We all have read the news of a collapsed bridge or a crumbled flyover. It is not rocket science to understand the reasons behind such accidents. More often than not, it is because of the low quality of construction. Sometimes, it may also be due to the overload of traffic. Somewhere, some rules have been compromised. Either during the construction of the bridge or at the time of usage.

I bring your attention to one more bridge which exists in the human mind. The one which connects a person from his/her current reality to the cherished dreams. The ability to walk through this bridge until the dream milestone is also coined as success.

Well, in most of the cases people spend their entire life navigating on this path...

The month of Muharram marks the beginning of the Islamic new year. Its historical and religious significance is defined by the martyrdom of Prophet Muhammad’s grandson Hussain who was killed in a battle at Karbala, in modern-day Iraq. This morning was the anniversary of the day when he and his 72 companions acquired martyrdom. The procession is a remembrance of this sacrifice and the moral victory of Hussain.

Mahatma Gandhi quoted “If I had 72 companions like Husain, I would have freed India in 24 hours, from British.” Gandhi, the champion of non-violence himself, further added. “The progress of Islam does not depend on the use of sword, but on the supreme sacrifice of Imam Hussein, I learnt from Hussein, how to achieve victory whilst being oppressed.

“I am not a Shia, I am not ...

Sixteen years have passed since the demise of Ustad Vilayat Khan in the spring of 2004. Yet, his music continues to reverberate. So do stories of him living life in regal splendor. On his 92nd birth anniversary on August 28, here is a note on the interests of the man beyond his music.

Fast cars

A gentleman of very refined taste, the maestro has a passion for cars and used to himself tune their engines. By listening to the sound of a car engine, Khan saab could say if it was tuned properly. He didn’t care much about the concept of drivers and would himself take off on cross-country drives. According to son Shujaat, “He used to do this even during his childhood.” Going out on drives from Kolkata to Mumbai, Kolkata to Delhi and Mumbai to Dehradun was common...

With the world on pause with coronavirus, Sweden’s unique approach has drawn intense global scrutiny, not all of it complimentary. It refused to impose tough lockdown, kept primary schools and core economic activities functioning, issued clear guidelines and relied on voluntary social distancing plus personal hygiene practices to manage the crisis. Chief epidemiologist Anders Tegnell explained that lockdowns have no “historical scientific basis”. “Each country has to reach ‘herd immunity’ in one way or another, and we are going to reach it in a different way.” He told the BBC Sweden will be better placed than most European countries to face a second wave of the outbreak. In the past fortnight infections rose again across much of Europe, they stayed low in Sweden but the re...

This week marks the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment to the US Constitution that gave women the right to vote. For all the countless advances towards equality that American women have made since then, it continues to raise eyebrows around the world that they have yet to become president or even vice-president. But because they now turn out to vote in greater numbers than men and also tend to vote Democratic, the Republican National Convention worked hard to put out a female-friendly version of President Donald Trump.

His wife Melania, daughter Ivanka, daughter-in-law Lara, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, his former campaign manager Kellyanne Conway and others gave personal testimonials of how Trump empowers and supports women...

The GST Council meeting on Thursday ended on a mixed note. It met to solve the problem of compensating states for a shortfall in tax collection, an issue that’s driven a wedge between the Centre and some states. On the positive side, a solution emerged. But it left many states dissatisfied. The compensation issue has put stress on federalism and the solution merely papers over the cracks.

GST’s legislative framework includes a guarantee to compensate states for a five-year period in the event tax collections stay below a threshold. That’s inevitable this year. The compensation is to come from cess levied on some products. This collection is inadequate and states expected the Centre to bridge the gap...

This isn’t a column on how Congress can revive itself. The joke will be on me for having any such hopes, especially after the recent inconsequential Congress Working Committee meeting.

However, Congress offers excellent lessons on what not to do as a leader. Here are 10 practical lessons for current and aspiring leaders, whether in corporates, startups or institutions.

Chad Crowe

1. Don’t blame your juniors: When several Congress leaders gathered courage to write a letter expressing their concerns, the leadership’s first reaction was to blame the letter writers. They called them traitors and questioned their timing. The concerns expressed in the letter were never discussed. As a leader, never do that. Take responsibility and listen to your team.
2. Don’t waste time in useless meeting...

Tensions continue to ramp up in the South China Sea with the American and Chinese militaries engaging in shadow boxing to assert their respective dominance. On Wednesday, China launched a couple of missiles, including one dubbed as an aircraft-carrier killer, into the South China Sea in apparent response to US aerial activities in the region. The missile launches come a day after an American U-2 spy plane entered a Chinese-declared no-fly zone during a live-fire naval drill by the Chinese military in the Bohai Sea off China’s northern coast. In fact, even on Wednesday the US had sent one of its three RC-135S Cobra Ball ballistic missile-detection planes from Kadena Air Base in Japan’s Okinawa into the Chinese exercise area ahead of the Chinese missile launches.

All of this shows tha...

As part of my work and passion, I often ponder over the future of banking. That leads me to the enabling role of digitalization in reshaping the face of banking. Collectively, the industry believed this was going to be one slow, yet steady process to transform the industry. What no one expected was a pandemic to force digital acceleration at such a massive scale.

Considering where we find ourselves today, I expect digital experiences to rewrite the rules of retail and corporate banking. In a volatile world and rising customer expectations, the industry will need to be agile. Dynamic teams and systems must ensure banking delivers a seamless experience to every customer.

Here are some of my observations on how the banking ecosystem could change in the post Covid-19 world.

Redefined retail...

Till the Corona virus was exported deliberately to the entire world, China went from being an economic giant to the most distrusted country worldwide. Even its very few allies are considered failed states or countries that are exporting terror—North Korea, Pakistan, Iran. China’s other allies are small countries that are in a debt trap with China.

Today, the biggest threat to China is Xi Jinping and the CCP, not America or its allies. Xi and the CCP have single handedly destroyed the image that China had as the only factory of the world with no hegemonic intentions.

A few years ago, I wrote in my TOI Blog, that I could never understand why China was not treated like South Africa during the Apartheid Regime where the entire world refused to do business with South Africa because of it...