Thought Garage

New Push to Raise the H1B and Green Card Quotas
On October 23, 2007, sixteen members of the New Democrat Coalition, led by the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, requested that "the House take action this year to resolve the immediate talent crisis that is facing U.S. employers." The group is pushing for reform that would increase H1B and employment based permanent residence, or "green card" quotas, before Congress adjourns this year. The New Democrat Coalition is comprised of 59 Democratic members of Congress who are interested in modernizing the Democratic Party and the entire country.

The New Democrat Coalition is urging Congress to pass the new reform this year, before the Fiscal Year (FY) 2009 H1B filing season opens for the filing of new cap-subject H1B cases on April 1, 2008. In addition to requesting more H1B visas and employment-based permanent residence, the group is pushing for modernized student visa programs.

Source: Murthy.com

Found this interesting interview of Charlie Rose with Top Indian Entrepreneurs at  Charlie Rose. Little old, I guess recorded in March 2006. But I find this specific excerpt with Anil quite relevant and interesting.

Video URL

You might also find the following quite interesting.

• Nandan Nilekani of Infosys
• Azim Premji of Wipro

Fortune’s special story on how Indian firms are expanding worldwide.  Wonderful strides and inspiring stories are redefining the new entrepreneurial India.

India’s firms build global empires – October 29, 2007

I never liked any movie stars that became so popular based on their caste and family background rather than their real talent. But I could not resist sharing this off-screen drama in the life of a hypocritical on-screen hero.

Chiranjeevi is arguably one of the most popular actors, if not the best, in Andhra Pradesh. For a while, he has been trying desperately to enter politics using movies as a base following the footsteps of NTR, (the movie star who challenged the unbeatable Congress and became the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh). But something the actor himself never might have imagined. His screen life drama one day may become his real life story  with a little twist. He would be playing the opposite role.

It was a sensational and unbelievable turn around when he canceled his first daughter’s marriage after her engagement to the then upcoming star UdayKiran. Unlike in movies where Chiranjeevi fights against villainous parents of Bride, he and his family seems to have played the role of villains. The engagement was canceled and later she was married to another after the press was completely blocked from access to his family.

His brother, another, of course a film star who started and survived behind Chiranjeevi’s tides of success and caste biased fan clubs, became a big case study. Beating up directors, fighting on streets and supremely confident one-man-pictures that never attracted even his own caste biased fan clubs. Recently, he married another movie star leaving out his earlier marriage and attracted legal charges for polygamy.

Now, his second daughter publicly announces to the media that her family confined her to a room and not allowed her to go out, the exact movie style the family and rest of his fans were quite used to. Only the difference is that the on-screen hero playing the role of villain. Finally his daughter escaped and got married and announced to public that her family can not come in between and torn her love. Movies seems to be working. At least his daughter learned something from his movies. Love is something her parents can not decide and force.

Too many movie style highly dramatic events, set the movie actor who wanted to start a new party and win the elections with more or less caste divided electorate, in real life drama. It will be interesting how he and his crazy fans could spin the whole drama for political gains and come out.

Based on what he has done so far, I guess, he would give a nice spin to all drama. Politics is something too expensive to loose over dignity and honesty.

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