THE RIGHT BRANDING

I am a believer of God, being a Muslim we have a blind faith on this line and we truly mean it, when it comes to the dignity and preservance of the identity.  We truly believe what is written in the book and the teachings of the Prophet (PBUH) are very true and their observance  is actually the right way to spend the life.

It is good theoretically but the question arises then why we do not  implement these things into our practical lives.

  I personally believe that this is the lack of strategic implementation. We are confronted with the dilemma which says that this concept is right and what one is doing is wrong. But still one does what is wrong. Even when it is obvious that this is wrong.

 The problem does not lie with the teachings or preachings, it lies with the way they are being taught today.

We are attracted toward distractions because we are surrounded by them. The world is like a marketplace where everyone is looking for his or her own benefit.  And being an individual, every person has the knowledge of books which tell us the right things and the right laws of nature but we still go for practice. Even when we know it is not correct and ultimately it the law which prevails.

The problem lies in the coding of the teachings laid down for us many years ago in the present context. No doubt everything is so comprehensive and is easily understandable but there is a lack of strategic implementation which tells how to implement this concept in today’s situation.

It should be evolving.  We have progressed much so we fear to go back in those ages which are not as developed as they are today. Although we know that essence is universal  but the branding is older.

So we have to fight within ourselves to find the way outs which could link us internally with what is permanent while staying connected with what is temporary. But the issue is it takes time. It requires a huge amount of thinking in the right direction which seems impossible when one is surrounded by many distractions.

However this strategic implementation requires the right  platform and the right mind sets.  Only then we can be successful  and we shall be able to enjoy the true essence of what is demanded from us by our God.

TAX POTENTIAL : MYTHS AND REALITIES (REVIEW)

In his article, Muhammad Arshad the author has criticized a paper titled, ‘UNLOCKING Pakistan’s Revenue Potential’ published in august by International  Monetary Fund.

The paper concludes that the country has the potential to nearly double its tax-to GDP ration over the long term.

The author was touched by the following points raised in the paper.

The paper says,  the income tax rates in case of individuals is 20 percent. And this low level of direct taxes is mostly a result of weak compliance and enforcement and abundant concessions and exemptions.

Secondly, reducing the tax exempt income threshold, widening tax brackets, adopting more progressive and lower tax rates and rationalizing concessions and exemptions would not only increase revenue yield but also improve the fairness of the tax systems.

His arguments are as follows:

1.       The reference of 20% is not true as para (1) and (1A) of Division 1 of Part 1 of the first Schedule to the income tax ordinance, 2001 clearly specifies the marginal rate of tax in case of a salaried person is 30 % and in case of non salaried person is 35%.

2.       Under normal tax regime the maximum income on which tax is not payable is Rs.400,000/- but if the country’s socio-economic conditions are taken into consideration the situation tells a different story.  Where the average household size is 5-6 persons, and in most cases there is only one bread earner.  So Rs 400,000/- per annum means around Rs.220 per person per day which is hardly sufficient to make both ends meet.

3.       Almost the entire amount is spent on consumable items which are also subject to at 17% sales tax.

4.       Individuals pay with holding taxes in a number of ways, which is otherwise not due for them. They deserve relief not more tax.

5.       There are more than 45 withholding taxes which are paid by millions of common citizens. Most of these WHT have no nexus with the income earned or capacity to earn. For example WHT charged on profit etc.

6.       Even widows and orphans pay taxes on all of their income.

7.       124 millions mobile phone users pay income tax at source. A country where 50% people live on or below poverty line this number is not small.

8.       Every commercial electricity user pays income tax at source.

9.       Business are made withholding tax agents and the tax department is mainly involved in the monitoring of collection of tax at source, levying  penalties and default surcharges making the cost of doing business very high.

10.   Withholding tax becomes an indirect tax when it is treated as a final tax and is passed on to the ultimate consumer as an indirect tax.

11.   There are number of minimum taxes which are levied without any reference to income. Taxpayers are forced to pay minimum tax even in case when they are suffering gross loss and they pay it out of capital. It is not justified.

12.   Sales tax and petroleum development levy prevent passing the benefit of falling oil prices to the Pakistani businessmen.

Pakistan has the potential to increase tax revenue. But sensible taxation is the requirement.  The sole objective should not be the collection of tax, it should be collection of tax based upon the principle ‘ from each according to his capacity to pay’. 

In the Memory of HIM!!!

Life has never been so easy from the start and shall not be easy the historical trends tell the bitter reality. When certain decisions are made and they are the toughest and the earliest in one’s life time, they contain a strong impact on one’s life. And the one who dares to breach and enter in one’s life being an elder was you.

It seems that you were a kind of test from divine. Sometimes we need a jolt; an emotional jolt. It is like a wake up call or an intimation of a big dilemma expected to happen. To prepare ourselves i believe.

I truly believe that elder’s should not develop any emotional attachment with their kids or if they do they should take care of themselves more after that. It feels very selfish on the part of you to leave in such a way that there is no comeback.  There is a need to be emotionally intelligent in the situations which capture you emotionally otherwise can make you paralize later on.

Those who never had experienced the feelings of affection and kindness should be emotionally intelligent in a much greater degree as compared to the normal one’s. The intelligence demands us to be aware of and control our emotional feeling and handle our interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathetically.

Thus in order to avoid the conflict within oneself and the feelings of indifference where you are experiencing  strange feelings, unable to identify what has gone wrong, one must be vigilant enough to stop such affections and counter them in advance or should be ready to bear the traumas until the life goes on. 

Confused Banking

Banking is a well defined job to do. It has testament for every segment it caters. 

There are many standing operating procedures which are available in the bank 

for the convenience of the employees to practice them uniformly. The policies

 are implemented well through them. These procedures guide the employees in

 different dynamic situations within the organization with respect to customers

 and the treatment of internal transactional activities. 

Like individuals who collectively make the society and devise its culture. The different branches of the bank collectively form the culture of the bank. It is very surprising that the standalone culture of a branch varies proportionately with the overall theme of the bank itself at times. It is similar as to the sects in a country which are proportionate yet are the part of the same society within a country. 

We can tolerate the individuality at the societal level but we cannot tolerate the individuality at a corporate level. When we talk about an organization it has to follow the standard rules and procedures uniformly to clarify its long term vision. Four tyres of the car are required to move it in the same direction in order to reach at a desired destination. 

But unfortunately the deviations and the individual opinions jeopardize the true spirit of a bank’s values. Some seniors in an organization create their own perceptions and implement them without bothering what the law says. They emphasize practices. The major dilemma with following the practices blindly is that they are not questioned at the end of the 

day. 

In case of any mishap, law is applied and religiously followed. And when the law is 

consulted and the parent policy is consulted which resulted into that practice it is observed that the policy itself didnot actually mean the concept which is being practiced keeping that policy as a precedent. 

The chaos however occurs at the lower end. Where the junior level robots are working. 

They are kept by certain organizations like pawns to be used in case of any issue. To transfer humiliation, to defuse the management’s wrath etc. These junior level robots bear the burden at the end of the day and suffer mentally. Not knowing what actually they are doing and what they are 

supposed to do. 

To be continued

BEYOND CAPITALISM (REVIEW)

Capitalism is an economic system based on private ownership of the means of production and the creation of goods and services for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism
 include private property, capital accumulation, wage labour and competitive markets.

Welfare capitalism is capitalism that includes social welfare policies.Welfare capitalism 
is also the practice of businesses providing welfare services to their employees.

REVIEW:

If an environment has the symptoms of 

l Profit motive

l Markets

l Private enterprise

It means it has the disease of capitalism. 

The core value of capitalism includes:

l Individualism

l Materialism 

l Self interest

These value have replaced the traditional human values which were

l Traditional duty to God

l Royalty

l Community etc.

The values of capitalism have converted the welfare based relations among humans into the interest based relations. Every thing can be seen from the eye of a business man and the

 eye of the businessman sees profit only. 

The markets have intruded in all spheres of life. And this intrusion is the essence of 

capitalism. 

These changes are good because we are earning money, our economy is growing but these changes have some negative impact too. For example 

l Enormous inequality

l Ecological destruction

l Conflict 

l Economic instability and

l  Anomie ( social instability resulting from a breakdown of standards and values; also :  personal unrest, alienation, and uncertainty that comes from a lack of purpose or ideals)

The traditional society, communism and capitalism all these systems have failed because

 the first two crushed individual initiative and the capitalism accompanied individual’s
 initiative with greed which incurred negative results. 

ULTIMATE SOLUTION:

Thus there should be an ultimate solution which is the mediation between the communism and capitalism i.e. Not only government centric neither unleashing individual’s initiative linked mainly with the greed. 

The ultimate solution must have the few qualities in it. These are

l Inquisitiveness

l Wisdom

l Artistic Creativity

l Altruism

But the problem with the ultimate solution is that, for the success of the proposal the people should adopt this attitude. However majority is struggling with the petty issues. They might 

divert their attention to the significance of this solution after the occurrence of certain 

catastrophe.

Unless, this aspect is paid attention the issue shall remain present and those who are

 sensing the importance of it should bear it stoically.

(Please Note: The original article was published in Dawn Isb, on 19 Jan 2016 by Niaz Murtaza)

The Silence of SOP

My mind is stuck in a situation. Neither able to think further nor is getting out of the trance. Like a life, as it is nothing without a purpose. A bank is nothing without its SOP.
SOP is a short abbreviation of standard operating procedure. It tells about the different procedures which a banker might need to follow when he practices banking. It is a guiding testament for the bankers.
A banker's art of banking is tested in the light of bank's SOP. How well the procedures are followed lead to the increased credibility and soundness of the bank.
After all the significance which I am able to describe about the importance of SOP when I apply the concept with the practicality, I come up with no words to express my feelings. Sometimes the situation causes you to lose your words, you become unable to jot down your feelings and look confused and scattered.
One of the many situations can shed light on the significance of the concept which a junior level officer in a bank who bears the burden of all the chaos, ultimately and definitely face in the organization.
To understand the concept, take an example of a situation where a customer requests the bank to apply cheque book without signing the cheque book request. As he is a valued client the manager giving him maximum favor forwards the request. It needs to be kept in mind that the signatory of the account is out of the country and his manager/accountant is requesting the cheque book on his behalf as it is a corporate account.
When the customer is reminded to send the original request signed by him the accountant/manager on behalf of the customer sends the cheque book request signed by the mandate of the account and the same mandate also authorizes a third person to collect the cheque book on behalf of the customer.
Now here comes the test of patience for the officer who deals with the situation. The SOP is silent on the issue. It is unable to guide that whether the request by the mandate is acceptable and whether the mandate can authorize a third person to collect the cheque book.
The junior officer seeks guidance from the middle manager. The middle manager calls many other and comes up with the mixed replies, confused, but sure of his ex-employer SOP. The case is then referred to the senior manager, who gives his go ahead for the delivery of cheque book on the authority of the mandate and acceptance of the cheque book request signed by the mandate. Although not confirmed about the current SOP,but of the previous employer's SOP, yet he confirms it from his own senior and the customer after being kept waiting for a long time is being told that what shall be accepted and what shall not?
Moral leaves a big question mark. The biggest question is imposed on the bank itself. It sheds light on the importance not only on the presence of SOP, but an updated one. Then onwards the implementation shall give reliability and confidence to the workers and shall help stop leg pulling among employees by misguiding each other and letting them become a convict of ignorance because of the silence of SOP.

SPIRITUAL MALADY

If at any level you have some proximity to spirituality, there is a probability that you might get excluded and isolated from normal course of life. You shall be declared oversensitive and super emotional. Your survival might become a question mark in the society you are trying to socialize with.  It is not a thing which needs an evidence to prove itself but the situations you might encounter and most preferably the strategy you will adopt for the treatment of such situations shall cause you to get yourself treated like an odds one out.

It has been proven from many studies written by many explorers in this area that those people who pursue on these lines are the unfortunate ones in the eyes of the world and this is somewhat true for the readers analyzing the case study of such person apparently by comparing the historical reactions of that person in such circumstances where it’s application is made. These people are considered disgraced, absurd and goofs.  This is the superficial analysis of the apparent situation and reaction. And this is somewhat correct because what a human eye sees is reality for many people.

But there is another side of the picture which purports that to be successful in the current market there is a popular concept called diplomacy. It runs parallel to the followers and believers of spiritualism. Spirituality demands personal transformation from a person to the religious beliefs, it demands tolerance and many other peace and patience related concepts which the religion teaches us. On the other hand you cannot run your house on the ground of spirituality only. You have to come out of your comfort zone and do the needful to maintain your living. Here come’s the conflict.

 The outer side demands diplomatic standards and strategy’s to be executed for becoming successful where as spiritual standards negate double policy and hypocrisy. It forbids the popular concept of politics in whatever shape and form it comes in the way of an individual’s career path. It demands truth and straightforwardness towards the situations one has to confront with. The difference between these two extreme opposite concepts cause the spiritual malady in an individual’s life. The personal dissonance caused by the conflict hurts that person on both ends and most of the beginners find themselves in a chaos.  This dissonance is a spiritual disease at one end and lack of interpersonal skills at the other end.

However, the reality is that both sides are indispensable for human because you have to live in humans so you  need to have  adequate diplomatic flexibility with you to interact with them effectively and you must need food for your soul and for that you need to inculcate and maintain some spiritual values in you. The solution to this is a question mark and a midway needs to be discovered and implemented to at least find a breathing space for oneself in the environment otherwise the saying that ignorance is blessing can only be praised and stated in this regard and one should maintain one’s stamina strong enough to deal with it.