The Story of Bagh Bahadur

Am often reminded of this wonderful story whenever there is an infection point threatening the human race. This is a story which my granddad told me and I have modified it a bit to suit the context.

Some time ago, in the town of Dandeli in Karnataka(India), there used to be a huge fascination for tigers. Bagh Bahadur who was a migrant from West Bengal had grown up in this village and a keen observer of tigers. When he could not get decent job, he took to street entertainment where in he body painted himself like a tiger and entertained people with his antics. Very soon he became a popular figure in the villages surrpounding Dandeli. Bagh Bahadur was a big hit with children as he had good perceptive and cognitive skills which allowed him to judge the mood of the audience and customise his acts. While he made good money, he was not aware of the adversity which lay ahead.

Teechappa had just returned from Banglore city and realised an opportunity to make money from the same trade. With the intentions of disrupting this space and scaling up operations across the state, he created a robotic tiger and trained it will all the available knowledge on street entertainment. After he was ready with his prototype, he did a marketing blitz and launched his robo tiger - Yakson. Soon Dandeli was talking about Yakson. The crowd began drifting towards Yakson - largely out of curiosity. Yakson was consistent in his performances and kept doing all the antics which Bagh Bahadur used to do. Infact Yakson being a robotic tiger could growl louder, jump higher and perform longer than Bagh Bahadur. The children simply loved it.

While Bagh Bahadur rubbished the feats of Yakson initially, he became more and more concerned as days passed. His income kept dwindling and he was finding it difficult to make ends meet. He had to take a desperate step to save his career. He announced an open challenge that he would battle it out with Yakson. While the villagers were shocked and tried to dissuade him, he stuck to his guns.

Teechappa sensed an opportunity to hit the final nail in the coffin. He accepted the challenge and called Bagh Bahadur to an open ground in Dandeli. A date was fixed and the arena was built. The news spread like wild fire and the villagers were pretty excited to witness this battle of Man versus Machine. The show was a complete sellout and it was decided that the winner would take away the entire booty.

The day arrived and Bagh Bahadur came in his best colours. Yakson had done all the homework. The local magistrate and Superintendent of police were made the judges. The contest had begun. Bagh Bahadur displayed his best tricks and earned the applause of the crowd. Yakson matched all and did better to earn a louder applause. The frustration of Bagh Bahadur was getting higher as Yakson's showmanship was making him the favourite. He had to make a last attempt to go for the kill.

A thought struck him as to what could be a differentiator and he realised that it's was his being a human. He asked Yakson to emote and cry like him. Yakson was not too successful at that. The crowd slowly started drifting. Bagh Bahadur struck his final blow. He asked a few people in the audience and come up and volunteer for the final act. A few suspecting people volunteered. Bagh Bahadur asked them to come ahead and put their fingers into the jaws of first himself and then Yakson. The frightened villagers refused to place their fingers in the robotic tiger. Bagh Bahadur had struck the final blow. The judges made their decision and Bagh Bahadur was crowned the winner. Teechappa knew he had lots of work to do - but wowed to return.

The above story does connect to the emergence of Artificial Intelligence and it's intrusion in our lives. Yakson which personifies AI which is showing promise and is already helping automate routine tasks. While directionally the attempt is to replicate human intelligence, that may still be many years away.

But the above leaves a lot of questions into my mind

Will Bagh Bahadur win Round 2 when Yakson comes back with more "Deep Learning"?

Can Yakson really replicate human being and we see the emergence of a 4th gender ?

What do we need to do with our careers with the advent of this tech disruption ?

Would be keen to hear your own questions / answers.

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