Culturally sensitive Marketing

Without a culturally correct interpretation of a country’s aesthetic values, a host of marketing problems can arise. Product styling must be aesthetically pleasing to be  successful, as must advertisement and package designs. Insensitivity to aesthetic values can offend, create a negative impression, and, in general render marketing efforts ineffective or even damaging. Strong symbolic meanings may be overlooked if one is not familiar with a culture’s aesthetic values. The Japanese for example consider the crane as being very lucky because it is said to live a thousand years; however the use of the number four should be avoided completely because the word or four, shi, is also the Japanese word for death. Thus teacups are sold in sets of five, not four, in Japan.

Patther Panchali

I happened to see Satyajit Ray''s 'Pathher Panchali' yesterday, and was almost moved to tears by what has been so nicely picturised by the great cinematographer.In one short film ,he was able to capture the abject poverty of the rural Bengali people, and their almost hopeless situation in life.Things are pretty much the same in any part of India, and the problems too are similar.This is despite India growing its GDP by almost 8 % every year. I guess it is the law of averages at work,with some people growing at a meteoric pace, while others showing a negative growth.And Robindranath Goes....Into that heaven of freedom ,let my country awake............!

Crime control

Law and order situation of  a county is a parameter that determines the 'country risk' which various business entities use to judge the business environment of a country.If the law and order situation is not healthy, no business man in his right mind would risk an investment in such a state or country.The law and order in our own country is not very good ,and therfore we do not attract as much FDI as many of our Asian neighbour do. There are only two ways in which crime can  be effectively controlled.

• Surveillance
• Deterrence

While the former is prohibitively expensive and impractical as it is next to impossible to keep an eye on each individual or each geographic area,most of the countries use the latter or deterrance to good effect. If a crime is commited ,the justice is often delivered swiftly and there is no appeal system.When we think of India, it seems that the cases remain pending in the judiciary for aeons and the system of appeals in a higher court actually makes a mockery of the whole system. So ,in my opinion the solution lies in firstly ensuring that there is effective deterrance by repealing the archaic IPC code, and secondly in effective implementation of these laws through the judiciary.The sysytem of appeals in a higher court should be done away with without any further delay.It may be interesting to know that in US no such system of appeal exists,and the judgement once delivered can not be challenged.Of course, the Indian government would have to ensure that the judges do not indulge in corruption. Is that a tall order?