Fool’s Walk is on

In my initial days of entrepreneurship, I had termed April Fools’ Day, as entrepreneur’s day? why?

Simple. Rest of the world think Entrepreneur is either a “Fool” or keeps on fooling the rest of the world.

There were several analogies from several stake holders view point as I had mentioned in my blog. Anyone curious may go through the same: https://sushobhanm.wordpress.com/2014/04/01/fools-day-the-entrepreneurs-day/

Even after 10 years from this blog and 14 years of journey, I still feel “fool’s walk continued”. During Covid 19 outbreak, it was felt deeply and documented during both 2021 and 2022 as well. Fool’s walk is still on and I am strong believer this will go on.

Entrepreneurs are different breed altogether, they can not be cultivated, manufactured or crafted. They are unlike a business man to think about profit & losses. They drive with passion and explore different crazy ideas which may a times will not see success. But they will keep on chasing new dreams with their solo walk.

Here are few pointers as artifacts to demonstrate why Fool’s Walk is Still on:

Strategies: I have observed and gradually understood, apart from me everyone surrounding (employees, colleagues, friends, customers, vendors, family, friends) know better how to operate by business than me. They keep on throwing ideas on how certain incidents could have been handled in better way. How strategic improvement would have enforced better impact. Many a times, I had offered them to handle my role for a day/week/month and demonstrate the idea through execution. Unfortunately, none of them accepted as yet.

Opportunity Cost: Many a times existing employees, job aspirants, associates, vendors are only conscious about deliverables. They will depend on defined SOW, SOP and always keep on complaining about organization, customer, individuals with the thought process of “beyond scope of work”. As a human being, we always believe that the other human, opposite side of the table, always trying to screw us. And from here, we lose customer centricity. We tend to stay away to understand customer expectations thinking “Beyond scope” and finally yield unhappy customer. And finally, the entrepreneur has to step in to clean the dirt of “issue out of nothing” In effect we finally trapped into fulfilling the defined job, instead of grabbing more opportunities in “hook & spread” mode.

Culture of Favors: Many of us are not grateful for the job which is helping me to have my bread & butters. We always feel the good kick once at the month end a SMS pops out in my mobile screen. But we keep on thinking that is our birth right. In lieu of the monthly package, the deliverable is actually a favor to the employer and the end customer. When a company, the boss, the supervisor asks for deliverables, we keep on feeling get accused, deprived. In effect, everyone feels Sales is touch, many persons are not willing to have variable part of salary as that will be linked to performance. In effect, the poor entrepreneur suffers. Neither he can get the jobs done by team, nor can push them. But end of month he will go on deep depression how to arrange monthly operational expenses.

No control: Most frustrating part of the story is most of the facts surrounding the entrepreneur is not controllable. Starting from Bank loan to fund management, employee leave, resignation, work schedule, customer expectation, family demand, none of them he can control. More precisely he cannot make anyone happy and finally he gets stuck into stress, anxiety, health hazards and keeps on riding roller-costar ride of entrepreneurship.

He keeps on searching for a fellow entrepreneur of similar syndrome so that his walk does not become solo. Effectively, Fool’s walk continues towards eternity.

Fools’ Walk Continued

Fools Day had been termed as “Entrepreneur’s Day” way back in 2014 as the thought came to my mind “Entrepreneurs are Fools”. That got further converged to a book called “Fools Walk”, as a entrepreneurs life story.

As we progressed in our entrepreneurial life for around 13 years and 9 years post the initial concept of Fools as, I can still understand, I have not progressed an inch to be wise from the state of foolishness.

Today I am going to state few contexts which I come across regularly through my team, colleagues, community and customers and most of the cases I still not have enough clue to solve the puzzle:

1)Phone is ringing no one picking up : I have told several time to my fellow members, if someone does not pickup your phone, how I can solve. Should I call him/her and patch you in or should I start calling instead of you? If not, how I can solve this problem? But why someone doesn’t pickup a call? He/She only does it when the call does’t give a comfort.

2) there is no requirement if anything comes up will get back to you : This is a typical reception barrier to say you know passively “No”. If we can not break this barrier, then surely we can not penetrate to an account

3) Price is too high : This is a Common problem & I think everyone of you face it. If I have win an opportunity only being L1, then there is not sales team needed. Every opportunity we will submit proposal and if we become L1, we will get it. On the contrary L1 doesn’t reflect anything till the time someone have comparative facts & figure between L1, L2, L3 etc. Fundamentally if we can not focus of values and demonstrate the same, we will be surely be trapped only into price war.

4) Ownership, Accountability & Inclusiveness: In my journey I keep on struggling on the pointers from surrounding with open ended non solvable issue:

• Never did earlier, first time doing it
• forgot it/Not remembering now
• Getting confused
• Do not know much as it is very technical
• Not finding the mail
• Need help, not finding proper way out
• Did it / Read it long back, can’t recollect now
• Customer wants to talk you only
• Getting Frustrated
• Can not handle pressure
•  

It is not important we will have solutions for every problems in our life,. But, it is important for us to try, discover and flag issues/concerns sothat your immediate superior / mentor can guide through a path. Otherwise, anyone can not address/solve the issues if it comes only as a problem. We can’t learn to fight standing in the back instead of facing the war in the battlefield. We can’t learn to swim unless we jump into the water, struggle and then gradually overcome problems. This can only happen once step into it with inclusiveness, accountability and ownership. This is part of behavioural patterns of human being and can not be taught. Skills can be nurtured and trained, but surely not attitude.

5) Terms & Deliverables: In business, it has been observed, all of us are always getting pressed by everyone else other side of the table, sometimes other stake holders in the team, sometime customer, sometime vendors and OEMs. If effect, we will always get pressed and compelled to agree the terms /deliverable from our side. Parameters can be be price, payment terms, sow, discounts, timeframe, milestones etc. In effect we will always be in catch 20 situation unless we have our own logic and have attitude the peruse to agree on a mutually beneficial agreeable pointer.

Many of these pointers are demonstrated through small real life stories in the book called “Fools Walk” which is nothing but a journey two fools/entrepreneurs, myself (sushobhan) and my friend Pritam.

The book is relaunched today with combinations of multiple editions and additions/alterations.

If you have time, you go through it. I am sure, you can relate the same.

Annual Office Picnic 2023

Last Saturday, 21st January, we had our office Picnic at Prime. The venue was little outside of the city on the Bank of Ganges. It is actually a day-out destination named Ganga Bitan Homely at Uluberia.

This financial year 2022-23, we were planning various different initiatives for internal bonding, engagement inside team to emerge as a bigger brand to penetrate globally. “Built in Bengal and Serve Global” is the vision for Prime V2.0, in spite of sitting the negatives inside the community, where the thoughts are nothing can be done in Bengal. However, we are surviving since last 13years and fighting back sticking to our global headquarters in Kolkata, 2nd largest and important city of British India. In line with the same, we had our sales conference on 14th April with “Good to Great” workshop. In between we had regular celebrations on Birthdays, casual fun with events, parties etc. Once winter arrived, Picnic was already in the Radar with main objective to a fun day along with family outside office and beyond work. Office is a place, we spend most of our day in a 24hrs span, after home. Hence the place needs to be beyond a workspace so that it is part of extended family and off course beyond money and work. The same can only happen when get connected with our family members, spouses, kids, parents and relatives. We can be of any help to each other mentally, morally even for a personal, family problems. In order to do that Office needs to be place of Fun where we can enjoy, share problems, get solutions, get friends-guides-mentors. This can only be established through out of office activities. I am a vivid believer of old school thoughts which I have seen 30/40 years back like Office sports, picnic, cultural programs, drama, songs, outbound travel with family etc which I had experienced on my father’s office.

Anyways, Picnic this year was conceptualized almost a month back. Finding out the venue, planning for menus, organizing the vehicle etc were organized by the Team professionally and smartly.

Finally on the day two 25-seater traveler bus and 2 private vehicles started at around 8.30am towards the venue. Two buses were stationed one at Airport and the other at Exide to cover both North and South participants respectively. It was around 2hours drive from Airport. To reach Ganga Bitan homely, we had  to take 2nd Hooghly bridge from south/ Nibedita Setu from north then take Bombay Road NH 16 towards Uluberia. Once driven from Uluberia flyover to Goruhata more, we took right towards Ulughata 58 gate ,vent (garchumuk). On the way, first we got Mohini more and then Belari More. From here, we took left Village Road to reach Ganga Bitan project , on Ganga Bitan Complex, Plot A-1 is GANGA BITAN HOMELY.

We all reached around 10.30am total around 50 people. Few of the members could not join as pre-occupied or health hazards and the members from other parts of the country surely got missed due to locational proximity.

Once we roamed around the property for few moments, we all rushed to breakfast. The menu was comprising of Green Peas Kachuri (karaishooti Kachuri), Potato Curry (Aloo Dum), Boiled Egg, Sweets (Seasonal Sandesh). On completion of the breakfast, team got settled in distributed manner, few got relaxed inside rooms (there were three well furnished rooms, one in the ground floor and two in the first floor), few went to the field besides the river with cricket, football, badminton etc. Few kept on roaming here and there, while few others engaged in casual gossiping. Meanwhile at around 12.30pm hot vegetables fry and chicken fry got severed along with liquor and milk tea. Sprite and Thumps up were also there to accompany for few enthusiasts.

Post this small break again people got engaged in freaking out in the field besides the bank of river. In between we got a cake cutting session to celebrate the success as a Team.

Finally, at 3pm, we reassembled for Lunch. Menu was sumptuous and mouthwatering with Rice, Daal, Fried Potatoes (Aloo Bhaji), Cauliflower Curry (Aloo Gobi), Fish (Katla Kalia), Mutton, Chatni, Papad & Sweets. It was so delicious and heavy, most of us couldn’t go back to the field even though we wanted to. Hence post lunch session mostly spent on gossiping, casual talks, music and kids dance.

Finally, it came to a end as all good things doesn’t last long. Around 4.30pm we had our evening Tea and bid adieu to our Day-Out spot. With the gratitude to river Ganges, we aspired to have similar outbounds along with team and their families in a much larger duration (possibly a nigh halt) so that we can cherish the colors of nature in different phases of day and night.

We all got rejuvenated and promised ourselves to have better interlock internally and surge ahead together to serve our customers in a better way so that Company will not only grow, we all will be the part of that journey with vision “Born in Bengal, Rising Global”.

Fool’s Walk – Retrospection in Covid19 Outbreak

Fools Day had been termed as “Entrepreneur’s Day” way back in 2014 as the thought came to my mind “Entrepreneurs are Fools”. That got further converged to a book called “Fools Walk”, as a entrepreneurs life story.

Last year this date, I had written my initial observations in lockdown phase during initial Covid19 outbreak.

But furthermore as you all know Covid situations still threatening all of us be in life or in business, my retrospection says terming Entrepreneurs as fools including me, was not at all wrong, rather this same analogy got further reinstated during last one year on Covid19 outbreak.

Let us run through few of the samples.

Collaboration:

Collaboration is a myth. In my last 10 year’s of journey, I have tried to collaborate with various enterprises in the community. The idea is to generate Businesses for the community enterprises for mutual benefits. every provider has its own strength and customer base. In effect if in the same base (where I have good relationship, existing Businesses), we can surely cross-sell new offering showing fellow enterprises as group companies, consortium and sometimes as a new SBU under my company itself. This will not open up extended sales arm for my fellow enterprises, but there will be additional revenue earning opportunity for me as well. Same is vice versa for the other companies as well. But unfortunately this got miserably failed due to ego, mistrust, doubt, lack of ownership etc. Similar experience got further revalidated during Covid times. The moment I am interfacing to the market, end customer is depending on my personal image, goodwill, repute, past credentials, trust, my methodology, thought process etc. But my collaboration partner is never ready to understand or rely on my thought process post picking up the order. He/She will completely overrule the baseline of the parameters on which the business was picked up. They will try to impose their own methodology completely suppressing me or my customers’ thoughts stating those are not practical as we do not process any domain knowledge. And then the real problem starts. Delivery team or partner does not listen to me, customer becomes unhappy, customer is unwilling to talk to delivery team, delivery team not interested to talk customer. I keep on try to become an interface or bridge between all stakeholders and try to settle the matter amicably. But nothing works out

 Delivery team/partner starts thinking I am trying to accuse them without any fault of theirs and having intent to not paying them. Customer keep on getting disheartened and finally order gets cancelled. This in effect waste a large amount of time to bring business and trying to deliver on a domain which was not my core competency, rather dependent on collaboration partner expertise. But story is concluded yet. The moment order lost, the partner/delivery teams becomes more doubtful as if I am creating a drama and trying suck the project from them and give it to someone else. They are least interested to understand the order is lost, rather they keep on pressing for their claims on payment. They are not interested to the loss of time, repute, goodwill, rather focused on recovering their receivables by any means (threating, legal, whispering campaign and what not).

The same story took place several times in 10years and got further reinstated in Covid times. The same was a learning as I am not learning from previous experience being a fool.

New resolution “No collaboration at all” and no experimentation in Business where I do not have internal competencies.

Employment:

I think many of you learnt though my lot of articles on employment problems in Bengal. We hired a senior sales person last year January (2020) and selected one more senior Sales Person on February end to join from April 1st week. Meanwhile Covid19 propagated and lockdown imposed. Still we had hired the 2nd sales person since committed.

May 2020 onwards we had started a 20-30% temporary deduction policy and committed employees we will replenish it back once everything settled down. Now April to October, entire sales team Business generation was zero. Two senior sales persons were playing hide and seek game by showing same lead every month and generating fake commitments. There was no intent of creating buzz even in those challenging times. In eight months (February to September), as there was no contribution from the sales team, we were forced to tell them about revision in salary structure by reducing fixed component and increasing variable component. Immediately both of them left and interestingly both of them reviewed us public rating site as below:

This has happenned many a times during last 10 years where employees will leave absconing, they will leave in just a overnight notice , they will complain about company strategy, they will run whispering campaing about company work culture etc, but very few found to be couragous enough to face exit interview and document his/her grievences(if any). More precisly the Covid19 taught me, employment situation in India has not changed. There are enough jobs, but not enough employable resources

The moment we float any requirement (JD) to the market, we are flooded with resumes from the markets from every possible sources. But interestingly most of them do not appear even in interview. Even after few people appear in the interview, once offered they put up “No show”. Many of them do not even confirm that they are not joining and more precisely they avoid picking up calls form HR.

Existing employees will leave overnight without extending any time for transfer of knowledge, handover and taking stock of the situations keeping customers into a no-man’s land. And post leaving the Job, they will post here and there in a whispering campaign mode.

Customers:

Best product or solutions in lowest possible price (if possible free) was always expected in the eco system and more precisely once it is a service. The same mindset shoots up further during Covid times. There were situations customer wanted something immediate without understanding COvid situation, lockdown etc. The demand was immediately someone needs to visit onsite either to enable a collaboration tools or to conduct a digital forensic for a ransomware attack. But they were not willing to pay additional charges for private vehicle etc and more interestingly once the job finished, they were reluctant to pay immediate with the clause of lockdown, finance issues etc. One of my customer taken hardware/software in January 2020, they have not yet paid large amount of money taking Covid as an issues and while running pillars to post (government, MSME, legal), no leaves could be turned as yet.

Family/Relatives:

Home had become our new office almost for 6-8 months during lockdown. Even after that many of the people are still continuing Work from Home and that may be permanent trend for many of the large organizations even. Here comes the problem statement. Mixing Entrepreneurial life with Home Atmosphere is always complex. During covid as Business went down, we had to stretch ourselves to find innovative ways to generate business and it was Web Meetings. Since morning 8am to 9pm night, it was stressful time to meet and explain new technologies, tools to the customers to bring business. But family always thought of us being too busy and not spending time with them in spite of being in office. The problems in office, financial troubles, business downsizing nothing could ever be shared with them and we never want to spread stress among the family. But in effect we had to suffer in a sandwiched situation between stress and family life expectations

There are many more examples can be shared. But the article may become too lengthy. I will try to express in the next article on the same.

However, let us celebrate today either as Fool’s Day or Enterprenure’s day.

 What do you say?

Mr. Chandraketu and ASAP Syndrome

It has been months, I was unavailable in my blog. Let us discuss today on some interesting topic.

Last two three months I was working with one of my ex colleagues and present business associate Mr.Chandraketu Verma for a specific global projects. The activities were covid related items like gloves, mask, PPE, medicines etc.

Interestingly every time any opportunity comes, it is on fire i.e. customer wants on yesterday basis. In effect all the people in the value chain including Chandraketu and Me keep pushing the downstream. However, at the end of the day it was happening like neither downstream nor upstream was getting moved by the push, rather they were becoming much more reluctant, slow and apprehensive if unnecessarily we are creating a situation always. Suddenly it struck my mind and I have named it “ASAP Syndrome ”.

In my 20 years of career, I have observed it across the community, eco system. Customer always jumps into the last moment and needs the same immediately. They always threaten at GunPoint as if otherwise he will place the order to someone else. The poor fools like us who thinks it real, jumps into the sea, get pressurized, take tension, thinks the situation as life and death scenario and try to achieve for something really war footing.

There are several pros and cons with this “ASAP Syndrome”. Oops, my apologies, I have not yet explained what is “ASAP” ! This is the short form of “As soon as possible”, and the same is quite commonly used in corporate world.

Now “ASAP Syndrome” is like a trap. Only few people gets attracted towards it by thinking about customer centricity.

Lets give an example of last Sunday. A specific material was supposed to be sent to Mexico from Bangladesh. Customer had given a purchase order on Thursday evening along-with payments as per payment terms. The moment the swift transfer slip passed to us, the pressure was building on us if the same could be dispatched. Mexico being 10/11 hours behind, they were pushing us to dispatch immediately. However, that was evening at Bangladesh and business hour already closed. More precisely Bangladesh is closed on Friday and Saturday being weekly Holidays. Hence last Sunday was the earliest possible time the same could be initiated. Sunday morning onward there was continuous push on updates on every half an hour form upward chain. Ajay Swin was getting pressure from Mexico and was pushing Chandraketu. In effect he was chasing me and I was further passing the same to Chandrashekhar, Ajhar. My counterpart Aminul Islam was also chasing them locally. Counter response was always ” we are working on the same and it will be done ASAP”. But unfortunately, the material was not available in the city and that had to be sourced from outskirts and in effect it could not be possible to dispatch on Sunday. But the customer pressure was still on and in effect all of us (me, Chandraketu, Ajay, Ajhar, Aminul etc) had sleepless night. Even our time night 3am, customer demand was to supply the courier slip of dispatch. How much in unrealistic it may be, customer was not ready to listen any practical difficulties. Even after the next day (Monday)bonce actually material got dispatched through DHL and tracking sheet shared , there was follow-ups like when tracking will be made available online, why they have not airlifted as yet etc. No one in upward chain was interested to listen that we do not have any control on DHL process, there are scarcity of flights in Covid situations.

This is just an example and I had mentioned the story with the name of Chandraketu as this was the recent one and “ASAP Syndrome” got evolved through this incident.

One of my other customer had a Cyber Security software product and they did not renew with software AMC last year. In effect many of signature based services were unavailable to them. After also one year struggle they had released a PO 15days PO for the last year backlog as well as this year’s renewal together. After releasing the PO, very next day they have started demanding not only the lic related features and services, but also started accusing us as if we are delaying the same and in effect their business dependencies are getting impacted.

They were not ready to understand, there will be certain procedures on deal approval, order loading etc at our side and OEM side as well. As they delayed the procedure for more than a year, old price clearance got expired, prices got escalated by 25% by now. Still they started blasting us why these processes could not be done in 24hrs. While we had asked for money as AMC renewal loading to the back-end distributor has to be 100% advance as the customer was defaulter (lic was not renewed last year), customer reaction was again accusing us as we had to manage it. They can not release money unless their internal processes are cleared. Almost every two hours there were follow-up calls and mails to extend Services to them “ASAP”.

Actually this reminds me good old story of “Cowboy and Tiger”. The cowboy was kidding every now and then seeking help with imaginary claim of Tiger Attack on his Cows. Every-time it appeared to be fals while people came for assistance. Finally one day really tiger came and alas no one appeared for his help.

In life everything can’t be “ASAP”. That actually dilutes the real urgency in emergency times. Most of the time most of the people will not react/support to the people with ASAP Syndrome. This may result many mistakes, mess, unwanted issues as no once can think in peaceful mind under “ASAP” pressure. More precisely, the rare people like us (who still responds to this syndrome and acts on war footing) suffers as upward steam keeps on pressing as we appeared to be responsive on pressure and down-steam does not bother to respond or shows reluctant to react. As a result the people like us suffers in a Sandwich Situation and struggles with dual pressure.

Have you faced “ASAP Syndrome”? How was your experience?

Fool’s Walk 2020

1st April, 2020 – An interesting day for us. Today is Fool’s Day and also the inception of new Financial Year for India. But the same is taking place in a Lockdown state !

Lock-down is the first ever experience for almost all of us. The Novel Corona Virus, incepted from China has already spread across continents and almost all major countries. In effect to enforce Social distancing in order to resist community spread, there was no other way for government other than pushing Lockdown.

Now even if Lockdown was inevitable for the country like us for saving our life, but it may enforce fight for survival even.

How? That is the context of my writing today as I am back in blog after many months.

When the lockdown was announced 10days back, we had anticipated problem in business.

After 10days, with so many announcements floating into the market from government, the SME businesses like us having no breathing space.
As a first generation entrepreneur, as an owner of a SME business, I am sympathetic to the situation, to my surrounded community. As a business owner, I feel like it is no longer about me and my family, rather it is about 50odd families which are linked with us starting from our employees, office boys, cook at home, driver, maid servants etc. Being sympathetic to the situation, I am not in favor delaying anyone’s legitimate money as that is survival for their families as well. Even though cook, driver, maid etc had been given a break due to the situation, no one had neither been terminated nor there is of any thoughts of deductions as even.

But how I can earn from business in this situation? All my customers became silent while paying us as per schedule. They have shown irrigation on continuous follow-ups even though many payments found to be at 60days delay. On the contrary, we had requested distributors to extend credit periods for 15-20days. But they were adamant with no relaxation. Bank loans are found to be always difficult proposition in my country even though big budget advertisements are always flooded. Inspite of being SSI, NSIC empanelled organization, getting even a 10lacs loan / CC/OD is damn difficult unless you have lobbyist or influences in bank.

Now my credit card payout last day was 30th March with heafty payout (where lot of transactions were from my overseas business trip just before lock-down). 31st March was my daughter’s school admission fees which was to be paid online (no intimation of delay or extension on date). Monthly grocery expenditures are as usual on schedule, rather escalated. Medicine costs are higher and spending are on schedule. Rest of the costs like electricity bill, mobile bill, telephone bills, broadband bill, DishTV recharge all are on schedule. Not mentioning more granular family expense history. How to manage the situation? How I can survive personally and help the people surrounded to be survived?

As usual, I treart myself a fool being an entrepreneur (as echo system persives) and I do not find a solution.
Do you know anything?

NB: The example given above is a sample for an entrepreneur/business man from middle class family and runs a SME business, nothing to be treated personally.

Sweater, A Sunday Refresher by Infosec Foundation

Sweater is not just a warm cloth to protect us in winter. It is not just a piece of apparel, which can be purchased from any shop. It is not just an output of some knitting techniques.

Hope you are wondering why suddenly in a hot and humid April of Kolkata, I have started talking on Sweater. Yes, you guessed right. This is the after effects of watching the latest Bengali Movie “Sweater”.

Last Sunday afternoon we had a premier and special screening with cast and crews in Carnival Cinema, Salt lake dedicated for Infosec Foundation Patrons and Members.

I am sure, again it has instigated your mind what is the linkage of a movie with cyber security, which is the core genome of Infosec Foundation. Wait, I will come to that point.

Before that, let us walk through the context of the movie. The story-line revolves around a Bengali middle class family from a class c city. The crisis for the elder daughter’s marriage has created the prelude of the movie. Younger daughter is extremely skilled with music, dancing and other extra-curricular Activities along with general smartness and good academic background. On the contrary, elder daughter is having almost no skills and always gets compared with her sister. In effect she keeps on growing down in morale and she gets rejected almost every sphere of life including marriage proposals. Her boyfriend also declines to marry in order to have bindings. Instead, he stresses on freedom, enjoyment of life and shows his reluctance on owning responsible. In this juncture, a twist comes into the story-line with an interesting marriage proposal where the mother in law from an elite family puts a clause of weaving skills of sweater as selection criteria for her would be daughter in law. Yes, everyone thinks this is not only wired, but also insulting for the girl as well. However, the lady is having his own justifications on it. As per her thought process, In modern times parents keep on grooming girls with singing, dancing, painting etc , but neglects an old family legacy like knitting. This tradition is not only an art, but flows with generations. Hence, if the girl knows knitting sweater, the same can create a comfort space between Mother in law and daughter in law.

Anyways, under this compulsive pressure, the girl starts being trained with her aunt on knitting. However, the aunt could not find the fire in her to learn knitting sweater for her own career, rather she was more focused towards passing the marriage exam. Her aunt tries to motivate her, boost her morale in order to ignite her underlying spirit of bouncing back for win for her own self. In the class, lot of different Activities get planned apart from knitting, like music , wrestling, outdoor activities and most students always think these are useless. Nevertheless, the teacher was adamant and she illustrates through live situations that knitting or any activities in life are linked with human mind situations. Moreover, that mind game decides the outcome quality of work.

With the series of excise, situations in life, the heroine could connect with her soul and objective of life. In effect, she learns knitting sweater with passion, gives exam with her would be mother in law, but rejects the outcome result. By this time, she got the spirit to accumulate strength, courage and enough wisdom to define her own path of life towards victory. In effect the Girl who was always got rejected by everyone in life sofar, could ignite her spirit to reject others like marriage proposal, mother in law terms and even the irresponsible boyfriend Pablo.

Overall, a wonderful family movie with fabulous location in hills with greenery, clouds and fog. Story movement little slow, however flow is good with excellent cast, great music, fantastic cinematography. This is the first production by the promoter house with a new director and new heroine. Sreelekha Mitra and Kharaj Mukherjee were two renowned cast in side roles, but they did excellent justice to their characters and in effect made the roles pivotal instead of just a side role. Sidhu (Siddhartha of Cactus) was a surprise package to me as I was not aware of these acting capabilities other than musical skills. Isha Saha played wonderful as “Tuki” and her Sister “Sree” was great as well. More precisely, both of them did justice to characters and made it realistic.

There was no family melodrama, overdoing of music, dance etc. Overall a fat-free simple movie with good to watch scenes with peace of mind. More precisely a first production from the production house with such an organized efforts with a distinct message to the audience is truly appreciable.

Now why suddenly a movie screening for Infosec Foundation. Hope by now with our many Activities last three years, you are well aware of Infosec Foundation vision and mission. Infosec Foundation and it’s global trustees believe any organized and sophisticated crimes cannot be only defended by tools-technology-processes, rather it needs inclusive efforts from people from all levels in the social hierarchy. In effect, we believe the basic defense is a common sense, more human like behavior than robotic actions. Hence igniting human mind is extremely essential so that they can start thinking before just sharing OTP over phone, just clicking on phishing link or responding to a provoking SMS. More precisely the cyber issues are propagated to the youth or elderly people instead of middle-aged little IT aware people. Too much of digital attractions of social media, digital content, streaming etc make everyone more screensavers and detached from family , relatives and society. In effect no friends, no adds, no family mixing programs, rather always addiction towards virtual world. In effect youth sometimes gets more adventurous and get trapped and elderly people gets compromised on no awareness on the usage of it.

Hence building cyber aware eco system needs an inclusiveness instead just tech workshop, seminars, event. And same thought process resulted a cause which can aggregate several families on a holiday for just fun and then mix, engage and get connected with each other under community building exercise.

With the same motive, we intend to organize Musical Evenings, Theater Festival, Picnic, Outbound Activities and soon. In effect, gradually cyber awareness best practices will get injected slowly and steadily through an organized process

As you know this is a voluntary non-profit activity, need everyone from audience to join, contribute, collaborate and build the eco system together.

Stay Tuned for future endeavors of Infosec Foundation.

 

Trip to Sundarban – a forest journey in Bengal

Preface

This story is of last December. Due to time constraints, work pressure and of course lazyness, I always get delayed to have a timely post. Never mind, better late than never. Interestingly, last few travels I was writing in Bengali and suddenly realized it has been long time I have not written something interesting in English. Off late, I have made a habit of having leisure twice a year – summer and winter aligned with kids school vacation. Last summer we went to Digha. The moment, Winter vacation was nearby, we were exploring a quick short trip.  Finally thought of exploring jungle and found Sundarban to be the nearest destination.

My parents visited way back to Sundarban through Wandervogel. The owner of that travel agency, Mr.Sumit Batabyal is a good friend of mine and we had taken many tour services through him. This time also we planned for a Two Nights and Three Days (28^th December to 30^th December, 2018) package through him in “Sundarban Tiger Camp“, Dayapur. We were super excited to explore this forest delta.

Introduction

Sundarban is world’s largest delta and named from the Sundari trees and abounded with deadly snakes, crocodiles, and Royal Bengal tiger.. This mangrove forest is listed as a world heritage site by UNESCO and the same is formed by the confluence of the Brahmaputra, Ganges and Meghana rivers. Life here is governed by the low and high tides.

The amazing wonderland is sprawl over 10,000 Sq. Kms spread across India and Bangladesh. The Park gained the status National Park on 1984 and become the designated kingdom of the famous Royal Bengal Tigers.

It used to host maximum number of tigers (as per an unofficial record, 270 were counted in 2004).However present claim is only about 100-120 tigers to be available there.

These forests are home to a variety of wildlife including variety of chirping birds, reptiles, and numerous of invertebrate including crocodiles. Our visit was to learn about their habitat, prey base, and adaptations for survival in these mangrove forests.

The excursion was a perfect fusion of wildlife, deep forest, birds watching and most importantly learning about  the varied custom and culture of the local people.

DAY 1 (28th December, 2018)

·         Journey from Kolkata to Sundarban

Sundarban is not reachable directly by train or bus. Nature has protected this dense forest from human invasion by separating it by series of rivers and tributaries.

The last rail station is Canning to approach further to reach the magical land. There are plenty of buses from Kolkata to Gosaba. Boat services can be availed either from Gosaba or Gadkhali.

We had taken Uber ride from Birati early morning to reach Priya Cinema Hall, Deshapriya Park by 7am. By 7.30, many other groups, co-passengers, families got assembled to ride the scheduled Bus Ride towards Gadkhali, our boat riding point. It was an AC luxury coach with 40seats capacity and the journey kicked off by 8am. We had been served a packed breakfast (sandwich, khasta kochuri, sweets) with mineral water immediately after our ride started. The bus took Basanti highway and reached the destination by four hours. There was a midway break for 30mins due to nature’s call and tea refreshments. We took a brisk walk towards launch ghat while the luggage were transported by rikshwa van.

We boarded in a Boat from Gadkhali Jettey for a spectacular ride through the amazing forest, islands and narrow creeks of the river. The boat captain and the lovely ornithologist was continuously guiding about the journey, places, history, geography and ofcourse mythology to make the journey memorable. We cruise through rivers Gomor, Durgadhwani to enter river Pitchkhali on banks to reach Dayapur Island where Sunderban Tiger Camp was situated.

The overall boat ride was around 2 hours and was fun filled with mild winter waves and refreshments.

We landed to Dayapur Island at around 2pm and we were greeted with local rituals at the entrance of the resort before checking into our rooms.

There are many different categories of rooms and facilities in this resort starting from AC/Non-AC Cottage, Rooms upto huts. We were allocated executive AC Cottages 3&4 as per pre-booking and packages. We rushed for hot lunch after a quick shower. We had been told to report at Launch Ghat by 4pm to cruise for Sajnekhali.

·         Sajnekhali

We cruise through the creeks and canals of the Sunderban Tiger Reserve forest and endemic and migratory birds and wildlife to Sajnekhali watchtower and Mangrove Interpretation Centre. Our guide obtained pass for all members beforehand and in effect immediately, we could venture into the jungle. The famous Sajnekhali tourist lodge located here. No one lives on this island outside this protected area except wild beasts. Inside the forest office, we have seen Mangrove Interpretation center. Crocodile pond, Bonobibi temple, and wild lizard’s pond.

As the sun sets in the distant horizon we returned to the resort to refresh and join for Hi-Tea with Snacks. Mouthwatering momo along with hot tea and coffee were served and the same was followed by bonfire and Tribal Dance to make our evening more memorable. The folklore depicted their century old cultural in its true native form. They showcased happiness and hardships in their lives through dance and recitals of their folklore.

A warm dinner cooked with farm fresh vegetables and was served at the Fishermans Wharf dining hall . The Dinner had soup, chowmin, fried rice, prawn, chilli-chicken along with desserts.

DAY 2 (29TH December, 2018)

·         Dobanki Camp

We woke up early to the chirping of birds and morning wake up bell. A hot cup of tea alongwith biscuits were served in our balcony. We refreshed quickly and boarded by 7am for a thrilling cruise towards Dobanke Watch Tower through creeks and dense forest and numerous rivers.

Breakfast was served on the deck with Idly, egg scramble, bread toast, butter, jam, fruits along with hot coffee and tea. We continued to search for wild animals both sides of the river while cruising through river creeks. Different birds, dear, crocodile and tiger pug marks were evidenced with great charm and enthusiasm.

Once we boarded at the jetty at Dobanki, the major excitement was the canopy walk to experience live animals from Dobanke Watch Tower with a 360-degree view the forest. The canopy walk was through a 20 feet elevated path (covered with iron mesh) through the deep mangroves forests.

On the return path our boat took more narrow path of a tributary and our exploration continued for the search of beasts on the river bank. This forest area was really dreadful dense and uncanny silence.

In sunderban, there is a popular saying, you might not find tiger while searching in the river bank or in jungle, but the tiger is surely watching you from deep jungle.

On the both sides, we found various types of mangroves sharing the riverbank and water was covering the base of dense mangroves forests.

We cruise back through Matla Sea Face (the point from where Bay of Bengal can be seen) to Sunderban Tiger Camp for lunch.

The Tiger Camp hosts various kind of trees alongwith different kind of Birds. Visitors can easily go to the watchtower to observe the birdlife. There are approx. 64 species of birds at the Tiger Camp.

In the afternoon we went for a village walk of Dayapur. The walk was to learn about the lifestyle, local crafts, cuisines, and way of life of the local villagers. We observed their indigenous farming methods and how their houses are completely mud made with small entrances.

On return to  the resort there was a wildlife movie along with tea, coffee and pakoda. The same was followed by banabibi pala.

The folklore of Bono Bibi is known to the people of Sundarbans like every Christian knowing about Christ, the incarnation of God. The Bono Bibi puja celebrated every year during January, when the text of the Bonobibir Jahurnana, composed in 1877 by the Muslim Poet Munsi Byanuddin Saheb is sung, narrating the life and mirades of Bonobibir and other related characters Dakshin Rai, Sha Jungli and Gazi Saheb.

The miracles of Bonobibir and her brother Sha Jungli had a tremendous influence upon the people of Sundarbans because both of them perform miracles to come to the rescue of the people of Sundarbans when in distress.

In distant past, there was one Dhana Mouli (Mouli Class of people collect Honey i.e Madhu) who was suffering from terrible financial problems. One day tired and distressed Dhona Mouli was asleep when he had a vision from Dakshin Rai, son of the king of Jungle, Dandakashya a Hermit by nature. Dakshin Rai, in fact was a sorcerer and incarnation of Tiger.

Dakshin Rai advised Shona (in his sleep) to sail towards Sundarban for collection of Honey.While sailing for Sundarbans, he should take along with him a little bay named Dhuki 8 years of age. Dhona sailed for Sundarban accordingly with his village boatmen and Dhukhi.

In the meantime, the cruel sorcerer, Dakshin Rai sucked all the honey in Sundarban in his custody. naturally worried Dhona since he could not find honey had gone to fast sleep. Dakshin Rai finally appeared in his original tiger form and asked Dhona to handover Dhulhi to him and in lieu Dakshin Rai promised boatful of Wax and Honey to Dhona. Realising the evil intention of Dakshin Rai, Dhona requested in vain to spare the life of little innocent Dukhi. However, Dakshin Rai was not moved. Dhona had no other option but to have a little Dukhi in the hand of Dakshin Rai. Dhona on arriving his native village informed Dukhi’s mother losing the life of Dukhi by a tiger.

As soon as Dhona left, Dakshin Rai lost no time in attempting to devour little Dukhi.The helpless boy in utter distress facing certain death, appealed to Bono Bibi, the saviour oof Jungle and her brother. Sha Jungli to come to his rescue.A fierce battle took place between Shah Jungli and the wily Dakshin Rai. Shah Jungli was the ultimate winner and dukhi was rescued from the clutch of Dakshin Rai and was sent back to his mother by riding on the back of a crocodile, who happened to be a career of Godess Bono Bibi.

Dukhi, introduced the Puja of Bono Bibi by collecting alms from village to village. since then, Bono Bibi is worshipped by the people of Sundarban irrespective of Caste, Creed and Religion.

Bono Bibi Temple always hosts Bono Bibi, Dakhin Rai, Dhona, Ghazi  sahib manily and these are the perfect example of harmony beyond religion.

This was the last night at the resort the dinner was served at open air garden with kebabs and off course bonfire.

DAY 3 (30th December, 2018)

·         Sudhanyakhali

Day 3 was also scheduled for early morning waking up with bed tea. We had to get ready by 7am as usual to report at the boat. Today’s plan was to visit Sudhanyakhali Watchtower. Breakfast was served at the boat as usual.

We could see different types of mangroves on the left bank. We now can see many infamous creeks entering into the deep forest. Entry paths of those creeks are covered with nets so that fishing boats cannot enter into deep jungle for crabs and honeys. If lucks favors, we can see the glimpse of tigers at the swampy river bank.

Breakfast was served on the deck with Sandwich, Boiled egg, Rajma Curry, Bread toast, butter, jam, fruits along with hot coffee and tea.

We could see many types of mangroves both side. Notably golapata, sundhari, Goran all covered both river banks. We observed many big fruits are hanging from trees. We had to walk through the caged walkways after disembarking towards the watchtower, searching for the wild animals. We could see lizard in the pond as well as monkeys surrounded.

·         Return

We returned resort by 11am from Sudhanyakhali. After having lunch at the resort , we checked out and boarded for returning to kolkata via Gadkhali. By this all fellow trvellers had become like a team or an extended family. We kept of enjoying by “Antakshari” for around 2 hours for celebration of this wonderful tour.

Important Places left out

Pakhiralaya, Jharkhali , Netidhopani, Buni Camp, Kalas Watch Tower etc was not covered during this short trip. Look forward exploring these areas while visiting through some other route.

Sunderban travel tips:

Sundarban tour guide: Some important information for travelers:

• Best time to visit Sundarban: From September to March every year. In winter, there are greater chance of seeing tiger, crocodile and other animal on river bank.

• How to reach Sundarban ?

Sunderban can be reached through various routes. We have reached Sunderban via Godkhali. Dhamakhali. But, it is better to reach core jungle via launch thorough Gosaba or Dhamakhali as well.

• Where to stay in Sunderban ?

There are many places in different ilands starting from resorts to budget hotels. We had chosen for Sunderban Tiger Camp in Dayapur through pre-defined packages. However, if you are looking at choosing hotels directly on reaching the spot in order to have better negotiations instead of pre-booking, then pakhiralaya will be the best place to have night halt. There are about 35+ different budget hotels in that location.

Security Symposium & Awards – Bangladesh 17th Feb, 2019

Preface

Without last year’s grand success of multi-city “Security Symposium & Awards”, (Kolkata-Bangalore-Delhi-Mumbai) and the International Infosec Summit (Infosec Global 2018) in Kolkata, we planned for surging ahead to conduct Security Symposiums in Three international Cities (Dhaka-Dubai and Colombo) for the confluence of Global CISO’s to brainstorm on the future and impending challenges to conclusively emerge as Cyber Security Game Changer across the Globe.

Security Symposium and Awards Dhaka – 2019 was the first event as a part of a multi-city Event organized by Infosec Foundation and Enterprise IT World.

The Topic of the event will cover Cyber Security Road-map for Financial Sector/ Industry 4.0 / AI & Blockchain / Startups in IT Security ecosystem, Agility and Flexibility in adopting Cyber Security for Telecom/ Cloud/ Infra Providers, etc.

In the era of hyper-growth, and digital-driven economy, the enterprise risk management has reached to a whole new level. Cyber security has gone through a tremendous change and reinforcing India’s Cyber Security Framework is one of the burning issues in delivering high performance solutions. Only few countries have a cyber-security strategy or are in the process of developing one to protect against cyber-crime. While the overall cyber security posture of India is satisfactory, the mission is still far from being accomplished.

This is a platform that aims to bring together the MD/CEOs/CIOs/CDOs/CISOs in Global CISO’s with an agenda to interact and discuss the latest trends in Information Security and share their key experiences and learning. It will be an excellent opportunity for the attendee companies to showcase their services, credibility and product related to Information Security.

Event Brief:

The theme of the event is to create awareness on the roles and responsibilities of officers and persons protecting critical infrastructure. The Symposium will also witness awarding CISO (Chief Information Security Officers) of the country in recognition of their exceptional contribution to the industry.

Date & Venue:

The Westin, Dhaka, 17^th February 12 Noon to 9pm 

Delegate Profiles:

Around 200+ in numbers, 70% mostly CIOs from Large Enterprises Level Corporate, Bank & Financial Institutions, CEO & IT Heads of mid-sized organizations, 15% Key Govt. Officials, police, CID, Cyber Security Experts, Cyber Law Experts, Policy Makers, 15% Start-ups & Academia.   

Event Highlights

The event was graced by Chief Guest Mr.M.A. Mannan, Honorable Minister, Ministry of Planning, Republic of Bangladesh alongwith Mr.K.A.M. Majedur Rahman (Managing Director, Dhaka Stock Exchange).

Besides few eminent key speakers like Mr. Mohammad Arfe Elahi (Chief Technology Officer, Access to Information Programme), Dr Muhammad Abdul Mazid (Adviser – A K Khan and Company Limited), Mr.Kapil Awasthi (Regional Director, North & East , Check Point Software Technologies), Mr. Ahmed Rokibur Rahman (Wooribank), Mr. Syed Moinuddin Ahmed, (Additional Managing Director & Company Secretary, Green Delta Insurance), Mr. Tapan Sarkar (Founder President CTO Forum, Managing Director ADN Edu Services Ltd.), Mr. Md.Jasim Uddin (Former First Vice President, FBCCI), Mr. Pallab Ganguly (Chairman – IEEE Comsoc Kolkata Section, CISO-Gen Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation), Mr.B. M. Zahid-ul Haque (Head of Information Security, BRAC Bank Limited), Mr. Syed Almas Kabir, President (BASIS),   Mr.Shaerul Haque Joarder ( VP & Head of IT, Bangladesh), Cyber Security for the critical Infrastructure in a Power Utility, Mr. Jaspreet Singh (Partner – Cyber Security – Africa, India & Middle East (AIM), Advisory Services, Ernst & Young LLP),  Mr.Greesh Behal, Regional Head – West (Klassify), Mr.Espen Haagenrud, (CISO, Grameen Phone), Mr.Azim U. Hoque (Co-Founder at Cyber Security Forum, Founder and President at University IT Forum), Mr.Tanveer Ehsanur Rahman (CTO, Novo Telecom) etc has also confirmed their gracious presence as speakers.

Detailed Coverage:

Risk and its mitigation is an integral part of any strategic planning. Risks are associated with core strategic assets and these assets have to be protected.  In our times, many of our assets are highly dependent on IT infrastructure associated to run and manage them. For example, national power grid, power grid, logistics, dams, aviation, transport, capital markets, communication. These assets can be attacked and there are evidences of attack where IT infrastructure is used as the route of attack. Cyber security includes all kind of manifested and potential attack on these systems and in turn damaging the core assets behind these.  Policy makers in macro-economic planning must take into account the short term and long term risks that stem from this. Next, ways and means to mitigate these risks and investment needed – both financial and non-financial must be articulated. Today, various non-state actors and proxies wage offensive action against sovereign nations, public and private nations and some are targeted to cause profound economic and psychological damage. Thus, many commentators argue that future wars will be mostly cyber-wars. Strategic Planning is now obligated, both in policy level and in working level to acknowledge the risk of cyber threats and also an inter-disciplinary approach to mitigate it.

The inaugural session was focusing on the same area since the chief guest was the planning minister of Bangladesh and the linkage of Cyber Security with the Digital Bangladesh Strategies were discussed in details.

After the inaugural session of Mr.Mohammad Arfe Elahi, Chief Technology Officer, Access to Information Programme (a2i), Bangladesh extended his keynote address Cybersecurity Initiatives by Bangladesh Government.

Next one was by Mr. Pallab Ganguly, Chairman – IEEE Comsoc Kolkata Section, CISO-Gen Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation (CESC) on Cyber Security for the critical Infrastructure in a Power Utility.

Advanced Persistent Threat Landscape and Remediation Roadmap was illustrated by Mr.Mohit Puri, Director – Presales, India/SAARC, Sophos in the next session.

Mr.Kapil Awasthi (Regional Director, North & East, Check Point Software Technologies) was instrumental delivering his Theme Session on Industry 4.0 Trends, Strategy & Best Practices.

There after the 1st Panel of the day took place with an interesting topic “Industry 4.0: Beyond Man and Machine“.

It was human muscle power that moved early phases of civilization. Man tamed animals and animal-muscle was put to use, especially for agriculture. Then men invented early stone tools, machine version 1.0. For last 10,000 years, man created machines of such power and sophistication that we no longer talk as how we learn as how to operate a machine but how machines learn from us. Internet of today is a great man-machine learning system where man is learning about machines and we machines are learning how human beings work. Thus a new dimension is now in the horizon where we are talking of Singularity where machines get a critical threshold of “intelligence” and rule us or machines become so smart that we humans, their creators find ourselves bench-marked against machines and companies may put their recruitment notice board with the frightening words – Humans need not apply.

Dr. Muhammad Abdul Mazid was the moderator for the session. Below was the core team architecture of the panel:

• Moderator: Dr Muhammad Abdul Mazid, Adviser-AK Khan and Company Limited,
• Ahmed Rokibur Rahman, Head of ICT, Woori Bank,
• Syed Moinuddin Ahmed, Additional Managing Director & Company Secretary, Green Delta Insurance,
• Tapan Sarkar, Founder President CTO Forum, Managing Director ADN Edu Services Ltd.
• Md.Jasim Uddin, Former First Vice President, FBCCI.

Key deliberations of the panel was revolving around the below questions:

1. With machines becoming so smart and productivity gains so high, will fundamental laws of business be valid and applicable?
2. How will be companies of Industry 4.0 look like ?
3. How shall we keep human beings employed or what will be the core competencies and skills of the future ?
4. How shall we prevent a scenario where machines will be our masters rather than our slaves?

After the 1st Panel, Mr.Sajeev Sengupta from Checkpoint had taken a detailed session on Threat Intelligence and Response.

Next session was Panel 2 on Security Orchestration and Managed Security it look place in the evening just after the tea break

Historically, IT security was diagnostic and reporting based. A security system used to monitor and report and the framework was that of “incident” and “events being managed.”. An evolved framework is now needed for more integrated and comprehensive reporting plus “acting” automatically for a wide range of events. This is Security Orchestration and Automated Response. For managed security business, SLA deviation not only results in loss of business, in worst cases of breach, it can lead to criminal proceedings even. Enterprises not only need to take action but also to demonstrate that a synchronized, timely and effective actions were taken and in a well documented manner for the threats and vulnerabilities. On the other hand, some of the current and future security threats and vulnerabilities will be launched in a way that there is not enough time to “report and analyse and act”, rather the system needs to be smart enough to take action automatically. Thus in short, we are finding an evolution from “reporting” to “acting”.

Security automation and orchestration replaces slow, manual analyst intervention from conventional incident response processes with machine-speed decision making.

Manual incident response processes, insufficient workflows and difficulty hiring security personnel have left security operations teams struggling to keep up with the growing volume of alarms. SOAR combines comprehensive data gathering, standardization, workflow analysis and analytics to provide organizations the ability to easily implement sophisticated defense-in-depth capabilities based on internal and external data sources.

Mr.Shaerul Haque Joarder was the  moderator for the session.

Below are the architecture of the panel team:

• Moderation: Mr.Shaerul Haque Joarder, VP & Head of IT, EPIC Group
• Mr.Espen Haagenrud, CISO, Grameen Phone
• Mr.Azim U. Hoque, Co-Founder at Cyber Security Forum, Founder and President at University IT Forum
• Mr.B.M.Zahid-ul Haque, Head of Information Security, BRAC Bank Limited
• Mr.Syed Almas Kabir, President – BASIS, CEO & shareholder of MetroNet Bangladesh Limited and Managing Director of AyAl Corp
• Mr.Tanveer Ehsanur Rahman, CTO, Novo Telecom LTD

Key deliberations of the panel was revolving around the below questions:

1. Importance of SOC (Security Operations Centre) and Incidence Detection and Response
2. Awareness of Cybersecurity in the society in order to adopt proactive measures
3. Potential Threats, Vulnerabilities and remediation measures in Financial Sector
4. Govt. and Policy makers standpoint on managed security arena
5. Impact of Cyber Attacks and adoption of 24×7 monitoring systems
6. Placing Managed Defence and Security Orchestration Strategies to the management/board

InfoQuest, the sixth print journal of cyber security was launched in Dhaka as well. E-version of the same can be fetched from this link

The concluding part of the event was Cyber Awards for significant achievements in the domains

More detailed photographs can be visible from the Facebook Album.

Stay tuned for our future initiatives.

“Infosec Global 2018”, 3rd International Infosec Summit in Kolkata

Preface

Last two years “InfoSec Global” had added a new feather in the cap for Kolkata. The worshiping of Cyber Wisdom is the major festival has become a critical milestone for the city of joy to welcome winter.

3^rd Edition of International InfoSec Summit “InfoSec Global 2018”, took place at The Park, Kolkata on 16^th November, 2018.

InfoSec Foundation is a non-profit Foundation dedicated for cyber awareness for citizens. This is being shaped as a platform to exchange ideas among different stakeholders like Govt., Banks, Police, Corporates, deciding best practice for industry, creating a road-map for Cyber Security, Information Security, Data Security in order to have cross pollination.

In the mission of spreading Citizen Awareness, we have already taken many steps pan India basis apart from our initiatives in Bangladesh, Africa and United Kingdom. Last two years we had organized international InfoSec Summit in Kolkata with all different stakeholders. Last July-August, we had concluded a 4 City CISO Symposium (Kolkata-Delhi-Bangalore-Mumbai) to connect the CISO community.

This year the event has grown larger with greater impact, reach, content and participation.

InfoSec Foundation is already working as voice of citizen where we bring in all stakeholders together to create a more aware and responsive ecosystem. Connect and extend initiatives that have not reached the targeted audiences, find gaps and demand raise the silent voice so that it reaches the ears of policy makers and functionaries.

Summits, CIO Roundtables, Print Journals, Cyber Security Help lines, Seminars, Training, Workshops, Product Development – these are few envisaged areas we have already started working in India, Bangladesh, UK and Africa.

InfoSec Global 2018 is the outcome of same vision driven by Infosec Foundation.

Infosec Global 2018, Kolkata

Infosec Foundation had taken the important responsibility through the International InfoSec Summit to ignite cyber security wisdoms among stake holders. Third edition of this International Summit took place on 16^th November, 2016 followed by 2^nd Edition on 3^rd  November, 2017 And first edition on 18^th November, 2018 in Kolkata. These event series has become integral part for the eastern Eco system to leverage the opportunity to connect the best Cyber Security Experts across the globe and get enriched with cyber knowledge.

This year the event was supported by West Bengal Government, NASSCOM, STPI and IEEE. Besides Prime Infoserv, Fortinet, FireEye, Kaspersky, IBM Security, Vehere, India Cyber Security Solutions, Global Insurance, Tata Teleservices, Hipla were the key sponsors who helped us to make it possible.

    

Theme of the Event

‘Cyber Resilience and Agility in your Digital Future” was the theme for the 3^rd International Infosec Summit in Kolkata this year. The program was designed for the leaders from the field of IT Infrastructure, Data Security, and Information Security across verticals. With the spread of Digital Assets and connectivity, the flexibility and agility is most important parameters to have proactive Defense. The strategies, action plans, learning, case studies, technology and process benchmarking etc. were highlighted during the summit in order to have greater wisdom for the audience.

Speakers and Topics

The event was graced with Chief Guest Dr.Gulshan Rai (Chief Cyber Security, PMO, Govt. of India). Mr. Shyamal Datta (IPS Retd., Former Director – IB, Former Governor of Nagaland), Mr. Debasish Sen ( IAS, Additional Chief Secretary, Information Technology & Electronics, Govt. of West Bengal), Mr.HariKusumakar (IPS, Secy Co-ordination, Home & Hill Affairs and Satet Cyber Crime Co-ordinator, West Bengal), Mr. Sanjay Mahapatra (Editor, Enterprise IT World) and Mr.Sushobhan Mukherjee (Chairman, Infosec FOundation and CEO , Prime Infoserv) was part of the inaugural panel.

 

Besides, the event had witnesses array of speakers across industry with the gracious presence of the global thought leaders. Eminent personalities like Dr.Ajeet Bajpai (Director General, NCIIPC), Ms.Vaishali Bhagwat (Partner VP -Shintre & Associates), Mr. Michael Joseph (Director, Systems Engineering, Fortinet),Mr.Nabankur Sen (Bandhan Bank), Mr.Shrikant SHitole (Country Hed, FireEye), Mr.Akshay Verma (Global Insurance), Mr.Gautam Kapoor (Partner, Risk Advisory, Deloitte India), Mr.Ahmed Rokibur Rahman (AVP, Head of ICT, Woori Bank, Bangladesh),  Mr.Debasish Ghosh (Chief Internal Auditor – Srei Group, President – Institute of Internal Auditors), Mr.Vishak Raman (Director, Security Business, Cisco India & SAARC),Mr. Anup Deb (IBM Resilient, Singapore), Dr. Amar Prasad Reddy (Director General, National Cyber Safety and Security Standards), Mr. Gant Redmon (IBM, United States), Mr.Sanjay Das (Deputy Secretary, Information Technology & Electronics, Govt. of West Bengal), Mr. Debasish Dey (Professor and Director, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad University of Technology), Mr.Ashok Sharma (Co-founder, and CTO, QOS Technology), Dr. Amlan Chakraborti (Professor & Director. AK Choudhury School of IT, University of Calcutta), Mr. Ishtiyaq Ahmad Shah(Security Consultant, FireEye), Mr. Dinesh O Bareja (COO – Open Security Alliance), Mr. Arijit Samanta (Regional Head, East India & Bangladesh, Kaspersky), Mr. Ritesh Bhatia (Director – Cybercrime Investigations, V4WEB Cybersecurity), Mr. Partha Sengupta (Vice President, ITC Infotech), Mr. Gigi Joseph (CISO, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre), Mr. Michael Joseph (Director, Systems Engineering, Fortinet), Mr. Arnab Bhattacharyya (Partner, Ernest & Young), Mr. Mohammad Zahinul Islam (Managing Director, lnter Exchange Solutions Limited, Bangladesh), Mr. Rana Sircar (Ericsson) etc. had graced the audience with their deep insight.

    

There were many interesting topics like Evolution of Cyber Resilience in Digital India, Cyber Crime, Cyber warfare, International Cyber Law, Digital Transformation is demanding “Tear down These Walls”,

Beyond Compliance- Security Challenges For Financial Services Industry, Integrated Architecture Approach to Securing your Enterprise, Security Orchestration and Managed Defense, Paradigm Shift of Indian Cyber Security, Vulnerabilities around Blockchain, Cyber Security Capacity Building – Turning Knowledge Into Performance, Threat Hunting, Infrastructure Security, Building Next Generation Cyber Defence, Rising Threats of Darknet, Taking Cyber Security To The Board Room, 5G Security etc.

Audience

There were 250+ people attended the event with delegations from all leading corporates, enterprises, academia, government, law enforcement agencies, manufacturers, providers etc. not only from india, but also from Bangladesh, Singapore, United States and United Kingdom in order to have true global flavor.

The audience were mainly from senior management, decision makers in the stature of MD, CEO, CIO, CFO, COO, GM etc.

 

There were 30+ Media Houses from print, television, radio and web platforms who were keen to spread the buzz to the mass audience.

Take Aways

The event had great deliberations in exchanging thoughts, knowledge, ideas, and case studies on cyber security among the speakers, audience, attendees, participating stakeholders. The same had not only generated great enthusiasm over networking, but also generated direct business opportunity.

The event has raised several voices, concerns from the community, extended government / policy makers’ roadmap, articulated steps on synchronization between stakeholders and surely created platform for enriched knowledge in order to have better wisdom. It was indeed a great platform for students, cyber aspirants to learn, engage and contribute.

6^th Edition of InfoQuest (the dedicated print journal of Information security) got unveiled during the summit. The print journal is working as a great tool as the mouthpiece of the industry in cyber security domain.

 

Infosec foundation had recognized several individuals and communities for their significant contribution in the domain.

  

Music was also not kept aside. Mr.Parijat played his solo songs ranging from Bob Dillon, RD Burman to his own Bengali Compositions whereas The Band Spectrum played the instrumental under the leadership of Arnab Bhattacharyya.

 

Infosec foundation is continuously working to connect human spirits beyond tools and technology and in effect, there was special attention on food apart from Music.

The lunch was consisting of Papri Chaat, Various Choices of Salads, Grilled Fish with Lemon Capers, Tandoori Chicken Butter Masala, Dhokar Dalna, Navratan Korma, Dal Makhni, Steamed Rice, Raita, Dahi Wada, Indian Bread, Kulcha, Hot Gulab Jamun and Ice Cream. Post Cocktail over snacs,  Dinner was of mix of Green Salad, Russian Salad, Fish Orly, Chicken Tikka Lababdar, Chhannar Dalna, Mixed Subzi Jhalfrezi, Rajma Masala, Peas and Corn Pulao, Anar Raita, Butter Naan, Assorted Sandesh, Angoori Rasmalai etc. The blend of traditional bengali cuisine with the nort indian delicacy had generated immense excitement in the audience.

The story does not end here. The journey will continue. Stay tuned for our upcoming movements.

More photographs can be fetched here.

Any queries can be directed to secretariat@infoconglobal.org