Whatever...

We hate profiling or typecasting. We all do. We cry our lungs out when a Muslim is singled out for 'questioning' at an air-port or denied a rental flat in a building. We despise stereotyping women or South-Indians or anything that involves the Aam Aadmi. Then why are we so eager to pick up brooms to hit any politician? When you are in public life (and for long), stones will be thrown at you - by people, opponents and media alike. Sometimes these allegations may not be true and may not even stand a chance in the courts. But if someone's name is thrown up enough number of times for the wrong reasons, his 'public image' is bound to take a beating. I am sure there are hoards of politicians who are as clean as you and me, but have fallen prey to the game called politics. Whether it is allegations of corruption, criminal conduct or anything else, common man does not have the means and patience to verify them. Hence, the 'image' plays a vital role in how we per...

Today, I was writing the address on an envelope to be sent to the Income Tax PAN services in Pune. The address runs into 6 lines and has more characters than twitter or SMS allows. I am sure this address must be receiving thousands of letters everyday. Why can't the Indian Post think of a way of shortening such popular addresses - something like tinyurl of the postal address? This will save a lot of time for individuals, reduce errors and lead to customer delight! The post box service is one way of looking at it. But it is limited by resources (space available for post boxes) and also latency on part of the addressee. However, a service that shortens the postal address can be driven by an alpha numeric code and is virtually unlimited.  This can be monetised by charging either the sender or the receiver. The receiver may be issued this code at an annual fee or the sender may be asked to paste a premium postage stamp (marginal premium of Re.1) for a shortened address letter. ...