree with me.  I didn’t even realize I needed to be “emboldened” to blog, is speaking out something that should fill me with fear ?

You defend the media obsession with TRPs by saying:

When bloggers tell you that TV channels are only interested in TRPs, what are they saying?

In effect, they are saying that TV channels are only interested in reaching as many people as possible.

And why is this a bad thing?

and also

Or, look at it another way. If a programme gets high TRPs, then this means that lots of ordinary people have liked it. The ordinary people may be right or wrong to have liked it – I pass no value judgements here – but the fact that they liked it is a reflection on them, not on the TV channel. So, why blame the channel? Why not blame the viewers?

Did I read that right? The light may be dark here, but  Mr. Sanghvi, are you really saying that any programme with high TRPs (or potentially high TRPs) is fit to be broadcast?

If so, here are a few categories of content that will get very high TRPs.  Celebrity gossip sells – I mean rumors, paparazzi pictures, speculation about “famous” people and so on.   Another category that is very popular among some people – porn.  Soft porn, suggestive photos, lingerie clad models – these are very popular in a certain segment.  But you don’t have to take my word for it;  I don’t claim to speak for your audience.

But tell me, Mr. Sanghvi, if your audience research suggests that celebrity gossip and soft-porn will  increase your TRPs, will you include them in your programming?  If adding hard porn and graphic violence will help you tap yet another segment and increase your TRPs even more, will you add them too?  Please tell me, I would be very interested in your answers.

I believe that the news media’s job is to educate and not to titillate, but again, that is just my personal opinion.  You are free to disagree.

You also say:

Such is the arrogance of the blogging elite these days that even when it attacks journos, it is effectively dissing the vast majority of media readership and viewership.

I’m sorry, Mr. Sanghvi, but sitting in my darkened room, I didn’t realize that attacking journos is equal to attacking readers.  I suppose then, by the same logic, attacking politicians is equal to attacking the voters who voted for them?  Maybe you should stop saying anything against any elected representative then – you don’t want to disparage voters, do you?

Perhaps you should darken your room too, Mr. Sanghvi, the light is blinding.

Other opinions on the topic :  Amit Varma, Rohit.

Ruchika Girhotra (Wiki pic)

We all know the facts of what happened to Ruchika Girhotra – in 1990, 14 year-old Ruchika was molested by Shambhu Pratap Singh Rathore, a police offer who subsequently rose to become the Director General of Police in Haryana (i.e. the highest-ranking police officer in the state of Haryana).  Rathore subsequently started harassing Ruchika’s family because he did not want them to go public with the crime.

Ruchika was traumatized for years by the “molestation”  and she subsequently committed suicide.  Nineteen years after the offence, in Dec. 2009, Rathore was finally sentenced – to 6 months in prison and fined a paltry Rs. 1000.  After the public uproar that ensued at this mild sentence, the case has now been transferred to the CBI.

There are at least two issues here:

Issue 1 :  Indian Laws on Molestation and Attempts to Rape:

Current Indian laws look at “molestation” as a minor offence.  Section 509 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) states:

Section 509. Word, gesture or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman
Whoever, intending to insult the modesty of any woman, utters any word, makes any sound or gesture, or exhibits any object, intending that such word or sound shall be heard, of that such gesture or object shall be seen, by such woman, or intrudes upon the privacy of such woman, shall be punished with simple imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year, or with fine, or with both.

When you consider Rathore’s 6 month sentence, it is ironic to note that if poor Ruchika had failed in her suicide attempt, she may have received a harsher punishment than Rathore’s.  Sec. 309 of the IPC states :

Section 309. Attempt to commit suicide
Whoever attempts to commit suicide and does any act towards the commission of such offence, shall be punished with simple imprisonment for term which may extend to one year [ or with fine, or with both].

So what does Sec. 509 mean by “privacy of a woman”? The media and the law use different words while talking about sexual harassment, and none of them are clear.  We need to explicitly define “molestation”, “eve-teasing”, “misbehavior” and every other euphemism we use.  Right now, everything short of outright rape goes by “eve-teasing” , “molestation” or “intruding upon privacy”.  Harassment of women in India takes different forms.  There is the groping that happens in public places – on buses, in crowds and so on, and there is the harassment that happens behind closed doors, where it can turn into an attempt to rape.   Which brings us to the other irony in Indian law – we have penalties for Attempt to Suicide and Attempt to Murder., but as the Supreme Court has ruled in a different case, the IPC does not recognize “Attempt to rape” as a crime.

An unsuccessful rapist can only be charged under Section 354, Assault or criminal force to women with intent to outrage her modesty, which carries a maximum sentence of 2 years – not a very harsh punishment for an almost-rapist.   Let’s be clear, the major issue in rape is not only the physical trauma that the victim suffers, but also the psychological trauma – which she would be suffer even in an attempt to rape.  The social stigma that she would suffer in Indian society wold not be very different either.  So while the victim suffers nearly the same consequences, how can a perpetrator who had every intention to rape get a mere slap of the wrist just because he was not successful in carrying out the rape?

Issue 2:  Offences against minors should carry a greater penalty than offences against adults.

In many cases, minor children may not even understand what has happened to them, or be able to explain the nature of the offence clearly.  Even when they do understand and can articulate clearly, the balance of power between a adult and a  child is so skewed that it is very easy for an adult to cow down a child with threats.

From the perpetrator’s viewpoint, children are an easy target of sexual harassment – whether molestation, rape or  incest, precisely because the probability of detection is so low.

One way to deter this is to make the punishment for a crime against a minor so stringent that even with a low probability of detection, the adult perpetrator will still think twice before committing the crime.  So I believe that the same crime, when committed against a minor child, should carry a punishment which is many times harsher that when committed against an adult.

The message that the judgement in Ruchika’s case has sent out  is that you can get away with a mere slap on the wrist if you commit a crime against a minor.  The Indian government needs to take action to change this perception.  I think it is high time our legislators made the necessary changes in the Indian Penal Code.  That is possibly the best justice that Ruchika Girhotra and all the other silently suffering Ruchikas around the country can get.

It’s true, there was a character called Sherlock Holmes in the movie.  But he had not much in common with the character that Arthur Conan Doyle created.  He was Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes.

When Guy Ritchie started making this movie, I’m sure he asked himself “How can I make this a blockbuster?”  He must have then asked the question, “which are the recent bestselling movies that were based on books?”

The Harry Potter series, the Da Vinci Code, and Ludlum’s Jason Bourne series must have come to mind.

So Guy Ritchie must have told himself – let me take the key ideas in all of them and mix them up.  That will make my movie an even bigger blockbuster than any of them.

So that’s what he did.

Here is the recipe for Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes:

Ingredients:

1 Part Harry Potter  (Key Ideas: Magic, Books of Spells)

1 Part Da Vinci Code (Key Ideas:  Secret Brotherhoods)

1 Part James Bond (Key Ideas:  Look like a Male Supermodel, Pursue Armed and Dangerous Women, Wake up Chained to Bed)

1 Part Robert Ludlum (Key Ideas:  Plot for World Dominance)

1 Part Sop to US Audience (Key Ideas:  Make sure to tell audience that the World dominance plot starts with the US)

1 Part Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes (Key Ideas:  make sure to include every eccentric trait of Holmes)

1 Part Watson.  Add a touch of Mary.

Mix all ingredients. Shake Well.  Serve chilled.

This much seems clear.  What I still don’t understand is the scene where Sherlock Holmes opens a (beer?) bottle with his teeth.  Where did that come from?