Price Regulation for Pharma Sector - Like Insurance, Banking, Telecom

Need for Medicine Price Regulation - Pharma Industry and Poor in India. This is a topic close to my heart, so I thought to blog an article appeared in Opinion page of Hindu and hope that this will also make many doctors who are and supposed to serve to poor to think if they are doing enough to serve the poor against the leading MNCs. Read the article yourself http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/opinion/article3415282.ece

Healthcare in India - Ready to take off!

Almost an year, I am thinking more about healthcare in India. So this looks at it as an example of emerging India.

The world around us tells that is the next outsourcing wave for India and everyone gears up.
Another buzz word in recent years is medical tourism. Around us, well known doctors in India announces us that India arrived. Some says it is not tourism, but it is 'medical value travel'.Whatever be the buzz word, it is arriving. See this news item. one among many such news items on this topic. A leading cardiac surgeon Dr. Naresh Trehan says it is $5 billion opportunity for India.. So it is time to stand up, listen and think on these words. "There has been a transformation in the private healthcare delivery in India, with hospitals providing quality medical services; clinical excellence; state of the art infrastructure and technology comparable to the best in the world". Dr Pradeep Chowbey, the director of Max Institute of Minimal Access, said, “The health­care facilities in India are at par with the facilities avail­able in developed countries. In fact, Indian doctors and surgeons are more experi­enced, efficient and caring for the patients and easily ap­proachable.(link here”).

So in 21st century, we are ready to take off or already in the trajectory after the take off. Hear India, we are a superpower in healthcare!

But amidst of all this celebrations and sudden realisation of India's power in healthcare, there is some feeble cry somewhere. The poor in India cries out, "what about us?". Also the ordinary man of India asking "Is this quality"(more here)?.

Recently Supreme Court of India did a reality check on some private hospitals in our capital, Delhi and the observations of the court is must read for everyone in healthcare sector. (Read news reports from a leading news paper of India here and here). Ordinary and poor in Urban India badly needs a good doctor and affordable healthcare(Read some statistics here). So how the ordinary and poor in rural India fares? Must be better if India is a super power in healthcare! Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen checks out healthcare sector in this news item. One doctor shares her touching story here.

In 1884, one Ms. Prisilla Winter came to banks of Yamuna in Delhi and started Delhi's first hospital, today known as St. Stephen's Hospital. The story is same everywhere in India. Some one came with missionary spirit and out of Christ's love reflecting from their hearts to give medical care to rich and poor alike.Such sacrificing stories of missionaries made people to remember contributions to education and healthcare when some one thinks of Christianity in India. Times have changed. Most of the mission hospitals closed down and many are in the brink of closing down. Most of educational institutions run by Christians moved from serving the poor to serving the rich and powerful. New ones failed to penetrate to Rural India by and large, though there are exceptions. The current reality of two indias - one for the rich and powerful, always glowing, shining and growing India and another for poor and marginalised, always looted neglected and forgotten as if they don't exist - call for a reality check by all who cares for our mother land. Christians in India needs to show christ likeness which was pro-poor and pro-marginalised. Many of us who were blessed with recent economic growth in India needs to start think of giving back to merge these two Indias in to one.

I recently came across a powerful analysis of current state of reach of healthcare in India here , in an open page opinion in The Hindu. Kerala has one doctor for 800 patients, higher than developed countries. I was wondering what we can about it. Instead of cursing the darkness, is there a way for me to light a small candle. I am not saying just about healthcare. But in the area of expertise we have, is there anything I can do to bring these Indias closer? Comment on the blog, if you have some thoughts.

Linux Turns 20

Hurray! Linux Foundation sketches the story of Linux in a small and beautiful video. Watch this must watch video here

Transparency and Corruption

India completed 61 years as a republic. The main news in the news papers today is on corruption. It varies from smaller ones to mammoth scales.

Some of the recent news are disturbing.

* Newly elected CVC faces an old corruption charge and Supreme Court is considering if he is eligible for such a post.
* Former Chief Justice of Supreme Court facing grave accusations of corruption and he is currently Chairman of National Human Rights Commission
* The Dust of 2G scam still ongoing and scale of it is mammoth.
* Chief Minister of one state in India may get prosecuted for corruption.
* One state's Chief Information Commissioner suspended being part of corruption (Link Here)

But on the same time we read the news.

*Finance Minister saying Government cannot reveal names of people hoarding black money.(Newslink Here)

And some of the other news are affecting those who fight corruption.

* Dr Amar Nath Pandey, a Right To Information (RTI) activist, was fired at and injured in Uttar Pradesh yesterday Jan 27th (Newslink Here)
* Yeshwant Sonawane, Additional District Collector of Malegaon was burned alive while trying to act against oil mafia.

Think of those who are on the side of poor and afflicted.

* Dr. Binayak Sen sentenced to Life Imprisonment on very flimsy grounds and ignored his impeccable service to the poor in Chattisgarh (News here)

This calls us to be vigilant and to fight more to expose corruption and to work towards bringing more transparency everywhere. I do believe technology coupled with RTI especially websites and Web 2.0 technologies can drive it more.

Let us not forget

* The sacrifice of Manjunath Shanmugam, an upright officer who lost his life in fight against oil mafia in 2005.

* The sacrifice of Satyendra Dubey who paid with his life two years ago when he blew the whistle on corruption in the Bihar stretch of the Golden Quadrilateral project.

Yes, it is time to resolve that, we will be on the side on transparency, truth, poor and against corruption whatever be the cost. Also let us resolve that we will continue expose darkness and light a candle to spread light wherever we are. Be willing to say that we will not pay a bribe whatever be the cost. If you like to involve, I would suggest report cases on bribery or to upload your city/states 'citizen charters' for various departments to 'I Paid a Bribe' website.

LibreOffice and Republic Day

Happy Republic Day to all of my fellow Indians! As we celebrate freedom and remember the day Constitution of India came to effect, let us remember multiple aspects related to this freedom.

People like Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, the father of Indian Constitution who later decided to exercise his freedom to practice any religion of his choice and converted to Buddhism. He reminded us that no one is born in to this world with a religion, but accepts one religion or other when he/she grows.

Selfless service of people like Graham Staines who left his home land to serve poor people of India and cost of such love to a forsaken people.

The Supreme Court of India, which expunged some remarks relating to conversion and Graham Staines work and upheld the essence of constitution

The freedom of religion we have here in this land when many other lands gone through numerous challenges to freedom.

Just a day before we celebrate Republic Day, The document foundation announced LibreOffice 3.3, new fork of popular free OpenOffice.org, thus declaring freedom of choice in matters of software options outside the grip of software corporations.

New features of LibreOffice

LibreOffice 3.3 also incorporates all the new features of OpenOffice.org 3.3, such as new custom properties handling; embedding of standard PDF fonts in PDF documents; new Liberation Narrow font; increased document protection in Writer and Calc; auto decimals digits for ‘General’ format in Calc; 1 million rows in a spreadsheet; new options for CSV import in Calc; insert drawing objects in Charts; hierarchical axis labels for Charts; improved slide layout handling in Impress; new easier to use print interface; more options for Changing case; and colored sheet Tabs in Calc.

Yes friends, let us celebrate freedom in the world of office suites!

Securing Linux/Ubuntu system

Happy new year to all.
The above article deals with securing Ubuntu. (Click on the title or here)

Father, Son and His Friend

Again ..from CSF email list..Please do read

After a few of the usual Sunday evening hymns, the church's pastor slowly stood up, walked over to the pulpit and, before he gave his sermon for the evening, he briefly introduced a guest minister who was in the service that evening.
In the introduction, the pastor told the congregation that the guest minister was one of his dearest childhood friends and that he wanted him to have a few moments to greet the church and share whatever he felt would be appropriate for the service..
With that, an elderly man stepped up to the pulpit and began to speak. 'A father, his son, and a friend of his son were sailing off the pacific coast,' he began. 'When a fast approaching storm blocked any attempt to get back to the shore.
The waves were so high, that even though the father was an experienced sailor, he could not
keep the boat upright and the three were swept into the ocean as the boat capsized.the old man hesitated for a moment, making eye contact with two teenagers who were, for the first time since the service began, looking somewhat interested in his story. The aged minister continued with his story, 'grabbing a rescue line, the father had to make the most excruciating decision of his life: to which boy would he throw the other end of the life line.
He only had seconds to make the decision.The father knew that his son was a believer and he, also, knew that his son's friend was not. The agony of his decision could not be matched by the torrent of waves. As the father yelled out, 'I love you, Son!' He threw out the life line to his son's friend.
By the time the father had pulled the son's friend back to the capsized boat, his son had disappeared beneath the raging swells into the black of night. His body was never recovered. By this time, the two teenagers were sitting up straight in the pew, anxiously waiting for the next words to come out of the old minister's mouth.
'The father,' he continued, 'knew his son would step into eternity with Jesus and he could not bear the thought of his son's friend stepping into an eternity without Jesus.. Therefore, he sacrificed his son to save the son's friend. ' How great is the love of God that he should do the same for us. Our heavenly Father sacrificed his only begotten Son that we could be saved. I urge you to accept his offer to rescue you and take a hold of the life line he is throwing out to you in this service.'
With that, the old man turned and sat back down in his chair as silence filled the room.
The pastor again walked slowly to the pulpit and delivered a brief sermon with an invitation at the end. However, no one responded to the appeal. Within minutes after the service ended, the two teenagers were at the old man's side. 'That was a nice story,' politely stated one of them, 'but i don't think it was very realistic for a father to give up his only son's life in hopes that the other boy would become a believer.'

Well, you've got a point there,' the old man replied, glancing down at his worn bible. A big smile broadened his narrow face. He once again looked up at the boys and said, 'it sure isn't very realistic, is it? But, I'm standing here today to tell you that story gives me a glimpse of what it must have been like for God to give up his son for me.
You see... I was that father and your pastor is my son's friend.

William Wilberforce, A Role Model

William Wilberforce ( 1759 – 1833): I am sure this name may not be familiar with many today. He is my role model as a politician. He was a British parliamentarian and is credited to be behind abolition of slavery in entire British empire including India in 1833. He became a Christian in 1785 and sought guidance from John Newton, former slave trader (who decided to follow Christ by then). As per Newton's advise Wilberforce continued in politics and took up causes like fight for the abolition of slavery based on his Christian conviction, His conviction was so indepth, so that spent his whole life for that purpose.

What a model to follow?

When I look at corruption all around in India, I feel we need politicians of this caliber and conviction. I wish more evangelical christians in India to have entered politics. I never heard many names apart from Vishal Mangalwadi who worked with BSP for some years.

Pirated to Free - Way to Ubuntu

If you consider switching to Ubuntu (Linux for Humans!) which is ofcourse free (free as in free salvation, some one else paid the price with their time and effort), be sure to read the switching guide from Microsoft Windows. The link for the guide is here.

Advantages of Ubuntu over Windows

• You save money as Ubuntu is free
• Ubuntu is stable (Think of virus in windows world and understand there is no 'reliable' virus in Ubuntu....Free virus vs. Virus free world)
• Ubuntu is open
• You can make copies of CDs and give to your friends too
• Community will help you
• Open office which will replace Microsoft office is free too!
• And many more..

But it needs one thing...Your willingness to try out and learn little bit :)
Wish you happy linuxing..and freedom from piracy

Corruption In India - I Paid A Bribe

View image | gettyimages.com

I was in US for a short time and surprised how straight forward the system works there. No one dares to bribe a DMV officer who is checking vehicles on road, but willing to pay $100, $525 or even double the amount in double fine zones. I thought about it and then read "Truth and Transformation : A Manifesto to Ailing Nations" by Indian philosopher Vishal Mangalwadi and understood what made western countries different and how even they are losing that differentiator over the years.

I was thinking about my country, India. Beloved former president Abdul Kalam made many students take pledge 'to say no to corruption', but I do not see changes in ground over the years. Then I came across 'ipaidabribe.com' and liked the initiative, though it may be limited to few cities and now in Bangalore. Yes, it is a very good start, let us give thumps up and try to clean-up our little backyard and our own influence circles. What we can do ? Decide not to pay bribe. If possible, question policies, Put in internet the actual process to follow, expose corruption, use licensed softwares, encourage upright officers and many more.