A Bong will always be a Bong

 

I have known Rajib and of him ever since he started his professional life as a journalist and then of him when he decided to say adieu to his profession as a scribe and instead preferred to sit opposite the table as a senior communication professional.

So I thought. Then came covid and another hue from his plume was revealed! And Mi Dios! How! This lad whom I knew as a wordsmith in reality turned out to be a skilled connector of dots as well! His preferred alphabet was not the one that divines words but strokes that create images. Images of everyday life. The ones that define us and we think so little of them. In his sketches, they come alive and remind us how precious they are.

Let us take a step back to the covid and quarantine days. It was a global lockdown. The whole world looked so bleak. Death was apparently the only news that merited a place in the headlines and news blogs were actually the recounters of the spread of covid. During that time many decided to share their passions with their friends and talents were discovered. And Rajiv was no exception. Suddenly, his LinkedIn posts mutated into sketches depicting his reflections on those bleak everyday life yet managed to extract a smile. And his sagacious corporate utterances took a back seat. Now, he has taken another step forward with his newly revealed skill set.

No. He is no Mario Miranda. At least not yet. But his book Bangaliyana skillfully marries his sketches with deft stitching of words to present us with an oeuvre of his emotions about being a Bengali yet not being one. Because he missed a few important stuff as he was a prabashi (expat Bengali)! In fact, the whole story in his book is founded upon those missed steps and his wonderment about them.

This book is straight out of his heart. So truly that my wife, brought up in Delhi, grabbed the book as Amazon delivered it and read through it in one sitting! I could see her smiling as she raced through the book. It wasn’t difficult for her to relate to those frustrations about saying something that was a statement and finding the cousins laughing. The realization that her pronunciations marked her out as a prabashi still haunts her despite having spent 37 years with a pure Bengali in khaas Kolkata! And Rajib endorses her angst.

This book is not just a prabashi talking to another prabashi. This book will also resonate with a pure-bred bong as it did with me. It keeps reminding you that a tiger never changes its stripes. Or, better still, a bong will always be bong – macher jhol bhaat or no maacher jhol bhaat! Point to note, the spelling of his name gives him away as a prabashi. He spells his name as Rajiv and not Rajib as a Kolkata-bred Bong like me might. 

A disclaimer. He was the one I asked to conceptualise and execute the logo of Content Crankers and he, as expected, hit the nail on its head. There was no space for disagreement.

Meaning of Empathy?

I was in a profession that made a regular lifestyle a challenge. Dinner by ten was considered irregular and bed before 2 am was an absurdity. Post sixty that lifestyle is now extracting its price. So I am now a regular visitor to physicians dissecting my past life and wishing more patients like me. 

As they say, que sera sera, or, as you sow you reap, but then those OPDs (Outpatient departments) also provide valuable life lessons.

Now let us assume that you are a nobody and you are ill. And you have been told that Dr X is the best. He does OPD at the hospital in your neighbourhood. So you don’t go to the hospital for treatment as such, but you go to the hospital to get treated by Dr. X.

Well. Now comes the part we all dread. Of being treated like dirt. The receptionist doesn’t care to look at your face even:

— Name?

— Doc?

— Why?

— 1500 rupees.

— Go and sit at the doc’s OPD reception

The damn hospital is big and you don’t know where Dr X sits. You try to ask that and face a royal snub. The guy standing next to you in the queue looks at you as if you have committed a crime! In a sense you have. You have stolen a few impatient seconds from his time.

But you are past sixty now. Whatever you were in your past life, with your chair gone there has been a big dent in your confidence level. And you cannot bear down on the receptionist enough to elicit the answer.

So you turn around and try to find someone who could guide you to the destination. You probably find a kind sweeper or someone ‘lowly’ enough to understand the ‘nobody’s’ (i.e. your) predicament and get guided to that specific waiting area which also has a receptionist.

You are a respecter of process. You are ready to wait your turn in the queue but you have not been told your serial number. So you approach the receptionist and she tells you curtly

— You will know when your turn comes

She goes back to whatever she was doing. By the time you find a seat in the waiting room your confidence is completely shattered. The PA system comes to life. A name is called and you find the guy who was behind you walking proudly in. Yes as he passed you by you must have felt his snigger at the lowly other patients! 

So you gather enough courage and walk up to the receptionist to point that out and she replies with disgust

— I told you you would know when your turn comes!

At that point perhaps a big gun in the hospital admin recognises you, comes over and shakes your hand. You are saved.  You are back to being that man who matters!  And the same receptionist who was scowling at you minutes back is now repulsively obsequious. 

The patient who was ahead of you in the queue and is clearly frail and needs to be attended to immediately stays behind!

He doesn't write because he cannot

Getting reminded of my inability to write is not a pleasant feeling. Especially when I have spent all of my professional life as a journalist!

If I am seeing a smirk and a desperation to hide the derision I wouldn’t blame you. Or if it’s a pity I wouldn’t fight that either. Because one cannot hide from the truth forever. So the earlier the better.

Earlier! Yes, I know. It makes me dumb. Anyone who takes four decades of one’s adult life to realise that one has been deluding oneself and steadfastly ignoring the reality has to be conceited beyond doubt.

I buy books throughout the year. Not that I read all of them. But like many others, I like to live surrounded by books — dust, and my wife’s disapproval notwithstanding. And I also buy books written by my friends.

For example, this year at the Kolkata International Book Fair, the first book that I picked up was the book on Dipankar Dasguta’s book on food. For want of a better description I am leaving it at that. I will definitely write about his book in this space some other day.

I have known Dipankar for decades. He started his professional life as a journalist with Bartaman. And then he moved on to the United States Information Service. Younger to me by a couple of years he has retired. Together with his wife he roams the districts of West Bengal and shares his experience of tasting food on Facebook. Incidentally, his wife, Krishna Sarbari, has also written a book and yes, I have bought her book as well.

And there are others. And many young publishers are bringing out commendable titles being written by them. So there was this young publisher I was chatting with. Stupid me in the flow of conversations had to say, “Bengalis hardly write about their professional experience!” He instantly latched onto this and turned it around against me. “Who is saying? You are said to be the first in Bengali media to build a bureau specialising in business. Yet, you haven’t written anything about it!”

And all of a sudden the reality dawned. I didn’t write because, perhaps, I couldn’t write. Dipankar wrote because he can! Simple. He didn’t buy it. But it is what it is.

Invest in your well-being. Buy protection through Mediclaim.

 

Nomoshkar, welcome to Monmoney, presented by Content Crankers. Today’s episode is about medical insurance. But before we proceed, please take a look at the opening screen.

Suparna Pathak: I am Suparna Pathak, with me is Investment advisor Saibal Biswas. Our questions to Saibal today are about Medical Insurance. Medical insurance is pretty complicated. People don’t understand how much coverage is needed, what are riders? Many complain that with a coverage of less than Rs 5 lakh, am unable to get admission in any nursing home, as only 1 per cent bed charge is allowable on the entire amount… can you please walk us through the world of medical insurance.

Saibal Biswas: We hardly study medical insurance and mostly buy it out of compulsion. How much to insure? We don’t know and follow wild suggestions. Let me start with a little fact here – the cost of education and medical insurance attracts the highest inflation rates, running almost in double digits. This means that our medical expenses are going up by the day

Suparna Pathak: it is about 14 per cent on average over the last five years…

Saibal Biswas: now if you add compound rate on that, you can imagine where it is headed. What I feel is that we must consider Mediclaim as the priority. Because we don’t know how high medical expenses will be in the days to come. There are many families who have become impoverished in trying to meet medical needs. I feel that we must give more attention to medical insurance, and increase the coverage amount.

One good thing is that suppose you take a policy of Rs 10 lakhs and there is no claim, then the coverage amount gets automatically increased, even doubling over time. This is a good thing.

Secondly, as you are mentioning, and we often overlook these, there are different limits, Like a 1 per cent limit on room rents, or a 2 per cent limit on ICU’s, in which cases you have to pay out of pocket. However, there are policies where these limits are waived, or you can take a rider.

Suparna Pathak: And perhaps they are not very expensive either…

Saibal Biswas: yes, you have to pay a little extra premium. In cases of medical emergencies, we reach out to the nearest facility where we feel the best treatment will be made available. Now at that point in time, perhaps the low-cost rooms may not be available and one has to shell out the extra amount. What I feel is that we must be careful, we have to see the features of the policies. Suppose in one particular year, the policy ceiling gets extinguished, can we still access the policy in that year? There are many small riders, add-on’s that we must check out.

Suparna Pathak: You are saying that I can take a policy for Rs 5 lakhs and by spending a little extra, buy some riders, like a room rent allowance. As we have seen during the Covid a huge amount of consumables were used, which are mostly not covered …

Saibal Biswas: exactly. Such riders can be bought. One can even buy riders where one gets cash benefits, where every day spent in the hospital entitles one to a cash benefit, provided one has opted for that rider. Similar is the case with maternity benefits. Critical illness – if one takes such a rider one is provided with a lump sum immediately. We all know how expensive the treatment of critical illnesses like a kidney ailment or major cancer is … a part of which can be addressed with riders.

I feel everyone must pay attention to medical insurance and increase the amount of coverage. Many people think that the office pays for medical insurance. But what happens after you retire? Perhaps you will not be able to access anything when you need it

Suparna Pathak: Besides, after the age of 60, new policies cannot be started vSaibal Biswas: my take on the subject is that even if the office pays for the insurance one should take additional coverage and perhaps even increase it after retirement. Everyone must look at the riders and carefully study what is being offered by which insurer to arrive at the best policy for the self, for health is something that cannot be compromised.

Perhaps we should do a full episode on medical insurance at a later date.

Suparna Pathak: We will return with a full episode on medical insurance for we seldom appreciate the value of teeth while we have them. It will not be out of context to state here that the cost of dental care is also going through the roof and you can also consider getting dental care under your medical insurance umbrella.

Keep watching Mon Money, Check out the description box to get our contact addresses, keep sending in your queries, and to see the written text of our discussions. Like, Subscribe and press the bell icon to receive notifications about our latest episodes. Nomoshkar.

Saibal Biswas: keep sending in your questions. Perhaps they will lead us to areas hitherto untravelled. Stay with us. Thank You.

Episode takeaway: Mediclaim is a Must. Another Must is reading the fine print.

Who the hell needs an advisor? I know everything.

 

Namoshkar, welcome to Mon Money presented by Content Crankers. We are back with a new episode, but before we move on, let us take a look at our opening screen.

What we will discuss today is a common question. For example, Utpal babu from Burdwan has asked us why we need to go to an advisor. What more do they know about my investment needs? Well, he may not have asked it in so many words, but that is the crux. I am Suparna Pathak, and with me is investment advisor Saibal Biswas – let us put the question before him.

Saibal Biswas: We may stand in front of a mirror and lapse into a monologue, but do we have all the right answers to our questions? We don’t. That is why we need mentors, colleagues, and subordinates… we feel that it is always prudent to get a second opinion. Finance is no exception. And for getting our decisions evaluated, it always makes sense to approach someone who has domain knowledge, someone who has studied the subject. This is a very basic rationale behind the importance of an advisor.

Now look at it this way. Suppose your age is X and mine is Y, our risk-taking ability may not be the same. Our goals may be different. Our investing ability may be different. Even, our financial outlook may be different.

Suparna Pathak: even if our ages are the same, our investing abilities may differ…

Saibal Biswas: Exactly. We tend to box things in. We tend to say that the risk-taking ability of a particular 25-year-old boy will be similar to that of another 25-year-old. But it may not be the case. What I am trying to convey is that everyone is unique. Their risk appetite and their ability to take risk is also unique. Their goals are unique and the roads to approach those goals will also be different. Who will decide on these roads? Who will analyse the risks? Who will choose the ways of approaching these goals? How are you going to achieve these goas and how will you continuously review your performance – this is where you need an advisor.

Suparna Pathak: an advisor is thus in effect like a doctor? Someone who identifies the pulse of the patient to identify the ailment. Now the question is, what is the pulse that you, investment advisors, look for?

Saibal Biswas: Every person’s need for investment is goal or target-dependent. Suppose one is unmarried. Then the question of saving for one’s children’s education does not arise. Even one’s need for insuring one’s life is redundant. As everyone is unique, we have to identify the needs through discussion. The person has to explain his or her needs, what is it that they seek to invest for and identify the goals. And based on that we draw out the charts and chalk out the routes.

Suparna Pathak: What kind of information do you need to arrive at such decisions?

Saibal Biswas: For understanding the risk we run a questionnaire. Where we try to understand how the person behaves when he or she is faced with certain circumstances. This is a part of behavioural economics – we believe that someone who gets easily scared when the market falls should avoid being exposed to equity. Similarly, there are others who may feel that they are not risk averse, people who want to take risks to earn more. They may be provided with higher exposure to equity. From the questionnaire, we identify the ability and willingness to take risks. Suppose we break it down to three categories – conservatives who do not want to take any risks, neutral who can take some amount to risk and aggressive who want the maximum risks to maximise their returns. Based on this we can fit a number to it, and then decide which asset class will best meet these goals.

Suparna Pathak: You mentioned a number. You have talked of this number in past episodes as well, what exactly is this number?

Saibal Biswas: Let me give an example. Suppose one’ son’s current age is 10. At 18, suppose he will go to study engineering. Now suppose the cost of studying engineering today is Rs 20 lakhs. Now in eight years’ time, because of inflation, that Rs 20 lakhs will become Rs 30 lakhs. So, one has created a number – that on a particular year, one will need Rs 30 lakhs. How this figure will be reached is the purpose of both the customer and the advisor helping one.

Suparna Pathak: This means that an investment advisor is the doctor of our finances. Their job is to understand our ability to take risks. Just as should not hide anything from the doctors, similarly one should not hide any material facts from the investment advisors. Their job is to go through your earning ability, spending habits and arrive at your ability to take risks. That is why we suggest that in this complex world to invest right, identify the right investment advisor first.

Stay tuned will we come up with more investment and savings-related questions answers and commentaries in the coming episodes. Post your questions in the description box. Visit our website to access our blog where this and more discussions will be uploaded. Saibal Biswas: Press the bell button for notifications. Write in your comments. Stay with us. Thank you.

Takeaway:

An investment Advisor is your financial physician. He helps you remain in the pink of financial health while helping you achieve your investment goals.

Balance risk, choose the right fund

 

Suparna Pathak: Welcome to another episode of Mon Money. I am Suparna Pathak and with me is investment advisor Saibal Biswas. Before we move forward, let us take a quick look at our opening screen.

Suparna Pathak: Saibal, everyone invests in Mutual Funds. More or less, everyone is of the opinion that investing in mutual funds will generate good returns. However, which Mutual Fund? Why Mutual Funds? Answers to these questions are still largely not known universally. If you tell us about Mutual funds – why we should invest in Mutual Funds, in what kind of funds…

Saibal Biswas: let me start by defining a Mutual Fund. To put it simply, a Mutual Fund is a vehicle that can carry many things simultaneously. A Mutual Fund is where we have collected different types of investments on the one hand while we have collected many investors on the other. They have all put their monies in the common basket and when the basket grows, the benefit is shared by them. This may be an oversimplification of things, but this is it.

What a Mutual Fund offers is professional management. These are professionally managed by Asset Management Companies. Naturally, if one were to manage the fund on one’s own, this kind of research, this professionalism would have lacked, or even the kind of funds available for investment would not have been there. For an individual, it would not have been possible to compile so many different kinds of investments.

The second advantage is risk diversification. If one were to invest in any one class of asset, it may lead to a disproportionately high amount of risk, but a Mutual Fund allows one to spread the risk evenly.

The third point is that one can invest in a Mutual Fund even with a low corpus fund which may be as low as Rs 500 or 1000. There may be many economically challenged people who may want to invest but are unable to because of the lack of funds. The Mutual Fund offers them a route.

Liquidity. Mutual funds are largely liquid. Some allow the withdrawal of funds within a day. In equity-based funds, investments can be withdrawn within two days. Basically, they are very liquid.

Because of the numbers involved – from investors to investments, to corpus funds – the cost of creating the basket also goes down.

So, a Mutual Fund offers a basket, at a decent cost, that is professionally managed and monitored by SEBI that also offers tax savings in cases. Overall, it is a great basket.

That is not to say that all funds were born equal. Debt funds, which are based on fixed assets, offer low returns while being exposed to lower amounts of risks. While equity funds offer higher returns with higher risks. There are also mixed baskets where debt and equity funds are mixed to create a Balanced Fund. This is to say that there are different categories of Mutual funds and one has to choose one according to one’s requirement.

Suparna Pathak: What you are essentially saying is that if one had, say Rs 100, one could have bought into a certain class of investment. Now if one invests the same amount with many others in a Mutual Fund, then professionals will invest the collected amount on behalf of everyone, freeing one of the worries relating to the why, when, and where of investing. The crux of the matter is that what one cannot do

individually, one can achieve through a Mutual Fund. Secondly, with a very small corpus fund, one can invest in a well-diversified basket – in bonds, in equity, perhaps even in real estate. The spreading of risks is also taken care of in a Mutual Fund

But are all Mutual Funds good? Towards which one should I turn?

Saibal Biswas: Risk. The choice of a mutual fund will depend upon one’s risk appetite. It will also depend upon one’s goals. For example, the goals that are on the longer term, allow one to tread a slightly riskier path. We have discussed in the past how, if equity is given adequate time, its riskiness goes gown increasing its returns. That is if one has long-term goals, one can consider equity investment as the chosen weapon.

Now suppose one has a short-term goal and wants to buy a car in two-year’s time. If the funds are deployed in the equity market, and it falls, that will be catastrophic. There is condemnation all round. But the fact remains, it was due to the wrong identification of the goal and the investment class. Here the identification and marrying of the right goal to the right investment is of paramount importance. That is why we say that for short-term goals, invest in fixed classes – they may be fixed deposits, mutual funds, bonds and the like, but for meeting long-term goals, use equity. The selection must be very precise and clear.

Suparna Pathak: many people pick up funds as it is said that the particular fund has posted the highest return. Should one make this the only factor or consider other things before choosing a mutual find?

Saibal Biswas: The return that is high today, may become low the next year if such returns were the result of high risk. What we look for is the consistency of returns. What kind of an outlook the Fund Manager has, the investment philosophy as it were. The Fund may follow a growth route or a value route but it should also accord some amount of safety. Otherwise, why will one take the Mutual Fund route?

Highest return should not be the consideration. It is good if such figures are posted, but what we look for is the consistency of returns with adequate safety.

Suparna Pathak: Investments, like relationships, is also about stability.

To sum up, what Saibal Biswas has said today is that one should invest in mutual funds, for even with a small saving, one can access all opportunities of investing in different parts of the market through them. He has also said that in order to identify the right fund to invest in, look for one that is stable, like peace is, in relationships. It is even better if you discuss with an expert advisor to seek out the right fund for yourself.

In the next episode we will see how investment advisors go about their jobs, how they analyze risks and on what they base their advice.

Saibal Biswas: keep watching.

Takeaway:

Identifying the right Mutual Fund is the trick in the game of investment. Consulting an advisor is advisable.

If it were not for books

 

I

wrote this a few years back in response to Prof Ayan Banerjee’s call to list 10 of my favourite books. If floated up on Facebook again And frankly, I was stumped. And as I kept reading this old post I thought of curating this as my blog as well.
 
Now, It's not as if I am not used to requests but requests of such intellectual proportion have seriously not been a regular occurrence. So, I was tempted to start with Swapan Kumar just for the play but it wouldn't have been right. So here I go. 
 

At an age when kids go out and enjoy a game, I was given a space of a few metres of a blind lane and access to the district library in Baranagar Ramkrishna Mission. Beyond that was a world full of violence, police raids and conflicts of sorts that were believed to have a corrupting influence on a young mind, and, of course, the real physical danger of stopping a stray bullet. 

 I had learning difficulties. Coming from a family where scholastic achievements and literary fame came easily, I was a skeleton in the cupboard as it were. But that lack of recognition was made up many times over by the books in that library and my father's collection. 

 Well as I said I had a middling intellect and an eager tongue. And I was fairing poorly in school. This was the time when I stumbled upon জীবন স্মৃতি by Rabindranath. What I am today is primarily because of that book, elementary physics, Euclidean geometry and Asimov.
Ayan Banerjee stay on. 

 I am curious to know how many of you reading this piece still remember the intro that Tagore wrote the way only he could. He writes that life paints pictures on the easel of memory and the facts blur. So what he was going to write shouldn't be checked for historical veracity. It struck a chord in my young mind. 

And then came Euclid. And somehow even my middling intellect latched on to the importance of an intro while communicating something. I realised that even literary efforts needed a structure as did academic articulation. 

While for years my mother and my teachers were trying to drum in an academic sense into my dyslectic mind, Tagore and Euclid together achieved the feat effortlessly. 

And then came elementary physics and the concept of relative motion. While for a lot like you, the difference between Newton and Einstein may have opened the gate for figuring out the intricacies of the physical world, to me it came as a justification for what I was -- a being with a middling intellect. What I was, I was. 

What I am today is what I am -- the product of a complex journey, a being defined by its course etched in my memory, a person defined by others from their relative perspective. Wait for Asimov. As is required I invite my cousin Ananyo Bhattacharya to join me in this journey. 
 

Illustration done by Dall-E