Trends in India - the "shaved" man (being bear is dead)

Trends in India- Going green (a fakoconsciousness)

"eco cool" is trendy!
and the "netas" (political leaders) are the one who "grabs" a "fako-trend" faster...;)..u know why...







going green means "wearing green"(??!!###)...check what the so-called Indian "cool greeners" do to be "trendy"










Source: OPEN (Life and Times. Every Week) Volume 01 Issue 23 "www.openthemagazine.com"

Trends in India- Bollywood

Trends in India- Television

Trends in India - Advertising trends

India @ Independence day

Few thoughts at the independence day from yahoo Message Boards "What does freedom means to u" :

" For me freedom is there should be no reservation for any catagory in all the sectors. People should be free to compete & get the success on merit basis not on cast basis. "

- dhavelpatel24

"Freedom means to live with dignity in an atmosphere where everyone gets an opportunity to share the fruits of the development of our country. Freedom to climb up the social ladder i.e. to enhance the social, economical, educational, cultural and political status without any discrimination of one's place of birth, language, region, caste, religion and also the social background. It is the responsibility of the government that our hard earned freedom is protected and promoted without prejudice to any section of the society. Further, it is also the oneros responsibility of the government to protect the weaker and poorer sections of he society from oppression, suppression and blatant exploitation. And ultimately the government should see that all are given equal opportunities to grow and prosperous in their field of choice. Lastly, we have to analyse that how far we have succeeded in eradicating the poverty, illiteracy and unemployment from our country, even after more than six decades and find out the reason for remedial action on war footing basis. Hope, the Central and State Governments shall awake from the slumber and work for achieving the real freedom to all the citizens of our country! "

- surendran. govindan

"freedom to me means when you can challange the SELECTIVE use of power by those authorised to use power whether in government, judiciary , police etc.and follow the rules of the land."

-S.K.Butta

"Ask a poor father what does freedom mean to him & he will give the answer that freedom means money to him. The money, which can save his only child’s life dying with a dieses. Ask a farmer working on the fields that what does freedom mean to him & he will give the answer that freedom means water to him.

Ask the only soldier fighting the enemy in a battlefield that what does freedom mean to him & he will give the answer that freedom means winning to him and ask anyone they all will have their own viewpoints regarding freedom.

But to me freedom is power, its power to fight myself, my fears, my inhibitions, and my blind thinking in the system. The system which plays with people’s lives, their future & their aspirations.

Freedom to me is responsibility. Its responsibility to maintain this freedom.Its responsibility to be ready for country, to be ready for sacrifice for the honor of the country.

Freedom is speech to me. Its speech to speak for the deprived & needy.
Freedom is knowledge to me. Its knowledge to be given to the greedy, greedy for money & greedy for self.

Freedom is music to me. Its music to be played in praise of the soldiers who died for the country & for the ones yet to come.
And lastly freedom is life to me, its life to live hundred times for the mankind, after dying hundred times."

- amitsaini4k5

"no corruption,education for all (proper),food for all,shelter for all. "

- asitpoddar

"Freedom means change in all the systems of work (i.e, political system, official system, change in education system etc.)
everything should be changed which the britishers has applied.
I want country free from corruptions etc then these should be changed
Jai Hind
Jai Bharat
Vande matram "

- jm_solanki

Source: http://in.messages.yahoo.com/Top_Stories/threadview?m=te&bn=aug-iday&tid=1&mid=1&frt=2#1

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I was watching the movie Gandhi (its the 15th time am watching by default...u know, each 15th august it has to be religiously telecasted in India) and revealed three truth :

1. Now we have millions of suckers as of British in India...and unfortunately they all r desis (the netas, cops, policy makers etc.)...hence I was wondering what policy and ideology Mr. Gandhi would have followed for these pigs.

2. Though we call ourselves Indians but the system and bureaucracy remains as British...is tht means we are actually dumb to create / or at least discover (from ancient Indian kingdoms) our own systems and policies?

3. The movie created the same impact as of slumdog m. at least in the silver screen...but we were not able to make any move after tht...in terms of Bollywood. hence, the theme as India will be explored further by various directors world over in future but tht will anyway not push/help/ benefit utopian Indian movie world.-

kaustav@INgene
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Being a minority in India... an article...




Source of this article: OPEN - Volume 01 Issue 23 www.openthemagazine.com

youth trends in India- few articles

Source : The Hindu

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an old article by:

Ms. Aarti Joshi
Lecturer
Shri Leuva Patel Trust Sanchalit MBA Mahila College
Amreli (Gujarat)
E-mail: aaratee2003@rediffmail.com

Youth Consumerism

A decade ago, India didn't have a single mall. A year ago, there were less than a half-dozen. But within two years, more than 250 are expected to be operational.

It's an enormous shift in a nation that for decades proclaimed itself a socialist state. After independence in 1947, India celebrated ``swadeshi,'' or locally produced goods, and Mohandas Gandhi dreamed of a nation of small villages earning their living through cotton spinning and farming.

So not everyone is happy about the new consumerism. Rights activists worry that the poor are being abandoned and nationalists wonder if India's native industries are being swallowed by global behemoths.

A new face of youth consumerism

"At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom."-Jawaharlal Nehru, on the eve of India's Independence India's latest tryst with destiny, BPO, is equally connected to the midnight hour. This tryst is also about independence: the independence of the Indian youth, whose time, talent and skills are suddenly valued in the employment marketplace. "A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance." This is that moment. And the utterances are music to the ears of consumer marketers, especially lifestyle brands. The 'youth' market they've been chasing all these years finally has a credit card with no supervised spending limit. The impact of consumerism by 'indies' - financially independent young people - is clearly visible. "We have tripled our sales in Bangalore city in the last three years," says Shumone Chatterjee, marketing director, Levi Strauss India. And he believes this is largely due to the effect of disposable income coming into the hands of the 18-22 age group employed in BPO jobs. Vishu Ramachandran, regional head (consumer banking), Standard Chartered Bank, India, estimates that India adds around 3 million young earners in the age group 20-24 annually. These first-time earners account for 7-8% of its credit card base of 1.4 million - a figure that is expected to more than double in the next few years. StanChart is targeting this segment with specially designed products like the Visa 'mini', which is 43% smaller than the regular card and being positioned as a 'cool accessory'. The MTV Citibank MasterCard, too, has gone in for a more exciting new look, a variant of its global 'mc2' design. Both cards offer discounts at popular retail outlets and hangouts frequented by young people.

BPO, with its ever-expanding demand for freshers, is fuelling the charge of he 'indie' brigade. According to Nasscom, BPO firms employed 245,500 people in 2003-04. Assuming 90% of this workforce is below the age of 25 and earns Rs 10,000 a month on an average, the purchasing power of Indies is no less than Rs 2,200 crore annually.

The important thing is that this is basically 'pocket money'. Many Indies live at home, so rent and food is taken care of. 'Live for today, hope for tomorrow, splurge tonight' is their mantra - enter the new and potent consumer.

Reebok is one company that's sitting up and taking notice. It is looking at the spending habits and disposable incomes of youth in BPO firms. "We are in the process of setting up an internal study to understand how to target these youth," said a company spokesperson.

But BPO is just one example. From retail to insurance to banking, entry-level jobs are aplenty. IT firms added 55,000 employees this year, mostly engineering graduates. Infosys alone recruited 10,000. "The role a good young person can play in an organization is huge," says Sarang Panchal, executive director (customized research), ACNielsen. "Their steep learning curve compensates for any lack of experience."

Interestingly, the young person's influence in family purchase decisions is high. Anything to do with technology? He is God. The decision of which brand of mobile phone, flat-screen TV or two-wheeler to buy can be swayed by the resident youth in the family (although there may be a difference in opinion on what is a 'reasonable' amount to spend).

Media onslaught

INDIA today is an exciting land in an exciting age: the first winds of change blew not when the economy opened up as we think in the early 1990s, but when India was exposed to color television. It is ironic that it took a sporting event (the Asiad) to unleash for Indians a new way of looking beyond their windows into the world at large. Media intrusion had begun in right earnest.

Color television in itself was a statement of status: it distinguished the wealthy from the not-so-wealthy. Color television was the new consumer discriminator in a country, which had just two brands of cars, and a near single-brand monopoly in the two-wheeler segment. Indian consumers were bored and dulled into buying brands. They had to pay more and wait longer for brands they today reject with ease.

Monopolistic regimes were at their peak in the early 1980s: words like conspicuous consumption were relevant only in a few pockets. In the 1980s, there were only 8,700 credit-card holders: the same number in perhaps one or two affluent colonies in South Delhi today. The media scene in terms of choice was not so very different either. Consumers were just beginning to relish quality journalism in India Today and admire the panache of investigative journalism that News-track had unleashed. But given the times that we lived in, most cities had just a couple of newspapers in English and a single vernacular newspaper.

Television, though in color, was state-controlled: the influences of Hum Log and Buniyaad were more in the arena of commenting on the Indian family than in creating bridges between the West and us as we see it today. Television then, as it does today, had a huge component of film-based entertainment, which was what captured the Indian imagination. Chitrahaar and the weekly Hindi film on television became opportunities for family bonding and reunion. Many Indian families happily altered their meal timings to adjust to programming schedules and perhaps, in the subconscious, they were also ushering in a wave of consumerism that would one day sweep us all.

Convenience products had just emerged and Maggi's 2-minute noodles were perhaps a sign of things to come. Remember that was also the time when our politicians were much younger and better looking: television made a John Kennedy out of young Rajiv Gandhi, and his boyish good looks and youth full innocence were reflected so ably through television. The Indian consumer had begun to derive first blood from advertising that talked to him and with him. Thanks to the increasing influence of television, he saw an increase in advertising in the form of television commercials or in the form of promotions, which captured the flavor of the moment. It was television, which helped create a slot for Hinglish: the language of today's India, be it in the music we hear or the brand communications we receive.

Television and a surfeit of magazines became the passport for the Indian to explore the world, as it were. With markets prizing open consumerism, it was now the turn of brands to leverage this media intrusion and this they did with gay abandon. Aided by the fact that India, being the cricket-loving nation it is, had cricket matches that became the ultimate media aphrodisiac. Both the channels as well as the marketers used this newfound medium to great advantage and suddenly there were endorsements for products, matches being sponsored and the return of the cola to India. It was Pepsi, which changed the face of media-led consumerism in 1986. Given the kind of market expanse it was seeking and the depth of its brand reach, Pepsi used television as the ideal conversion vehicle: from brand salience to brand purchase, it traveled the full distance.

But while media can certainly be lauded for the role that it played in harnessing consumerism in India, we must pause and examine the evolution of the Indian consumer. The Indian consumer was shaking off the shackles of monopolistic regimes: these regimes were crumbling not just because of media but also owing to a real need for India to develop and make itself a global player. Politics had a role to play in this evolution as much as media did: for every additional television programme which added value to the Indian consumer movement we also have Manmohan Singh to thank. He began the era of reforms on the instructions of the International Monetary Fund but quickly realized that in this lay India's future of becoming a relevant world-economy.

It was against this backdrop of a new school of thought that we saw, for the first time, choice becoming a relevant issue in the Indian marketplace - a word that had earlier been made redundant with trite licensing norms. It is true of any market that it can only be relevant and throbbing if the players in it are relevant and successful as well.

In India, consumerism had always been looked down upon. This was a social imperative and not just an economic one. The Indian was encouraged to save rather than spend, given the history of India and the fact that many many Indians were on the brink of poverty and penury either because of businesses failing or relocation (refugees) the habit of saving had certainly cramped consumerism. What was required was the unlocking of this potential. It was critical to rid the Indian consumer of this feeling of guilt whenever he or she spent any money, which is why communication in the earlier days always focused on family health (almost like insurance advertising) and never promoted the joys of buying per se.

India had to transcend from that mindset but the journey was painful and tormenting because while on the one hand markets did open up, so did poverty, thereby increasing the chasm between the haves and have-nots. It was a paradox that most marketers would have been scared of. Add to this the fact that there was no one India. Both in terms of purchase-behavior or linguistic unity you had a deadly mixture that communication had to swallow whenever it attempted to reach consumers. And, this paradox no communication vehicle could cover.

This is why we saw the birth of language channels: at this time, the entry of the Star TV Network also brought India on a global media platform like never before. I have often believed there were two India's as far as consumerism is concerned: the India before and the India after Star TV. It is not as if Star TV was doing anything dramatic but for the first time the Indian was exposed to global programming in the truest sense. What Star TV also brought to the table was a bouquet of channels, which included the enfant terrible of all channels: MTV.

Many people were up in arms over the MTVisation of India and blamed corroding values on MTV. While some thought they were just using the channels as a flogging horse, my own belief is there was some truth. Media has a strange way of influencing human behavior. Media is the art of creating habits and it is this art form that can be most devastating in shaping consumer behavior and consumer opinion. This is what MTV did at that time in India. Music was no longer restricted to Lata Mangeshkar or R.D. Burman. The Springs teens of the world was what India was looking at and for.

It was this borderless world that media created for the Indian consumer. Almost simultaneously, to some divine design as it were, more and more companies were entering India. The classification of homes switched from television owning homes to cable and satellite homes and today's figure of 70 million C&S homes is only an indication of the kind of media fragmentation we are about to experience.

I will not suggest that it was media which changed the Indian consumer or which made him the consumer that he is today because just like everything else there was a rejection of media as well. Not all TV channels were successful; not all TV programmes had great TRPs. Slowly the bugbear of the South being forced to watch Hindi programming was eliminated in the form of regional channels such as Sun, Udaya and Gemini. Not to mention the fact that our very own state television went the regional way as well, with almost state-wise specifications.

It was an India that was rapidly embracing change. But in this entire hullabaloo, the Indian consumer was conveniently forgotten. Marketers forced their global understanding on him and that once again caused the consumer to reject them. Coca Cola's early failure in the Indian market is a testimony to how horribly they got their consumer insights wrong. But Coca Cola was not alone. India's largest car manufacturer was caught napping too when the Korean chaebols unleashed competitive advertising for their cars.

Surprisingly it was Korea's Daewoo that first advertised cars in India despite Maruti being around for more than a decade. What was this a reflection of? In my mind it represented marketer apathy for consumers: relationship marketing was never top-of-mind at any Indian company and suddenly these MNCs began wooing the Indian consumer. The same consumer who had learnt to live with neglect and a poor post-purchase scenario was being emboldened to say his piece. At the same time India was also witnessing a spate of activism.

published in : http://www.indianmba.com/Faculty_Column/FC191/fc191.html

dtd: September 14, 2005

micro and macro trends as spotted in India

More details about these trends will be added soon.

All copyrights to the INgene team


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American born cool desis

Uttara ChoudhurySunday, August 30, 2009 2:57 IST Email

Mumbai-born, New York-raised anthropologist Shalini Shankar spent three years "kickin' it" with desi teens in the Silicon Valley for her book, Desi Land: Teen Culture, Class And Success In Silicon Valley. She spoke to DNA about how desi teens navigate the world of their immigrant Indian parents, American pop culture, and 'model minority' expectations.

While staking out US high schools, Shalini Shankar discovered how desi teens keep their dating lives on the 'DL' or 'down low' to avoid providing fodder to gossipy aunties. The intrepid anthropologist also got into her subject's heads to discover the things they consider FOBby (uncool) and tight (cool). "I was expecting desi teens to be more angst-ridden, but I was pleasantly surprised," said Shankar.

"I have to admit I really liked them. They were fun and connected to their families. They weren't the kind of teenagers who were embarrassed to be seen with their parents or loathing community events," she added. Excerpts:

Are desi teens more comfortable in their skin than the "American Born Confused Desi" (ABCD) tag would have us believe?

I don't find the ABCD tag offensive, but do find it out-of-date. I didn't set out to argue against the stereotype, but wanted to investigate how relevant the category was. I found that the younger second generation Indian Americans born 1980s onward seems to have a much better handle on being Indian American in a multicultural America.

In Silicon Valley, where schools are ethnically and racially diverse, there is a lot more overlap between school and home, and being racially non-white is not so unusual. This may not be the case in some parts of America, but in metropolitan regions ABCD is not a useful term at all.

Indian American teens win many Spelling Bees and academic contests. Is there a geek gene at work or are Indian parents goading their children to succeed?

I think there is nothing inherent or genetic about this intelligence. In 1965, the US began to recruit professional migrants from Asia, and this self-selected group didn't come as refugees or agricultural workers. Indian immigrants who are surgeons and scientists are going to want their children to replicate their own success, and to that degree they do push them.

I also looked at Indian kids from working class families with lower educational qualifications. These parents had difficulties in getting involved in their kids' schools and advocating for them. Many of these desi youth had a difficult time in school and didn't go on to college -- they were not winning Spelling Bees.

Are desi teens more driven about college, grades and jobs than their peers?

They are driven, but that drive doesn't come without a price -- stress really takes a toll. A lot of Indian American teens are completely over-committed. There is tremendous academic pressure on them from their parents and their schools. This is an angle we don't hear often because these kids tend to do so well.

Does the pressure drive them to breakdowns, drugs or Red Bull at the very least?

Red Bull, I definitely saw, but I didn't see much drug use. I think what helps is that a lot of these teens have a strong network of Indian friends who are under similar pressure, so they have some support.

Is this a good time to be a desi teen in America?

I think it is a good time to be a Hindu desi teen. I don't know if it is a great time to be a Muslim desi teen. If someone like Shah Rukh Khan is detained at Newark Airport, what does that say about ordinary people who are racially profiled based on their religion? Post-9/11, Indian Americans don't get a uniform reception -- there is more suspicion and scrutiny.

Do desi teens have a swinging social life?

A chapter in my book deals with dating on the "DL," or "down low," which means secretly. Most parents don't want their teens to date, so they don't publicise it when they did it. Out of a hundred kids maybe there were four or five parents who were okay with them dating during high school.

India has changed a lot but the parents of most desi teens still hold onto the India they left behind in the '60s and '70s. I imagine some parents in Mumbai are far more liberal than parents in some of these communities, which have very conservative views on dating and sexuality.

Tell me about living the Desi bling life.

While desi teens wanted to live the "bling" or opulent, high-end life in Silicon Valley, they were still invested in their community and religion. One could be a religious Hindu, Muslim, or Sikh and still drive a Lexus or Mercedes. While other people might judge these desis as being too materialistic, they didn't view it as a contradiction. Keeping up with the Kapoors, so to speak, involves maintaining community standards, along with all the material displays.

How do Indian teens deal with things Indian?

The teenagers I met were proud of being Indian; even in school they would plan and perform Bollywood-inspired dances. Many of them were avid Bollywood fans and especially loved the Karan Johar-type films that have been marketed heavily to the diaspora and feature them as central figures. As a professor, I see Indian students in my undergrad classes who want to travel to India to do development work or public health projects. Those ties to India are very much alive.

Source: http://www.dnaindia.com/lifestyle/interview_american-born-cool-desis_1286203

'India's tech revolution led by men and women under 27'

Thu, Aug 6 02:03 PM

Washington, Aug 6 (IANS) Saying that the US needs to wake up to the reality of India's technological revolution being led by IIT-educated 'young men and women under the age of 27', President Barack Obama's nominee for deputy commerce secretary said countries like India, China, Brazil and Russia were going to pose a major challenge to American dominance in the coming years.

'Today, we find ourselves competing not only with companies of great capacity, but countries intent on establishing dominance in the growth areas of the 21st century,' Dennis Hightower, Obama's nominee for deputy secretary of commerce, said at his confirmation hearing Wednesday.

'Countries such as Brazil, Russia, India and China -- often referred to as the BRIC countries -- are now employing aggressive industrial policies reminiscent of Japan's strategic commitment to the electronics industry in the 1960s,' he said.

Referring to his recent business travels in India, Hightower said he was 'floored by that country's commitment to reinvesting in technology and the implications for the United States'.

Visiting 'a veritable who's who of global technology giants' in Bangalore, the would-be Obama official said he 'was struck not only by the technological inroads being made in newly designed, avant-garde factories and laboratories, but also by the fact that this technological revolution was often being led by young men and women under the age of 27.

'By and large, these young people were not educated in the United States like many of their fathers -- at MIT, Cal Tech, or Rennselaer, for example -- but at the Indian Institutes of Technology.'

Hightower noted there are 'projections that place the United States in fourth place over the next 15-20 years in terms of consumerism, manufacturing capacity, and the growth of an entrepreneurial base that keeps pace with new global developments and delivery systems.'

'This forecasted outcome, to my way of thinking, is unacceptable,' he said stressing 'we must re-establish the primacy of the United States as the world leader in innovation, creativity and excellence across the global economic spectrum.

'If America expects to lead, we must put our best minds on the toughest problems -- reforming the way America uses healthcare, consumes energy and educates our children,' Hightower said.

'America must now act with a renewed sense of urgency' he said, as 'our global competitors are neither standing still nor shy about taking action to exert their global economic ambitions'.

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)

Source: http://in.news.yahoo.com/43/20090806/836/tbs-india-s-tech-revolution-led-by-men-a.html