The Hindu Business Line : You can't empathise with hunger unless you go hungry

HUNGER, peace and development are words that usually fall on deaf ears. But if you read Towards a Hunger-free World: The Ethical Dimension, edited by M. S. Swaminathan, and published by EastWest Books (Madras) P Ltd (ewb@vsnl.com), there is a possibility that your views may change. The slim compilation of papers presented at a Chennai symposium has inputs from economists and religious leaders, scientists and activists.

The preamble talks about the moral responsibility for those vested with authority "to ensure that suffering and deprivation are not bequests handed down to coming generations". Pedro Medrano rues that there has been a profound ethical deficit in our decisions and behaviour. Kamal Hasan observes how peace and food are strangely interlinked.

Pity, this is but a minute glimpse of the book that deserves to be read, preferably on an empty stomach.

Services in every product

IT IS common to categorise industries according to what they are involved in — as products and services. But all industries may be treated as service industries to an extent, writes Kanishka Bedi in Production and Operations Management, published by Oxford University Press (www.oup.com).

This is how: "Even purely manufacturing organisations do not just sell a product but provide some form of back-up such as after-sales service, advice, warranty, repair, installation, or training." Likewise, in service industries too, "often a product changes hands", as for example, in the form of diagnoses and prescription reports, and credit cards.

"In an educational set-up, a student may see the degree or diploma as the end product, while the institution's perception may be entirely different, as it may consider an enlightened student with appropriate knowledge and skills as the end product." How true!

The book is full of worked out examples and problems, apart from spreadsheet exercises. Illustrations have real-life feel, be they about Brar in Ludhiana adding machines, or Trinity Hospital in Bangalore buying disposable syringes. Well laid-out.

The energy audit edge

AMONG the publications of the Continuing Professional Education Committee of the ICAI is Energy Audit and Management for the Indian Industry.

Energy auditing is given elaborate treatment in a separate chapter. "The simplest approach is to consider the overall factory as a black box and identify the different forms of energies going into the boundary." Energy efficiency measures can be classified as short, medium and long term. Implementation of these measures is the most difficult aspect of energy conservation programmes, notes the book. Economic analysis of energy efficiency involves computation of ENPV and EIRR, where E is for economic. A book to help you energise your auditing skills.

Derailment of religion

THE new Railway Minister is already keen on finding the truth behind one of the worst tragedies and a book he may find useful is Nirendra Dev's Godhra: A Journey to Mayhem, published by Samskriti (www.samskritibooks.com).

"What went on in Gujarat was a national shame," writes Amar Singh in his foreword. "For the first time, since partition, religious polarisation took to the streets — forcing people to flee their own land and home."

In the intro, Dev notes how communal and ethnic conflict could be marred by gross abuse of official position and documents such as voters list and traders licence. More than two years have rolled by since Sabarmati Express got torched, but the embers seem to be still alive, with a national party finding division within its conscience on whether to assume responsibility for the carnage that followed and so let the halo fall off one of its leaders. Essential read, not only for mantriji but every responsible citizen.

Value additions and erosions

MARKETS can drive one crazy, and if you were to see what the prices of your favourite shares were more than two decades ago, as Dr Vinod K. Singhania and Monica Singhania present in Equity Share Quotations, published by Taxmann (www.taxmann.com), be prepared to spot winners and losers. One may drool that Wipro was at Rs 16.25 those days, or that you could have bought Vishnu Sugar for almost one-hundredth of its current quote, if only a time machine could take you back to 1981.

There are a few scrips whose values seem to stay as stable as rock, as if time didn't matter to them and growth was an unknown word. However, when you see some big names of yesteryear with eroded values now, would you blame the bourses for being treacherous or corporate governance for letting value evaporate?

Rolls Royce of toilets

MOST people think it is a waste of time to think about human excreta, though you may find their frequent expletives get peppered with references to the same. For Joseph Jenkins, however, it is a great resource, as he would explain in The Humanure Handbook (www.jenkinspublishing.com).

Humans take flush toilets for granted, writes the author. "But where does the flushed material go? What would happen if everyone in the world crapped in their drinking water supplies? Why doesn't any other land mammal defecate deliberately in water? Why do we?"

Then comes a valuable tip: "Two five gallon buckets and a large bag of peat moss, sawdust, or even shredded junk mail will make an odourless, waterless, environmentally friendly emergency toilet for one person for two weeks." More: "If a compost bin and a steady supply of sawdust, peat, leaves, and so on is available, that toilet could last indefinitely — literally for decades, even lifetimes."

Among the many mails that Jenkins has received is this: "When I first heard about this system I was cynical, `it must be smelly, it must have lots of flies all over it.' It isn't, it doesn't. It, for me, is the Rolls Royce of toilets. It is simple, it is humble, it is effective."

No time to waste, ignoring waste.

Tailpiece

"Have you seen Harry Potter?"

"Hairy? I've seen only muddy potters."

ReadingRoom@TheHindu.co.in

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