TELANGANA RAMULAMMA 'VIJAYASHANTI'

By M H Ahssan

The sleepy village of Ramannagudem in Warangal district came alive last week after South Indian action heroine Vijayashanti launched her movement for a separate Telangana state from there. A veteran of 200-odd films, she received a rousing welcome from the village she claims as her ancestral home. Later, thousands of onlookers lined the 250-km route from Ramannagudem to Hyderabad for a glimpse of her.

How far she's willing to go to create Telangana is anybody's guess. But for now, Vijayashanti is competition for the other vocal proponent of the separate state theory—K. Chandrasekhara Rao of the Telangana Rashtriya Samithi (TRS). Prior to last year's elections, Rao had made tall promises, but many feel he has failed to make any progress in pressurising the Centre on the issue.

That's where the south's very own 'Lady Amitabh Bachchan' comes in. Her fans know her as the angry young woman of the screen. Now, they'll be waiting to see if she has the same passion for the Telangana movement. "It's not a new political party, it's a peoples' movement. Anybody who believes in the cause is welcome to join me," Vijayashanti, who quit the BJP a month ago, said. She claims there's been an overwhelming response to her "clarion call" and that she's received feelers from many Telangana politicians. In reality though, she is yet to attract any big names to her camp. But there's one party watching her uneasily—the TRS.

It's proving to be a trying summer for K. Chandrasekhara Rao. On the one hand, his party has been hit by a flurry of resignations after a couple of junior functionaries were slayed by the People's War. There's an uneasiness and fear within the party, especially among the more vulnerable lower rung, after the Naxal diktat that the TRS sever links with the Congress by July 15 or "face the consequences". While security for senior leaders has been stepped up (many have moved to larger cities), there is little protection for the ordinary party worker from the Naxal wrath.

Now Vijayashanti is adding to KCR's headache, highlighting his party's slow progress on the homeland issue. It's no wonder that KCR spent all of last week visiting key leaders in New Delhi including Sonia Gandhi, PM Manmohan Singh and defence minister Pranab Mukherjee, who heads the upa subcommittee on the Telangana issue, to muster support.

However, Vijayashanti, though critical of KCR, is guarded in criticising the TRS leader. "The people are unhappy...I too feel it is not right. But if the TRS leaders are willing to resign from their ministerial posts, we can come under one umbrella," she says.

Meanwhile, it's been a mixed response from the BJP about her leaving the fold. It was considered a political coup for the saffron party when she joined it in the late '90s, a time when the party was struggling to establish itself in the southern states. However, many in the party feel Vijayashanti is a spent force and her decision to leave is a blessing in disguise given her list of extravagant demands, including five-star accommodation and chopper rides every time she went campaigning. "People like her have a shelf life, and I am afraid the expiry date on this one is over," says a senior BJP leader. On her part, the former actress claims she was disillusioned by the party's flip-flop on Telangana.

Of all the parties, the TDP, opposed as it is to any division of the state, is unflinching in its criticism of the actress-turned-politician. "Telangana is being used as a laboratory for political experiments. Everybody wants to exploit the issue... and then dump it after achieving their personal agendas," says former tdp minister Kadiyam Srihari.

Clearly, Vijayashanti knows that Telangana is an emotive issue she can capitalise on.Her entry, if nothing else, is sure to add sound and colour to a dormant Telangana campaign.

Is Anything More Corrupt Than A Govt Buying MPs?

By Balbir K Punj

During a recent meeting in Ralegan Siddhi, Anna Hazare’s team decided to renew its fight for probity in public life. One could say it is also time to judge the impact of his campaign on the system, asking some relevant questions. Has the first, “successful” phase of the movement really touched the collective conscience of ‘civil society’ and affected the attitude of the ruling establishment towards corruption? Or is its influence superficial?

Stripped of hyperbole, the real achievements of the movement are modest. Nothing has changed for the better on the ground. Our venal rulers continue on their course, smug as ever. Otherwise, the two whistle-blowers, Faggan Singh Kulaste and Mahavir Singh Bhagora, former Lok Sabha MPs (both of the BJP), would not be behind bars for exposing the cash-for-votes scam of July 2008, and their third comrade, Ashok Argal, would not be facing arrest.

The establishment’s vindictiveness is blatant of course, but on predictable lines. What is really shocking is the deafening silence on the part of civil society. Is a meaningful crusade for clean public life possible without standing by those who resist temptation and dare pull the plug on graft at the highest level? These three honourable men had done just that.

Actually, the anti-graft crusade started in the lead-up to the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, with BJP leader L.K. Advani constituting a task force to go into the issue of corruption at the top and Indian black money stashed abroad. The task force’s analysis hit the nail on the head: the virus begins with people at the top bartering favours at the expense of the exchequer in order to enrich either themselves, their kin, or organisations they or their kin have links with. One recalls the pledge Advani took not to hold any office till investigations into the hawala diary case did not clear his name. He rejoined Parliament only after he was proved innocent in the courts. It is from this that he derives the initiative and moral strength to take up the fight against corruption.

Approached by dalals of the beleaguered Manmohan regime and the Sonia Gandhi-led Congress at the fag end of the previous Lok Sabha term, when the UPA-I government was facing a trust motion on the nuclear deal, the three MPs promptly informed the BJP high command. They had the option of accepting crores in silence, but did not. Instead, as advised, they decided to expose the sordid drama through a sting operation, with the help of a TV channel. The TV channel let them down and they were left with no option but to bring the cash to the Lok Sabha, display it, and expose the sleazy game in front of the entire country. In any other civilised society, such men would have been hailed as heroes and honoured while those who tried to bribe them would have got their just deserts.

It is just the reverse here. The arrest of Amar Singh in the case is part of a cover-up operation. He was but a mercenary, doing a dirty job at the bidding of those who were the ultimate beneficiaries of this murky enterprise. Obviously, the cash did not belong to him. The investigating agency, the Delhi police, has neither tried to trace the origin of the cash nor brought to book the faceless persons who had written the script and directed this squalid drama. The theatre of the absurd is complete. The Delhi police has spared the faceless crooks and put the fearless crusaders behind bars. The message is clear: Say ‘no’ to temptation offered by the Congress and, to be sure, you’ll be damned.

The shameful event and its aftermath is full of ironies. The rulers, swearing by the sanctity and supremacy of Parliament while dealing with Anna’s team, have subverted that very institution. And Anna’s team, which had received nationwide support in its fight against corruption and the corrupt, has been indifferent to this issue, staring at us in the here and now. Why is that? Because the three heroes of this ignoble saga belong to the much-abused and demonised tribe of politicians. They resisted and exposed graft and are paying for it. So shouldn’t ‘civil society’ have rushed to help them?

In fact, the silence of ‘civil society’ on this stormy issue has to be seen in the backdrop of events leading up to the conclusion of Anna’s fast. There is little doubt that those who manipulate the system to fatten themselves are indeed cunning and ingenious. Otherwise, the recent anti-corruption crusade would not have ended with the issue being reduced to whose Lokpal bill should be the template for action.

The scamsters who are now facing trial in the 2G case are claiming that whatever they did has had the written or tacit approval of the prime minister and the then finance minister and that the two should therefore be summoned as witnesses. There was a report the other day that a SEBI board member has revealed that the current finance minister was trying to influence SEBI in cases involving some leading corporates. Surely, this indicates it is the Congress that is the fountainhead of corruption—more so than officials or bureaucrats at any level. Therefore, the focus of the debate on corruption must be on the Centre.

With 24x7 TV channels focusing on the swelling support for Anna’s team and the countrywide concern for the fasting crusader, UPA-II was able first to delineate the minimal demands of the team for the fast to be called off. The campaigners settled on three points, and the entire debate was turned around: instead of fixing the spotlight on those whose corruption was writ on every wall in Delhi, it was directed against an abstraction—corruption in the future. When it is evident who is corrupt now, at the political level, is it not a bit ridiculous to debate a future Lokpal to look at future corruption and the jurisdiction that body should have?

As the concern for Anna’s health rose across the country, the debate was becoming one of ‘civil society’ versus Parliament. In effect, the contention was reduced to a question of semantics. And finally when it all ended, with the whole Parliament thumping the desks and adopting the joint resolution by this demonstration of support, the Congress must have breathed a sigh of relief. The spotlight on the corrupt had been switched off—even if that was only for the time being—and the entire focus was on restraining countrywide corruption in the future; a parliamentary committee was to design the tools for doing that. In this manner, the Congress was able to lead by the nose the debate on black money and corruption.

For the next three months, the country may watch with bated breath how this standing committee, headed by a Congressman, tackles the several proposed versions of the Lokpal bill and arrives at one acceptable to all stakeholders. Meanwhile, the prime minister, who is said to have approved with his silence the handing of 2G licences to the undeserving, may relax. Delhi chief minister Sheila Dixit, exposed by the Shunglu committee and the CAG report on the CWG contracts—the money spent by her government was ten times what the committee headed by Suresh Kalmadi spent—can also take it easy.

So where does the battle against graft and exposing and punishing the corrupt stand at this juncture? No doubt, the stature of Anna and his team has gone up several notches in the public mind. People at large have a sense of victory over the system. Public awareness on corruption and the need to fight it is high. Especially in the middle class. In real terms, however, despite Anna’s campaign, there’s little to show on the ground. The original goal of bringing back Indian monies stashed abroad seems to have been completely forgotten. While the focus is on corruption in generic terms, the most visibly corrupt faces continue to be safe in their positions of power. They continue to manipulate the system to save the guilty and target innocents. An unscrupulous and a ruthless establishment continues to persecute, slander and vilify those who dared to raise their voice against its venality and frauds.

In its second phase, Anna has decided to focus on the long-pending issue of electoral reforms and performance audit of MPs. These are not metaphysical and abstract issues. They have germinated in the given framework of Indian politics. Can there be any meaningful movement on such issues divorced from the given context? Will Phase 2 of the movement also end in a sense of victory but without any tangible achievements to its credit?

A serious Concern - OVERLOADED PLANET

By J Ajit Kumar

It has been quite clear for sometime now, that Earth is an overloaded planet. The six billion human load is unbearable and making life more and more miserable for an increasing number of people every year, though there exists some organisations making a living out of this business of population growth.

Sustainability is the hottest topic in every international forum now and it is quite surprising that all of us are missing the fact that our own planet has already reached unsustainable proportions. The utopian concept of Socialism can be thought of in two ways – bringing in ‘equality’ either by trying to make all people rich or by making everyone poor. By increasing the denominator, whatever be its justification, the chosen route seems to be the latter. At this rate one of our future children will definitely step on the destruction button for planet Earth.

 
India is one of the most overloaded geographical areas in the whole world and within it the state of Kerala presents the extreme limits of population density. Not a single rainy season passes off in Kerala without the spurts of Dengue fever, Rat fever, Cholera, Jaundice etc., etc. What is the most important reason for this? Nothing but an unsustainable number of human beings per square kilometre.


Kerala has one of the maximum density of population and the ‘safe’ inhabitation land area now available is carrying almost double the advisable number of people. The net result is pollution of all water bodies, lack of safe drinking water, lack of infrastructure to process the human waste etc., etc. Almost three fourths of all human problems relate to population explosion and yet there are no serious attempts to control. The revered Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer has recently come out with a report recommending strong measures against population explosion and as usual all religious retarders have jumped in.

Discourage Overproduction
There is no doubt and no two opinions about the need for children to sustain humanity. Nobody has ever questioned that. And nobody questions the relevance of marriage and family in human lives. All the questions now center around the number of children each family must have. But invariably the religious retarders always succeed in confusing birth control measures with abortion and pro-life slogans and defeat any initiatives in population control. All they want is license for uninhibited reproduction like animals.

All forms of excuses (including God) are drawn into the debate to camouflage and confuse any debate between restrictive reproduction for common good versus wanton reproduction with ulterior motives. Though God often finds a mention in their arguments, the real motives behind increasing ‘tribal’ strength is crystal clear to everyone.

It is always the organized religious groups that oppose any restrictions on population growth. The logic is obvious. The strength of any organization is directly proportional to its strength and all organizations want to be strong and powerful. And all organizations are self-centered and bothered only about their own God, their own office bearers and their own tribe in that order. The point they often miss is that the whole world is interconnected and each of us (including our man-made Gods) are dependent on each other.

Any attempt to grow beyond the limits of sustainability will unleash destruction from within our own system. An overcrowded Earth is an unsustainable entity and no amount of organization or religion can remove the limits. Restriction in numbers is one of the basic requirements in any organic system and Earth is no exception.

Encourage Restriction  
Restrictions are often positive when compared to complete ban imposed by religious doctrinaires. Like animals, every man is born free and what ultimately differentiates man from animal is due to the reasonable restrictions imposed on him or her by the society. Our culture is nothing but a sum total of the impact of these restrictions. But for these restrictions and regulations, man will go down the evolution chain again to the level of animals and birds. Present condition of humanity is even more precarious.

We have in our midst a set of people who are monopolizing the custodianship of all morality and liaison with God. Acceptance of reasonable restrictions, as opposed to illogical do’s and dont’s imposed by such monopolizers, is the need of the hour. If they are not shown their place, perpetrators of such obscurantist ideologies will make our lives unbearable mentally also. While population explosion is putting our physical existence at risk, victory for religious obscurantism will make us animals again.

Imposing reasonable restrictions on the size of families should come natural to any society or government in twenty first century. It is common knowledge that Mother Earth cannot sustain a population of more than say 4 or 5 billion humans, which is just one living species among millions of others in this planet. We simply do not have the natural resources to sustain so many human beings and all natural disasters happening now are indeed man-made in a way. And restricting our numbers is the only way to ensure progress and development with social justice.

This has been proven beyond doubt in almost all European countries and states like Kerala in India. The present high standard of living in colony-dependent European countries and self-sufficient Asian states is additional proof for this. The only mistake that happened is the case of some European countries is that they went into a negative growth in population.

Justice Krishna Iyer’s recommendation to Kerala government to impose restrictions, including penalties, on families with more than two children is a progressive step in the right direction. It is exactly what is needed in a progressive society with cent percent literacy, highest rate of family suicides and complete consumerism.

Kerala is not producing anything sufficient enough for itself other than children which further increase its needs. Thus it is caught in vicious circle and the only way to break it is to restrict its population growth. Other than the petty minded religious hierarchy, no one is expected to oppose it. But the famed Kerala elite must speak out and defeat all the religious obscurantism that is overtaking Kerala these days.

Developing Your Critical Thinking Leadership Skills

By M H Ahssan

By taking responsibility for your own leadership critical thinking processes, you are taking action to analyse and adapt your approach to decision-making and problem-solving. You put yourself - and your company - in a much stronger position to lead and succeed in the "new normal" business world.

There is a growing recognition that the old, pre-crisis way of doing business is never coming back. In its place is the "new normal". While some classic leadership strategies and skills will continue to be effective, leaders in this brave new world will need to lead differently - and think differently.

Critical thinking enables leaders at every level to understand the impact of their decisions on the business as a whole and ensures both alignment with organisational goals and accountability for results. 

The "new normal" is a different kind of competitive landscape, buffeted by geopolitics and global instability, rapid technological change, unique financial pressures, a rising tide of data and information to filter through, and the proliferation of new corporate business models.

The mind-set that made leaders successful in the past probably won't ensure success in the future. In fact, several recent studies and surveys have identified critical thinking as the number one requirement for successful leadership in the 21st century. Yet there is mounting evidence that many current and emerging leaders lack this quality. And it is this competency gap that is shaking up and reshaping leadership as we have come to know it.

 Leadership in the "new normal"
In the wake of the economic crisis, we all know what a failure of leadership looks like. The companies that folded in the GFC serve as stark examples of what happens when decisions are based upon erroneous, partially false or incomplete information and when management fails to think clearly and strategically about the full implications of its actions. The resulting fall-out put an end to business as usual and created a "new normal" that looks markedly different from anything anyone has seen before.

Business organisations must be prepared to do things differently if they expect different results. In this demanding, dynamic landscape, it is only natural that they also require a different mind-set from those in charge.

The equation works like this: Thinking drives behaviour; behaviour drives results. So enterprises that want to change the results - and, indeed, change the organisation itself - can achieve the highest leverage by changing the thinking of leaders and managers throughout the organisation.

But what kind of thinking - or rather rethinking - will be required of leaders if they want to succeed in the "new normal"?

Why critical thinking is critical
Critical thinking appears to be exactly what is needed from leaders who are navigating the volatility of the "new normal". Diane Halpern, an award-winning professor of psychology at Claremont McKenna College and a widely read author on the subject, offers this definition in her seminal book, Thought and Knowledge:

"Critical thinking is the use of those cognitive skills or strategies that increase the probability of a desirable outcome. It is used to describe thinking that is purposeful, reasoned, and goal-directed - the kind of thinking involved in solving problems, formulating inferences, calculating likelihoods, and making decisions ... it's the kind of thinking that makes desirable outcomes more likely."

If ever there was a time for clear, discerning, solution-centric thinking, this is it.

Every two years since 1983, Executive Development Associates (EDA) has conducted an extensive survey on trends, growth and the evolution of executive development. The 2009/2010 EDA Trends in Executive Development: A Benchmark Report revealed trouble on the horizon for corporations seeking future business leaders.

To gauge the readiness of the next generation of leadership talent, EDA asked senior executive development professionals to share their views on the strengths and weaknesses of the incoming leadership group - the people who are most likely to fill executive-level positions in the next three to five years - and the subsequent impact on executive development.

The survey identified "hot topics" in executive development for the next two to three years. At the top of the list was leadership, followed by "business acumen, honing skills in strategy execution, leading / managing change, and talent management."

But when asked "What competencies are your leaders lacking?" their responses indicated little confidence that leaders had what it takes to execute in these critical areas successfully. Here's what they said was missing:

 •Strategic thinking
•Leading change
•Ability to create a vision and engage others around it
•Ability to inspire
•Understanding the total enterprise and how the parts work together
What critical thinking looks like

Having established the need for a mind-set shift to more critical thinking, we need to be clear on what that means in the workplace.

In general, critical thinking is the ability to deal with the contradictions and problems of a tumultuous environment in a reasoned, purposeful, productive way. Decisions are made using an approach that is fair, objective, accurate and based on information that is relevant to the situation.

Critical thinking is also reflective and focused, constantly evaluating the thinking process itself. It is thinking with a purpose. Critical thinking requires a healthy dose of skepticism and an equal measure of good judgement.

For decades, companies have relied on the Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal, a widely used assessment tool for evaluating the cognitive ability of current and future leaders. Developed in 1925, the model identifies factors that are key to critical thinking and decision making and predicts judgment, problem solving, creativity, openness to experience and other leadership behaviours.

Five sub-tests measure critical thinking as a composite of attitudes, knowledge and skills:

 •Inference
•Recognition of assumptions
•Deduction
•Interpretation
•Evaluation of arguments

Professionals with high scores in these sub-tests are able to identify and examine the assumptions, influences and biases that might sway them. They stand back from the fray and strategically assess the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions or approaches to problems. They make business decisions that answer the right questions, solve the right problems, mitigate risk and improve productivity. They also lead from a position of strength, being able to motivate and move people both inspirationally and intellectually by providing solid reasons for actions.

Whether they lead teams, departments or entire enterprises, leaders who apply the skills of critical thinking to their roles perform at a higher level and offer their organisations a distinct competitive advantage.

Critical thinkers think differently about their impact on the organisation - understanding how their decisions and actions influence business both inside and outside their narrow functional silos. These leaders are able to balance department or team issues with broader company issues and embrace a larger responsibility for the success of the organisation. This keen sense of accountability is what enables them to execute for results now while fulfilling their obligations to positively impact the future.

Leaders who engage in critical thinking also understand the total organisation and how the individual parts work together. Context is key. Now more than ever, business acumen is foundational to effective leadership. It is impossible to apply critical thinking skills to the business of making money without an understanding of the business drivers that connect day-to-day decisions and actions to key financial and strategic performance goals of the organisation. It is one thing to understand one's role as a leader. It is altogether another thing to understand how to set direction and directly affect the outcomes.

Critical thinking is big-picture thinking too. As Hagemann describes it, "Leaders need to be able to comfortably climb to the 30,000-foot view and analyse a dynamic system, while simultaneously and adeptly analysing information to quickly make decisions across levels." Critical thinkers operate from a broad perspective in order to make sure the correct problems are addressed and they are taking acceptable risk. They recognise the difference between short-term gains and sustainable, long-term results and lead accordingly.

The advantages of this kind of leadership behavior are readily apparent. Critical thinking enables leaders at every level to understand the impact of their decisions on the business as a whole and ensures both alignment with organisational goals and accountability for results. It's exactly the type of leadership behaviour demanded by the "new normal" - and exactly what's missing. And this disconnect is likely to intensify over time.

Given the critical-thinking competency gap exposed by the EDA survey and other research, the obvious assumption is that the traditional development process that businesses have relied upon in the past to prepare leaders simply hasn't kept up. So, what's the solution? To accelerate development and raise leadership accountability to a whole new level of awareness and action, there needs to be a new emphasis on critical thinking in leadership development.

Learning to think like a leader
The good news is critical thinking is a skill that can be taught. According to Halpern, "There is a large body of evidence showing that people can learn to think better. Of course, education makes us all more intelligent, but critical thinking is more focused. Everyone can learn to recognise and use the skills of critical thinking, and we can always get better."

New competencies, however, may require a deeper, more analytical approach. The challenge today is not to discard what has been learned in the past, but to build upon traditional competencies with a whole new and more complex set of skills, tools and sensitivities.

Leaders in the new normal need to learn how to be discerning, how to think clearly and wisely, and how to be accountable for their impact on the business.

Discovery learning in leadership courses
Critical thinking can be impacted by the right leadership courses. However, the process can be more challenging than improving a behavioural skill, because you can't easily measure it. Success is demonstrated in results.

As with any skill, intellectual or otherwise, the key to building critical thinking - and achieving successful results - is practice. Research has demonstrated that people learn best when they are actively involved in the learning process and engaging in the behaviours they want to learn. But what's vital in developing critical thinking skills is framing the concept of practice within a relevant, job-related context.

Acquiring critical thinking skills requires participating in learning experiences that force you to consider new ways of thinking about and acting within complex situations that are directly related to the work you do. You need the opportunity to respond to issues, reflect on and reframe your experiences, develop new thinking, and, in turn, engage in new behaviours and actions that are relevant to your position and objectives.

Developing your critical thinking skills
In addition to participating in these types of leadership courses, leaders can take charge of their own critical thinking development by taking these actions:

 •Get some feedback about your critical thinking skills from a trusted boss, colleague or coach
Are you jumping to conclusions or using a reasoned, analytic process as you work toward a goal? Are you able to put aside biases and assumptions during analysis and decision-making? What kind of "thinker" are you perceived to be and why?

•Challenge yourself to develop a deeper understanding of your company's business, especially its financial and strategic drivers of success
Are you clear about what drives the organisation's decisions, how financial success is achieved and how you impact both strategy and the bottom line? Are you making decisions that are aligned with this understanding? Is your knowledge of the business strong enough to drive behaviour and to engage teams and employees?

•Use multiple sources of data to form an "information web" before making a decision or forming a conclusion
Are you asking a lot of questions? Identifying stakeholders and their issues and opinions? Separating facts from assumptions? Are you using the Internet as "one" source of information rather than "the" source? Can you analyse information from different perspectives and viewpoints?

•Take time to think
Are you rising above the fray when it's important to make a decision, take action or form an opinion? Are you aware of the distractions getting in the way of your thinking time and taking action to minimize these distractions? Are you finding time and space to let your mind focus and reflect on important issues?

•Ask for input, critique and opinions from others as you analyse alternatives
Are you checking tentative conclusions with others? Using peers, coaches or mentors to critique your thinking process? Are you willing to open your mind to other ideas or alternatives?

KINGMAX Unveils 128 GB Huge Capacity USB 3.0 Flash Drive

By M H Ahssan

▲ KINGMAX 128GB Huge Capacity USB 3.0 Flash Drive, the ED-01 KINGMAX, a renowned leading memory and flash drive manufacturer, has recently unveiled 128GB huge capacity USB 3.0 flash drive, the ED-01. With huge capacity, the ED-01 flash drive not only meets the market’s demands for large media file storage and transferring, but also transports the user to a super-speedy experience that every second counts. The ED-01 sports a sleek contoured design that stands out from its competitors and wins design award from media. It has a delicate read/write LED indicator to display the flash drive’s status while in use and the unique Clip-Cap design that prevents the cap from accidental drop-offs or loss. Besides, made with durable plastic combined with a special finishing procedure, the leather-like texture of the ED-01 is warm and smooth to the touch. Its elegant, low-profile design will demonstrate your taste for luxury and that you appreciate and use only the latest in technological advances. When the era of USB 3.0 comes, the demands of super speed and huge capacity storage device increased. Using USB 3.0 full-duplex bidirectional synchronization data transfer technology, the ED-01 read speed at 66 MB/sec and write speed at up to 41 MB/sec. Moreover, its capacity upgrades to 128GB and backward-compatible with USB 2.0. Whether data is HD movies, photos or large presentation files with rich media, the ED-01 will transfer and storage large data in a short period of time. The ED-01 USB 3.0 flash drive is fully compliant with the European Union’s RoHS (Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive) standards. It also passed CE certification in the EU, met the United States’ FCC criteria and was awarded the latest Windows 7 certificate that guarantees its compatibility with operating systems. All KINGMAX products are manufactured under the most stringent quality control measures and rigorous tests, to ensure each and every product meets the highest standards for quality. The ED-01’s product warranty further ensures consumers that they’ve purchased a reliable and reassuring experience. Specifications: ‧ Interface: USB 3.0 ‧ Storage: 8GB/16GB/32GB/64GB/128GB ‧ Dimensions: 74.5 x 20 x 9 mm (L x W x H) ‧ Weight: 10.5 g ‧ Color: Black Features: ‧ Compatible with USB 2.0 ‧ LED light indicator ‧ Clip-Cap design to prevent cap loss ‧ 5-year product warranty

BEST WRITING IN ARCHIVES - 'Raw is Training 600 Baluchis in Afghanistan'

THIS IS AN ATTEMPT TO SHOW OUR READERS THE BEST WRITINGS OF OUR WRITERS.  - SOME EXCLUSIVE PICKS FROM THE BEST WRITINGS.  PLEASE READ ON.. EDITOR

Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed is a man who wears many caps: he is the Pakistan Senate foreign relations committee chairman, the secretary-general of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League, and widely regarded as Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf's right-hand man. A former editor of a major national daily, Hussain knows a thing or two about the unrest in Baluchistan. It was a parliamentary committee headed by him that had recommended that the government grant autonomy to the Baluchis, and ensure their province wasn't forgotten in the rapid economic development of Pakistan.

M H AHSSAN met Hussain at his residence in Islamabad's upscale E-sector, recently on his visit to Pakistan. Though the joke here is that the E is for Extremely Rich, Hussain's own home is modest. His phone keeps ringing as he takes calls from politicians of all ideological hues. Between calls, he talks about the Great Game India's playing inside Afghanistan and its possibility of destabilizing the region.  << CLICK HERE >>

PHOTO FEATURE - Toddler's Food & Snacks

A JUICY MOCKTAIL DRINK FOR CHILDREN

BAKED DRY FRUIT BUNS ON CAKES

A SHERRY ON CREAMY OAT MEAL

BAKED FRUITS WITH OATS IN YOUGHURT

A DELICIOUS MIXED SALAD WITH MINI-MEALS

A MOUTH WATERING SNACK KEBAB

FULLY BOILED BOCOLLI SHERBS

A JUMBO SNACK FOR FOODIE CHILDREN

A MILANO ICE CREAM PUDDING

STARRY SANDWICHES FOR TINY TOTS

BOILED BEANS - A HEALTHY MEAL

A REGULAR SNACK OF VEGATABLE PUFFED SANDWICH

AN EVENING - AFTER-SCHOOL MEAL

STRAWBERRY ICE CREAM

A HAPPY FREE TIME SNACK MEAL

(A Newsindia Photo Feature)

Impact of Celebrity Endorsement on a Brand

By Saurabh Katyal

The motif behind total branding may be decocted as an attempt to amalgamate diverse activities to win customer preference. Apropos to this context, the topic “Impact of celebrity endorsement on overall brand”, is a significant one. The crescendo of celebrities endorsing brands has been steadily increasing over the past years. Marketers overtly acknowledge the power of celebrities in influencing consumer-purchasing decisions. It is a ubiquitously accepted fact that celebrity endorsement can bestow special attributes upon a product that it may have lacked otherwise. But everything is not hunky-dory; celebrities are after all mere mortals made of flesh and blood like us. If a celebrity can aggrandize the merits of a brand, he or she can also exacerbate the image of a brand.

If I may take the liberty of rephrasing Aristotle’s quote on anger, “Any brand can get a celebrity. That is easy. But getting a celebrity consistent with the right brand, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose and in the right way... that is not easy.”

Celebrity endorsements are impelled by virtue of the following motives:

• Instant Brand Awareness and Recall.
• Celebrity values define, and refresh the brand image.
• Celebrities add new dimensions to the brand image.
• Instant credibility or aspiration PR coverage.
• Lack of ideas.
• Convincing clients.

The scope of a celebrity on the incumbent brand:

Simply stating, a brand is a differentiated product and helps in identifying your product and making it stand out due to its name, design, style, symbol, color combination, or usually a mix of all these.

Before we can scrutinize the effects of celebrity endorsement on the overall brand, we have to ferret the implicit nuances that act as sources of strong brand images or values:

• Experience of use: This encapsulates familiarity and proven reliability.
• User associations: Brands acquire images from the type of people who are seen using them. Images of prestige or success are imbibed when brands are associated with glamorous personalities.
• Belief in efficiency: Ranking from consumer associations, newspaper editorials etc.
• Brand appearance: Design of brand offers clues to quality and affects preferences.
• Manufacturer’s name & reputation: A prominent brand name (Sony,Kellogg’s,Bajaj,Tata) transfers positive associations

The celebrity’s role is the most explicit and profound in incarnating user associations among the above-mentioned points. To comprehend this, let us analyze the multiplier effect formula for a successful brand:

S=P* D*AV --the multiplier effect
Where S is a successful brand,
P is an effective product.
D is Distinctive Identity
and AV is Added values.

The realm of the celebrity’s impact is confined to bestow a distinctive identity and provide AV to the brand; the celebrity does not have the power to improve or debilitate the efficiency and features of the core product. Thus, we are gradually approaching an evident proposition claiming,

“The health of a brand can definitely be improved up to some extent by celebrity endorsement. But one has to remember that endorsing a celebrity is a means to an end and not an end in itself.”

An appropriately used celebrity can prove to be a massively powerful tool that magnifies the effects of a campaign. But the aura of cautiousness should always be there. The fact to be emphasised is that celebrities alone do not guarantee success, as consumers nowadays understand advertising. They know what advertising is and how it works. People realize that celebrities are being paid a lot of money for  endorsements and this knowledge makes them cynical about celebrity endorsements.

Compatibility of the celebrity’s persona with the overall brand image
A celebrity is used to impart credibility and aspirational values to a brand, but the celebrity needs to match the product. A good brand campaign idea and an intrinsic link between the celebrity and the message are musts for a successful campaign. Celebrities are no doubt good at generating attention, recall and positive attitudes towards advertising provided that they are supporting a good idea and there is an explicit fit between them and the brand. On the other hand, they are rendered useless when it comes to the actual efficiency of the core product, creating positive attitudes to brands, purchase intentions and actual sales.

Certain parameters that postulate compatibility between the celebrity and brand image are:

• Celebrity’s fit with the brand image.
• Celebrity—Target audience match
• Celebrity associated values.
• Costs of acquiring the celebrity.
• Celebrity—Product match.
• Celebrity controversy risk.
• Celebrity popularity.
• Celebrity availability.
• Celebrity physical attractiveness.
• Celebrity credibility.
• Celebrity prior endorsements.
• Whether celebrity is a brand user.
• Celebrity profession.

Successful celebrity endorsements for a brand- An Indian perspective
The latter part of the '80s saw the burgeoning of a new trend in India– brands started being endorsed by celebrities. Hindi film and TV stars as well as sportspersons were roped in to endorse prominent brands. Advertisements, featuring stars like Tabassum (Prestige pressure cookers), Jalal Agha (Pan Parag), Kapil Dev (Palmolive Shaving Cream) and Sunil Gavaskar (Dinesh Suitings) became common. Probably, the first ad to cash in on star power in a strategic, long-term, mission statement kind of way was Lux soap. This brand has, perhaps as a result of this, been among the top three in the country for much of its lifetime.

In recent times, we had the Shah Rukh-Santro campaign with the objective of mitigating the impediment that an unknown Korean brand faced in the Indian market. The objective was to garner faster brand recognition, association and emotional unity with the target group. Star power in India can be gauged by the successful endorsement done by Sharukh for three honchos- Pepsi, Clinic All Clear and Santro. Similarly, when S Kumars used Hrithik Roshan, then the hottest advertising icon for their launch advertising for Tamarind, they reckoned they spent 40 - 50 per cent less on media due to the sheer impact of using Hrithik. Ad recall was as high as 70 per cent, and even the normally conservative trade got interested.

In the Indian context, it would not be presumptuous to state that celebrity endorsements can aggrandize the overall brand. We have numerous examples exemplifying this claim. A standard example here is Coke, which, till recently, didn't use stars at all internationally. In fact, India was a first for them. The result was a ubiquitously appealing Aamir cheekily stating Thanda matlab Coca Cola. The recall value for Nakshatra advertising is only due to the sensuous Aishwarya. The Parker pen brand, which by itself commands equity, used Amitabh Bachchan to revitalize the brand in India. According to Pooja Jain, Director, Luxor Writing Instruments Ltd (LWIL), post Bachchan, Parker's sales have increased by about 30 per cent.

India is one country, which has always idolized the stars of the celluloid world.
Therefore it makes tremendous sense for a brand to procure a celebrity for its endorsement. In India there is an exponential potential for a celebrity endorsement to be perceived as genuinely relevant, thereby motivating consumers to go in for the product. This would especially prove true if the endorser and the category are a natural lifestyle fit like sportspersons and footwear, Kapil-Sachin and Boost or film stars and beauty products.

Some Global Examples
Globally, firms have been juxtaposing their brands and themselves with celebrity endorsers. Some successful ongoing global endorsements are as follows:

• Celebrity endorsements have been the bedrock of Pepsi's advertising. Over the years, Pepsi has used and continues to use a number of celebrities for general market and targeted advertising, including Shaquille O'Neal, Mary J. Blige, Wyclef Jean, and Busta Rhymes, who did a targeted campaign for their Mountain Dew product.
• George Foreman for Meineke. He has also sold more than 10 million Lean Mean Fat-- Reducing Grilling Machines since signing with the manufacturing company.
• James Earl Jones for Verizon and CNN.
• Nike golf balls, since the company signed Tiger Woods in 1996, have seen a $50 million revenue growth. Nike's golf line grossed more than $250 million in annual sales. In 2000 he renegotiated a five-year contract estimated at $125 million.
• Other successful endorsements like Nike—Michael Jordan, Dunlop—John McEnroe, Adidas—Prince Naseem Hamed, and so on.
• Venus Williams, tennis player and Wimbledon champion has signed a five-year $40 million contract with sportswear manufacturer Reebok International Inc.

Advantages of a celebrity endorsing a Brand
Brands have been leveraging celebrity appeal for a long time. Across categories, whether in products or services, more and more brands are banking on the mass appeal of celebrities. As soon as a new face ascends the popularity charts, advertisers queue up to have it splashed all over. Witness the spectacular rise of Sania Mirza and Irfan Pathan in endorsements in a matter of a few months. The accruement of celebrity endorsements can be justified by the following advantages that are bestowed on the overall brand:

• Establishment of Credibility: Approval of a brand by a star fosters a sense of trust for that brand among the target audience- this is especially true in case of new products. We had the Shah Rukh-Santro campaign. At launch, Shah Rukh Khan endorsed Santro and this ensured that brand awareness was created in a market, which did not even know the brand.
• Ensured Attention: Celebrities ensure attention of the target group by breaking the clutter of advertisements and making the ad and the brand more noticeable.
• PR coverage : is another reason for using celebrities. Managers perceive celebrities as topical, which create high PR coverage. A good example of integrated celebrity campaigns is one of the World’s leading pop groups, the Spice Girls, who have not only appeared in advertisements for Pepsi, but also in product launching and PR events. Indeed, celebrity-company marriages are covered by most media from television to newspapers (e.g. The Spice Girls and Pepsi)
• Higher degree of recall: People tend to commensurate the personalities of the celebrity with the brand thereby increasing the recall value. Golf champion Tiger Woods has endorsed American Express, Rolex, and Nike. Actress Catherine Zeta-Jones is used by T-Mobile and Elizabeth Arden. 007 Pierce Brosnan promotes Omega, BMW, and Noreico.
• Associative Benefit: A celebrity’s preference for a brand gives out a persuasive message - because the celebrity is benefiting from the brand, the consumer will also benefit.
• Mitigating a tarnished image: Cadbury India wanted to restore the consumer's confidence in its chocolate brands following the high-pitch worms controversy; so the company appointed Amitabh Bachchan for the job. Last year, when the even more controversial pesticide issue shook up Coca-Cola and PepsiCo and resulted in much negative press, both soft drink majors put out high-profile damage control ad films featuring their best and most expensive celebrities. While Aamir Khan led the Coke fightback as an ingenious and fastidious Bengali who finally gets convinced of the product's `purity,' PepsiCo brought Shah Rukh Khan and Sachin Tendulkar together once again in a television commercial which drew references to the `safety' of the product indirectly.
• Psychographic Connect: Celebrities are loved and adored by their fans and advertisers use stars to capitalise on these feelings to sway the fans towards their brand.
• Demographic Connect: Different stars appeal differently to various demographic segments (age, gender, class, geography etc.).
• Mass Appeal: Some stars have a universal appeal and therefore prove to be a good bet to generate interest among the masses.
• Rejuvenating a stagnant brand: With the objective of infusing fresh life into the stagnant chyawanprash category and staving off competition from various brands, Dabur India roped in Bachchan for an estimated Rs 8 crore.
• Celebrity endorsement can sometimes compensate for lack of innovative ideas.

Disadvantages of a celebrity endorsing a brand:
The celebrity approach has a few serious risks:

1. The reputation of the celebrity may derogate after he/she has endorsed the product: Pepsi Cola's suffered with three tarnished celebrities - Mike Tyson, Madonna, and Michael Jackson. Since the behaviour of the celebrities reflects on the brand, celebrity endorsers may at times become liabilities to the brands they endorse.
2. The vampire effect: This terminology pertains to the issue of a celebrity overshadowing the brand. If there is no congruency between the celebrity and the brand, then the audience will remember the celebrity and not the brand. Examples are the campaigns of Dawn French—Cable Association and Leonard Rossiter—Cinzano. Both of these campaigns were aborted due to celebrities getting in the way of effective communication. Another example could be the Castrol commercial featuring Rahul Dravid.
3. Inconsistency in the professional popularity of the celebrity: The celebrity may lose his or her popularity due to some lapse in professional performances. For example, when Tendulkar went through a prolonged lean patch recently, the inevitable question that cropped up in corporate circles - is he actually worth it? The 2003 Cricket World Cup also threw up the Shane Warne incident, which caught Pepsi off guard. With the Australian cricketer testing positive for consuming banned substances and his subsequent withdrawal from the event, bang in the middle of the event, PepsiCo - the presenting sponsor of the World Cup 2003 - found itself on an uneasy wicket
4. Multi brand endorsements by the same celebrity would lead to overexposure: The novelty of a celebrity endorsement gets diluted if he does too many advertisements. This may be termed as commoditisation of celebrities, who are willing to endorse anything for big bucks. Example, MRF was among the early sponsors of Tendulkar with its logo emblazoned on his bat. But now Tendulkar endorses a myriad brands and the novelty of the Tendulkar-MRF campaign has scaled down.
5. Celebrities endorsing one brand and using another (competitor): Sainsbury’s encountered a problem with Catherina Zeta Jones, whom the company used for its recipe advertisements, when she was caught shopping in Tesco. A similar case happened with Britney Spears who endorsed one cola brand and was repeatedly caught drinking another brand of cola on tape.
6. Mismatch between the celebrity and the image of the brand: Celebrities manifest a certain persona for the audience. It is of paramount importance that there is an egalitarian congruency between the persona of the celebrity and the image of the brand. Each celebrity portrays a broad range of meanings, involving a specific personality and lifestyle. Madonna, for example, is perceived as a tough, intense and modern women associated with the lower middle class. The personality of Pierce Brosnan is best characterized as the perfect gentlemen, whereas Jennifer Aniston has the image of the ‘good girl from next door’.

CONCLUSION
Despite the obvious economic advantage of using relatively unknown personalities as endorsers in advertising campaigns, the choice of celebrities to fulfill that role has become common practice for brands competing in today's cluttered media environment. There are several reasons for such extensive use of celebrities. Because of their high profile, celebrities may help advertisements stand out from the surrounding clutter, thus improving their communicative ability. Celebrities may also generate extensive PR leverage for brands. For example, when Revlon launched the "Won't kiss off test" for its Colorstay lipsticks in 1994 with Cindy Crawford kissing reporters, the campaign featured on almost every major news channel and equally widely in the press. A brief assessment of the current market situation indicates, that celebrity endorsement advertising strategies can, under the right circumstances, indeed justify the high costs associated with this form of advertising.

But it would be presumptuous to consider celebrity endorsement as a panacea for all barricades. Celebrity endorsement if used effectively, makes the brand stand out, galvanizes brand recall and facilitates instant awareness. To achieve this, the marketer needs to be really disciplined in choice of a celebrity. Hence the right use of celebrity can escalate the Unique Selling Proposition of a brand to new heights; but a cursory orientation of a celebrity with a brand may prove to be claustrophobic for the brand. A celebrity is a means to an end, and not an end in himself/herself.   (Newsindia Syndication)