Work from home is the new mantra for employees of IBM, HP, Cisco, MS

Work from home is the new mantra for employees of IBM, HP, Cisco, MSRising realty costs, travel time, apart from other complexities of maintaining office space is making a business case for MNC tech firms.

The last time Kumar, a sales executive working with IBM India, visited his company's registered office in Bangalore was some six months ago to get his broken attendance card replaced. Kumar, 35, is among nearly 50,000 IBM India employees who are working from anywhere, but the office.

"I do not have to show my face to my boss anymore, well at least for a few weeks or months at a stretch," says Kumar, who requested that his first name not be revealed. "I used to miss catching up with other colleagues at office, but now there are hundreds of us on the road for the company," he adds.

For nearly 50,000 employees at IBM India and some 15,000 tech workers at HP's India operations, work-fromhome is no more an HR incentive meant for women going for early maternity leave, or a privilege for few - it's now an integral part of their work life.

While over 40% of IBM staff does not have any space in office, a quarter of HP India employees across the functions of sales, marketing and customer support do not have to mark their attendance or swipe employment cards.

Rising real estate costs and travel time, apart from other complexities of maintaining office space for a growing base of staff, are making a real business case for multinational tech firms like IBM, HP, Cisco and Microsoft.

What was once an option taken by those with personal problems or medical predicaments has now become a norm in some companies with the option of working from home finding more takers than ever before. Employees at IBM even receive Rs 15,000 more a month for this. This is because they save the company walloping infrastructure costs, one of the perils of rapid expansion.

This way the company can also drive home the point that it truly promotes work-life balance. The company says it also increases the productivity of employees. "We know that if we can successfully address the challenges of work-life balance, IBM will certainly gain a competitive edge in the war for talent," a company spokesperson said.

The company, however, denied paying these employees extra. At HP, the number is anywhere between 10,000 and 15,000, and the company, which did not confirm the figure as it does not share its India headcount, says it leads to better employee engagement.
 
Source: Tech News - Work from home is the new mantra for employees of IBM, HP, Cisco, MS

Techgig

India ranked 4th as world's most dangerous countries for women

Increasing human trafficking and continuous presence of female foeticide, infanticide has placed India as the world's fourth most dangerous place for women, as per a survey conducted by Thomson Reuters' Trustlaw Women, a hub of legal information and legal support for women's rights . Trust Law contacted 213 gender experts from five continents to rank countries by analyzing six risks. The risks were health threats, sexual violence, non-sexual violence, cultural or religious factors, lack of access to resources and trafficking.

In India, a whole gamut of human trafficking is run whereby women and girls are trafficked within and into India since they are most vulnerable into the sex trade. The enormous bulk of trafficked women and girls are poor, some belong to landless families, and most come from dalit, adivasi or other low caste communities.

In 2009, India's then-Home Secretary Madhukar Gupta estimated that 100 million people, mostly women and girls, were involved in trafficking in India that year.

In 2009 it was estimated by India's Central Bureau of Investigation that about 90 percent of trafficking took place within the country and that there were some 3 million prostitutes, of which about 40 percent were children.

The purposes for human trafficking in India are numerous such as forced prostitution, marriage, domestic labour, bonded labour, agricultural labour, industrial labour, entertainment, begging, adoption, drug smuggling and peddling and organ transplants.

The 2007 U.S. Trafficking in Persons report identified that the lack of co-ordinated national action undermines attempts to combat human trafficking. It recommends the urgent necessity to establish an effective national-level body to enforce the law strictly as these problems are made worse by the reported complicity of law enforcement officials in trafficking and related criminal activity.

As far as female infanticide and foeticide in India is concerned up to 50 million girls are thought to be "missing" over the past century due to female infanticide and foeticide according to the U.N. Population Fund. According to the report this problem is creating gender imbalances and other serious problems that experts say will have far reaching consequences for years to come.

Experts in India who have analyzed the National Family Health Survey 2 (NFHS2) estimate that about 300,000 girls go "missing" in India each year. Other studies have put the number between 150,000 and 500,000.

In India, where the child sex ratio is calculated as the number of girls per 1,000 boys in the 0-6 years age group, the problem is severe. The 2001 Census shows there are only 927 girls per 1,000 boys, representing a sharp decline from 1961 when that number was 976. In certain parts of the country there are now fewer than 800 girls for every 1,000 boys.


Apart from India, Afghanistan has been placed as the world's most dangerous country for women and Congo has been placed second due to the horrific levels of rape dominant there. Pakistan grabbed the third place for its increasing domestic abuse and economic discrimination and Somalia ranked fifth respectively due to its genital mutilation and acid attacks.

But if India wants to make its country worth living for women it will need to cover lot of aspects as far as security is concern. According to police records, over 400 rape cases have been reported in the capital in the year 2010 alone. According to the data, 18,359 rape cases were registered in India in the first three quarters of this 2010; hence, we need to provide an environment of safety and security to our women with strict implementation of the female centric laws that's in theory in our books. 
Source: SiliconIndia, Wednesday, 15 June 2011, 12:31 IST 

Engineering students develop 110 km/liter diesel bike

Have you ever imaged of a two-wheeler that runs on a diesel engine?

Four engineering students from Bangalore have developed a diesel bike that gives a mileage of 110km/liter - a challenging task accomplished by the innovative brains.

A magnificent idea that can be of a great help to the common man who struggles with the never-ending fuel price hikes, the young brains from the at the M S Ramaiah Institute of Technology took the challenge of developing a two wheeler diesel engine with automatic gear and automatic clutch and have successfully carried out the project.

Guided by their project guide Dr. S V Prakash, four mechanical engineering students namely Naveen V V, Tony Paul, Nadeem Anwar and Sanjay Bhushan decided develop a diesel-run two-wheeler as our final year project. Fitting a Bullet engine to Kinetic Blaze, they had to do a lot of alterations. While spending four months on the project with various workshops in Bangalore and Coimbatore, they reduced 325cc engine to 200cc, flywheel weight reduced to 7kg and power reduced to 3.5 hp from 6.5 hp apart from many other alteration works.

"We have spent almost 72 thousand on the production of this prototype and with mass production, the cost would be around 55 to 60 thousand," said Nadeem Anwar, a member of the team.

The highlight of the innovative work is that it gives a mileage of 110km/liter and it reduces travel expense to a great degree as diesel engine runs at 40 paise per km and petrol engine runs at 1.70 per km. The vehicle offers a smooth ride with automatic gear and clutches and is less polluting compared with other diesel-engine vehicles. In addition, the life of a diesel engine is generally about twice as long as that of a petrol engine.

Dr. S V Prakash, the project guide who has been a great help to the young students to materialize their dream project, said India's largest engineering and construction conglomerate 'Kirloskar Group' has shown interest in the technology and has offered to further assistance to the project.

Source of News: SiliconIndia, Monday, 06 June 2011
Authour: Binu Paul

Google reveals Gmail hacking, likely from China

(Reuters) - Hackers likely based in China tried to break into hundreds of Google mail accounts, including those of senior U.S. government officials, Chinese activists and journalists, the Internet company said on Wednesday.

The unknown perpetrators, who appeared to originate from Jinan in Shandong province, recently tried to crack and monitor email accounts by stealing passwords, but Google detected and "disrupted" their campaign, the world's largest Web search company said on its official blog.

The revelation comes more than a year after Google disclosed a cyberattack on its systems that it said it traced to China, and could further strain an already tense relationship between the Web giant and Beijing.

That incident also triggered a highly charged debate over the country's censorship and rigid control of the Internet. Google eventually all but pulled out of the world's largest Internet market by users.

"Investors would like to see Google figure out a way to operate in China, and capitalize on the growth of the country," said Cowen and Co analyst Jim Friedland.

"It's been a tough relationship. And this highlights that it continues to be a tough relationship," he said.
A U.S. government spokesman said it was looking into the incident but declined further comment.

"We recently uncovered a campaign to collect user passwords, likely through phishing," Google said in a post on its corporate blog on Thursday. "The goal of this effort seems to have been to monitor the contents of these users' emails."

It "affected what seem to be the personal Gmail accounts of hundreds of users, including among others, senior U.S. government officials, Chinese political activists, officials in several Asian countries (predominantly South Korea), military personnel and journalists."

NO OFFICIALS TARGETED?

The events leading to Goggle's withdrawal from China exacerbated an often difficult relationship between Washington and Beijing, with disputes ranging from human rights to trade.
The attacks revealed Wednesday were also the latest computer-based invasions directed at western companies. The United States has warned that a cyberattack -- presumably if it is devastating enough -- could result in real-world military retaliation, although analysts say it could be difficult to detect its origin with full accuracy.

Lockheed Martin Corp, the U.S. government's top information technology provider, said last week it had thwarted "a significant and tenacious attack" on its information systems network, though no signs pointed to a Chinese origin.

The White House said it was investigating the claims, but referred Reuters to law enforcement.
"We're looking into these reports and are seeking to gather the facts," said White House spokesman

Tommy Vietor. "We have no reason to believe that any official U.S. Government email accounts were accessed. I'd refer you to FBI for additional details."

FBI spokeswoman Jenny Shearer said: "We are aware of Google's announcement regarding attempts to obtain passwords and gain access to these accounts. We are working with Google to review this matter."

Cyberattacks originating in China have become very common in recent years, said Bruce Schneier, chief security technology officer at telecommunications company BT.

"It's not just the Chinese government. It's independent actors within China who are working with the tacit approval of the government," he said.

While Google said last year's attack was aimed at its "corporate infrastructure," the latest incident appears to have relied on tricking email users into revealing passwords, based on Google's description in its blog post.

It said the perpetrators changed the victims' email forwarding settings, presumably secretly sending the victims' personal emails to other recipients.

Schneier said the details that Google has released about the email hijacking do not appear that unusual.

"For the past five years we've known that the Chinese conduct a lot of espionage over the Internet," he said.

The bigger question, he said, was why Google was choosing to publicize this attack now.

The company said it notified the victims and relevant governments.

"It's important to stress that our internal systems have not been affected -- these account hijackings were not the result of a security problem with Gmail itself," Google said.

The company's shares finished 0.7 percent lower at $525.60.

(Reporting by Alexei Oreskovic and Edwin Chan; additional reporting by Alister Bull in Washington D.C; Editing by Andre Grenon, Phil Berlowitz)

-Alexei Oreskovic and Edwin Chan
SAN FRANCISCO/LOS ANGELES | Thu Jun 2, 2011 5:17am IST

ALTERNATIVE RAW MATERIALS FOR PAPER INDUSTRY

There are two main fibrous raw materials used in papermaking, woodchips (43%) and recovered paper (42%), the rest being other pulp (1%) and non-fibrous materials (14%). In addition, a quantity of additives (mainly natural mineral fillers) and dyestuffs are used together with traces of auxiliary chemicals.

So basically the forest provide directly and indirectly all the primary raw material required to make paper. In prehistoric times, forests covered over 80% of Europe. But an ever increasing demand for land for food production, and the rapid changes during the industrialisation period, led to extensive exploitation and the area of forest was reduced to less than one quarter by the end of the 19th century. However, once man began to realise the value of wood as a resource, this decline was reversed through the large-scale reforestation of the past 150 years. In 2002 the recorded area of Europe's forests was 329 million hectares, and today is about 30% of the land area.

Wood is the primary raw material for the pulp and paper industry because it is the main source of cellulose fibre. Non-wood materials, for example cotton and cereal crops such as straw, can be used for papermaking but the advantage of a year-round wood supply, combined with the product diversity made possible by mixing wood fibres, has made it the most practical and economic option. However, nowadays the paper demand is increasing and in order to be sustainable, papermaking has to manage the forest resources, with the risk of a shortage of suitable raw materials.

Other alternative materials, rich in cellulose, were tested in the last decade, for example wheat straw, surplus of which is available in many EU member states, or beet pulp residual from the sugar production process; however, quality issues have generally prevented their use.

Apparently, for this issue, biotechnology's potential isn't fully exploited. In fact novel pulping process could be developed, aimed to overcome the above mentioned quality problems (that are mainly due to too short cellulose fibres); for instance, several microfungi are able to produce cellulose-like biopolymers, growing directly on vegetable biomasses or even on paper industry effluents.

Another option could be starch, that has been used extensively in paper industry, for different uses, mainly in its native form. The development of new efficient starch derivatives with a high degree of hydroxyl groups, obtained by chemical and biological modifications, allow the bonding promotion between short fibres, creating new, longer ones, thus allowing the production of stronger paper of better quality.

Most probably, it will be impossible replace the woodpulp for papermaking, but a modern approach to the preliminary stages of the process could allow a reduction of virgin fibres needed for good quality paper.

Triple suns over China

The sun is shadowed by two smaller twins due to an astronomical phenomenon called phantom sun.

Highest paid IT jobs in demand for 2011

As the information technology boom gets stronger and expands its operations to new untapped markets, the enterprise IT becomes the most sought after job for the new-age techies, with 15 to 20 percent salary hike during 2010. Siliconindia surveyed human resource managers and hiring managers. More than 50 percent of recruiters expect to see more hiring in the first half of the year in the areas below, which are well in demand for the year to come.

Data Architect

A data architect understands the behavior of systems in a multitude environment and how they chart out strategies on how a number of systems can interact with each other to obtain a desired result. A data architect needs to be able to have an end-to-end vision, and to see how a logical design will translate into one or more physical databases, and how the data will flow through the successive Stages involved. The salary of a data architect with an experience of 3 to 10 years ranges somewhere between 8,80,000 to 17,30,000 per annum.

Data Modeler
A data modeler designs methods for handling, processing and evaluating material. He or she needs to formalize and document of existing processes and events that occur during application software design and development. The salary of a data modeler with an experience of 3 to 6 years ranges somewhere between  3,50,000 to  8,50,000 per annum.

Data Warehouse Analyst
Jobs managing the ever-increasing storage demand with the rise of video, enhanced Web graphics and larger archiving demands. A data warehouse maintains its functions in three layers: staging, integration, and access. 'Staging' is used to store raw data for use by developers. The 'integration' layer is used to integrate data and to have a level of abstraction from users. The 'access' layer is for getting data out for users. The salary of a data warehouse analyst with an experience of 3 to 7 years ranges somewhere between 3,45,000 to  8,00,000 per annum.

Operation Mangers
The dealings of an operation manager range from strategic to tactical and operational levels. An operation manager needs to have a combination of team management, vendor management and technology know-how. Tactical issues include plant layout and structure, project management methods, and equipment selection and replacement. Operational issues include production scheduling and control, inventory management, quality control and inspection, traffic and materials handling, and equipment maintenance policies. The salary of an operation manger with an experience of 3 to 6 years ranges somewhere between  3,75,000 to  7,70,000 per annum.

Business Intelligence Analyst
Companies need analysts who can guide decision-making processes in a constantly changing business environment, and help reduce costs and better evaluate internal and external clients. A Business Intelligence Analyst plays a key role in better business decision-making. The salary of a business intelligence analyst with an experience of 3 to 6 years ranges somewhere between  3,25,000 to  7,40,000 per annum.

Lead Application Developer
A lead application developer needs to have higher-level application design skills that focus on clean, easy and useful experiences. He or she needs to Identify, define, and model the application requirements. The lead application developer has to define data structures and distribution to satisfy the application solution. The salary of a lead application developer with an experience of 3 to 6 years ranges somewhere between  3,30,000 to  7,20,000 per annum.

ERP Technical Developer
ERP is a great help for organizations of all sizes to improve efficiency and cut coasts. Developers need to customize software according to specific organizational needs. The salary of an ERP technical developer with an experience of 3 to 5 years ranges somewhere between  2,90,000 to  6,40,000 per annum. 


ERP Business Analyst
There has been so much investment in ERP in the enterprise, but every company environment needs a business analyst to define the business processes, and configure and deploy them, as well as set up the reporting structures. The salary of an ERP business analyst with an experience of 3 to 4 years ranges somewhere between  1,22,000 to  5,12,000 per annum.

Web Developer
From social media to mobile applications for smartphones such as the iPhone, the Droid and HTC devices, Web development continues to be in high demand, especially in customer-centric front and back-end frameworks and systems. A web developer is responsible for programming the functionality of a web site. A web developer figures out how it is going to do it and then writes the necessary programming code. The salary of a web developer with an experience of 3 to 10 years ranges somewhere between 3,15,000 to 13,75,000 per annum.

Networking Engineer
A networking engineer is a high-level LAN/WAN technician who plans, implements and supports network solutions between multiple platforms. A network engineer installs and maintains local area network hardware and software, and troubleshoots network usage and computer peripherals. The salary of a networking engineer with an experience of 3 to 10 years ranges somewhere between  4,27,000 to  13,50,000 per annum. 

You are not as adult as you think!

You may still have something of a teenager in you even in your adulthood as the human brain keeps developing till we are in our 40s, says a new research. The findings from the University College London could perhaps help explain why seemingly respectable adults sometimes just can't resist throwing a tantrum or sulking until they get their own way.

The discovery that the part of the brain key to getting on with others takes decades to fully form could perhaps also explain why some people are socially awkward well past their teenage years, reports the Daily Mail. Neuroscientist Sarah-Jayne Blakemore of University College, said: "Until about 10 years ago, it was pretty much assumed that the human brain stops developing in early childhood. "But we now know that is far from the truth. In fact, most regions of the human brain continue to develop for many decades," Blakemore said.

"The region that goes through the most protracted development is the pre-frontal cortex at the front of the brain. "It is involved in decision-making, planning and inhibiting inappropriate social behaviour and also things like social awareness and understanding other people and empathy," said Blakemore. 

No. 31 for Dravid: There’s nothing to prove

Rahul Dravid is a man of different character. A man with a mission, but nothing more to prove. A cricketer with a willow, but when it strikes the leather, it transforms to a magical reality.


The Kiwis witnessed the magic of this man for the second time in the series. An innings full of character and timely - when India needed the most. His innings took India to a position from where they can have a real go to clinch the Test match and the series. When it matters, Dravid showed again, he is the man for India. Scoring at a percentage of nearly 50, Dravid mixed stability with aggression in his innings. The 193-run partnership with skipper MS Doni (98) was a story of absolute domination and strategy. Both complimented each other not only with stroke-making but also patience and intent to be calm when the other showed aggression.


That's the hallmark of a great batsmen and a greater team mate. Do we say more of The Wall? Dhoni missed the three-figure mark by a whisker. His innings also came at a time when doubts were beginning to rise about his own performance in the team. But after today, things will be calmer now, for sure.


Riding on Dravid's brilliance, India declared on 566/9, a huge lead of 375 and with two full days remaining, the lead gives a great impetus to win this Test. Harbhajan Singh quickly got into the act reducing New Zealand to 24/1 at the end of day 3. Tough call to save this Test match for New Zealand. Can Ross Taylor do something here?

Private Clouds: hot favorites for enterprises

With enterprise IT organizations trying to leverage maximum efficiency with cost savings, adoption of cloud computing - both private and public turns out to be the latest fad in its deployment of resources. Private clouds are adopted at widespread and accelerating rates than it was suggested by the previous researches, says a survey by Novell. 

Companies are particular about simplifying management across their integrated physical, virtual and cloud environments but with cloud computing in focus, whether they can attain it with minimal risk is a point to ponder. 77 percent of the large enterprises organizations use some form of cloud computing today, much higher than previously suggested. 89 percent of respondents in these organizations believe private clouds are the next step to the already implementing virtualization while 43 percent are planning to use a combined approach of private and public cloud computing. 31 percent find that a key benefit to private cloud computing is the ability to manage a heterogeneous infrastructure. 87 percent believe that public cloud computing will naturally take its course over company owned data centers and 92 percent think of it as an alternative to the current IT platforms.

Private cloud computing earns the advantage over public cloud computing when it comes to the matter of security concern. 91 percent are concerned about security issues in the public cloud, with 50 percent indicating security as the primary barrier to implementation whereas 86 percent believe data is more secure in a private cloud. Private cloud computing provides freedom from maintaining hardware, lower cost upkeep, resource scalability, lower initial costs. 76 percent showed more confidence in internal IT departments for providing data security than outside vendors.

"The survey results are telling," said Jim Ebzery, senior vice president and general manager of Security, Management and Operating Platforms at Novell. "The path to public cloud computing needs to begin with the private cloud, learning to leverage the public cloud within the safety of the enterprise network. Despite these concerns, enterprises are moving forward with cloud computing -- whether in a private cloud, public cloud or in a hybrid cloud environment". 

Top 10 excuses why techies don't give projects on time

When engineering projects are not delivered on time, whom do we blame for that? Clients are known to be the most stubborn people on earth to get their job done. All they understand is that they pay for the service and find no reason for not being demanding. Some engineers do face genuine issues but some try to take advantage of the genuine situations and it would be hard to believe that such a situation might not have been faced by the engineers. 

No matter, whatever changes are incorporated in the IT sector to make it more lean and adaptive, the delivery of projects would be delayed at some point of time and the techies know how to get away with it. With India being one of the fastest growing markets in IT and ITeS space, SiliconIndia conducted a small survey to see what are the excuses which techies in India normally bet upon. And here are the top 10 reasons that make them hunt for more time to get their projects done. 

1) Requirement Slippage: "What can I do, if the client does not stick to his requirements?" Any techie you come across must have either made this excuse or must have come across it. Many times, when the team members in a particular project are about to complete the project keeping the client requirements in mind, they are insisted to either make certain changes in the project or bring in some addition to it. Requirement slippage is a genuine problem faced by team members in a project but many times it becomes the easiest excuse for any techie if the project is delayed. This excuse is often validated by the organization and the team members can easily prove themselves impeccable.

2) Wrong Project estimation: Project estimation is usually given by a module leader who is not deeply associated with the project. He or she is the one who builds relationship between the client and the project team and integrates the module's findings into the broader project work. Usually when the project demands some more time to be delivered, the team members crib about the project not being estimated in an appropriate manner. At times, the requirement is underestimated, the time frame is not fixed in sync with the project and the entire project is not compatible with the engineers working on the project. This excuse has a broader dimension as any one part of the project estimation could become a reason for extending the time for project delivery.

3) Work Overload: Attrition is no big news in the IT industry. The software professionals deal with immense pressure in coding their programmes correctly. In such a case, when one team member resigns, the existing team members are overloaded with the pending work of the ex-employee. And in such a case, the priorities of the project team members change and this becomes another excuse for team members. 

4) Infrastructural issues: Well if nothing works out, then this is the excuse which everyone resorts to. Blame it on the company's infrastructure. Indian IT infrastructure usually lacks with effective resources like availability of power and high bandwidth. So probably one could understand the frustration caused due to a technical snag. Each time there is an infrastructural slowdown, the efficiency of employees comes down.

5) Information does not get passed on, lack of understanding of processes:Communication of the project details seems to be another area for making an excuse. If the project is not delivered on time, the problem could be directed to the organizational processes. The discrepancy in understanding of a project requirement is one point which the techies pick on to make an excuse.

6) Health issues: This is the most common excuse which prevails in every sector. This is one area, where the employees can't be questioned further. It has been widely seen that many IT professionals take sick leaves on Mondays because they are reluctant to work on Mondays after a relaxed weekend. 

Accenture to invest $100 Million to make 2.5 lakh job ready

Beginning a new initiative called 'Skills to Succeed', Accenture will make 250,000 unskilled and semi-skilled people around the world job- or business-ready by 2015. Accenture and Accenture Foundation will invest over $100 million into this initiative, reports Mini Joseph Tejaswi from The Economic Times.

This program will seek to educate people, and build skills that enable them to participate in and contribute to areas like IT, BPO, hospitality and retail. India, with over 450 million unskilled and semi-skilled workforce under 35, is likely to be a significant beneficiary of this campaign.

Accenture has roped in Dr. Reddy's Foundation and Nasscom Foundation to provide BPO skills training to underprivileged youth from rural India. It has entered into a partnership with IGNOU to offer a diploma course on BPO services. "With Nasscom Foundation, we will train adolescent girls and young women from economically backward areas in animation skills," said Rekha Menon, Executive Director in Accenture India.

Endhiran beyond all limits

This one can break all records. While one agrees that the forthcoming film Endhiran from Shankar's stable starring Rajnikanth and Aishwarya Rai could be one of the biggest blockbusters ever, a certain multiplex in Chennai called City Limits has already set the tone for what can happen. The particular multiplex has 30 cinemas and if it works out well there will be 450 screenings daily of the Rajnikanth starrer in that cinema hall alone. No film ever has had this kind of a planning or response from the theatre owners till date.

When Karan Johar had pumped in his film Kaal into the Fame Adlabs multiplex years ago doing 13 shows daily, one felt that it was a record. And that was also being done becuse Karan knew that the film wasn't looking too good enough to be a winner. But what this Rajnikanth film can do is beyond all limits...


Source: Sanskrti Media and Entertainment


Enthiran Tailor:

Pakistan scandal throws focus on India

 Young Indian cricketers were on Tuesday warned of the perils of corruption following the illicit gambling allegations levelled against the Pakistani team in England.

Former India captain Anil Kumble, asked if he feared players from his own country could in future be hauled up, said: "Of course I am worried. "These days youngsters who have not even played for India have agents," Kumble, one of the game's elder statesmen in India, said.

A British tabloid claimed over the weekend that a middleman gave undercover reporters exact details of no-balls to be bowled by Pakistani seamers Mohammad Aamer and Mohammad Asif during the Lord's Test against England.

The News of the World said it had paid the middleman, Mazhar Majeed, 150,000 pounds (230,000 dollars) for information on the practice of spot-fixing, which is widespread in illegal South Asian betting circles.

Majeed, who claimed to be an agent for several Pakistani cricketers, told the newspaper he worked for an "Indian party". "They pay me for information," Majeed was recorded as saying.

The identity of the "Indian party" is being probed by Scotland Yard investigators. Many observers point to India's huge influence over the International Cricket Council (ICC), which has been attacked by critics for failing to clean up the game.

India, cricket's financial powerhouse, accounts for nearly 70 percent of the game's global revenues and is regarded as the hotbed for betting syndicates and match-fixers.

Matthew Engel, a former Wisden editor, on Tuesday described the ICC as "a notoriously dysfunctional organisation, controlled by Indian interests and obsessed with political and financial manoeuvring".

The shady world of Indian bookmakers came to light in a match-fixing scandal in 2000 that led to life bans for Test captains Hansie Cronje (South Africa), Mohammad Azharuddin (India) and Salim Malik (Pakistan).

The scandal broke when New Delhi police, working on an unrelated extortion case, tapped a conversation between Cronje and an alleged bookie. India's federal Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which probed the 2000 scandal, alluded to the underworld's links with cricket in its report.

"During the inquiry," the CBI report said, "it was learnt that the lure of easy money has gradually attracted the underworld into this racket". Cronje, who accepted having links with bookmakers but denied he was involved in match-fixing, was killed in a mysterious plane crash near Cape Town in 2002.

Betting on sports is illegal in India except at horse races, but major betting syndicates have been in operation for many years taking advantage of the country's lax gambling laws.

The Hindustan Times on Tuesday quoted police as saying that bookies, when caught, get away with a paltry fine of 200 rupees (less than five dollars).

"First it is a bailable offence, second, electronic evidence is not admissible in court," the newspaper quoted a police officer involved in anti-gambling investigations as saying.

"We have to keep a check on the activities of these bookies but they take advantage of the law. Since international markets are also involved, we cannot do much."

The lucrative Indian Premier League, where players from around the world earn millions of dollars in the game's crowd-friendly Twenty20 format, was a key target for the sport's anti-corruption watchdog.

But the ICC's Anti-Corruption and Security Unit gave a clean slate to the event's third edition this year after being kept away by organisers for the first two years.

Sehwag Did Get His Century!

So it is now open season on Suraj Randiv, who bowled the no-ball that ‘denied’ Virender Sehwag a century he truly deserved (In contrast to those knocks where he blazes away from ball one, on this particular occasion Sehwag absorbed the loss of his colleagues at the other end, battled with the demons of the pitch and atmosphere, revealed an unsuspected ability to do the grind, and fulfilled the fantasies of millions of Indian fans who, ever since the swashbuckler made his debut, have lusted after the possibility that one day, he will bat through an innings). It is also open season on Kumar Sangakkara, the Sri Lankan captain, who if the transcription of words picked up from the stump mike is to believed, reminded Randiv, just as he prepared to bowl the decisive ball, that “If he hits it, he gets the run”.


Digression: Consider Randiv’s brains, or lack thereof. If Kumar was in fact instructing his bowler, was that instruction to bowl a no-ball? Ridiculous – a batsman can and, in this instance did, hit a no-ball. A more canny bowler would have bowled a wide – because it is the wide that, by definition, you cannot hit.


But back to cases: So everyone, from the Sri Lankan cricket board to sundry Indian stars of yesteryear, have been banging on about the Lankans’ lack of sportsmanship (If there is any irony in Mohammad Azharuddin, who was banned from international cricket for match-fixing and related activities, talking of the spirit of the sportsman, ignore it, please – it is also the silly season).


What strikes us is how the public discourse, and wall to wall ‘exclusive’ coverage on television channels, misses the point: Sehwag was denied his century not by the Kumar-Suraj combine, but by scorers and umpires who were clearly asleep and/or ignorant of rules that, incidentally, have been framed so ambiguously as to convert a fairly simple proposition into a complicated situation.


Here is what happened, pure and simple: Randiv bowled. The umpire called ‘no-ball’. There is a reason the umpire calls it as soon as a bowler bowls one – it is to let the batsman know that there are no real penalties attached to having a go. A batsman, on hearing that call, knows he can have a swing without running the risk of being bowled, caught, declared LBW.


So Randiv bowled. The umpire called. Sehwag had a swing, and despatched the ball over the ropes.


That logically is seven runs added to the total – one to the team total as an extra, the other six to Sehwag, the batsman who was quick to seize on the opportunity. Simple.


This is where the idiocy of umpires and the ambiguity of the rule book come in: How could the game be over as soon as Randiv over-stepped? A ball, to be deemed bowled, has to be delivered; the batsman has to play/miss it; in the case of the former the ball has to be retrieved while the batsman runs, or not…there is no provision in cricket for declaring a result, and ending a match, at some intermediate stage of this process.


Thus, for umpires to declare that the game was over as soon as Randiv overstepped is plain folly. To understand this, consider a hypothetical situation: Randiv bowls. It is a no-ball. Sehwag decides the game is over, lets the ball go and walks off. Sangakkara collects and whips off the bails.


Is the batsman out? Of course he is. The extra run cannot be counted until the ball in question is officially dead; in our example Sehwag left his crease while the ball was in play, therefore he is out.


So, if his dismissal off a no ball counts, why were the runs he scored off that no ball not counted to his name?


The question, simplified: How could the umpires, or the scorers, or both, consider the match over before the ball had completed its necessary course?


Read Law 24 (No ball)


Runs resulting from a No ball


The one run penalty for a No ball shall be scored as a No ball extra. If other penalty runs have been awarded to either side, these shall be scored as in Law 42.17 (Penalty runs). Any runs completed by the batsmen or a boundary allowance shall be credited to the striker if the ball has been struck by the bat; otherwise they also shall be scored as No ball extras.


Where is the ambiguity? The law clearly says that any runs completed by the batsman, or a boundary allowance, off a no ball shall be credited to the striker.


Sehwag ‘completed’ a sixer. His score – unless the scorer is a congenital idiot – should have been 105. End of story.


The key is to understand that a game is not declared over midway through a cricketing action – which is the space between a ball being ‘live’ and being ‘dead’. Consider this example: India needs one run to win. Sehwag whacks the ball high in the air. While the ball is in the air, the batsman cross over and complete a run. The ball comes down, and is caught.


Is the game over, simply because the batsmen had crossed while the ball was in the air, and had not yet been caught? No, the verdict in this case would be, the batsman is out, the run doesn’t count. So clearly, runs and results are not declared at some arbitrary point while the ball is live – such a determination happens only after the ball is ‘dead’.


The fallacy appears to be in the thinking that any runs accruing to the batsman and/or side after a result is achieved do not count. That is equally a fallacy. Here is an illustrative example:


India needs to get one run to win. Sehwag drives, and the batsman race across for a single. The ball then goes on to cross the boundary. Do you award Sehwag one run, or four? Clearly, the answer is ‘four’ – despite the fact that the first of those runs won the game.


It is not the intention of this post to ‘excuse’ what Randiv did, or what Sangakkara asked him to do. That action was clearly unsporting, childish, petty. Here was one of the great batsman of the modern era, in challenging conditions, digging deep within himself to play a match-winning innings that was contrary to type. A gracious opposition would have admired, applauded; instead, the Lankans appear to have conspired to score a childish ‘victory’.


Fair enough. What beats us, though, is this: Why is there, amidst all this noise, no attempt to question the outcome declared by the scorers? Why is there no debate on the central question? Where were the umpires, the match referee? And where, incidentally, was the Indian team management that it did not think to question the scorers’ declared result?

For the Love of Dravid

There are a few men we hate to see fall -  one such man is Rahul Sharad Dravid, ‘The Wall’ of Indian cricket for decades. Many dream to do what Dravid has done with the willow – with which he fought many a battle to bring glory to Indian cricket.

Dravid with his warrior spirit oozed confidence from the very beginning of his career and made an entire generation fall for his sturdy and no-nonsense approach to the game. Dravid may not be a Tendulkar or a Ganguly or may not be as swashbuckling as Sehwag, but he is and will go down as one of the batting greats to have ever graced the game of cricket.

Somewhere in all these years of grind, Dravid never got his due as a player but none can question his loyalty to the team, nor can one ever say that he flinched while facing hostile bowling that has been dished out to him all over the world.

Such is the prize on his wicket that legendary spinner Shane Warne wrote in his memoir:

“The fortress could also describe Rahul. Because once, Dravid was set, you needed the bowling equivalent of a dozen cannon firing all at once to blast him down.”

Statistics say that Dravid after Allan Border faced the maximum numbers of deliveries in Test cricket – this tells us how much Indian cricket is dependent on him.

Year after year, Dravid has been consistently scoring runs and winning matches for India at home and abroad. No other Indian batsman has saved or won more Test matches than Dravid, but he has never received the accolades that he so rightfully deserved. Lack of laurels has never been a deterrent to his motivation; such is his love for cricket that Dravid like a humble servant of the game continues to labour every single day to bring honour to Indian cricket.

After Sachin Tendulkar, he is the only Indian batsman to score more than 10,000 runs in both forms of the game. But Dravid has always been the man behind the curtains and our board too hasn’t been kind to him. From being forced to keep wickets when India missed an all-rounder to being given the captaincy when it had no takers, Dravid has done all that he could do for the country.

It’s bewildering that there was no media hype and fanfare when Dravid went past 11,000 Test runs to become the fourth highest run-getter in Test cricket. Maybe we have failed to see the perfectionist in Dravid or maybe we just have a penchant for imperfection.

Is Dravid destined to play the quintessential role of the supporting hero eternally? He does not seem to have a problem with donning this role as long as the team wins. But I do have a problem with this as a true player like Dravid deserves to be up there with the greats of the game.

Hopefully his lack of runs in the Sri Lankan series doesn’t force the selectors to overlook him for the Australia and New Zealand series.

It’s a pity that from now on we will get to see less and less of a legend called Rahul Dravid.