Steam Center Blog

Countries that have low levels of corruption have a high quality of life and much beauty I t is widely recognized that corruption is a major cause that holds back development in India and perpetuates poverty. More than ten years ago, this author published a note that described a mathematical relationship between levels of corruption and levels of poverty that prevail in different parts of the world. It is in the public domain online. The new Government of Shri Narendra Modi has been seized of the problem. One of its achievements has been elimination of big ticket top level corruption. While this is sure to have an impact over the long term, in the immediate future it seems that at lower levels corruption shall continue to increase as it has over the last several decades. Today a report in the Times of India described that it has increased by 5% in 2015. Corrupt officials at the lower level are like carnivorous animals that once having tasted human blood cannot live withou...

http://coinindia.com/galleries-britishimperial.html An update on November 2016 demonetization in India added at end of this note H aving lived and worked in both the west and India, one thing has never ceased to amaze this author more than the utter chaos that prevails in the design of Indian notes and coinage ever since a decade or so after independence from British Rule. It was not so when India was part of the British Empire. Then the design of Indian rupee coin remained essentially unchanged for decades. What changed was the image of the ruling Monarch on the coin. Ever since then, the design of the Indian one rupee coin has changed with great rapidity so many times that it is difficult to keep count. So has the design of other coins so that if one was past forty one would have to pull out one’s specs to make out which is which. It is hard to distinguish between a one and two rupee coin without reading what is on it. Compare this to the US where even a blind p...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bhagirathi_River_at_Gangotri.JPG When Ma Ganga flows, pure it brings prosperity to lands it flows through, otherwise it brings misery to the same lands; the more the pollution, the greater the misery.    T he Ganges River has been the foremost lifeline of Northern India ever since the disappearance of the Saraswati River more than three thousand years ago. Lives of millions depend upon it. However, sadly, it has become one of the most polluted rivers of the world. According to Wikipedia ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganges ) The Ganges was ranked as the fifth most polluted river of the world in 2007. Pollution threatens not only humans, but also more than 140 fish species, 90 amphibian species and the endangered Ganges river dolphin The Ganga Action Plan, an environmental initiative to clean up the river, has been a major failure thus far due to corruption, lack of technical expertise, poor environmental planning, ...