Last few days, I was having a war of mails with an SBI branch. My wife had an account with the bank and recently she transferred that from one branch to other. The first thing they told me when I went to the new branch to get a net banking account is “Only your account number is transferred. You need to give your address proof, identity proof and two photographs”. When I walked around, I saw the notice about KYC and guessed what was going on. There was nothing wrong with the account transfer, but the lady was just pushing me to submit the KYC docs.

I called my wife and asked her about the status of KYC document submission. She told me that she had submitted all the documents just one month back in previous branch. However, after I got her net banking account, they did not enable the transaction rights on the same. We called up the branch and the guy told that he will enable the transaction rights. Two days passed, nothing happened! We mailed them and the reply came…

Please submit your ID proof ,  address proof and Mobile number for updating KYC .After submitting these you will get transaction rights

I replied back saying those are already submitted with the previous branch. One thing I noticed is that, KYC does not mandate submission of mobile number. But, the guy was taking a line like, 1 kg potato, 1 kg onion, 1 kg tomato and throw in some coriander leaves too…

This got me pissed off. I replied stating clearly that the KYC documents are already submitted and the mobile number can be found from the application for net banking. Then came the reply…

Your CIF and account is at *** branch. Please send the KYC details… 

Well, I had enough of the guy. I decided to do a bit of research about KYC. It did not take much effort. Google came to the rescue and I got two documents.

1. RBI notification on KYC

2. A document on SBI site explaining KYC

The first document from RBI told me clearly that

a. The bank should safeguard the information supplied by customers

b. The bank should form clear norms about KYC

The second document told me the possible norms of SBI. One can refer to slide 5 of that document to see when a customer is expected to submit KYC documents. A mere transfer of account was not part of that. So, I wrote the following mail to my wife and asked her to forward the same to the branch.

…You can refer slide 5 of that document. It lists down some conditions for which bank may ask you to submit or re-submit the documents. However, none of those situations apply here. It is not a new account, it is not an old account where the documents are not submitted, you have not asked for any locker facility, there is no change to people who operate account and as far as I can see, there are no suspicious transactions on your account. Now, you can submit these documents again if you want. However, it is important to know what happened to the previous set of document that you submitted. Did they throw it in waste basket or (mis)use it to open an account for a terrorist or got a sim card issued with that? …

Well, to make the long story short, we got an explanation from them why they did not update the information previously submitted. Though my wife agreed to resubmit the documents, I think it is important to make these people answerable. Imagine, from the common man, who does not have time to find out the details and argue with these people, how much of documentation these people will be getting done and done again and again and again…!

Today, all such schemes are flawed by such issues. Sometime back when address proof was made mandatory for mobile connections, some of the telephone companies were asking for resubmission of address proofs. However, they were doing it indiscriminately. Now, what happens to the old document that they collected? Did it actually go to the telco or went into the waste bin of reseller? The authorities who form such rules and mandate that everyone should submit crucial documentary proof does not mandate the proper handling of such documents. The way these documents are handled makes the common man lose respect for such initiatives. I would like to strongly suggest that be it TRAI or RBI, but if they ask institutions to collect crucial information from customer, they should also ask the businesses to take care of the following.

1. Acknowledge the documents that is collected

2. Handle them with due care

3. Maintain the privacy of the user

I believe, using digital documents and digital signature can be of great help here. Paper documents can be easily forged and the person sitting at the counter and accepting the documents can handover the same to someone else to make more copies. In case of a digital document, I can add a message that the document is submitted for XYZ purpose and it should be used only for that purpose and sign the whole document including the message. Lets just hope that one day we will grow up to that.

Yesterday I went to see Bangalore palace with my wife. The entry fees was Rs. 200 for Indian adults. There was an ‘audio guide’ which was just an mp3 player that allowed to play tracks by selecting some numbers. There were altogether 21 tracks with a few sub-tracks. There was nothing much to see. Fees for still camera was Rs. 600 and for video camera it was 1250 (I felt bad about not having a new generation mobile camera phone as they have fixed fees for that at 250. Today most phones come with cameras that are much better than the standard digital cameras)
We completed the visit in about one hour. Once we came out, we saw the horse carriage ride. They were charging Rs. 100 per person for less than 5 minutes ride. Still I took ticket for 2 and we boarded the carriage. At the time of boarding, the coachman, an old man in shabby clothes, was begging for tips to the people who got down. They joked that “all our money got over after buying tickets from counter” and walked away.
While we were in cart, my wife asked if we could give him something. I had only Rs. 10 as change in my pocket. At first I thought what will he do with that money? He was covered in a blanket that was nothing less than rags. He had a beard and his face carried the features of a drunkard. Will he buy drinks with the money that I give him?
Well, when our 5 minutes drive got over, I found that he was not asking tips as he did last time. He was possibly humiliated enough by the behavior of last lot. My mind was still full of confusion. Gita talks about ‘patre dhana’. However, I decided to forget Gita for a moment. I gave him Rs. 10. Suddenly his face lit up. He held that close to his heart. His eyes turned towards me and they were filled with gratitude.
Till then I was thinking about the Wodeyars. The owners of that palace – A dynasty that stood with Britishers when Tippu fought against them, A dynasty which protected the dignity of their women by covering their face in ‘purda’ but adorned the walls of their palace with images of nude women, the king who claims that the palace is built from the profits of the trade by the royal family and not by the wealth of the people, a king who now uses a BMW with gandaberunda symbol on its front as his chariot when the man who was riding his old royal vehicle was covered in rags and begging for alms…
Well, I forgot all that by seeing the smile of the poor man. It was only his face that stayed in my mind when I was coming back.

Before I start, let me make it clear that this is not about real Kaayal or Malabar. But, this is about two restaurants in Bangalore that I visited in past two days. One is reasonably posh with own website and fan base and the other is a small drab shop which nobody talks about.

Kaayal:

This restaurant is at Jeevan Bhima Nagar, opposite to Miranda public school. Many people whom I know had told me about this place. There was lot of expectation built up before we went there. The inside of the restaurant looked promising. But, to be frank, I felt compared to “Kolkata Kitchen”, a similarly themed restaurant at Vigyan Nagar, it was not that great. Just one glance at menu killed whatever was remaining of my initial excitement.

• There were not enough vegetarian items
• What ever was there were over priced (Eg. Kadala – channa – curry cost Rs. 70)
• None of the items were really great

My wife had some non-veg stuff and she also did not like them much. We had a plate of tapioca, and quite a bit of it was not edible since they had not taken care to remove the hard part of tapioca root. The curry was masala water + channa and they did not seem to gel with each other. The bill came to be Rs. 280.

Malabar:

Today morning we had gone to the Ayappa temple near kaggadasapura level crossing. While coming back, we walked through the kaggadasapura main road. Near the junction where kaggadasapura main road met K H Road, there was this small shop called Malabar. There was space for hardly 10 or 12 people. We got in there and had our breakfast. The Kadala (channa) curry was the best of all. The thick gravy clearly made the statement that it is far superior to the masala water that we got from Kaayal the day before. The tea was really nice and I actually wanted to order a second one. The appam was very delicious (My stomach was upset the day before after dinner from Kaayal and I feel it was possibly due to some excessive fermenting agent (baking soda?) that they might have used in their appam).

It was not a great place as far as the cleanliness and ambiance were concerned. However, it was not a place where you can’t sit and have food. The bill was only Rs. 78 after having almost same amount of stuff that we had from Kaayal.

The moral of the story? Not just the appearances, but even hearsay is deceptive. Well, go to these two restaurants and experience for yourselves

/. says production of renewable energy has surpassed the production of nuclear energy.

http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/11/07/05/2321210/Renewable-Energy-Production-Surpasses-Nuclear-In-the-US

Now, the question is why is India still trying to appease US and all the members of NSG to get nuclear energy?

I have been looking at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_policy_of_India#Solar_Energy

I think, the government should take bold steps to make solar energy cheaper and promote more investments there rather than trying to run behind nuclear energy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2G_spectrum_scam

Well, it will not be fair to compare a petty crime with 2G scam. However, I could not resist doing the math after a conductor in BMTC bus did not give me ticket even after I asked him for the same.

I was coming from New Thippasandra to G M Palaya after some shoping. My wife was also with me. I gave twenty rupees to the conductor. He gave me Rs. 10. But, he did not give me a ticket even after I asked him. He murmered something and walked away.

Then I did this math.

Total number of buses BMTC has = 6122

Assumptions: Each bus makes 8 trips per day and 10% of bus conductors does this to minimum of 5 guys per trip and average amount is Rs. 10.

Loss to BMTC per day = 8 trips * 600 (10% of 6k) * 5 persons * Rs. 10 = 400 * 600 = 2,40,000

Assuming this happens 300 days per year, total loss per year = 240000*300= Rs. 72 million

Assume this happens in 5 cities in India. Loss =Rs.  3.5 crore per year

That is, if we take 1 department and just 5 cities, and see the loss due to such petty corruption, that alone comes close to 3.5 crores. Now how many such departments do we have? RTOs, Government medical colleges, police, Town planning, Excise… I am sure there must be hundreds of them where the amount must be much bigger than Rs. 10. So, if I put a very moderate amount of Rs. 1C per dept per city and assume that there are 20 such departments in a city and if we just sum it up for 43 cities in India where the population is more than 1 million, the amount can easily be = 1C * 20 * 43 ~= 860C per year.

Well, no wonder why to ‘rule them all’ our rulers need to steal in lakhs of crores :;

(Well, I would still say punish Raja’s of corruption while leaving alone the small guys. I would even suggest that petty corruption should be accepted as a way of wealth distribution in a country like India :; )

Here is an example of the services done by the “mother” for the society.

For those who do not understand Malayalam, here is the important points from the above page.

1. The fees for the BDS seat in Amrita institute is 3 times the fees levied in any other private institution in Kerala

2. They do not share any seats with government and conduct their of entrance exams

3. Earlier they used to share seats with government. However, after becoming deemed varsity, they stopped doing so.

4. They claim that state government rules are not applicable for them

5. When contact, Principal told that he does not know about any donation as that is fully controlled by management

I just wonder what happened to the efforts by Govt. of India to de-recognize a large number of “deemed” universities!

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article2078925.ece

I don’t know who is correct and who is wrong. But, what happened in Delhi yesterday is unfortunate. This brings back the fears of another emergency. Is it going to be India after Egypt, Lebanon and Yemen? I think Government should act wisely to avoid any such crisis and take everyone in confidence at this juncture.

“Our leader Sonia Gandhi ji is concerned because Kanimozhi being a woman is in jail and it is a matter of concern and in fact one can’t do anything,” Azad said.

http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/not-appropriate-to-call-on-sonia-when-kanimozhi-in-jail-karunanidhi-108159

I am very much concerned about Soniaji!. There must be hundreds of such women in Jails and Ms. Gandhi might not have had peace of mind even for a moment thinking about all of them

Today’s Hindu had this news.

“No IPL ticket for BBMP councillors”

“…. On Monday Mayor S. K. Nataraj repotedly sent a letter to KSCA asking for their for their share of 250 passes…”

However KSCA informed BBMP that they have no control over it and passes etc are controlled by franchise owners!

“….KSCA’s move has rilled the councillors who pointed out that the BBMP does not even collect advertisement tax from stadium authorities”

What should we say about this? Some franchises are making money and BBMP is causing a loss to public exchequer by allowing tax benefits to them. Inturn, they expect to be rewared by free passes to councillors! It was just last year a PIL was filled in Mumbai HC which caused the govt there to take a decision that they will impose taxes on IPL from next year (2011) onwards. Following that, HC has dismissed the PIL. I feel, our politicians have a short memory and they don’t read news papers. The only possible solution to this is that we the citizen of this nation develop good memory that lasts minimum 5 years.

http://www.mathrubhumi.com/story.php?id=165816

A former minister in kerala was sentenced for 1 year rigorous imprisonment by Supreme court. Instead of RI, he is put in a hospital room with attached bath, food from home etc. Now, he is on hunger strike to get AC and mosquito net!