Retired People– Untapped Resource of Knowledge

While in Houston with my son, I utilise my time in reading books available freely in library. Last week, I came across an interesting book 'The writer within you' written by Charles Jacobs, retired CEO of Newspaper group. He has given a step by step guide on Writing and publishing for retired people. He gave numerous references and highlighted words of wisom at every stage.I read the book from cover to cover and influenced by his idea of motivating and guiding the retired people to write. He has also started a website retirement-writing.com to spread the message. I liked his idea as it synchronised with my stream of thought. I registered as user on the website and downloaded a free document on how to write a fiction.

I imagined the vast knowledge potential being wasted in India in the form of retirement system based on age and not on capability. I contacted him by mail and congratulated for the novel idea and wonderful job he has done. In reply to my mail, he expressed desire to publish the book in India if some publisher is ready to do so.I felt that his book needs to be translated in Indian languages, and many writers will be ready to take up such job if permitted by author.

Particularly in field of education, this potential can easily be tapped by following his idea. Every educational institute in India is in need of experienced teachers. Retirement of teachers creates a gap at higher level which is generally filled by fresh graduates with no or little experience. Appointment of retired teachers on honorarium or clock hour basis gives a partial solution as many retiring teachers do not want to accept such responsibility requiring physical attendance in the institute. Few teachers engage themselves in private education, social work or develop new interests. But, majority of retired teachers spend their remaining life period without using their acquired skills and knowledge.The members of his family, his friends and neighbors are not in need or interested in using his knowledge. This leads to suppression and blocking out of his capacity.

A system can be developed to provide avenues for these teachers to participate in education activities like examinations, syllabus formation, writing books, translation work, training programs or student guidance projects, research and development work, interaction with current teachers.

If we succeed in it, the vast knowledge store in these retired teachers can be put to use to strengthen entire education system and shall provide retired teachers some financial support, respect and satisfaction of contributing to noble cause of education which was their main occupation in active service period. The government and educational institutes should form action group to develop a comprehensive plan with objective of building a financially sound and sustainable organization for harnessing this untapped educational resource. Web technology should be used to provide the core support and communication platform.

This thought that 'government or somebody else should do this job', represents a typical Indian mentality. Why not follow the example of Charles Jacobs, who tried to bring his vision into reality? In America, I observed that people do not wait for the government to do impliment new idea. They convert it into a business. A casual search on the net will reveal that these individuals (or professional associations formed by them) have established their business in cyber world as it is the effective and low cost, low resource demanding technology.

It occured to me that I can do the job through Dnyandeep websites. While collecting data for Sahitya Sammelan website, we had a fair knowledge of Marathi writers world. Dnyandeep is planning to start Translation service on mymarathi.com and can be linked to promote writing by retired people. The message must spread across all languages in India and should be extended to all fields where experience is source of knowledge. This will take time but will get materialised someday by somebody, because, it is the pressing need and opportunity with sure success.

e-Bussiness through website

Requirement of e-Business has posed a new challenge before traditional business industry. Industry in India is not yet prepared to face such a challenge. There is need to
undertake major project to create awareness and educate the industry about the importance of web technology and gearing up the business with it.

“ Every manager carries around in his head a set of biases, assumptions and presuppositions about the structure of the relevant industry, about how one makes money in the industry, about who the competition is and isn’t about, who the customers are and aren’t, which technologies are viable and which aren’t and so on…” - Peter Drucker

These are the main stumbling blocks which limit their vision and obstruct inflow of warning signals from changing environment and resist the change in system. This inertia is percolated to lower cadres of organization and it becomes difficult for business to respond to the new requirements and grab the opportunities unfolded or overpower new competitors.

The website of industry can provide interaction with vendors, suppliers, customers and build IT brand image for the company. All MNCs’ and successful industries in India have their strong presence in cyber space.

Martin T. Focazio in his new book 'the e-factor' suggests a normal website budget of $20000/- minimum for a business at single location having 100 employees.With e-commerce capabilities such as shopping and catalog management the cost may be $50000 to $60000. For companies with multiple locations and full integration, websites can range from $250,000 to $4 million or $5 million. Focazio further mentions that 33% of initial budget should be allocated every year maintenance and improvement of website. Unless it is considered as normal marketing cost like advertisement, the website will not yield expected results.

What is budget of Indian industries for website in this context? Even if we replace $ with Rs., still it is not spent by these industries. They consider it as one time business, hardly changing the contents or keeping it updated. How then our industries will cope up with global compition?

The Corcoran Group, a New York City real estate company earned $4.5 million in sales initiated through their website in the first year and it grew to $ 60 millon in two years

Though in India, due to less number of connections,slow internet speed and low internet awareness, such spectacular results may not be apperent. But the situation is changing fast and global companies are ready to take advantage of this opportunity due to their high money power and technical supremacy.

Dnyandeep is committed to provide guidance and services needed for the industries to meet this new challenge.

Role of e-Architect for future education system

Future educational institutes will require strong and sustainable infostructure instead of infrastructure and shall be managed as e-business. Design of such infostructure shall be done by new creed of professionals called as e-architects.

SRM (Student Relation Management) would be main guiding principle and effective service to student (education) would be the at the focus for building necessary infostructure and employing service providers (faculty and administrative staff).

Evaluation of product shall be in the hands of employers. Education may be totally sponsored and designed by employers to meet their demand. Students shall be at liberty to join courses from different service providers ( educational institutes ) and choose the employer after completion or they may join specific facility sponsored by the employer of their cherished profession.

Their shall be tough global competition to attract students.Students shall evaluate and compare the quality and content of courses, capability of faculty and decide which courses should be joined to get necessary expertise for negotiating with future employers. This would be similar to the present practice of comparing the products on internet and then going to shop that provides best offer.

Employers shall open guidance centres for students for helping them in selecting proper courses. They may offer salary beforehand for meritorious students. Just as Dell usherd the era of direct to customer, some employers may provide predesigned education service package with attractive paybacks.

Traditional education experts and consultants will be replaced by e-architects who will be strong in IT skills, know the modern business management systems and have studied present education system. Both educational experts and IT professionals can lean the tricks of trade of other discipline to become e-Architect for future educational institutes.

The management of present educational institutes is too busy in their routine duties and do not find enough time to study changes in global scenario and plan for future sustainance. A special task force should be formed with help from outside consultants to do blue print planning for IT enabled administration and distance education. The task before such committee would be to compile baseline data regarding resources available with institute, SWOT analysis in the light of global trends, development of detailed plan with schedules, milestones,roles and rsponsibilities, communication and feedback systems and self correcting mechanism to keep the progress in desired direction. Achievement goals should be decided not on availability of resources and present constraints but on future demand requirements and opportunities.

India's Vision - Education to All

Govt. of India has allocated huge financial resources to achieve the goal of providing education to all.It is a wise decision as the future world power will be in the hands of the country who controls global education system. India has a fare chance of becoming world leader in this respect due to large population with considerable human resource in education field.

However, educational institutes in India are far lagging behind foreign institutes in adopting new educational systems, advances in web technology and student centric approach.Unless we change this scenario, it is difficult to attain our objectives.
It is absolutely urgent and necessary to evaluate and understand how foreign schools, colleges and universities are modernising their educational systems through web technology and e-governance, focussing on interactive learning and expanding global reach.

With WEB 2.0, there is a paradigm shift in web technology. The users have become the masters of websites and not the website owners.This has reflected in business and customers are controlling business. Just as customer is the most important element in business, student is the most important element in education. Students should be given central role in e-governance of educational institutes.

At present, the status of web echnology in educational field in India is far from satisfactory. Very few institutes have their presence on web. Those who have their websites, they are mostly designed as information brochures which deal with history, building photos and course information. Many a times, these websites are only to fulfil statutory requirements, not updated and hide factual conditions. The websites of foreign educational institutes give prime importance to faculty-student interaction and have main focus on students - Current students, past students and future would be students. They are closely monitoring progress in web technology and are renovating their systems to remain in line with student's changed expectations.

Adoption of web technology can reduce the cost of education through networking and sharing, can enhance quality of education and develop a capability of global reach. Educational institutes in India should give a serious thought to this changed requirements. If they do so, it will be possible for India to excel in this field also and achieve goal of Education to All on global scale instead of limited to India.

Adobe and Google moving towards Global Virtual University

Adobe has developed excellent virtual education tools through flex technology which can provide real life education experience with far more effectiveness, easy accessibility, global participation possibiliies for teachers and students.

Google is building capabilities for students to create the infrastructural environment they like with landscape, 3 D buildings, virtual libraries with instant accessibility to all information not only through books but all sources.
Adobe and Google may take lead and enter in education business which will be the greatest global business in future. Yahoo, Microsoft and IBM also are gearing up to enter this race.

We are now protecting our educational institutes by law through rigid examination system and certification pattern, but the day is not far off that the private industries and future employers will just consider capability and knowledge rather than formal degrees and certificates. The global competition for quality will force the industries to reexamine their too much reliance and prerequirement of formal degrees. This may lead to major lay off to those who have been recruited on high paid jobs based only on degrees.

Under such circumstances, what would be the future of educational institutes who are thriving only on infrastructural extravagance? There will be tough competition for teachers also, as only tech savvy and effective teachers would be needed, and they will be available from global market not only from academic field but any walk of life as knowledge and experience would only be the recruting criteria. And the selection and thereby appointment of teacher will be in the hands of students.

Education then will be freed from all artificial bondages of rules and regulations, would be available to anybody who wants it, would be affordable and would be governed by real need of society and industry.

Extravagant Infrastructure for Educational Institute- Is it necessary?

It is observed that private educational institutes in India are spending huge amounts on building spectacular infrastructure with modern facilities comparable to business houses. These include high profile buildings, reception rooms, gardens and landscaping. Such investment is welcome only if primary attention is given to educational resources and employing good, motivated teachers and maintaining high educational standards.

Unfortunately, it is observed that these vital aspects are neglected. For example, if library building is specious, air conditioned and with attractive interior design, it is no value if it lacks books and latest journals and has librarians with no interest or experience. Computer lab with large number of computers but without the necessary software or network support or are not accessible to students. Workshops and laboratories with costly equipment and instruments but without well trained operators and curators. Teachers and faculty recruited only to satisfy the statutory requirements.

Such institutes might be succeeding in creating good impression about the educational standard of the institute in society and getting more students enrolled,but I must warn that this may be disastrous not only for students and their future employers but also may pose a serious threat to the survival of such institutes in the light of global high quality requirements in education.

India has a high tradition of quality education. International community believes high standards of education in India. Shantiniketan has earned reputation as place of true learning, where the classes are conducted under tree shade. Our forefathers believed in trueness of purpose, discipline, hardwork, sacrifice and seclusion of worldly pleasures as essential for learning. Rama, Krishna and all kings of worldly wealth spent considerable time of their life in forest learning from teachers who were constantly in pursuit of knowledge.

Where are we now ? Ironically advanced countries are trying to follow our abandoned traditions to improve their educational systems and we are blindly following their rich, leisure oriented outfits which are unnecessary and increasing the cost of education instead of quality.

Treat Education as Serious and Healthy Business

Present Scenario in India

1. Education has turned into a corrupt business with every component failing in one or other respect.

2.Students, Parents, Teachers, Administrators of educational institutes and society in general are pursuing their own goals without understanding the impact of their behaviour on the effectiveness and quality of education.

3. Considering Education as a serious and healthy business can achive win-win situation to all concerned.

4. It is necessary to study global scenario, changed expectations, modern teaching techniques and careful planning to transform present push pull changes in education system to objective oriented and financially sound business.

5. Invasion of education system with business motives by foreign universities is at the doorstep through virtual universities with luring promises.

6. It is therefore necessary to study their capabilities and have self appraisal our education system.

Software for Child Labour Survey

Government of India has enacted law to prohibit child labour, however it is observed that many children are still being forced to leave education and engage in jobs of heavy labour work and even in hazardous environments. SEDT, a social organisation in Parbhani did survey of child labour and a software was developed by Dnyandeep to analyse the data. The results revealed large anomaly in Govt figures and actual number of children engaged in child labour.

Software for Village Information System

Rural Development plans often do not yield desired results due to insufficient information about the present situation and real requirements of villages. Development planning and allocation of funds at District level by governmental and semi-government agencies depends to a large extent on the socio-political leadership instead of need based priority.
Village information system software is developed by Dnyandeep to collect all relevant data from the village as regards income, land holding, employment, education, health, standard of living, earlier utilization of development funds up to family level. The project was implemented for Kerwadi village and the data was analyzed for assessing needs of development. Salient features of software are:

a. Software is in Marathi with Visual Basic having backend support of MS Access was developed for the Central Govt rural survey project undertaken by a Social organization SEDT, Parbhani. There is a provision of summarizing the reports at Taluka and District levels.

b. Software gives choice and complete flexibility to the user in designing and extracting reports as per requirement.

c. Exhaustive data from each family in village was collected and analyzed for various purposes with statistical inferences, charts and graphs. The report of survey was presented in District Collectors conference in Aurangabad.

d. It is hoped that the implementation of this project in all villages will help planning and make the task of assessment of fund utilization quite easy.

लेखन व्यवसाय- आंतरराष्ट्रीय स्थिती

हे आपणास माहित आहे का ?
१. भाषांतराचा दर आंतराष्ट्रीय बाजारपेठेत शब्दाला ३ ते ५ रुपये आहे.
२. व्यावसायिक लेखक व भाषांतरकार तासाला ३० ते ६५ डॉलर (सुमारे १२०० ते २५०० रु.) एवढी फी आकारतात.
३. एका फुलस्केप पानातील मजकुराचे भाषांतर करण्यास २५० डॉलर फी आकारली जाते.
४. जाहिरातीतील मजकुरासाठी यापेक्षा कितीतरी जास्त पैसे देण्यास व्यावसायिक तयार असतात.
५. ’घोष्ट रायटींग’ म्हणजे दुसर्‍याच्या ( नेते, उद्योगपती इत्यादी ) नावावर लिहिणे, यामध्येही मानधन खूप जास्त असते.
५. वर्तमानपत्रे, मासिके, वेबसाईट, पुस्तके प्रकाशित करणार्‍या व्यावसायिकांना भाषांतरकारांची गरज लागते.

भारतातील लेखनव्यवसाय

भारतात अजून साहित्य लेखनाला फारसे महत्व दिले जात नाही. नवोदित लेखकाला चांगली कथा, कविता वा अन्य लेखाच्या प्रसिद्धीसाठी प्रकाशकांची मनधरणी करावी लागते. सर्व हक्क विकूनदेखील लेखकाच्या हातात पानाला ३० ते ५० रुपये एवढे कमी मानधन मिळते. हौसेपोटी स्वत:ची पदरमोड करून एखाद्या लेखकाने स्वखर्चाने पुस्तक प्रसिद्ध केले तरी त्याला ते पुस्तक विकणे दुरापास्त होते. भेटीदाखल पुस्तके वाटून लेखकाला आपली हौस भागवावी लागते. त्यामुळे लेखन हा व्यवसाय म्हणून कोणी स्वीकारू शकत नाही. आंतरराष्ट्रीय बाजारपेठॆत मात्र लेखनाला फार महत्व आहे व चांगल्या लेखकाला आपल्याकडल्यासारखी केवळ प्रसिद्धी व मान न मिळता उत्तम धनप्राप्ती होऊ शकते.

सध्या इंग्रजी शिक्षण पहिलीपासून देण्यास सुरुवात झाली आहे. इंग्रजीत प्राविण्य मिळविल्यास आज इंजिनिअर वा वैद्यकीय पदवीधारकांना जे महत्व आहे तेवढेच महत्व इंग्रजीत लेखन व्यवसाय करणार्‍यास मिळू शकेल. मग अशा विद्यार्थ्यांनाही परदेशात मागणी येईल. भारतात इंग्रजी साहित्याचे भारतीय भाषेत भाषांतर करण्यास भरपूर वाव आहे. कारण बहुराष्ट्रीय व भारतातील मोठ्य़ा उद्योगांना त्यांच्या उत्पादनांची स्थानिक भाषेत जाहिरात करण्यास, माहितीपत्रके व नियमपुस्तके बनविण्यासाठी भाषांतरकारांची गरज लागते.


भारतातील जे उद्योग व व्यवसाय आतापर्यंत स्थानिक बाजारपेठेवर अवलंबून होते त्यांना या श्रीमंत स्पर्धकांपासून धोका निर्माण झाला आहे. त्यावर मात करण्यासाठी त्यांना आपल्या उत्पादनांच्या दर्जात व सेवेत सुधारणा कराव्या लागतील. पण त्याबरोबरच परराज्यातील व परदेशातील ग्राहकांपर्यंत पोहोचण्यासाठी त्यांनी इंग्रजीचा आधार घेण्याची आवश्यकता आहे. स्थानिक उत्पादने व व्यवसाय यांच्या माहितीचे इंग्रजीत भाषांतर करण्यास यामुळे प्रोत्साहन मिळून आंतरराष्ट्रीय बाजारपेठेत स्थान मिळविणे येथील उद्योगांना शक्य होईल. आज भारतीय भाषेतील लेखक अनेक असले तरी इंग्रजीत लेखन करणार्‍या व्यक्ती हाताच्या बोटावर मोजण्याइतपत कमी आहेत. ही स्थिती बदलणे जरूर आहे.

भाषांतर - गरज व व्यवसाय संधी

मराठीतील अपार साहित्यसंपदा जागतिक स्तरावर पोहोचविण्यासाठी त्याचे अन्य भाषांत भाषांतर वा रुपांतर होणे आवश्यक आहे. महाराष्ट्राबाहेर राहणारे मराठी बांधव हे कार्य अधिक सुलभतेने करू शकतील कारण त्यांना मराठी साहित्याची जाण असतेच शिवाय स्थानिक भाषा व तिची वैशिष्ठ्ये माहीत असतात. असे भाषांतर मोठ्या प्रमाणावर झाले तर मराठी साहित्य सर्वदूर पोहोचेल व त्याचा येथील साहित्यिकांना फायदा होईल. मराठी साहित्य अधिक समृद्ध होण्यासाठी इतर भाषांतील साहित्याचे मराठीत भाषांतर वा रुपांतर करणे तर महाराष्ट्राबाहेर राहणार्‍या मराठी बांधवांना अधिक सोपे जाईल. युनिकोड अक्षरसंच वापरून संगणकावर मराठी मजकूर लिहिणे सोपे झाल्याने आज इंटरनेटवर फार मोठ्या प्रमाणावर लोक आपले विचार मराठीतून व्यक्त करू लागले आहेत. निश्चित योजना व योग्य व्यासपीठ मिळाले तर केवळ अभिप्राय, गप्पा वा चर्चा एवढ्यापुरताच याचा उपयोग न राहता त्यायोगे मराठी साहित्यात मोलाची भर पडू शकेल. मायमराठी या संकेतस्थळावर या उद्देशाने स्वतंत्र भाषांतर विभाग सुरू करण्यात येत आहे. महाराष्ट्राबाहेर राहणार्‍या मराठी लोकांचे सक्रीय सहकार्य मिळाले तर ते त्यांच्यासकट सर्वांनाच लाभदायक ठरेल.
या कार्याला व्यावसायिक संदर्भही आहे. आज जागतिकीकरणामुळे जाहिरात व प्रसारमाध्यमांसाठी मराठीत लेखन व भाषांतर करण्याची गरज वाढली आहे. महिला, विद्यार्थी व शिक्षकांना याद्वारे आर्थिक लाभ मिळविण्याच्या अनेक संधी उपलब्ध झाल्या आहेत. सध्याच्या जागतिकीकरणाच्या युगात
मराठी साहित्य व उद्योग यांच्या प्रगतीसाठी मराठीचे इंग्रजीमध्ये भाषांतर करण्याचा व्यवसाय वृद्धींगत होण्याची गरज आहे. ज्ञानदीप आपल्या मायमराठी डॉट कॉम या संकेतस्थळावर असा विभाग सुरू करीत आहे. असे कार्य व्यवसाय म्हणून करणार्‍या परदेशातील काही मराठी व्यक्तींनी यात सहभागी होण्याचे व नवोदितांना सर्व ते मार्गदर्शन करण्याचे मान्य केले आहे.

Translation – Potential Big Business

In the new age of globalization, effective communication and information exchange have assumed a new dimension and translation services seem to attain a big business status in near future. In the Indian context, this is more apparent as multinationals are trying to enter local markets and expand their customer base. Up till now the local markets are protected from foreign products and services due to language barrier as most of the people do not know English and rely on the salespersons who can talk their language.
Now the situation is fast changing and soon multinationals will employ translation services to create advertisements and service centres to provide local language support. Creative writing will translation will help writers in becoming financially sound. This will increase imports and would help MNCs.
Indian industries should encourage and sponsor the translation services for translation of information from regional language to English for exporting their products and services.
Translation of books also may become a lucrative business. Students and teachers can take up this profession which will help Indian industry while earning.Educational institutes should take a lead and form links with industries and writers for developng this new potential business.

साहित्य आणि साहित्यिक

किती योगायोग पहा. मी नुकताच साहित्यिक या विषयावर ब्लॉग लिहिला.
’इ सकाळ’ मध्ये आज खालील बातमी वाचली आणि माझ्या मताला पुष्टी मिळाली. खरंच प्रत्येकाने रोज काहीतरी लिहीत राहिले तर साहित्य समृद्ध हॊईल.
लेखन कुणाची जहागिरी नाही - महेश भट
मुंबई, ता. ११ - ""लेखन ही कुणाची जहागिरी नाही. तेव्हा ज्याच्याकडे शब्दभांडार आहे किंवा ज्याला लिहिता येते त्यानेच लिहिले पाहिजे असे नाही. तर जो जगतोय, जो अनुभवतोय, तो लिहू शकतो आणि जेव्हा अशी पुस्तके लिहिली जातात तेव्हाच त्यात जीवनाचा अस्सल गंध अनुभवता येतो,'' असे विचार सुप्रसिद्ध सिनेदिग्दर्शक महेश भट यांनी व्यक्त केले. वैशाली हळदणकर लिखित "बारबाला' या आत्मचरित्राचे प्रकाशन आज भट यांच्या हस्ते करण्यात आले, त्यावेळी ते बोलत होते.

साहित्यिक

या जानेवारीत सांगलीत मराठी साहित्य संमेलन भरले होते. त्यावेळी काही साहित्यिकांना आपण इतर सामान्य लोकांपेक्षा वेगळे वा श्रेष्ठ आहोत असे वाटत असावे अशी शंका आली. माझ्यामते साहित्य म्हणजे लिखित स्वरुपातील माहिती. कोणताही माणूस जे लिहितो ते साहित्यच असते कारण तो आपले विचार व आपल्या भावनांना स्थायी स्वरूप देत असतो. तसे पाहता सर्वच लोक साहित्यिक असतात. आपण पाहतो की साध्या संवादात सामान्य माणूसही अतिशय मार्मिक, अर्थवाही बोलतो. मात्र ते लिहिले जात नाही. सतत लिहिण्याची सवय असणारा व लिहिलेले सर्वांसाठी प्रसिद्ध करणारा तो साहित्यिक अशी व्याख्या करणे अधिक योग्य ठरेल.
’दिसामाजी काहीतरी ते लिहावे’ हा संत रामदासांचा उपदेश प्रत्येकाने मानला तर अमाप साहित्याची निर्मिती होईल. शिवाय लिहिणार्‍याला साहित्यिक असा मान मिळेल. पण यापेक्षा महत्वाचे म्हणजे त्याच्या साहित्यामुळे त्याचे व्यक्तिमत्व चिरंतन होईल. फार वर्षांपूर्वी मी आणि माझा मित्र शिराळकर सांगलीतील प्रसिद्ध हिंदुत्ववादी नेते कै. का. भा लिमये यांना भेटायला गेलो होतो. त्यावेळी त्यांनी आम्हाला सतत लिहित रहा असा संदेश दिला होता याची आठवण झाली. ते म्हणाले ’माझ्यापेक्षाही माझा एक मित्र छ्त्रे माझ्यापेक्षाही खूप बहुश्रुत व हुशार होता. मात्र त्याला लिहिण्याचा कंटाळा होता. दुर्दैवाने त्याचे ऎन उमेदीत निधन झाले. त्याच्याबरोबर त्याची सारी विद्वत्ताही नाहिशी झाली. आज त्याचे नाव कोणालाही माहीत नाही. मात्र मी लिहीत असल्याने लोक मलाच मॊठा विचारवंत मानतात.’
आज ब्लॉगच्या सोयीमुळे कोणीही आपले विचार सहज प्रसिद्ध करू शकतो. त्याचा फायदा घेऊन प्रत्येकाने साहित्यिक व विचारवंत व्हायला हरकत नाही.