Reserve Bank banking ombudsman for unresolved issues with banks

All of us have problems with our banks from time to time. But when the problem lasts, unresolved, beyond 30 days, many of us are not aware that we can turn to the Banking Ombudsman at the Reserve Bank of India.

Please

click here

to go to the Reserve Bank Ombudsman’s website, and file your complaint. One of my techie friends was very impressed by the quality of the site…there’s a provision to send the whole mail trail of your correspondence with the Bank as a pdf, too, or send a screenshot.

click here

for the list of Ombudsmen.

Hope this helps some frustrated bank consumers!

Sharing…not sharing….

I’d been talking about the location of a bird which I found by accident. When I posted about it, a friend asked,
“Did you ask some one, and did they not disclose the location ?”

In other words, was I sour-graping because I was not being told the location of this (or any other recently discovered) bird?

My response to him:

Ha, ha, I know better than to ask for the location of any recently-discovered bird, O expert birder! Have I asked you? (I know you saw it.) No, it’s not a case of sour grapes…in fact, the reverse, as I have given the location of various birds to many expert birders, after discovering them by sheer accident (eg . Indian Eagle Owl at Ramnagara or Turahalli.) I can confidently say, go look in Lal Bagh, a large public park in Bangalore, you will find the Spotted Owlet. This does not guarantee that the person will see it.

I am a well-known “L-B”…. a Learner-Birder.I have neither the  knowledge nor the scientific background to qualify as an expert 🙂 Neither will I ask where the Pratincole, or the Emu, or the Mute Swan,  the Roc, or the Phoenix,  are to be found. Most birds will, for me, be found only within the covers of my “Grimmskipp”(Grimmett and Inskipp) , “Salim Uncle” (Salim Ali), “Pam Ram” (Pamela Rasmussen) , or “Kashmir Jack” (Krys Kazmierczak). You think I will go on a ship-without-a-toilet to see pelagic birds? The answer is, Gua—no!

We’ve already had the hilarious situation, in Lalbagh, of a totally non-bird interested jogger coming up and telling us, “Some crows are harassing some bird which I don’t know, can you help?” It proved to be the Mottled Wood Owl. No  humans (birders or non-birders)  were troubling it…but it was the ever-present mobsters, the crows.The Mottled Wood Owls, in spite of the Lalbagh crowds, have been at their location off and on over the years.

My birding friends here  in St.Louis, Mark Glenshaw, Chris Ferree, Jim Wilson, Mary Dueren (Audubon Society)  and Danny Brown (Wildlife photographer and conservation scientist) , freely share the location of birds and animals in Forest Park, with me. That doesn’t mean that I can see them all the time! In fact, in the heights and the thick foliage  of the Cottonwood trees, even when Mark is showing me where the  huge female Great Horned Owl is sitting…it takes me several minutes to spot her. It took me a week of scouting the right area before I saw the mink family, and the little baby mink came up to my feet and looked up at me.

Oh well… about both points of view (share and don’t share) have their validity….disturbance to the birds is a ver real fear.  Ne’er the twain shall meet…

Unfortunately, birding is becoming a secretive, “I-know-so-and-so-who-will-tell-me-where-x-bird-is-to-be-found” kind of activity. This is why I like my UGS (Usual Gang of Suspects)…we are a happy-go-lucky lot who are as thrilled to see a House Sparrow in front of the Udupi Banashree Darshini as we are to see a Crested Hawk Eagle at Nandi Hills! We don’t want the secret birds……where the ordinary birds are, is secret enough for us most of the time!

Cheers, Deepa.

Southern Railways e-bookings suspended suddenly

I went to the Southern Railways site to book a ticket and got this message: ” E-ticketing facility has been temporarily stopped. Inconvenience caused is deeply regretted.”. Why are we at the mercy of a monopolistic service who are so customer-unfriendly? Not a word of explanation….or any information about when the service will be restored. Why do we get such shoddy service from our Government departments?

“Internet Surveillance…the second time as farce?” Talk at CIS

Internet Surveillance Policy: “…the second time as farce?” – A Public Lecture by Caspar Bowden

The Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, invites you to a public lecture by Caspar Bowden*, the Chief Privacy Adviser of Microsoft’s Worldwide Technology Office, on Internet Surveillance Policy: “…the second time as farce?

Abstract

In 2000, as Director of the independent think-tank, “Foundation for Information Policy Research“, Caspar led a campaign to revise several aspects of a new comprehensive UK law governing electronic surveillance (“the RIP Act“). UK legislated in this area many years before most other countries, and the approach was widely criticized although some amendments were achieved. After a hiatus of a decade, many Commonwealth countries are now copying the RIP law (evidently unaware of the original controversies over its defects). Caspar will discuss the legal-technical intricacies of such legislation, the underlying policy dilemmas, the background context of the failed 1990s policy of “key escrow”, and the subsequent privacy catastrophe of blanket retention of the “traffic data” of all of the 500m citizens of the EU.

Caspar Bowden

Caspar Bowden is Microsoft’s Worldwide Technology Officer for Privacy, providing advice on technology policy matters concerning privacy in over 40 countries, with particular focus on Europe and regions with horizontal privacy law. His goal is to ensure that users of Microsoft products and services are in control of their personal data and that fair information practices are respected. He is a specialist in data protection policy, privacy enhancing technology research, identity management and authentication.

Earlier he was the director of the Foundation for Information Policy Research and was also an expert adviser to the UK Parliament for the passage of three bills concerning privacy issues, and was co-organizer of the influential Scrambling for Safety public conferences on UK encryption and surveillance policy. His previous career over two decades ranged from investment banking (proprietary trading risk-management for option arbitrage), to software engineering (graphics engines and cryptography), including work for Goldman Sachs, Microsoft Consulting Services, Acorn, Research Machines, and IBM.

Who should attend?

This public talk aims to engage in a dialogue with anybody interested in questions of technology, surveillance, policy and the politics of Internet based governance. Students, research scholars, academics, practitioners, those in the business of technology development, design and study, are invited to attend the lecture that approaches the issue from different angles of technology, society and politics. 

Entry: Free; Limited Seating

Registration recommended: prasad@cis-india.org

* Caspar is speaking in his private capacity and his remarks do not necessarily reflect any official Microsoft position

Date: Jun 27, 2011

Venue: TERI Complex, Domlur 2nd Stage, Bangalore

Time: 5.00 p.m. to 6.30 p.m.

—

Contact:

Nishant Shah
Doctoral Candidate, CSCS, Bangalore.
Director (Research), Centre for Internet and Society,( www.cis-india.org )
Asia Awards Fellow, 2008-09
# 00-91-9740074884