CHIMPANZEES AT YALE ?

    DNA  sequencing has established conclusively that humans share 99% of their genomes with chimpanzees and bonobos monkeys, and 98% with gorillas. In other words, only 1% is the genomic difference between the creatures swinging in the trees and those piddling on them. I suspect the difference may be even narrower in cities like Delhi and Meerut, maybe even Parliament, where the animal instincts are allowed freer play. But that is not my primary concern here; what I'm worried about is how quickly the digital word, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Deep Learning are ensuring that our genomes may soon become identical with that of the apes, and there may be nothing left to distinguish the two species.

   The 1% difference consists primarily in the size of our brains- the human brain is three times the size of that of chimps, except in the American rust belt and parts of the Indo-Gangetic plain where it started shrinking quite some time back, a phenomenon which has gathered speed since the arrival of Mr. Trump  and He Who May Not Be Named,  in 2016 and 2014, respectively. I suspect that this is primarily due to our ignoring that old dictum: "Use it or lose it !" For the undeniable fact is that humans have stopped using their brains and it is withering away, just like our coccyx did when we descended from the trees and no longer needed a tail to hang from the branches. This certainly disproves that little poem I had read many years back, when Darwin had not yet been rejected by the BJP intelligentsia:

" Said mother monkey to her little ones

As she swung by her tail.

It's just a matter of time

Before one of you becomes a professor at Yale."

   Now, I have no personal knowledge of the number of chimps on the faculty of Yale, but the figure is likely to go up soon, as homo sapiens drops out of the race. The disenfranchisement process has already commenced in India with most of our central universities, reverse evolution helped by the BJP govt's ill advised interventions in our education policies and appointment of cyphers as Vice Chancellors. A Planet of the Apes is a distinct possibility before we reach Net Zero by 2070.

  Homo Sapiens was evolving smoothly till the mid 1980's or so, widening the gap between itself and the chimpanzee, just as Mr. Adani was doing with Mr. Ambani till the Hindenberg moment. Kids were studying Wren and Martin to improve their grammar, and PG Wodehouse to learn the magic of the English language. Students and researchers went to libraries and turned to encyclopedias to glean more knowledge and information ( As a kid I remember having two sets- the Britannica and another one by Arthur Mee: they still adorn the bookshelf in my dad's flat in Kanpur). We wrote long essays, penned emotional letters and sent heartfelt cards to one another. Cartographers drew maps, artists created paintings, scientists did painstaking research in dingy labs, architects drew plans by hand, musicians scored music and spent hours on their instruments. People composed soulful poems and 700 page books in longhand.  I felt like a Nobel laureate when my first piece was published in the Junior Statesman (JS) Calcutta sometime in the late 1960s.  

  And then BAM!- the Internet arrived in January 1983 and suddenly evolution stopped. Earthquakes never come alone, as both Turkiye and Mr. Adani have discovered, they are followed by after-shocks. And so the Internet was quickly followed by other tremblors- Google, Wikipedia, Quora, Facebook, Instagram, Microsoft and other OS's, Whatapp, Netflix, the World Wide Web, even the Dark Web. Suddenly there was no need to use our brains any more: any information we wanted was just a click away, auto-correct took care of the grammar and spellings, computer programmes literally manufactured music, building plans, mathematical equations, medical diagnosis. Whatsapp forwards rendered cards and good wishes redundant. In fact there was no longer even any need for text or language- a well contrived Emoji could convey anger, love, happiness, sorrow, worry, fear or any other emotion more graphically than words. We have regressed into the prehistoric era of cave paintings and Mespotomian cuneiform ( not to be confused with the more universal cunnilingus). The unused synapses in our brains have started giving way to Parkinsons and Alzheimers. But things are about to get worse.

  ChatGPT has now arrived, a deep learning, AI powered language application bot which can compose, create, formulate, assimilate, deduce on any subject under the sun. It reads millions of pages everyday and uses that knowledge to answer almost any question or write on any subject. It makes errors but it's getting better everyday. In just a couple of months it has acquired more than 200 million users. In tests conducted in the USA it has passed the SAT exams, admission tests to law schools, business schools and medical entrance exams, without any human input whatsoever. Amazon says there at least 200 books authored by ChatGPT on Kindle, and admits this may be a gross underestimation since its rules do not require an author to reveal whether or not the work is the result of AI software. Seeing the ground slipping under their feet, both Google and Microsoft are coming out with their own versions of this AI phenomenon- Bard and Bing. China is reportedly developing its own rival bot.

  Can you see the future, folks ? Forget about encyclopedias, soon there will be no need for colleges and universities or the Kota style of coaching institutes. The boneheads currently being selected by the UPSC will, in a decade or earlier, be replaced by zombies who will know little but will know how to google for the rest. Who will hanker after Shakespeare or Orwell when ChatGPT can produce books in a day in the same language and style? It will be impossible to distinguish between a Chetan Bhagat and a ChatGPT novel, or to figure out which is worse. Mozart and Vivaldi's music can be replicated by deep learning. It may take a bit longer to create the paintings of a Rembrandt or a Satish Gujral, but it WILL happen, believe you me. The one thing which these AI tools may not be able to replicate, however, is the judgments of our courts because even deep learning needs to be able to detect a consistent pattern, logic and reasoning in its store of information, and since these are conspicuously absent in the orders of our courts, even ChatGPT may throw in the towel here and recuse itself !

  Very soon then, our brains may become completely dysfunctional, which, by the way, may not be a bad thing at all. The way we have used this organ over the last 20000 years or so has only made this planet a mockery of what God probably intended it to be. But the good wife, Neerja, is not impressed at all. According to her neither ChatGPT, nor Bing, nor Bard will ever be able to figure out how a woman's mind works, and so their domain shall remain untouched by artificial intelligence and algorithms. And so, while the chimps may take over Yale, Eve will reign supreme in Eden.  I may not be around when that happens, of course, but I'll drink to that nonetheless.

OF PUPPETS , SURROGATES AND THE REAL McCOY : A "CRASH" COURSE ON THE INDIAN STOCK MARKET

    A disclaimer is in order before I venture into the rest of this piece. These days, any hack of standing has to begin with a disclaimer to show that he is someone to be reckoned with, that his background is of interest to his readers, that he is pure as the driven snow, and that therefore whatever bilge he dishes out is of some import. I reckon that, as someone who has been pulling the flush every week for the last eight years, I qualify for a disclaimer.

   It is a simple one: neither I, nor anyone of my family members (including my short-seller pooch, Brutus) own a single share in any Adani company (at least the known ones, for God only knows how many more he has tucked away among the mangroves in Tonga, the Pantanal and Pitcairn's Island). Actually, it's a bit of an unnecessary disclosure because nobody except Adani owns any Adani shares, and though SBI and LIC may hold some shares as pledges, they will eventually have to render unto Adani what is Adani's ( and also what is Tom, Dick and Harry's, for doesn't the hand of God rest lightly on the gentleman from Gujarat?)

  One of the upsides of growing old is that you continue to learn something new every day. I turned 72 last December, and in just 45 days thereafter I have assimilated more knowledge about the stock market than in the preceding seven decades, thanks to the anti-Hindu-n-berg report, the 408 page smokescreen of Adani Enterprises, and Mahua Moitra, who is pretty good with a taser herself.

   I have now learnt, for example, that "round tripping" is not what Mr. Modi does- a trip to Gandhinagar to remind the people who built Gujarat, and back in time to launch another Vande Bharat. It means sending moneys from place A to Place B, washing it in a local laundromat, and then sending it back to A in some other form. With this knowledge, however, came the realisation that the wife has been doing this for the last forty years, without my suspecting it ! She takes my monthly pay check in Shimla, deducts a small amount for keeping a few loaves of bread on the table, and sends the rest to her sister in Delhi. From there the shekels are routed to Varanasi to purchase Banarsi silk sarees, which then find their way back to Shimla through trusted emissaries. Voila! The round tripping is now complete, with Shukla being short- sold, not a short-seller. Which corresponds to the motto of SEBI- "Ignorance is bliss". Or, as the Finance Minister hinted the other day: What you don't know won't hurt you, or me. It is also govt. policy, what with RTI being asphyxiated and Parliament doing more expunging than debating.

   Take that other thing, called an IPO ( Initial Public Offering) or, as in Mr. Adani's case, an FPO (F----d Up Public Offering). This is essentially a method of crowd funding where the family is the said crowd. I myself have not floated an IPO, primarily because I consider myself a gentleman and gentlemen, as we all know, prefer bonds. Furthermore, I don't have a large family, or any shell companies in Mauritius, or any contacts in the RBI or SEBI. I also don't know any FII's (Foreign Institutional Investors). Actually, I do: two- ex-colleagues parked in the USA and Switzerland, respectively, but they won't lend me a penny since I still owe them a drink from their last visit to India. According to them, therefore, there are problems with my liquidity as my credit rating is down by quite a few pegs.

   Mr. Adani, however, did float his FPO and came a cropper. My limited knowledge of the Indian stock market tells me that he forgot two things: one, thanks to the impending Cow Hug Day, the proverbial bull on the bourse had been replaced by the cow, which had already bitten off more of his shady shares than it could chew. And secondly, as the Hindenberg report has shown, a stock market can put up with upticks and downticks but not with antics. Perhaps the investors felt that the conglomerate had more ticks than your average mongrel on Dalal street, or tricks than P.C. Sorcar Junior, and decided to watch Pathan instead on the telly. Mark it up as another victory of the bikini over the Houdini.

   Another dreadful realisation dawned on me the other day as I was fondly leafing through my bank passbook- I practically belong to Mr. Adani, or at least all my assets do, which is the same thing. Just consider the facts, all ye bhaktiveers: my bank deposits have been given to Mr. Adani's many companies, and with a debt to equity ratio of 2021% (Adani Green) there is a good chance I may not get them back. The moneys I have invested in mutual funds  have also been given to- you got it right first time!- Mr. Adani. The premium I have been paying faithfully every year to LIC is invested in Mr. Adani's shares, which are estimated to be over valued by at least five times. Hell, I belong to the Company Store, just like those wildcatters in the Max Brand and Zane Grey novels I grew up on. In fact, I might as well delete the name of Neerja (the long suffering but round tripping wife, folks) as my nominee in all my accounts and substitute it with Mr. Adani's name- he's going to get it all some day in any case!

  Moving swiftly from the economics to the politics, one has begun wondering why we need 543 MPs and a Parliament at all ? Most MPs are nowadays zip-locked into silence, Ministers have become nodding mannequins in front of the Adani Mall, and Parliament itself has become a necropolis where democracy is buried a little deeper with each session. Why spend tens of thousands of crores and millions of manhours in electing MPs and Prime Ministers when the shots are being called by someone else? If Mr. A is to make industrial and environmental policies, if Mr. A is to make all our airports, ports, power plants, roads, coal mines, if Mr. A has the first right over all financial resources of the public and the state- then why have a government at all? Why install puppets to give the pretense of a government when the puppeteer himself holds all the strings? Why settle for a surrogate when you have the real McCoy, as it were ? Why not just do an Ayatollah Khomeini and appoint him the Supreme Leader ?

   And now you must excuse me; I have to rush to Dal me Kala street because my broker informs me the shares of toilet paper have touched, quite appropriately, a new bottom- it's an opportunity to wipe the slate clean and rise again from the ashes, or whatever has hit the fan.

BOOK REVIEW - MAPPING A COUNTRY'S HISTORY

                                 

BOOK REVIEW:  WE THE PEOPLE OF THE STATES OF BHARAT

                               [ Sanjeev Chopra. Harper Collins. 2022. ]

( This review was originally published in the TRIBUNE)

AMALGAMATING HISTORY WITH GEOGRAPHY.

 The book is essentially a work of history, but from a different perspective. Historical accounts are usually narrated from either the victor's angle, or the loser's; based on either events or individuals; seen through either spatial or temporal lenses. But this book approaches the history of post-Independence India from an entirely different and novel angle- the cartographic lines that shaped the units which comprise the states of modern India. It examines the cartographic footprints of political decisions, linguistic, ethnic, religious and social aspirations that determined where the internal boundaries of states should be drawn, and in the process ends up as a fascinating account of how the Indian republic evolved from 1947 to the latest carving up of Jammu and Kashmir in 2019.

   The author traces the course of India's internal geography from the first Hindi map of India in 1952 to the reorganisation of J+K in 2019. He explains the rationale for the disappearance and reappearance of Tibet on our maps, the role of the States Reorganisation Commission, the integration of Portuguese and French territories into the republic, the dismemberment of Assam into seven states and the creation of Nagaland, the merger of Sikkim, the formation of Jharkhand, Chattisgarh and Uttarakhand, the inevitable birth of Telengana, the disputes over state capitals such as Madras, Chandigarh and Hyderabad, the new outlines of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh, among many accounts. It is a fascinating narration of political movements, regional aspirations, linguistic demands, and an example of what can be achieved by dialogue, accommodation, wise counsel and statesmanship.

   Of particular interest are the chapters relating to the merger of the 562 princely states( 9 opted for Pakistan) and 9 provinces, and the manner of drawing their boundaries. Chopra lays bare, through first rate secondary research, the moves and compulsions of the Congress, the Muslim League, Sheikh Abdullah and Maharajah Hari Singh in Kashmir: though they finally led to the signing of the Instrument of Accession on 26th of October 1947, that still left a legacy which bedevils us today: of Kashmir's total area of 222236 sq.kms Pakistan and China continue to occupy 78114 sq.kms and 42735 sq.kms, respectively.

   It's not possible to recount the cartographic background of each state in a short review, but a flavour of the book can be gleaned from the chapter pertaining to the erstwhile princely state of Hyderabad, the jewel in the Chamber of Princes. The then Nizam, Osman Ali Khan, tried to position himself as a rival of Jinnah for leadership of the Indian Muslims during and post 1947. In an ironic paradox, Kashmir and Hyderabad had reverse similarities- both were ruled by sovereigns belonging to a religion different from the majority of their subjects, with the religions reversed! Chopra explains how the activism of the Congress, Hindu Mahasabha and the Arya Samaj gradually made the Nizam's position of sovereign independence untenable. He received no support from either Mountbatten or Jinnah; the latter, in fact, saw in him a rival and did not want him in Pakistan. The matter was finally decided by Operation Polo when the Indian army marched in on 15th September 1948 and Hyderabad was integrated into the dominion of India.

   The merger of the fractious princely states was a monumental task without parallel in global history; the sheer magnitude of the achievement can perhaps be appreciated by just one example- the Kathiawar region of Gujarat alone had 222 separate princely states! This book's primary feat is that it takes us back in time to reveal how the states of today took shape after balancing competing demands, as in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Punjab, Himachal, Andhra Pradesh, Madras, Madhya Pradesh to name just a few. New states were formed, old ones like Hyderabad and Baroda disappeared, and ( an interesting but little known titbit) the seeds of Telengana were sown in 1957 when a Gentleman's Agreement was signed between the leaders of the two regions for sharing power. 

   We also learn of little known nuggets of history: how the merger of Bengal and Bihar into a super-state was narrowly avoided because the proposal was never formally submitted to the States Reorganization Commission even though both the Chief Ministers had agreed upon it. The reader is also told about the international ramifications of the merger of the French and Portuguese enclaves, the graphic history of the strategic Andaman, Nicobar and Lakshadweep islands, the convoluted passions and concerns of the peoples of the NE states, an issue not yet fully resolved, the soft spot of the British for the Nagas ; the difference between the Parts A,B and C states; the subtle distinctions between Instrument of Accession, Merger Agreement and a Standstill Agreement.

   We The People  is a treasure trove of little known facts and a subtle blend of history and geography. Rome was not built in a day,  nor was the Indian republic. In fact, it is still a work in progress 75 years later, which just shows how stupendous was the task which confronted the founders of our nation. This book should be a tribute to those statesmen, visionaries and administrators who navigated their way through those tempestuous seas to reach the safe harbour that is the thriving and united Republic of India today. This book should be made compulsory reading for today's Parliamentarians and politicians who are doing their best to undo the phenomenal achievements of their predecessors in creating a nation out of chaos.

   

A WEEK OF CONSPIRACIES, NATIONALISM AND DELUSIONS.

   

                                                   THE  NEW  INDIA  WHINING

This last fortnight has not been a good one for the BJP or its bhaktiveers, even if we discount the irony of an autocratic despot being invited as the Chief guest at our Republic Day function. One would have expected that the wiseacres of MEA (Ministry of External Affairs) would, in between rejecting assorted documentaries and financial exposures as conspiracies, have advised the Prime Minister that a person who tears up his own country's Constitution is not the best choice to preside over another nation's commemoration of its still intact (though fraying at the edges) Constitution. But then one should expect this from our new were-wolf warrior diplomacy, I guess. As they say, a man is known by the company he keeps.

  Of greater import, however, was the official overkill on the BBC's two part documentary on The Modi Question. Hastily putting on his saffron tie and without even bothering to see the documentary, the MEA spokesperson informed the media that it was a conspiracy against India and indicative of a colonial mind set. This is what I term a typical lazy "Augmentin" response. For my more healthy readers, Augmentin is a broad spectrum antibiotic: when a doctor is too lazy or incompetent to identify the exact cause of your infection he will prescribe a broad spectrum antibiotic, hoping that it will work against your virus too. It's like a cluster bomb, and of late it has become the weapon of choice of the MEA, led as it is by another ( to continue with the ordnance phraseology) loose canon.

  Even the twitterati will concede that the BBC's credibility is slightly higher than that of our govt. spokespersons, Kangana Runout or Amit Malviya. It is funded by the British taxpayer  (the British govt. is just a conduit, though most rashtraveers here will miss this fine distinction) and its loyalty is to the former, not the latter. A couple of years back it had released a similar factual documentary on the Bengal famine of 1940, squarely holding Churchill and the then colonial govt. to account. It never let up on Boris Johnson as Prime Minister and carried full reports on his Partygate shenanigans during Covid. It is therefore a bit rich when our own TV anchors- TRPveers- who long ago sold their grandmothers to the highest bidder, tell us that the BBC is compromised and has no credibility.

  I believe that Mr. Swapan Dasgupta (who used to be a journalist in pre-Vedic times), and who has been given more than his fair share of screen space as an apologist for the BJP in the documentary, is the Media Advisor to the Prime Minister. If so, he should be shown the door immediately for the govt's decision to ban the film on digital platforms, and, as a logical follow up, to use force to prevent its viewing in public or in university campuses. For now this documentary has become the second most sought after video after Pathan and Deepika Padukone's panties.

  If Mr. Dasgupta had not spent all his time defending the indefensible he would perhaps have learnt about the Streisand effect. It all began when in 2003 the California Coastal Project Report uploaded a picture of the coastline in which Barbara Streisand's Malibu mansion was also visible. The intention was to develop proper policies for combating coastal erosion. But the  actress filed a suit claiming US$50 million for invasion of privacy. The attendant publicity, however, had the opposite effect from what she had intended: where earlier the photograph had only 6 downloads, her action resulted in 420000 downloads in the following months! Attempts to suppress or to hide information only ensure wider dissemination and draw even more attention to it. Which is what is happening to the BBC documentary much to the embarrassment of the bhaktiveers.

  The double whammy, based on a similar principle playing out, was delivered by the film Pathan. It has been obvious for some time that, for reasons I cannot fathom, Shah Rukh Khan is the right wing's bete noire; maybe there's something here none of us is aware of. For he has always comported himself in public as a gentleman, has stayed away from politics and has been reticent to a fault. I suspect that that is what angers some people. He does not conform to the image of the "enemy" that these lumpens target, and he refuses to endorse the politics of the day (as most of his peers have spinelessly done). But he is India's biggest superstar and therefore must be brought down, if only to convey that people of his community cannot be allowed to succeed in this new rashtra.                                                                                                                        Internationally, Bollywood is the preeminent face of India's soft power, from the time of Raj Kapoor to AR Rehman. And the face it presents is one of joyful cultural diversity, multi-faith, multi-community, whether it be in its content, songs, dances, lyricists, directors, singers or actors. This is not acceptable to the present dispensation and its adherents, which want desperately that India should be viewed only through a single religious and cultural prism. And since Shah Rukh Khan is the recognizable face of the other Bollywood he has to be brought down and "in the dust be equal made" with the Vivek Agnihotris and Akshay Kumars of the world.                                                                                                                                                                    The unconscionable targeting of his son in a patently false drug case boomeranged on the government last year. So Pathan, his first film in five years, could not be allowed to succeed. Controversies were manufactured, TV debates engineered to build up public opinion against it, social media was swamped with "boycott Pathan" calls, threats were held out liberally by petty minions of power. But the Streisand effect came into play again, as it had done earlier for Brahmashastra too, and Shah Rukh's movie is well on its way to becoming our own Titanic or Avatar. The push-back from Bollywood appears to have finally started.                    Is the toxic nationalism virus becoming weaker, like the Covid one, or are we developing greater immunity to it ? Time will tell, but these two developments last fortnight are a harbinger of better times (which should not be confused with "acche din"). As I write this, a triple whammy has just been delivered by the Hindenberg report on the Adani conglomerate whose valuation has plummeted faster even than the moral values of our TV anchors. The story is still a work in progress but, as usual, the "conspiracy" and "anti-India" cards have been pulled out of the deck again to counter the report. It didn't help much that the CFO of Adani Enterprises, in a televised address on Tuesday, wrapped himself in the national flag and compared the carnage of his shares to the Jalianwala Bagh massacre ! At least he spoke, even though it was burlesque at its worst, for there has been a resounding silence otherwise- not even a well-oiled squeak out of the Finance Ministry, the RBI, SEBI, the Stock Exchanges or SBI so far. It's not a question of who will blink first (Adani has already blinked by cancelling his FPO last night), the real question is: who will speak first ? For all I know the facts presented in this report or in the BBC documentary may be wrong  (though I suspect they are not), but surely this great nation cannot be equated to two individuals, notwithstanding their delusions of immortality ?

  Not a very auspicious beginning to the Amritkal or our much vaunted G-20 presidency, is it ?