By Rajan Narayan
AND a few stray thoughts for yet another Saturday. For a Saturday following the week when the controversy over the alleged mockery of the `Last Supper’ enactment at the inaugural ceremony of the Paris Olympics which opened on July26, 2024. . For a Saturday following the week when it was reported that there’s a huge loss of jobs, particularly in the banking sector, due to digitalization. For a Saturday following the week when a very incriminating bio-film was made on former president of India, Manmohan Singh. For a Saturday following the week when reportedly less than 20% of the vacant faculty posts at Goa University have been filled at the last three years.
‘LAST SUPPER’ MOCKERY
AND a few stray thoughts on the controversy over the alleged mockery of the Last Supper’ at the inaugural ceremony of the Paris Olympics. Now festival director Thomas Jolly has clarified that the performance was not a depiction of theLast Supper’ but a slice of Roman history. The Last Supper’ analogy refers to the last supper Jesus Christ had with his disciples before he was crucified. Jesus had apparently claimed at the supper that one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, would betray him to the Roman authorities. TheLast Supper’ story became world famous because of the painting depicting the Last Supper’ by painter Leonardo da Vinci. In many Catholic homes there will be a print of the painting on the wall in the dining room or some other room. The Paris Olympic organizer Thomas Jolly insisted that their so calledLast Supper’ enactment was Roman bacchanalia eluding to the no holds barred festivities indulged by the pagan Romans. It was a costume drama, a takeoff on ancient Rome. Never mind that the Olympics originate in Greek history. The Roman Catholic church has no sense of humor and the French on the other hand have no respect for authority, be it political or religious.
This Olympics in Paris commemorate the 100th Olympics in modern history. That is the Olympics of the modern era coincidently started in France a 100 years ago. But so furious is the Church in Rome that they had special prayers to condemn the vile French-styled enactment of the ‘Last Supper.’ There was an unfortunate power breakdown, plunging Paris into darkness on the second day of the Olympics. This is being interpreted as the gods expressing their anger on the organizers of Olympics 2024.
France is the only country where no religious symbols are allowed in public spaces like schools or workplaces. Women may not wear hijab or use Hindu caste marks on their body in public. However, the entertainment media and artistes are free to finger and make fun of any religion. This can prove to be very disastrous and expensive. Remember the French cartoon of Charlie Hebdo depicting Prophet Muhammad and the publication’s office was attacked with its editor Samuel Paty being killed.
In Islam you may not create or project any image of the prophet.This is also true of the Sikh religion. For Muslims the Quran is a symbol of their Prophet and the Sikhs worship their Guru Granth Sahib which are the preaching of Guru Govind Singh. Now that the controversy has been laid to rest we home the world will settle down to concentrate on the Olympic games and forget the Bacchanalian `Last Supper.’
NO BANK JOBS
AND a few stray thoughts on the reported huge number of jobs, especially in the banking sector — due to digitalization of banks. The cashier’s glass cabin may still be there but bank clerks have almost disappeared. It is the bank clerks who used to process requests for cash withdrawal and other banking work. In the non-digital era you got a token and had to wait patiently till your number was flashed for you to collect your cash. There were long queues at the peak hours of people seeking withdrawal of money from their account.
Nowadays the bank discourages you from withdrawing cash by check or withdrawl slips. They ask you to go to the ATMs to withdraw cash, except that there is a limit of Rs20,000 ATM withdrawal. ATMs do not accept deposits or do they now with elaborate ATM stations in place? Most still go to the bank to deposit cash or checks. But there are fewer clerks to update passbooks, instead is a passbook updating machine in place where you may insert your passbooks if you still prefer to keep track of your account courtesy a printed passbook.
According to an RBI survey by the ratio of clerks to officers has gone down very sharply. Over a decade ago 70% of bank employees were clerks and 30% officers. Now it’s the other way around with the percentage of clerks coming down to 36% and that of officers over 64%. There is a level as they all get stuck at the middle management level. There are relatively very few vacancies at the top management.
What is true of the banking structure today is also true of most private corporate organizations. In Infotech companies there is no place for you if you are not computer literate and savvy. The army of account clerks and accountants has virtually disappeared. This is because everything is done online. All you need to receive and make payments is a smartphone. Even the vegetable vendor now has Rupay of Google Pay connection.
Incredibly, even government organizations have gone digital. The mamlatdar’s office had large armies of clerks. Applications for domicile or residential certificate had to move from desk to desk before it reached the mamlatdar. The speed with which your application moved depended on how much speed money you were willing to pay. However, now you may do all this online. Apply for forms or documents online and receive them online.
All this again has led to a sharp fall in vacancies and jobs. While more and more Goans are seeking safe and lucrative government jobs, the bitter truth is that the number of government jobs too has shrunk. You may not be able to speak fluent English. But if you are not digitally literate you cannot even breathe in our overwhelming digital revolution of the day.
Needless to say for senior citizens who are not even smartphone-savvy, life has become a nightmare. But for my very highly digitally savvy colleague Heena in office, I would be totally lost surviving in the digital world.
Even in my field of journalism over 50% of the traditional jobs have vanished. When I joined journalism over 60 years ago news matter for printing was typed on a lino-machine. Each of these machines were like typewriters where keys were pressed for matter to be lino-cast. This gave way to photo composers.
In addition to the compositors we had dozens of proof leaders and fact-checkers. Now a journalist corrects copy online, designs pages online and forwards the issue to the printer online. Everything becomes so high tech that a journalist can always do fact-checking on Google or ChatGPT. Except as citizens Arun Baba Naik has pointed out ChatGPT is not very accurate. When I chatted with ChatGPT for some details relating to my Dayanand Narvekar beating up case when I was editor of the `OHeraldo’ the dates furnished were all wrong. While this horrible incident happened to me in September, ChatGPT claimed it happened in November.
Admittedly, ChatGPT admitted its mistake as Arun Baba Naik has pointed out in a Facebook post, this is what happens if ChatGPT gets a menu wrong. If AI includes the poison in the menu a mistake like this can be fatal. Similarly AI driven vehicles can be a major risk. At the end of the day, our natural intelligence is better than any Artificial Intelligence.
I understand that the aIgarothims are iterative self-learning models. The hope is that it will improve with more and more data. Arun Baba Naik confesses that he has nightmares when he drives an autonomous Tesla powered by AI.
BIO-FILM ON MANMOHAN SINGH
AND a few stray thoughts on a very incriminating bio-film made on Manmohan Singh, former prime minister of India. The film depicts Manmohan Singh as a mild, weak personality who danced to the tunes of Congress chairperson Sonia Gandhi. It was Sonia Gandhi no doubt who recommended Manmohan Singh for prime minister’s post.
I recall spending almost 15 days with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on his trip to Brazil and Cuba. As usual, the PM had taken a party of 30 media people with him. The travel time from New Delhi to Brazil was almost 20 hours. I recall that we had to take a break in Amsterdam as the pilot and the cabin crew of the chartered Air India flight could not fly for more than 12 hours.
The Prime Minister and his wife and top officials, like the national security advisor, traveled in the front part of the huge Air India plane. The middle part was converted into a first class for the benefit of the media on the trip. Needless to say it was caviar and champagne and everything else laid on all the way. At least twice a day during the flight Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would step out of his cabin to spend quality time chatting with media people. Manmohan Singh even celebrated his birthday on the flight.
Manmohan Singh may come across aqs mild is in fact very firm when his mind is made up. He was not Sonia Gandhi’s voice. He had his own views and was very independent. Manmohan has never forgiven General Parvez Musharraf of Pakistan for his betrayal. At the non-alliance summit at Cuba the two, mainly Manmohan Singh and General Musharraf, came together and met person to person for the first time in 2006. This is during the non-alliance summit in Havana in Cuba. The media were invited for a photo ops. While Musharraf was very friendly with Indian media, Manmohan Singh ignored the Pakistani media.
The problem with Manmohan Singh is that he is a scholar and introvert and not skilled in public relation diplomacy. We tend to forget that it was Manmohan Singh who ended the permit license raj and initiated the policy of liberalization.
GOA UNIVERSITY VACANCIES
AND a few stray thoughts on less than 20% of the vacant faculty posts at Goa University being filled in the last three years. The problem is that there are no suitable candidates for senior positions in the university. Indeed, when the university started all senior faculty, including that of vice-chancellor and registrar, was from out of Goa. Special bungalows were built for the teaching staff in the university campus, fully equipped mod cons like refrigerators, washing machines, etc.
Unfortunately, there have been shrill demands that only local Goans should be considered for top university posts. In the absence of qualified Goans, this vacancies remained unfilled. Over the last three decades any grand new infrastructure at the university has crumbled. But more and more courses have been added on without proper faculty. The only job oriented courses are Master’s in computer science. There is no research undertaken by the university.
As the chief guest, namely the chairman of the Indian Space Organization, S Somnath, insisted, the objective of the university is not only to produce graduates but to focus on creating a vibrant eco-system. Governor of Goa and Chancellor of Goa University PS Sridharan Pillai has expressed his disappointment over the University Library.
Unfortunately, Vice-Chancellor Harilal Menon has not learnt any lessons. He proposes to use Rs100 grants to upgrade multi-disciplinary education in research. The university needs to consolidate its gains instead of creating more and more unemployable graduates. The graduates who do their masters in Konkani have no job opportunities. Whether in Goa or elsewhere.
LALITA KAYI
AND a last stray thought on the shocking case of the 50-year-old woman named Lalita Kayi found chained to a tree in the middle of a forest in Sindhudurg district in south Maharashtra. Forest Inspector Vikas Padve from the Banda Police Station in Sawantwadi taluk said the woman was found tied to a tree with an iron chain around her legs. “A local shepherd in Sonurli village (approximately 490 km from Mumbai) was out in the forest when he heard the woman’s cries on Saturday (July 27) evening. He informed the Sawantwadi Police Station. The police carried out a rescue operation and admitted her to a nearby hospital.
The woman was referred to the District Hospital in Oros taluk and later shifted to the Goa Medical College, for advanced treatment for deteriorated physical and mental health. Doctors say she is doing fine with a few psychiatric issues, she speaks little and will remain under observation till the investigation is complete.
The police found a photocopy of an American passport, an Aadhaar card that identifies Ms Kayi as a resident of Tamil Nadu’s Tiruvannamalai district, medical prescriptions, a note in her bag scribbled with “my former husband”; and other documents. “The documents in her name suggest that her visa has expired. The police is working with officials from the Foreigners Regional Registration office to get her documents verified to ascertain nationality. Lalita Kaye has been living in India for the last 10 years at least.
Police reckon that Kayi may have been tied up in the forest for nearly 48 hours, before her cries were heard by someone. Police are trying to trace her contacts of this US-born woman who has lived in Goa for some time. A police team has left for Tamil Nadu and Goa.
“As of now, she is not stable to give an official statement as she is recovering from weakness. She seems to have not eaten for days and was also tied up in the open in heavy rains. With preliminary information, we believe she may have been tied to the tree by her husband, who may have fled afterwards. The probe into the case is underway.”