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Retired or Working We in India , being an old-fashioned country, are not used to see people idling or having private means and taking life easy. We place our friends / relatives / people surrounding us – whether male or female as to whether they are Working, Retired or still Unemployed. But are these 3 categories enough to group all persons ? Let us see – off hand I can think of several categories – such as …. 1.      Working and getting a Salary 2.      Retired and getting a Pension 3.      Retired and getting no Pension 4.      Unemployed – totally 5.      Sporadic employment 6.      Self employed – hence no retirement 7.      Not having to work – having private means Of course there can be some more categories, but let us consider the above one by one 1. Working and getting a Salary At the employable age, we all want to know whether person X is employed or not. We place all persons in regular employment, whether in the Public sector or in the Private s

The progress of the Nouveau-Riche THEN or the Stage - I In the 1950’s and 60’s, a class of people came to be known as the Nouveau-Rich. They were mostly tradesmen who became very rich by selling grocery / vests & underwear / chole – bhature / or bricks & sand etc. These, the Nouveau-Rich loved to show off their money among themselves, made mistakes in manners etc., but were rich ! They gave their children professional education with the backing of capitation fee (seats in medical / engineering colleges in that era were very limited). Being tradesmen / businessmen they were polite towards the salaried officer class, and did not put on airs in public. Among themselves they called the other class as snobs The salaried class whether employed in the government or industry, was better educated professionals, and sometimes offspring of similarly employed officer parents. Their paths crossed at railway trains or tourist spots. The salaried class did not mix with them and t

SHORTAGE Dictionaries describe “shortage” in various ways, such as …… ·         A complete absence of a particular thing, ·         Something that is needed but is in short supply or missing, ·         Not to have something that is needed, ·         To have too little of something, ·         An insufficient supply of something, ·         An inadequate supply of something necessary, ·         A situation in which there is not enough of something,       and so on.  But we in India have forgotten the above meanings. At least the last three to four generations have been born and brought up in a situation of shortage of one item or another. The leaders of the country are prone to blame any shortage on various things.  It could be such a serious thing as draught in the Antarctica or shortage of penguins in Africa . The people of course have been forced to take it as something which is ordained to their karma. Let us take a view of the items whic