DK Kapila The Oracle

  An Interesting Social Evolution Underway Me and my inclination to watch and listen. At this lovely upscale hotel, more like a resort, at Udaipur, in December 2023, well the wedding season is on. Relatives of the immediate two families going to be related by marriage are driving up. With the traditional drums and folk dancers welcoming each guest, even those not invited to the wedding are welcomed but then how can the staff make out. But imagine the befuddled looks of a couple or family just coming for sightseeing and getting a drummed up welcome. But the real show is somewhere else. The marriage is the show. First you see the grandmas and aunts, the older types. Heads covered, permanently it seems, waddling in due to old knees, socks and chappals on, sitting around. But the diamonds are shining and big. Then comes the mother and the younger aunts, heads covered ever so firmly, speaking some English, moving around giving off positive energy on footwear they may not be actually use...

  Poor Dinesh ! Poor Poor Dinesh !! No it’s about me. Just to be clear. It’s all about poor Dinesh at the New Delhi International Airport. I should have walked upto him and patted his shoulder in sympathy. I should have blessed him and wished him more stoicism. But I did not. Social conventions mandate discretion at times. I was standing in line at the Tea Counter. In December. Keeping a social distance due to some in the queue coughing. A sort of distance as in Covid times so to say. I had to, after all if the wife wants tea so do you. The perils of social distancing came into play suddenly. A young lady with a stroller and a rather grown up kid just bulldozed her way in. Swung the stroller around like a weapon and said excuse me Sir, step back. Taken aback at this new mode of warfare, a stroller with a kid included, moving across in a wide arc, pointedly at me, I stepped back. Immediately. The young lady after that said, Dinesh, take the stroller and watch Rajesh. I noticed a you...

 A ttitudes to Stray Dogs have evolved. We read today a lot about the rights of stray dogs. Street dogs if you will. They can only be vaccinated and sterilised but cannot be displaced from their locality or chased out. FiRs are registered against those people (human beings) who inflict any cruelty upon them, even if for some it’s a response to harassment or a bite to a loved one. The judges have thrown their weight behind animal rights, specially at the Supreme Court, but it’s led to a lot of conflicts within localities as residents find themselves on opposite camps. There are those who are indifferent, then those who were indifferent until attacked or harassed, then those fed up of the noise and littering caused by strays, then those who adopt a few strays and lastly the activists. It’s a tough call for each category after each episode by a stray dog. The littering caused by the packs of street dogs is another concern.. This is as it is the last decade or more so but it was not al...

  The Crux of It – The Golden Years. Dinesh K   Kapila I am a little fed up. My friends and even acquaintances send me varied posts on the Golden Years. and the later part of it. Many are gloomy or with dark shades of gloominess.   Now by now most friends are mostly retired and some a few year before me and some a little after me. The dark shades may vary in intensity but there are still years to go. Considering the average life span now. Can we live through so many years with dread. Only praying and meditating and thinking through the scriptures – that is another often received advise. Along with the need to know philosophy and what is life all about. The darker ones, as I said earlier, are centred around the subject – How to be mentally ready for what awaits us. In the long term but who has seen the long term, simply put, is everyone seeing the long term !. Leave that aside, why it is a concern is because one post says – be ready for whatever food you are served in ...

  A lesson on the importance of tie ups in a developmental initiative years ago. Dinesh K Kapila More than twenty years back, I was assigned three districts in Punjab. I tried to be a committed, passionate, driven developmental banker. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity to learn all about governance, rural commercial activities, rural livelihoods, banking and credit and the impact of socio economic initiatives. At the district and sub district level. It taught many a lesson in humility and reality.  Once in the sub mountainous areas, a President of a small NGO and a Branch Manager of a PSU Bank (also the Lead Bank) met me during a visit to their block. The concern was for a village inhabited by primarily socio economically deprived communities, they were into weaving baskets, brooms, artefacts etc from wild grass - mainly Sarkanda and another species. They made a subsistence level living, dependent totally on the local commission agent cum trader for credit to buy inp...

  Thoughts – Employment Punjab. I am just recollecting instances from twenty years ago. As a District Dev Mgr I would travel across the districts of Ropar, Nawanshahr and SAS Nagar. We had financed a large number of projects across multiple sectors. Drinking water supply projects for villages would have contractor from Punjab certainly, but the digging of trenches would be by labour from Kashmir, the Overhead tanks were constructed by labour from UP Gorakhpur generally, masons from UP and Bihar, laying of pipelines by skilled workers from Bengal and Bihar. I found at a few places drilling of tube wells in hard rock by labour from MP but the machinery was owned very much by businessmen from Punjab. Regarding roads again the contractors and owners of machinery were from Punjab but the skilled labour and labour and overseers for bridges, culverts, roads etc were all from other states, including Jharkhand and Odisha. A similar scenario was there in Irrigation projects including lining...

  Quality of our Teachers Just got this feedback from Private School heads operating on the borders of cities. Solid infrastructure, well kept playgrounds and logistical support. But on the borders and also some kilometres away from recognised urban areas the socio economic profile changes. But first the teachers, BA BEd and BScBEd teachers are available literally on tap. But without a holistic grounding and view and a lack of awareness and exposure. Teachers need to have this quality too. So some of these schools have hired Engineers, IT Professionals and the like. Or BA with diplomas even Food Processing but well grounded and aware. They are able to reach better and to impart knowledge inputs better. This does imply BEd colleges should wake up and rearrange their inputs. As regards students, the cultural profile is a lack of reading in their families, this impacts their ability to learn and understand. But as far as the parents are concerned, when advised to themselves read and b...

  Rural Banking and Development and a Uniquely Different Honour !  . Dinesh Kumar Kapila Rural Banking has its own charm and nuances and the cultural context changes from State to State.  Way back, I think around 2005 or so,  I was the DDM (District Development Manager) for Rupnagar,  Nawanshahr and Mohali districts.  Those days we had a Farmers Club Programme, in association with Banks. The amount we disbursed as grant was maybe average to satisfactory for some States but certainly not Punjab, my home state. But the large hearted farmers and at times Banks would combine and make it a success, specially the inauguration ceremony, with pomp and show. But this got certainly more stretched at some point or the other, but one inauguration I still remember was eye-popping in the surprise element and in its uniqueness. The inauguration was scheduled exactly midway through the week, something I generally avoided. But the Club was affiliated with the Lead Ban...