myownniche

Classic Incantations - Experience of a lifetime

2012-01-27T01:32:00.001+05:30

When I first heard that a German Orchestra was going toperform A R Rahman's film scores in five Indian cities, I never thought I would get a chance to watch it. In all previous cases of his concerts that happened inside the country,I never got to watch any. But this time, I strongly felt thatI was going to attend it.

The "Effort" that lead to "The Pass"

It all started with LAPP India, the sponsors for the eventstarting the Facebook page with the “Info” section giving out this.

“All you A. R. Rahmanfans, here’s your chance to pay a tribute to him.This January, the GermanOrchestra 'Babelsberg' will play Rahman's scores in five different cities. Keepfollowing this page and the updates to get lucky and receive an invitation!”

I don’t remember how I landed up at the page though. I thought I'll give a try anyway.

My first try was a failure.

But hope grew as I got the reply the next day saying that Ihave to do more and since I didn’t have anything in my mind at that point oftime, I posted this and it happened. I got the invite.

They call me "writer" too (Nobody 'dared' to address me that before!). I thanked them, by plagiarizing A R Rahman’s Oscar acceptancespeech. They informed that all will get unique codes tobe used to get the passes.

The excitement triggered the immediate query.

They posted a listwhich confirmed my name in it.

In between to show that I am active there (although I was pretty inactive!), I tried this too.

The impatience grew.

Then they said this.

I was one among them and thought I willmiss a concert opportunity this time too. But they asked to add “LAPP India Execution” as a friend in Facebook and within 1-2 days I got my unique code/reference number.

As per their advice, I had to collect the pass a day before (12 noon -7 pm) at Max Mueller Bhavan orjust before the concert (3pm -7 pm) at the venue. An official trip came in between on the day prior tothe concert. But I reached back in time at 6 pm. I got the pass after divulgingthe reference number to the LAPP India representative and thanked him. I forgot to ask his name as I wasso excited.

The Concert

I reached the venueat 5 pm and had to wait along with others in the queue to enter. The waitoutside lasted till 5.45 pm. Then we all had to wait just outside the doorstill 6.15 pm. Then came in many well-known personalities including Vairamuthu, Suhasini,Ranjit Barot, singers Karthik, Sreenivas, Shweta Mohan etc. and Rahman’s familycame in too. The silent auditorium became active when the cameras flashed non-stopand Rajnikanth walked in. Hoots and whistles all over. A R Rahman followed.

The proceedings started with Indian and German National Anthems.Three dignitaries from Max Mueller Bhavan, German consulate andLAPP India talked about the Germany-India2011-12: Infinite Opportunities, just before the concert.

The Repertoire

The orchestra started with the “Warriors of Heaven and EarthSuite” which played the main melody and other pieces (like Horses) from the score of the movie. The strings, brass, percussion and KMMC choirwas in perfect harmony.

The following piece was the “Lagaan Theme” that comes as thelast track in the CD. The KMMC choir was awesome in this piece. All instrumentscame alive in this performance. Liveorchestra took the music to a different level.

“The Rising” suite followed. To be honest, I had forgottenmany pieces in the movie. Although I felt familiar at places, I couldn’t dig itfrom my memory. It was a calm piece. I guess "Mangal Mangal" can't have an engaging orchestral interpretation, as I didn't hear it.

“Passage Suite” featured solo by Kavita Baliga and was soamazed how vocals can just define the whole “Aria” track. It was heavenly. Theorchestra easily followed her vocals.

“Cry of the Rose” featured tracks from Roja. It started withthe finishing portions of “Thamizha Thamizha” which suited the live orchestral version so well and then went on to “KaadhalRojaave/Roja Jaaneman”. Navin’s flute rendition made me feel that these are timeless masterpieces. The orchestra complemented well.

“Enthiran/Robot Suite” started with a mismatch (I felt so, may be I'm wrong) between the visuals and the pieces. KMMC choir performed “ArimaArima”, which sounded good although I felt it needs many more vocalists in the choir to give that effect when we watch it on a cinema screen. But, “Puthiya Manitha” was too good. It was great. Toknow what we witnessed and listened to, just observe where all the tune is used inthe movie, especially at the movie end credits. The performance gave that proper symphony effect. And never thoughtthat it will sound so grand. The orchestra was simply amazing.

“127 Hours Suite” started with “If I Rise”, followed with “Tearsof Sun”. I was expecting “Liberation” themes to make it large. It didn’thappen. The orchestra was so good that I didn’t miss them.

“Lord of the Rings Suite” was grand with the vocals and theinstruments were all over the place. A special mention to the male vocalist,Arun HK. His vocal range is amazing.Kavita Baliga was splendid too. The “Lothlorien” piece was too good.

The interval followed. A short film on KMMC MusicConservatory was played. Audience loved it.

“Bombay Theme” opened the second half. Navin’s rendition onflute was superb. The orchestra, especially strings, made it grand. The orchestra didn’t doanything different, but it was enough. After all, the same version is beingwidely used all over the globe because of its universal appeal.

“Tribute to Indian Composers” was splendid. It started witha piece by his father, R K Shekhar, followed by MSV, Ilaiyaraja (Sendoorappoove), SDBurman, Naushad, Laxmikant Pyarelal (Hero), Jatin-Lalit (Pehla Nasha) and SEL (KalHo Naa Ho). Apologies for the ones I missed. But, the piece became grand by asudden switch to ARR's tracks. “Kannalane/Kehna Hi Kya” was too good and then thoseepic portions from “Oruvan Oruvan Muthalali” followed. The orchestra waswonderful on all instruments. The applause at the end was deafening.

“Elizabeth: The Golden Age Suite” again showcased theimportance of vocals. A girl from the KMMC choir took the lead. The orchestrafollowed it very well. I guess the lead portion was the “Divinity Theme”.

“Netaji Suite” started with portions from “Azaadi”. Thevisuals gave a patriotic feel. The orchestra played it well. I couldn’t reallyconnect the other portions and the names of those themes. Sounded familiar, butwas elusive.

“Meenaxi Suite” had some beautiful pieces from the movie.The visuals were a tribute to Indian beauties such as Madhubala, Nargis,Hemamalini, Madhuri Dixit etc. to name a few. The orchestra was good and kept aminimal character.

“Slumdog Millionaire Suite” started with the “Latika’s Theme”.The vocals by KMMC choir added the beauty. “Mausam and Escape” followed. Asad Khancame on stage with Sitar. I felt he made a few mistakes here and there (Again, I maybe wrong!). A R Rahman came on stage and sat at the piano. Both played aJugalbandi kind as a beginning and the orchestra joined them. It was a wonderful finale.

The "Swades Theme Suite" (which should have played before "Netaji Suite"), was not played.

The felicitations for the Babelsberg Orchestra, the KMMC Choir,the soloists Asad Khan, Navin Iyer, Kavita Baliga & Arun H K, the conductorMatt Dunkley and the maestro followed. (TheMC told that Navin is getting engaged today. Best wishes to him)

After the felicitations, the orchestra performed “Aayo Re”from Water (incidentally, for which ARR has given himself 10/10). The male vocalists from KMMCchoir were too good (even with 1-2 mistakes here and there) and female vocalsdid their portions very well. The orchestra was splendid too.

The Man. The Music. The Legend

A few words. It was amazing to see what a simple and humble MAN couldcreate within 20 years of MUSIC, MUSIC and only MUSIC. And, only a true LEGEND can doa tribute to include even those who negatively criticized and took potshots at him when he flourished across theboundaries and won hearts.

Other Notes

I met Suresh Kumar of the famous “Background Score” blog. Talked tohim briefly.

They issued 1132 passes (the seating capacity of the hall!) in Chennai and the number of peoplewho couldn’t get was more than 4000. Although lady luck eludes me a lot, she gave me company atthe right time.

The experience was so unique that I’m sure I won’t forget itfor a long time.

And finally, Thank You A R Rahman, for your MUSIC.

Aren't they critical part of our society?

2011-12-08T20:35:00.001+05:30

I always find verifiable data and informationanswering lot of questions and clearing doubts. In statistics terms, it gives trends, seasonality,prove or disprove hypotheses, which helps us to substantiate facts and discardfactual errors. Economics data is something that fascinates me at presentbecause of my job as well as due to my general interest in the same. Asignificant data in the field is the economic value generated inside our country or the GDP(not going into detailed technicalities). Every analyst speaks of how much asector contributes to the growth of GDP or how much it pulls down andother stuff. But no one speaks anything about how much housemaids (I don’t knowif there is any better word to use here) contribute to this economy.

Even before women started coming into theskilled jobs that generate income (If I may count a homemaker as a skilledperson who is not generating income in economics sense) in large numbers, we had housemaids. Then,it was mainly supporting work. But now, they have become a critical ingredientof every family such that sometimes a child is more attached to them than theirmothers. But in the social psyche, wheredo they stand? Does anyone care about their lives? What pushes them to do suchhard jobs? Since they are mainly women, what do their husbands do?

I stay in an apartment where the housemaidcomes every day to clean and she is paid an amount less than Rs.1000. Since I’mnot paying it, I never thought if it was enough. She does the job at hand in 20-30minutes and does the same at other nearby apartments and goes back to her placefrom where she travels around 1-2 hours in the morning to come for work. Shedoesn’t come strictly on time, but she comes almost every day and tells inadvance when she doesn’t come. I’m not sure if she does the same work throughoutthe day too. Sometimes, she comes even when she is ill. She has two sons; oneis doing his engineering and the younger one in school. Somehow with her incomeand with some help from the houses where she work, she managed to pay the feesand other related expenses. Her husband doesn’t go for any work.

Currently, the elder son has some healthissues and he had to be admitted in hospital and she was not able to understandand explain what his illness is. The doctor told that it is fever and she wasnot able to understand what it means. He was taking medicines for a month.Yesterday, she came for work and told that his son needs an operation. Shelooked so absent minded while doing the work. After all, she is the mother. A mother may beconscious about what she is doing even when she’s very sick; but if her childis sick, I don’t know how to explain how a mother feels. She told me that shedoesn’t know what exactly is his illness or why is he being operated. I didn't know how to tell her that everything will be ok, even without knowing what exactly is the issue. Today,she didn’t come.

I’m not sure how many families would have sustained if the considerable inputs from housemaids had not beenthere. The surprising part is that we will easily stereotype them as depictedin that Tata Docomo Ad. May be the company had just used the normal societalnotions about housemaids. When Chetan Bhagat said he helped his maid and herdaughter, he was made fun of in every way possible in social media. Nobody wastrying to understand the significance of what he tried to convey. He evenmentioned that his family warned him before he helped. I don’t know the root cause of such behavioramong us. May be this is what we have ‘learned’ over decades and centuries. May be this the dark side of our 'glorious' traditions. May bewe are taking so many things for granted, about which we don’t even think orponder about. Coming back to the economics point, we may not be even realizing the value they are adding to this country by doing much work which don't count in any GDP numbers.

Like almost in any social aspect, here too Ihave only questions. Why do many of us treat them like second class citizens, onlybecause they were born in such conditions and had to struggle in life even fromtheir time of birth and so they are unprivileged? Why do many of us treat theminhumanly for even the most trivial of mistakes? Why wouldn’t we think that theirsons/daughters can also be like our sons/daughters, if proper resources areprovided? Why wouldn’t we think that they also have same rights as we enjoy?

One more point. In the traditional “breadwinner”stereotype, she is the one who is running the family in most cases I have seen, including the one I mentioned above. If he wasa responsible man, how would have been her life? I still don’t get the idea ofnot taking any responsibility, being a husband and father. May be ourpatriarchal leanings never taught men to own up responsibilities, but to haveonly power. Here again, I’m lost. I haveno idea. Why is it so? Is there something really wrong with how our society hasshaped up? I don’t know. The questions justremain.

Innovations and their aftermaths

2011-10-06T11:30:00.001+05:30

People surprise me a lot. I learn newthings from everyone around me, every time. But, the new levels of consumerismwhich traps people in and the way they succumb to it is something I can’t evencomprehend.

We are living in a world of products. Andthese products are from brands. And if you ask someone what’s a brand, no onecan give a right answer. Sometimes, a product itself is the brand. Sometimes, it’s aperson and sometimes it’s an idea and sometimes it’s just a fad. Everyone wantsto associate with some brands, for no reason but for just the sake ofassociating with the same. The story of brands started with innovations.

Innovation is an overused and abused word. Thenew world always meant innovation means products, which, sometimes one doesn’teven need and that sell in large numbers as everyone needs a share of the pie. Thebiggest driver of capitalist economy also was based on these innovations wherethe one who innovated and made money out of it controlled the ones who couldn’t.The supposed-to-be world’s best companies based on the brand equity (whateverthat means) or the market value are the ones who produce stuff which are borneout of this ‘human ingenuity’.

The other –isms suffered because everyonein this world wanted a piece and to be part of innovation driven capitalism. Butthere is a dark side to this story. The people who were engaged in appreciatingthese innovations resulting in new products were never concerned about how theywere getting produced. Mass production is lovely word for the producers. Buthow’s it done? There you’ll see stories like this one. But, somehow and surprisingly,it doesn’t affect anyone. There’s no hue and cry on the same. But when thecompany’s owner dies, it’s as if a catastrophe has happened. Let’sgo a bit deeper.

If these innovations didn’t result inblockbuster products, you would be answerable to your shareholders. If these blockbusterproducts are not made in bulk, after the emotionally moving marketing gimmicks,you can’t sell accordingly to the demand. And to make this bulk productionpossible, factory workers have to over work at cheap labour and with noovertime dues, so that the cost at which these products are being made will bejust pittance compared to the final selling price of the product. If such lowcost production had not been possible, these ‘blockbuster’ companies based on ‘impressive’sales wouldn’t have made any person ‘iconic’. So, what makes these ‘iconic’people ‘visionaries’? Does those Asian and African blood and sweat count in?But, yeah, that’s the world order.

Consumerism, as a natural progression ofcapitalist economy, has ensured that any shit can be sold in this world, with takers. Ifthere are no takers, create them. America is a land where workers’ rights were seriouslytaken in to account. Even the history of MayDay as worker’s day has significant contribution from the country. And, it’san irony that the companies from same America are driving inhuman conditionsfor workers worldwide, in the name of outsourcing and low cost production. But, incase if these low cost production workers fight for their right and shut downat the same time, which may sound least probable but possible, the salesnumbers will go down the drain, blockbuster companies will go bust and theinnovations will look stupid and no comments on the icons and visionaries.

To end abruptly, I stop with a thought. Whenwe become “proud owner of product x”, who is more important here? I still don’tget it when someone says that.

Me vs. Me

2011-10-02T11:53:00.002+05:30

The topic is religion and faith. I may sound stupid, offensive etc. So, it's just my opinion.

I was bornin a religion because my parents belong to that religion. Like the 99% of otherkids, I was also introduced into the religion and my growing up is much relatedto the activities as part of that religion. I admit that many of my beautifulchildhood memories are also associated with the same. It was all about, “Godwill hear a child's prayers more than adults” and such. So, till a stage ofgrowing up, it was serious matter for me and I was very much involved. Education,especially science, had some other story to tell through the proofs it offeredin subjects such as Physics, biology etc. Then then questions started in mind and increased in number more thanthe answers anyone could give.

Even when I saw people thanking god forgood things in life and attributing the wonders in this world and universe tohim/her, nobody gave me explanation for natural disasters and accidents. No onegave any explanation for diseases for which there were no remedies. No onegave any explanation for people fighting in name of religions and killing peoplewho followed other religions, in the name of their respective gods. No one gave any explanations about why god was masculine and there were different rulesfor men and women. No one knew why they ate only vegetarian food as pat of their religious beliefs. There I started questioning myself and what I learnedthroughout.

The questions never stopped. If rains areattributed to god, whose responsibility is floods? Don’t tell me it’s due tohumans, because it used to flood even where humans didn’t interfere at all. Whyis human ingenuity considered below that supernatural power, which no one hasever found anything about? When the best education has taught me enough things to explain thingswithout god, why should I worry about that entity? Why should one fear god ifhe is the one who does only good? Isn’t the religious faith and other superstitionsmake our life miserable than anything else, also with many worries aboutfuture? When I find out reasons not to believe in god and almostno reason to believe in god, what shall I do?

In education, somewhere down the line Ilearned about the normal distribution which gives almost correct explanation ofthe anything random happening in this world. So to take the two extremes of goodand bad, there’s always things that happen most of the time, which comprisesall the normally good and bad things, and in rare cases extremely good or badthings can happen. Mathematically, it may have limitations, but still it givesmore satisfying explanation than any religion’s version about god. And thatrandomness is acceptable and rational. Won’t this give the proper explanationthat the future, even the immediate future is just another random event, andnot controlled by some power? There, doesn't the whole astrology sound meaningless?

Coming back to science, please don’t tellme that science still don’t explain many things. Since science in 2011 is notwhat it was in 1911, it is just normal that science in 2111 will give you moreexplanations. That’s the scientific way. And I find my mind free and my thoughts arefree of any baggage, this way. So, are the explanations complex or simple?

Still, there are questions. The thoughtsand debates continue….but as someone pointed it rightly, there are myths and some of the active myths are called religions.

Chennai Auto Rickshaw drivers & Some Basic Economics lessons

2011-08-25T11:27:00.001+05:30

In a city I like (love is always for Kochi) for its “better than peers” infrastructure and a human face, Chennai has a lot…quite a lot to explore. Apart from the food outlets, my initial face to face interactions was with the necessary evil part of our public transport system; the auto rickshaws (autos from here on), to be exact the drivers. In Chennai, they don’t use meters in autos. If you take autos, it’s based on the destinations. However close you are, it’s what the driver decides and asks.

So, on the first day to office, I got ready a bit early and was waiting for an auto. An auto came to me. I told him the location and also asked him how much will it be. He told Rs. 70. Although I was a bit shocked to hear that, I asked him why it’s so high. He told me that it’s a one way, so has to run more distance. But, Google Maps has already informed me that this one way will increase the trip distance from 2 km to 2.5 km. I tried to argue and he came down to Rs. 50. He didn’t budge further. He moved on. Then, the next one came, he asked for Rs. 40. I was startled again (considering that the previous guy asked Rs. 70). Still, I tried to get it down. I told him that I will give Rs. 30. To my surprise again, he agreed. The real stuff was during journey. I told him that even at Rs. 30 it is Rs. 12/km, which is high. Also, I told him the fact that there are some drivers who are even asking insane amounts as high as Rs. 70. He smiled and told me, “Sir, I know it’s high. That’s why people are ready to face any difficulties and take share autos”. He knew basic economics.

That was my introduction to share autos. To know share autos, you just have to image how school children are taken in autos and Maruti Omni vans in our cities. This is even worse. And people are ready to take such difficulties, only because of the reason which the sensible auto driver told me. So, a few times, I tried going in these share autos and found that although comfortable only when not crowded, this was damn cheap. How else would you explain the same distance, that costs minimum Rs. 30 in autos after all arguments, will make you poor only by Rs. 5 or Rs. 7 or Rs. 10? When crowded, it’s another ball game though. And a funny part, you get small plastic chairs to sit at the back of these share autos which will give a lateral view from the back of these vehicles. Once or twice, when I had ample time, I tried that too.

So, I tried to understand what forces some auto drivers to ask this insane amount of money. Some days passed, with me successfully negotiating down to Rs. 30 almost every single day. One day I asked an auto driver how much distance he drives a day and how much of that with passengers. The answer was startling. He told me that he drives around 100 kms a day in the Chennai city and he gets people for only about 50 kms. I asked him without much thought, “Isn’t it better to take people even at low rates than driving without anyone and spending almost the same amount of fuel? (In a sense, Opportunity Cost in economics parlance)”. Even though it was without much thought, I found that it was a useful one. I used this question on every further day as well. Almost every driver pondered over it with silence and the result was that no one asked any extra money when I got down. What surprised me was the fact that almost all of them didn’t even think how much revenue they lost by driving without passengers. One day, a driver took only Rs. 25 from me.

Then one day I got that famous reply, which we all love, from one auto driver. “One person like you can’t change the entire auto drivers”. I knew I had no convincing reply to tell him. But, I told him that I know that fact very well and I’ll still try because the ones who don’t know will at least think about it and mostly won’t repeat the same because it helps him as well as the travellers.

The arguments still continue but that question always helps. The funny part is that most of the arguments are in Tamil, a language which I know (no, partly know!) only from A R Rahman songs and mostly Tamil movies. Sometimes, I get really stuck for words. Still, I just try because I feel it’s worth than not trying at all.

Jamal & Salim

2011-07-23T21:40:00.004+05:30

When Danny Boyle made a very small film in 2008 with new comers, except for Anil Kapoor, playing the lead and other characters, the movie had not takers. No distributor was confident enough to take it up, with recession setting in; the task became tougher for the producers to sell the 'not-so-fascinating-product'. The only backing the movie had was a nice story, a crisp screenplay, a steady mix of genres in music, other technically brilliant contributors and a classy director at the helm of affairs. The movie somehow got out of the can; it touched a chord with the commonest of the common people, who happens to constitute a majority in this world, across the globe. Although the movie had to withstand a lot of criticisms from pseudo and ‘real’ intellectuals, at home and abroad, about selling India’s filth and poverty to the West and the rest of the world, everyone knew that much of the facts were not far from truth.

Anyway, the movie is not the point here. I watched the movie two weeks back and one thing I really observed, closely for the first time, is the characterization of the two brothers; Jamal & Salim. The author or screenplay writer may not have meant it the way I think, but there is something lively and interesting about these too characters.

The story’s hero is Jamal. He’s in pursuit of the girl with that quintessential Bollywoodish happy ending and Salim playing the villain at times, he’s definitely the hero, in every conventional sense. Jamal is a resilient character. He waits with patience all the years for his love. In the beginning, he’s the little brat, who always used to be bullied by Salim, but being younger he trusts his elder brother Salim many a time. He shows his enthusiasm when he tries his best to get his superstar idol’s autograph. He’s heartbroken when he finds out that it’s being sold for money by his big brother. But, soon life gets complicated with his mother dying in front of his eyes. He, along with his brother, gets lured into the trap when they see money. He finds his love, for whom he comes back from Agra, finding out that she was alive and there he lose her again. With his optimism not dying out even a bit, the life rightly or coincidentally teaches him whatever he needs to snatch that victory that not many can even dream of and finally he gets his girl. Although here luck helps the brave, the resilience makes him cross all hurdles and helps even get rich on the way. He's that character everyone may want to be.

In contrast, Salim’s character is different. He’s shady, dark and unpredictable. He bullies his younger brother; he sells Jamal’s prized possession of autograph from some change. He too goes through the pain seeing his mother die in flames, along with this brother and both of them falls in to the same trap. Realizing the truth, Salim runs away from it, but not without saving his brother. They make a living in Agra and he agrees to come back with Jamal to find the girl. There he changes his mind to take Latika for himself and when the urban economic growth made inroads in Mumbai, Salim, becomes a giant in his own right under his underworld boss. He lets the girl go to his boss and once he snatches her away from Jamal. But, finally even when he knew for sure that he will die, he lets her off and helps her to reach Jamal. Salim’s character doesn’t get a chance to celebrate at the end of the movie.

Salim's character is full of contradictions. He’s bad; at the same time he’s also good. He’s real. He is the one, at any age, who takes all the DECISIONS; of selling Jamal’s autograph, saving his younger brother from the begging racket, taking the girl with him, making her available to his boss, snatching her from his younger brother on his boss’s orders, and finally risk his own life to let her go to Jamal. He never celebrates his life. But, he’s the one who gives the story a happy ending, at his own life’s cost. His character reminds us about there’s more to life, behind and beyond those happy endings. He's that character no one may want to be.

And, the movie ends with a victory track that made, and continues to make, its mark all over the world, which almost every radio listening, TV watching, iPod ‘wielding’, Internet accessing audience has heard it at least once, and may be many times more. And, in this fast changing world, maybe, we better should just worry about the results, in this case, the ending, mostly the happy ending. The character analyses, although with zilch expertise above, may not even deserve and have a scope.

Manali - 4 Days of Fun, Excitement and Exhilaration

2011-06-19T21:45:00.005+05:30

This post is very very very long. I didn't intend to make the post this long. Sincere apologies in advance, if you fall asleep while reading this ;)

Day 0 – Delhi

From the time when we 16 of us knew that we were going to Manali, all of us were excited. We badly needed a break from the class room sessions which continued even during weekends. So, the day arrived when we packed our stuff, missing lots of things from the list the organizers had given us. The excitement was getting built up to an extent where the afternoon sessions went without much of paying attention from our side. So, the session was done with at 5 pm and we got to know that a bright Orange Volvo 9400 was waiting for us to take us to Manali. We got in and we started at around 6.30 pm.

The first stop was at Murthal, where we stopped to have dinner at a Punjabi Dhaba. Even though it was all vegetarian, the freshness of the food items, especially the fresh Makhan (Butter or Ghee, I guess) made it up for the same. The journey continued and after some random and intermittent stretches of sleep, the bus started climbing the mountains. The zig-zag movements up the mountains, overtaking big trucks even at the most dangerous curves, thanks to our graciously old, but really strong driver, gave many instants where one even fails to take breaths. The journey continued in National Highway 21.

Day 1 – Manali

The early morning was completely on mountains. We had a small break at a hotel and we continued the journey. If one side looked majestic with rocks and trees on mountains, the other side offered depths than may even go down around 200-300 metres in straight line stretches. But, somehow the climbing didn’t make it look so dangerous that we were enjoying the beauty of the water flowing down and also the Sainj power station, where we had a look of the majestic power of flowing water, although the project generates only around 100 MW of power.

We reached Kullu and the roads became narrow such that we had to struggle a bit as the road traffic was increasing. The view of mountains, rivers and trees were so beautiful along Kullu and we had to move around 40 kms further to reach Manali and the stretch got even tougher with small road (A bit ironic for a National Highway!) and more vehicles. But, we reached around 9.30 am at Manali. We had to move out of the bus at the Aloo ground (Guess this was the name), from where we had to catch the SUVs to our base camp. The base camp had all tented accommodation. Even the bathroom and the toilets were tented!

We all got ready and the facilitator, Ms. K, told us about the day’s plan and we had breakfast and she got us to do some team activities, after which followed the discussions. The anticipation about the trek in the afternoon made me want the time to run as fast as possible. Then we had lunch and everyone was ready for the trek. We had to move around 3 kms up the mountains in Manali and we reached a market place. From the parking spot, we walked up through a road where we got to see the locals who were all engaged in selling stuffs to the tourists. We walked through some very narrow concrete tracks and there we were at a walkway from where we started our trek.

The initial excitement pushed everyone to rush their first steps on the mountains and after a few minutes we realized that gravity doesn’t leave you so easily when you climb up. We had to stay and control our breaths after moving vertically every 10 metres, but we moved on. At around 200 metres elevation, another facilitator Mr. P, also a trekking expert who were accompanying us explained about the waterfalls we were approaching. It’s called the Jogni falls and he explained about the beliefs around it, how people meditate under the falls inside the cave-like spaces under the rocks. We were not allowed to go in the water, but we went and touched the water and washed our faces and realized why we were not allowed to go in the water. It was damn too cold; it was chilling cold.

Evening was fast approaching and we started our return. The return seemed so fast because this time gravity was with us and a bit dangerous as there was a possibility of slipping, but everything went fine and we were back at the walkway from where we started and within no time we reached the parking lot, from where we got back to the base camp. They call it the “acclimatization trek” to make us familiar with the trekking environment.

The night, we were given roles for the next day’s real trek and we found that we would be given a hand-drawn map and some viewpoints to find our own way and we had to make arrangements on our own about the water, light food etc we were carrying. Everything was explained and all arrangements were made and we were ready for the next day’s trek and we went back to our allotted tents. Two people had to stay in one tent. They gave us the sleeping bags that kept us warm during the night. That was the first day in my life I stayed inside a tent. By the way, did I mention that we spotted a small snake just below our tent inside the rocks, playing peekaboo with us, whenever we were entering and going out of it?

Day 2 – Kothi to Gulaba

The excitement about the “real” trek made us all get ready in the morning at around 8 am itself (although we were late from the directed time!) and after the breakfast we had to complete an activity before we left for the trek. The activity was tent making, blindfolded with one person, who could see can explain the directions. We did a good job as we found the tent stay put. We left immediately for the trek. The place from where we had to start is named Kothi, 15 kms away from our base camp at Manali (at 2050 metres above sea level). It took a while to reach the place and there we were at the starting point.

The guys who were assigned as the navigators started with map, compasses and viewpoints pics and we followed them. We moved in wrong directions at times and corrected the path with the help of the facilitators who were accompanying us. At the third viewpoint, we had a small activity and then we moved on. The stretch was a steep climb up and we managed to reach a level grounded track. The navigators had some tough time again going up and down for a bit, but we moved through the alternate track, although moving up, which had enough space to walk on. We got into a wrong track, which was a bit dangerous and I found a bit tough as my shoes didn’t hold much grip and the facilitators accompanying us, who are also trekking experts gave me a small tip to avoid slipping and it worked!

After some stretch we realized that we bypassed 1-2 viewpoints and we were ahead of time, when we were running around 50 minutes late after the initial hiccups to find the right trekking trails. Then we reached grasslands going up, where the trails were getting steeper, and then flatten for a bit, then gets steeper for a long stretch, then flatten and it went on. We reached a place where we saw the grasslands broken in the middle and rocks were everywhere. It looked like a landslide. We managed to climb up and we saw a tent there and thought that was the camp site and realized it belonged to a shepherd. Yeah, he was there with his herd of sheep. We realized that we had to move up again around 30-40 metres and we were all dead tired. Did I mention that we were carrying our backpacks with the sleeping bags, 2 litres of water and clothes for the next day and refreshments such as small packets of biscuits, dry-fruits etc.? :)

The final stretch was full of grass and though it was steep, baby steps took us to the camp site which looked beautiful under the scorching sun. It was too hot. We were at 700 meteres above the starting point at Kothi, (which was at 2200 metres) and the place is called Gulaba (2900 metres above sea level).

The lemon juice we got was lifesaver as we were dehydrated to the maximum possible extent. We had lunch and then rested till evening 5 pm. Then we were called for a meeting and was discussing about the trek and many had become so tired and became a bit cynical about the whole stuff. So, there were suggestions on some alternatives for the further trek which they agreed with. I wanted to get till the maximum they had already planned though. But I was not disappointed as we were continuing the trek next day also. The sunset happened in no time and the temperature dipped so fast. We had to get into our jackets and the sleeping bags ensured we slept peacefully. Again, the night was spent in make-shift tents. These tents were smaller. Although there was full moon, it was so dark. So, for lights, we just had torches. And, mine was not working!

Day 3 – Gulaba to Roli-Kholi

Since we had change in plans, the day’s trek was planned to limit within a stipulated duration and the plan was to return to the camp at Gulaba. So, at morning we started after the breakfast. The sky looked dark with clouds and sun was hiding behind them. The stretch from the beginning was like the final stretch of the last day. The mountain was full of shit, from sheep, wild goats and horses. The grass had nice grip, but the elevation was increasing faster than the day before.

I was with the guys who were at the front and the time we reached there it started raining. I tried to open the umbrella they gave me and found the handle in one hand and the rest in the other! Raindrops were lashing on us and the facilitators accompanying had a tarpaulin under which we stayed although I was getting wet from all sides as the winds were too strong and the tarpaulin had holes all over it! And everyone was wearing two layers on top and I just had one since I was sweating all along! And my lower was not covering till my feet, so they gave me a lower that was water proof, which helped this amateur (me!) to a great extent.

The rain subsided and we thought of getting back. Ms. K, who was with us, started descending. But, two guys in our group spotted a stretch of snow and wanted go up. They prodded me too. I had questions in my mind and we saw water flowing down so fast due to rains. It was still raining, and I had to hold the umbrella and them too, and I found a bit scary. But, one guys started climbing and I just followed and surprisingly within 5-10 minutes, we were there. The facilitators told us that we were around 400-500 metres above the Gulaba camp, which means at around 3300-3400 metres above sea level. We took hands full of snow, tried all poses while taking pics and was one of those memorable moments of the whole trip.

We didn't really touch Roli Kholi as it was around 200 more metres above (which we would have attempted if there was no rain) and from the current location itself we could see the final destination, Bhrigu Lake, which was in the earlier plan. Now, since we had no other options. We started descending. I found it easier, may be due to the grass grip, even though I was thinking that it could slip a lot due to water. And my doubts came true when I slipped 4-5 times although I didn’t fall and I was enjoying it. The thing that surprised me was that I was with the seasoned trekking guy, which I attributed to beginners’ luck and not me! In between we saw a foreigner family with Sherpas, moving up to Bhrigu lake. with mules carrying their stuff including the stove, tents, utensils etc. There was a 4-5 year old girl along with them, walking like the elders, taking no help. The sight was so inspiring. We reached back at the camp, had nice lunch and the plans were changed that we had to go back to the base camp.

We packed our stuff and due to rains, many things were wet and with heavier backpacks we had to climb down a steeper descent, to the road from which we had to catch the vehicle to base camp. It was so tough because of the trek in the morning, but we moved down and within 20-25 minutes we started moving on road. We found that by road, we had to cover around 25-30 kms till the basecamp and the hairpin bends and curves were getting steeper and steeper. Around 3-4 kms behind the base, we had to wait in traffic jams and as we do elsewhere in India, our driver went in the wrong lane as it was empty; we reached the camp without getting much late!

After some rest, we had two team activities and had short discussions on the same and everyone wanted to go to the centre of Manali town and some wanted to visit the famous Johnson Café (I heard it for the first time!). We walked down the road and found that we walked a lot without realizing it and some went to the Café and we just roamed around the Manali Food Festival (surprisingly more cloth shops than food shops) and Manali Carnival, which were really small versions of what we expected before we got into them. I observed that only the ones who were selling things in shops were the locals and everyone else outside the shops and was roaming around was a tourist, including us! We got back to the base camp in a taxi, had dinner and slept peacefully.

Day 4 – Manali to Kullu to Delhi

In the morning, I was one amongst the ones who woke up so early, took bath 48 hours after last bath and was ready for the day. I found myself an hour early before the time specified for breakfast. The view of mountains from the base camp was so beautiful and reminded me of the song "Puthu Vellai Mazhai" from the movie Roja. And I was surprised to see that everyone else, who enjoyed the view, humming the Hindi version of the same song, "Yeh Haseen Vaadiyaan"!

After breakfast, we had a couple of activities, which everyone thoroughly enjoyed and by around 12 noon, we had a small discussion about everyone in the group. I was a bit surprised about some comments about myself and we had lunch in between and we started our return journey, on the way which we had the icing on the cake! Yeah, we did Whitewater River Rafting!

This even bettered the snow! The guys who controlled the rafts gave us instructions and asked us to hold tight to the ropes and realized why they mentioned so. The rapids were breathtaking and the experience was so wonderful with chilling water falling all over us and we had a stop in between at a similar end from where we started and after 10-15 minutes we moved to the final destination. We changed to dry clothes and were ready for the return journey.

The main descent on roads after Kullu was frightening. Our Volvo was moving at high speeds and on the left side of our bus, the depths were around 200-300 metres, and water running deep in between the rocks, but we reached the bottom of those mountains within no time and by around 9 pm we were at the same hotel we stopped on Day 1 morning for break. We had dinner and the journey continued on mountains for 4-5 hours more and we reached Chandigarh and the roads and terrains looked familiar! My sleep was really bad because of the descent and most of the time I was awake.

Day 5 - Delhi

Early morning, we covered Chandigarh, Karnal etc. We stopped at a “Haveli” themed hotel called “Haveli” at Panipat and reached back at Delhi within 1-2 hours. The SUVs took us back to our accommodation facility and we were all so tired. After a thorough bath after 4 days and a breakfast, we all didn’t need more reasons to sleep.

This was one of the most memorable experiences of my life. I was surprised about my fitness levels and the intermittent courage (don’t know if it was courage or foolishness!) that forced me to take some risks. Although these 4-5 days would not have changed me or others individually, there were a few lessons learnt and had a really good time with the group that was worth it.

I don’t know what will better this experience, but life looks so interesting, beautiful and worthy, when one does something completely different from the usual routine.

Indian Agriculture - Are we facing a crisis?

2011-04-09T13:09:00.000+05:30

India is on a growth path. Industries are doing well and service sector is booming. Everywhere we get to see the resurgent India and the feel good factor is on the face in any form of media. But, there is always a pertinent question about Agriculture. We have started importing food grains. Prices are shooting up. The farmer suicides continue to be reported from every part of the country except a few states.

Why does a nation that grows at 8-9% can’t even save its farmers? Is our agrarian part of the economy breaking down? Where are we going wrong?

Just take a look at the table below. This is a very simple analysis courtesy a Ma'am at college.

Sectors	Share in GDP	Population Dependency
Primary	17%	60%
Secondary	29%	15%
Tertiary	54%	25%

The estimated contribution to Indian GDP by all three sectors is as given above (2008 data, not much change till 2011). The primary sector (constituting Agriculture, Fishing etc) contributes around 17%. The secondary sector (constituting Industries) contributes around 29% and the tertiary sector (constituting all the services) contributes around 54%.

Now, come to the percentages of population dependent on each of these sectors. 60% of the population is dependent on primary sector, where around 80-90% of these are dependent on agriculture itself. This means that around 50% of total India population is still dependent on agriculture. 15% of the population is dependent on secondary sector and the rest 25% is dependent on tertiary sector.

If we combine the secondary sector and the tertiary sector, around 83% of the GDP is contributed by these two sectors and 40% of the population is dependent on these sectors. But, in case of primary sector, the share in GDP is only 17% and 60% of the population is dependent on the same.

Coming to the growth story, everyone agrees upon the fact that our GDP is growing at 8-9% and will continue to do so. Now, let’s do a simple math. If the secondary and tertiary sectors grow at 10-11% YoY, and even if the primary sector doesn’t grow at all (0%), the growth is given by 83%*(10%-11%)+17%*0% = 8.3-9.13%. Did you notice?. Our GDP can grow at a rate of 8-9%, even without any growth in primary sector, especially agriculture!

So, 60% of our population lives in a no-growth sector, although in the current budget it’s claimed that it’s 5.4% (FY 2010-11), which is only an aberration for only this year. It has been normally around 1-2% for more than a decade, which is almost near to a no growth situation. This is also the reason why, the share of agriculture in Indian GDP is continuously reducing from the past and will continue to reduce, if status quo prevails.

This is alarming. Even if we suppose that more and more people are ready to move away from primary sector to the other two, are they skilled enough to do so? Are we investing enough in the skill development? Are we ready to move from people intensive agriculture to a mechanized one? Doesn’t the migration from hinterlands to big cities indicate that the agrarian system in this country is at crossroads, as they don’t get the right prices and due to other inefficiencies? Even if we don’t have revenue growth from agriculture, are we ready to support the ones who engage in agriculture? I guess, as of now, the answer is a resounding NO. One thing is sure. If we continue to observe how agriculture has been shaped up in our country in past 1-2 decades, we are going to face a crisis or we are already facing one. Some policy changes have to definitely happen and may be only some radical changes will help. That’s for sure.

Self-Interest

2011-02-22T11:05:00.000+05:30

Economics talks about a concept called efficiency. Although I’m not going into details, it just means that a person’s output is efficient when he/she acts in his/her self-interest. So, it simply means that the efficient outputs need to make an economy efficient and everyone should act in one’s own self-interest to achieve that efficiency. There’s nothing wrong with this concept because there have been many great minds supporting this idea in all walks of life.

I have not read any Ayn Rand books. There is one concept that’s often pointed out by many in talks and discussions where she staunchly supports capitalism claiming that capitalism is the perfect environment that enables a person to work for himself and innovate. And yes, many results are there to see all over the world. Here again, a person is acting according to his/her own interest or rather self-interest, which enables no interference from others and enabling him/her innovate.

Now, come to social context. If everyone acts on his or her own individual interests, shouldn’t the society become better? But does it happen? No. So, back to the main point. Why does everyone serving his/her own self-interest not resulting in a better world? That’s something to ponder about.

In Finance, there is an idea in practice called futures trading. A very scientific argument in favour of this is that speculation from all quarters that trade will result in the right price discovery of anything that’s traded. But, futures trading has resulted in many failures than successes for a few. The reason? In trading, you get profits when the prices are inflated without any reason. Then when they sell off to book profits, the poor farmer at the other end of the spectrum, for whom which futures trading is really 'supposed' to do good, gets hurt badly. The prices were never discovered rightly because, the human "greed" was never taken into account when they speculated.

Now, drawing parallels to the serving self-interest part. I’m not claiming futures trading or innovation is bad. But, we miss an important part in the claim of this "serving self-interest". So, let me add something to it. “Everyone acting in his/her own self-interest results in better system, when it doesn’t harm anyone else”. “When it doesn’t harm anyone else” is utterly ignored from every context. And, the examples are plenty from the global financial meltdown to the Maoists insurgence in central India to the current protests in the middle east; everywhere the ones who could act in their self-interest acted so. But, they didn’t realize that they were hurting many and that they were suppressing, hurting and ignoring dreams and aspirations of many.

Come to personal lives. Aren’t we all selfish in whatever we do? With our friends, relatives, loved ones etc. We are all selfish. But have you ever thought that, you could have made life better for them as well as you, if you were not hurting anyone? May be, we would even have had fewer divorces, fewer child abuses, fewer family issues, less criminals and better individuals.

I’m connecting being selfish and serving self-interest here because, selfish is always given a bad connotation. But, my argument is this. Why can’t we be selfish in a good sense, where we do good for us, but don’t hurt others? Wouldn’t it make a better us and a better environment for ourselves to live in?

Music Music & More Music

2011-02-01T00:10:00.001+05:30

What makes human beings different from animals is the human ability to create music, where as animals can sway only to nature's rhythms.

"Shylock was a man of no music", says Shakespeare in "Merchant of Venice". In simple terms he indicates how music makes a man, human.

Musicians who create music are the best mathematicians.

Music is what makes any sound different from being Noise.

Music is Time. Time is Music. Stop music, time stands still.

We Blog, Therefore We Are

2011-01-10T15:05:00.000+05:30

Title Courtesy: Indiblogger

Bangalore IndiBlogger #AkshayaPatra Bloggers' Meet. It was my first bloggers’ meet. To be honest, I felt a bit weird because I know only a few bloggers virtually and mostly no one in real. And, I was at loss initially because I didn’t know how to start up a chat with any of the bloggers who were present. But as the time went by, I slowly started to meet many bloggers and felt good that I came for the meet.

The “60 famous bloggers” was a surprise. Initially I thought it was actually the “famous” bloggers. But then I came to know that “famous” meant “random”. My mind went blank when I saw my name on screen and came to know that I was next to introduce. But, it didn’t go bad, I guess. It was just about my blog and a bit about me. The lunch by AkshayaPatra was a light one. They serve the same fresh lunch to around 1.2 million Indian children, who would have only a single square meal a day. And as mentioned by the president of the foundation, it’s just not serving food but a movement to get rid of one of the enemies of this country, the hunger. The introductions with many fellow bloggers were the one that broke the ice (for me!). To be honest, that was the best part of the meet. Met many bloggers. Avid twitterers. A 12th standard boy who blogs about technology (btw, he has an impressive blog!). After the same, we had some group discussions on topics that are relevant in blogging and social media. Then, had a nice near-zero(!) Bangalore traffic back to my room.

Three Cheers to Indiblogger team and the bloggers and blogging!

Ministry of Corruption, Scams and Scandals

2010-11-18T19:56:00.002+05:30

Official Circular

As we have observed an impressive line-up of corruption scandals of late such as the Common Wealth Games over-spending, Adarsh Housing Society apartment distribution, 2G spectrum allocation etc., it is high time that we form a long proposed “Ministry of Corruption, Scams and Scandals” or in short MoCSS. The Dept. of Corruption, Scams and Scandals (DoCSS), will have a cabinet minister and a Minister of State (MoS) each for every state in the country. The decision for the inception of this ministry was decided after the existing cabinet committee identified, in a crucial meeting that happened last night, that there is a strong scope of nationalizing such activities.

To lay down the guidelines for the activities to be taken up and run by MoCSS, a high level committee of experts (who has solid experience of scandals of minimum Rs. 50 crores) was constituted. They have come up with a strict set of guidelines according to which the ministry would be run and they are as below.

1. The cabinet minister should have an experience of being involved in at least a Rs. 1000 crore scam in any sector. In addition, if there is any experience in criminal activities such as siphoning of govt. funds, money laundering etc. can also add value to the resume.

2. The ministers of state (MoS) are in a different context in this ministry. For each state, there would an MoS each to ensure that there is equal participation from all the states. The funds to be looted by…err allocated to each MoS shoud depend on the population of each state. Btw, the current-hair-shortened-lady-chief-minister (name withheld due to privacy) is banned to become an MoS in this ministry.

3. The bureaucracy in this ministry would be the erstwhile officers who were forcefully expelled from other ministries and the seniority in each position would depend on the scale of “activities” they ran in the past.

4. The main activity of the ministry is identified to siphon off funds from the exchequer to fund the current corrupt activities and to given the intermittent scams and scandals a makeover, by making it regular. Every MoS would take the responsibility of publicizing the activities of the department by organizing the "Corruption Melas" in their respective states.

5. For the efficient and informed and misappropriate allocation of funds, an application in a white paper, in handwritten format only, will be eligible. No use of computer is allowed in creating the application form. Any 'wrong-doing' in this regard, or if found ineligible, the application would be rejected. The grants would be allocated even before it is sanctioned by the ministry and when sanctioned, if there is any extra money granted, it would be taken back by the Cabinet Minster himself. The extra money should be transferred to his personal account; the details would be given to you by him personally.

6. The employees to be appointed in this ministry should have at least 5 police cases, specifically criminal, filed against them. All these cases would be repealed once you are appointed an employee in the ministry.

7. The ministry should meet the Finance Minister immediately so as to request for funds for the ministry in the next Union Budget. Since there are many activities to be run in the country, around 10-15% of the spending estimates would be required by the ministry. It is estimated that when years pass by, this ministry would spend more than the Defence Ministry to help our country become super power by 2019 autumn.

8. Media would be given all data about the activities that would be happening inside the department since the activities are all transparent. Every year, a section media would be asked to partner with the department for the marketing of the various department activities and another section would be allowed to report the same and the rest would be given a chance in the subsequent years. A rotation policy should be set in place immediately.

9. Equality of gender is a must from the word go. The world comprises 50% men and 50% women. So, it is imperative that a 50-50 allocation should be done in our ministry too. Every committee would be headed by a Male and a Female Member and they select the committee members based on their discretion (family member, friends, erstwhile jail mates etc), but the 50-50 equation should be maintained.If there is any opposition in this regard, the state level committees can be organized based on the respective sex ratios in the state. But national committees in this ministry should have a strict 50-50 equation. MoCSS will thus become the first ministry with "equality of gender" being planned and practised from the inception itself.

10. There should be a strong rotation policy in the ministry. Every committee head and every other employee in each division of the department will have an option of working in other projects even when assigned a role in a project. This is to ensure proper employee participation and to increase employee interaction.

These are the main guidelines which would be strictly set but loosely followed for the efficient functioning of the ministry.

End of Circular

Vision: “As a responsible part of the government, we will aim to create a strong and corrupt ecosystem for scams and scandals in this country”

Mission: “It is our right and duty to involve each and every citizen of this country to become more corrupt than they are and make them participate in every scam and scandal possible, irrespective of their caste, creed, gender etc and also to reduce the urban-rural disparity in this regard”

Motto: “Satyameva 'Na' Jayathe”

“I support women’s rights. But, I’m not a feminist”

2010-10-25T23:11:00.000+05:30

……has become common statement these days. I have seen the same being repeated in social media, discussions in blogs and many have even started countering the same. I guess there is a misunderstanding in the way in which the word “Feminism” has been perceived by many.

From the time when man and woman lived in caves and when the concept of family (single partner!) came into being, men had to go out to make a living (provider) and women had to stay back taking care of children (nurturer). And subsequently, many beliefs and ridiculous laws came into prominence, which relegated women to secondary citizens because they stayed at homes, while the men made decision, which should also be the one main reason that drove men into chauvinism. It went to an extent where women were considered witches during dark ages, when women raised voices against the establishments that suppressed her.

So, if we take any uprising against some conventional establishment, it will have an ideology associated with it. When the revolution was for equality of classes, it was “Socialism”. When national spirits started rising in many nations, it was “Nationalism”. Ok. May be they are not the best analogies. But, when half of the human population, the women, had to fight for their rights, it was naturally termed “Feminism”. Ok, that's one way of looking at it.

As usually happens with any such revolution against established norms, the beginnings are always radical steps. It happened in case of feminism too. The bra burning episodes talk of the same. But, the concept is really misunderstood in recent times. "Feminism doesn’t mean to become a man or what he does". Feminism doesn’t mean women’s freedom from men, but from the patriarchal establishment, which men also need. Feminism isn’t something only women have to care about. It has to involve men too.

The problem, if I call so, is with the imagery that was created about feminism. Divorces increased. Families began to break. But, why is this associated with feminism? It’s just because, women now have the financial and economic and social independence, which they never had in the past and the reason why they had to stay in the marriages. Even now, many women stay in marriages for the sake of children. So, does that mean men are the culprits? I don’t think so too. If women retaliate with extreme steps like attacking (physically, financially etc.) men back, will it solve the problem? The answer is again, No.

I saw a video where young women and men doing street plays in Tamil Nadu on domestic violence, in which a 30-something man was sharing his experiences. He said that he had seen his father beating his mother during his childhood and he never saw any wrong in that. Even his mother didn’t convey her sufferings to him. Maybe, the patriarchal setup was so deep that even she would have thought it was her husband’s right to hit her (2-3 years back a pan-India survey showed that 54% of married women found it right to be hit by their husbands!). But, after seeing the street plays, this man in his 30s say that now he realized that his wife is also an individual with same rights as him. From the day on which he has seen the street plays, and talking to the young men and women who conducted them, he has never hit his wife and he repents his past and he said how happy their family is, unlike in the past. So, in a confined environment, there was no one to correct him. In the past, his wife suffered. The family suffered. From his point of view, they didn't have peace of mind. and he never realized that he was the sole reason. So, who is to be blamed here, the individuals or the system?

Getting the feminine aspects to the mainstream in running a family, a business, in a discussion, in policy making etc., which will involve more participation of the genders, their different sensibilities, talents etc. to create a better society, is the actual feminism. If a woman does what a man does, it’s not feminism. It’s the same as in the past with change in the protagonists. What difference will it make if it’s done by a man or a woman? And, I hope that’s the real meaning the young women and men have to understand; that sharing equal rights as individuals is what actually feminism strived to achieve and is badly required in several societies even now. So, know more about feminism. Read and discuss more about feminism. Form your own opinions and views without being influenced by anyone else.

So, if I support women’s rights, I am a feminist. And I have to be proud about it because I am participating to create a better social fabric.

About a Simple Man. Only Respect.

2010-10-04T14:55:00.000+05:30

I loved him very much. When I was around 10, he used to patiently answer many of my queries, most of them being repeated and recycled. He used to share many stories from the past (How he went to Burma before 1947; don't know if it's true!). He used to vividly explain the struggles and how it was all in the past. He used to bring fresh catch from the harbors and I miss them even now. Even though he fell victim to paralysis 14 years back, even though his speech was affected due to the same, somehow I could get what all he used to say. It was so comfortable to be in his company. No airs. Plain and simple talk. He was such a lovely man. Even though our family was so poor, he tried his level best to educate his kids as much as possible and I should definitely thank him for what we are now. He was such a simple man that I have never seen him to be demanding at all. The 86 years he lived on this earth is definitely worth it.

RIP Grandpa. I can only thank you for everything by trying to be as unassuming, as simple and as honest as you were. Will definitely miss you.

A Tale of Extravaganza!

2010-09-26T19:51:00.000+05:30

So, CWG will go on; may be with some hiccups here and there. Media celebrated the failures with ample footage. The intermittent positive vibes couldn’t be included in their “breaking news” topics as rest of the headlines was busy bashing the Organizing Committee. Social media also enjoyed the failures as much as possible with umpteen jokes, ranging from splendid to distasteful. Many got angry at the organizers when they saw the filth and the accidents; the same got angry with the media when they saw the images of the excellent facilities, which never got any mention in any media. Other countries initially criticized, but then agreed to come in. Some claimed it was because of the current Indian ‘clout’ across the globe. The CWG president also was quoted in media without any fail. Anyway, now it all looks like a interesting drama that’s going to unfold within a week of time. How will it go? I think no one knows how is it going to be.

What is the point of having such an extravaganza? It’s no bigger than a Football world cup or Olympics. Ok, I will leave out the comparisons. But in an event where 85 countries agreed to participate, it’s really important to show off our mettle and our current status of being on a solid path to be the next economic super power! No one will have a second opinion on the same.

A person, when he/she gets rich at the monetary level, his/her next step is to get acceptance from the society because as all know, even from childhood attention matters the most for any person. It's true for a nation also, I guess. India was long known to others as a poor and inept nation, but came to limelight when the country was liberalized in trade. The outsourcing business pulled India to a global stage. Barring the poor and hungry and considerably malnourished population (I’m not downplaying it!), India is a growing economic power which could even veto global conferences now. The clout is growing day by day and many are acknowledging it too. So, this is a stage where we have to prove ourselves. No doubt about it. But is it worth it?

One main aspect about the negative coverage in the media, was about the execution of different facilities. But, it is done by an unskilled, uneducated low level worker. An aspect that came off late in public was about the unmonitored and unsafe conditions in which these people are doing their work and the situations in which they live. Almost all of them are migrant labourers. They live in makeshift apartments. And, they don’t have any assets that they own for themselves. Basically, they are just having a hand to mouth existence. So what incentive does he/she has to complete something, as the global standards demand? Nothing.

Taking the case of this unskilled, uneducated low level worker, he/she won’t even know these ‘global’ standards and they are very much needed in this context, by the top level corrupted ones to loot as much as possible, a fact which we overlook. Also, latest news say that many such people have been evicted even from their makeshift and temporary livelihoods (where they would have lived permanently!), because they would be ‘eyesores’ for our ‘guests’. Where will they go? Will they be rehabilitated? No one has any answer. And, no one can do anything.

The advent of migrant labourers indicates one more alarming situation in our nation. Many are leaving agriculture and related occupations at their native places because of crop losses and ever increasing costs and since they are not skilled in anything else, they are forced to take up these jobs. So, it hurts economy on both fronts, where both the agriculture as well as these large project executions suffer. So, in a way, we are feeding our inefficiencies big time. Unless and until we put a check on them, it’s going to be really bad and we won’t be realizing how it will be hurting our economy. We won’t even know how much wrong our basics are.

Coming back to CWG, I’m still pestered by some questions. Is it worth such a level of spending (the numbers range from Rs.10000 crores to Rs. 60000 crores and even more) to show off our economic power? Are we covering up our weaknesses through this extravaganza? What will we do with these ‘splendid’ facilities in future? Won’t the land prices that increase considerably in Delhi hurt many? I am not sure. I don’t know.

Anyway, let’s just prepare for the worst and hope for the best.

Some "reality" in this "virtual" space

2010-09-14T02:29:00.004+05:30

At this hour (damn sleepy, pardon me if I go overboard sometimes down here in this post!), I’m executing a promise that I’ll write something in my blog as it is being left without any updates for long durations (basically it means that the posts are less). So, this person has ‘cajoled’ me to write something here.This person exists somewhere there in the real world. But I know her only through this virtual space (Cyber-space, is that sci-fi enough?). And she's an influential character (see what she's done at this point of time at night!).

When I started my blog, I never thought it will look like as it looks now (No, I didn’t mean this blogger template!). It was just fun and the boredom at the initial stages of my job gave me ample time to write down anything. I never thought I could write like this (some things have turned better, I think so!). But I still never think that I have that extra capability to pull readers to my blog. But off late, something really encourages me. It’s because of these very "beautiful" (pardon me, actually I don't know!) friends I have got over the cyber space.

At first, I have to say about this wonderful person with whom I share some kind of comfort level which I can’t even share with some of my close friends. She just said “I like reading your articles”, the reason for which I asked because, even I’m trying so hard to like my posts sometimes. But she asked me not to "fish" (how sad!) for praises. What to do? In a way, that’s also true! But seriously, such comments are making me a bit nervous now because I’m not sure if there’s something that was there in the previous posts which I should repeat in this one and further. I really don’t know. Chatting with her is another revelation. She’s such a wonderful soul to hear my ramblings (of course, I hear hers too!) over chat and yeah, she’s elder than me (But I promised that I won’t mention her age!). The kind of openness I could share with her (of course, I didn’t reveal my all secrets!), it’s pretty funny that, even when I have not seen her, I feel that she’s very influential on me, the proof being I'm posting this.

The second person with whom I interact has contacted me through Facebook. She told me that one aspect (which I'm also proud about!) that I highlight in many of my posts attracted her to my blog. Again I don’t know the person in real. But again, some nice message exchanges have happened, which were so warm and lovely.

Then there are many who just contact me once or twice and I don’t know them too in real. Still, may be after long time, they again come back with a note or a comment, which makes me believe that at least I’m not making people hate life, fall sleep or bored to death, because of what I write. And sometimes I feel that they are indeed saying “Not bad” after reading what I just scribble here.

So, these “real” friends in this “virtual” cyber space have given me something to rejoice (No cheerleaders! So some self *jigs*). The interactions are so rewarding. On an end note, I still don’t get why she told me “I like reading your articles”. Anyway, I acknowledge everything (For eg: roses, brickbats etc.) that is coming my way. After all it’s all for me and affects no one else. And yeah, it’s 'virtually' a 'really' humbling experience!

Do we need to defend A R Rahman?

2010-09-03T19:37:00.003+05:30

As a person who closely follows him and his music, I don’t think I have to try and defend his music. There’s no point. So to the question in the topic, it’s a straight answer. NO. We don’t have to defend A R Rahman in this situation. Even Rahman never defended his music by talking anything about it. He defends his music by making music and making more music. So in the wake of the CWG theme ‘fiasco’ (that’s what media says!), where the same sections of media which were praising him (which again was unwarranted and without any control!) till now, are trying to reduce him to a mere money-monger who asked Rs. 5 crores for the theme and forget to see some truths behind the man and the music. So I thought I would take a comprehensive look at his career. So, I’m sorry for such a long post.

Pre- Roja

He was mainly an advertisement jingle composer. And, since his father R K Shekhar was also a film composer, only the ones who belonged to that generation knew him. But, by proving his prowess in the ad world some people took note of him. And when Mani Ratnam was looking out for a new music composer for his new movie and since Mani’s cousin knew ARR, he was recommended for the same. Thus started a collaboration which in itself has become a landmark in the Indian Film Industry. ARR was paid Rs. 25000 for the same.

Roja & Post-Roja

We still have the audio cassette of Roja at home. There was nothing unusual about the cassette at that point of time. But later, I realized that there was something special about the cassettes and CDs in which ARR has given music. The noticeable aspect was that credits. The musicians who played various instruments, the ones who helped to mix it and even the ones who were part of the chorus were mentioned in the credits. It was a welcoming change. And it has been mentioned over and again in magazines, by the people who were/are involved. I have not seen such a thing in any other CDs here.

Rahman was busy breaking records and breaching musical boundaries. With Rangeela, he broke into the Hindi Film music scene too. Sony grabbed the chance to release one of his albums, a first for them to work with an Indian artist, with Vande Mataram releasing in 28 countries simultaneously. They gave him a chance to work with a musician of his choice. He selected Nustart Fateh Ali Khan, the choice I believe is one of the greatest associations Rahman has ever done.

Criticisms followed. People even claimed he was making music with software. When 1997 Filmfare music award went to Jatin-Lalit, they commented that they don’t need to grow long hair, make the producers to wait for months and work at midnight to get such accolades. There was no reply from Rahman. No talks. No statements. But Rahman replied. Through his music. The reply was Dil Se. Quite literally the reply was “from his heart”. Chaiyya Chaiyya became the first track to feature in UK Top 10 charts and the song revived Sukhwinder Singh’s career. And, currently, the Jatin-Lalit combo doesn’t exist anymore!

When the decade ended with the landmark “Taal”, he became the top composer in Hindi Film Music. The producers started to realize the worth of the long wait at his studio for even months and the singers realized the worth of losing their sleep in the nights to sing for him.

Post 2000 & Pre Oscars

When Airtel started their campaign, they roped in Rahman to score a jingle, which as per their current records, is the most downloaded music piece in mobile downloads in the world. Even now, after almost 10 years, every other ad jingle is yet to beat it.

When Kaho Naa Pyar Hai music became a raging hit in 2000, the same old comparisons, criticisms etc surfaced again. This time too Rahman never talked out to media. Nothing. But reply came through music. The soundtrack was for Lagaan, the first ever film production by Aamir Khan, which redefined many things in Indian Film making.

He was noted by Andrew Lloyd Webber, a giant in his own right, who wrote scores for the likes of “The Phantom of Opera” and was invited to score and produce music for “Bombay Dreams”. After that he scored for a bigger project, the stage musical for “Lord of the Rings”, where he collaborated with an all-female Finnish band, Varttina. In between, in 2003, he scored for a Chinese film “Warriors of Heaven and Earth”, where after hearing the score no one would ever expect that it’s an Indian composer who has combined the Chinese, Turkish and Indian sounds together to create such a beautiful soundtrack. In 2005, the TIME magazine critic, Richard Corliss, picked Roja as one among the top 10 soundtracks of all time.

He missed quite a few important projects domestically during these years because he had to give total attention to his foreign projects and so, for about 3-4 years, we got to hear only very few number of tracks from him. But, in 2006, he showed us how even a strumming rock guitar can infuse patriotism in a mass masala commercial movie. The background score of Rang De Basanti is bigger than the songs, and the movie minus even the small bit of its music is a dud. The Filmfare annual issues never had any changes in the “Top Music Composer” for years now.

Oscars & Post Oscars

Rahman understood in the initial period itself that Indian music can grow beyond its boundaries and its people and he knew that visibility was needed for the same. And he knew that it will happen through only music itself. Somehow, Slumdog Millionaire happened in 2008. When he got a Golden Globe, a BAFTA and an Oscar double, some detractors claimed that a musician can prove his mettle in the global music scene only if he wins Grammy. Unfortunately for them, he won that too. Then people targeted “Jai Ho”, claiming that it’s not his best and many more. But, the scale of achievement was unbeatable and Jai Ho became an anthem that went across the boundaries.

“Giving Back to Music and Society”

No one really knows about this side of Rahman. No one has any idea about what and how he gives back to music and society because the media never went/go beyond the peripheral stuff, where only films matter. The only other thing everyone hears is that he has launched many new singers, where he broke the monotony of using established singers and gave variety to the listeners. Many music directors just followed suit.

An important aspect he has sometimes mentioned during his Chinese film composition and the Lord of the Rings projects, and knowingly or unknowingly ignored by the media, was about the usage of Prague Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. He talked about the importance of live scores in the original soundtracks of movies. And also that he would start working in that direction. The result was the music school, the KM music conservatory, where he is trying to create such an orchestra and more importantly giving music lessons to students. The facts about the school itself would need another post to write about. As he says, it’s his small contribution back to the music.

When the Shahrukh starrer “Don” was released, the makers and music composers never gave any credit to the people who dealt with music department of old “Don”. Because our laws are designed in such a way that in such situations, the original creators can only crib. But, in Kal Ho Naa Ho, Karan Johar bought the rights to just use the “Pretty Woman” for Rs. 8 lakhs, because internationally they would have been sued. Since the movie had a significant number of screens in USA, if the track had been used without permission, one can foresee the consequences. In dealing with the rights of music, ARR even walked out of an SRK-Karan Johar film because they couldn’t compromise in the discussions on music rights. He has been fighting for music rights for music directors and lyricists from the time when he could do it. Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy and Vishal-Shekhar once gratefully acknowledged ARR’s role saying that only a music composer of his stature can do that and it would help them too in the future. Although, it’s not succeeded fully, the fight continues.

He never talks about his A R Rahman foundation, which engages in charity activities. He composed theme song for free for “Banyan”, an institute that take care of mentally challenged women. He did concerts free of cost all across the Tsunami affected coastal areas of Tamil Nadu. He collaborated with many musicians from across the world for the same in a track called “We can make it better”. He worked with UN for Anti-Tuberculosis campaign and the Millennium Development Goals, at the special invite from the then Secretary General, Kofi Annan. Many of his concerts were charity concerts. And many and many more.

But, no one knows about what he does because he never boasts about it and no one ever reports about it. As everyone who has interacted with him says, he still remains the same humble old ARR who started as a newbie in Roja. Even during the Oscar win, he claimed over and again that he sees it has a chance for more international collaborations for other people too and it would open new avenues for musicians, both insiders and outsiders.

The CWG Theme ‘fiasco’

What I wrote till now, is a background with which one has to look at Rahman and the issue here. Else, no one understands the real Rahman and the CWG theme track and the Rs. 5 crores.

Media asked him a question whether the theme will be like Waka Waka. He told them that their idea is to go beyond such a track and make it into a theme (Come Out and Play!) based track. But, how it’s being interpreted now in the media is there for everyone to see. Also, he asked media to portray positive image about our own games which we are hosting and now media is writing against him. If you dig some more, many comments that have come against the track are made up in the media and only a few are jumping in the bandwagon to pull him down. Such a rampant negative image for the track has given no chance for many to even to listen to the track. But the listens and downloads and many comments at websites indicate the track is on a positive side. Many like the song. Now, what the Organizing Committee is going to do is yet to be seen. The problem is that the comments from majority who like the song are somewhere hidden in this onslaught of negativity.

The Rs. 5 crores and 6 months everyone is talking about is another thing. I don’t know why ARR should compose a song free of cost for the Indian Government. He is just an entertainer who is giving his time and effort for something for which he has to be paid. And as media skillfully hides, it includes the performances during the opening and closing ceremonies. For Shahrukh Khan to dance in a Baraat, people offer more. When ARR created something original and that too for the country, why is Rs. 5 crores an issue? Basically he’s doing his work and getting his remuneration. And the amount was agreed upon by the Organizing Committee. As of now, it’s not yet proved if this sum is right or if he has asked for Rs. 15 crores before and it was brought down to Rs. 5 crores and all that. The problem here is that now it has become tax payers’ ‘valuable’ money, whereas if it was a movie production company’s money, no one would have cared. And the 6 months, the Organizing Committee asked him 6 months back and he started work then and the fact is that he's simultaneously working on multiple things and isn't it common sense to understand that this talk itself is point-less? Media, on the way of making the whole issue sensational, has averted all attention from the CWG corruption to ARR and is just doing what the Organizing Committee also would have wanted.

About criticism from people apart from media, they were always there. But now, since media’s and their goals are in the same track, it has become so easy for them. The likes of Louis banks, Aadesh Srivastava etc has every right to hold hatred and grudge against ARR because they never won accolades Oscars, 4 national awards and 25 Filmfare awards. They are not and can’t be what ARR is today.

The funny part is that African part of the song “Waka Waka” is a complete rip off from a 1986 track from Cameroon and it’s not credited by Shakira in the worldcup anthem version. The “Waving Flag” song was meant for a fight against poverty (just see the lyrics!) and as irony would have it, it was used by Coca Cola all across the globe during the world cup. The CWG Theme is the only complete original track and stand for what it is meant for. If it's good or bad, it's decided by listeners and not just a handful of journos.

Future

ARR has worked with many filmmakers and they know what they want from him and he gives them. So, it won’t affect him anyway. But, the negativity the media created may take some time to go away. I hope the same media won’t praise him either in the future. Because even that would be an insult to him.

When this is happening, the music he has done for “Endhiran” is ruling charts and breaking records in sales. The first song of “Jhootha Hi Sahi ” is out and the bit is as fresh as ever (see the comments in Facebook). And still, filmmakers are ready to queue up at his studio, waiting to pull night outs to get what he gives them. The queue at his studio will remain the same or increase in length.

A Hypothetical situation

ARR is getting many chances from outside India now. He has his own recording facilities in London and Los Angeles. So, if he decides, because of this CWG theme issue, that he will concentrate on only Hollywood and other foreign and non-Indian stuff, it would be just our loss. We will miss out on all his music, the anticipated collaborations and all that. But, I guess it’s better for him because he can work with better technology, better facilities, better "people" and more money.

And if that happens, the same media will write earnest requests to him to come back and do music for Indian films too. Indian media never fails to amuse me. :)

Why I wrote this

I just wanted to write something about the man and his music for a long time. So it was just some thoughts, mainly coupled with facts. Actually, what I wrote above are facts and facts only. I am not a die-hard fan who is blindly following him. But, I always believe that he is a kind of person and his music is a kind of stuff, if one would enact and follow, that can make this world a better place. I think so because it’s so hard for a person to be grounded and down to earth when you have achieved such heights in life and it’s so tough to constantly churn out high quality stuff again and again. The thought itself amazes me. That’s it.

Of course, JAI HO!

Post Midnight Babble!

2010-08-18T02:15:00.001+05:30

I'm enjoying my life now with many things happening and to do at the same time. Yeah, full of academic stuff. The only thing other than the academics I can regularly do is tweeting and more tweeting as my whole work is on the laptop and I'm quite regular at taking 'breaks'. ;)

When you have your hands full, you push yourself so hard that you find out your limits. Your psychological and physiological limits!! When you fall sick and then you pull off consecutive all-nighters (No pride! Actually, one of the stupidest things to do in my life!!) when you're recovering, you realize it may turn really bad sometimes. But, when things get done and work gets over, it's satisfying to the core.

But, I'm guessing how long will a human being can be just interested in completing tasks and getting satisfaction out of it. I have worked before. I am doing my MBA now. I have to work after this. And I get really vary when people say that they enjoyed their day because they had a satisfying day at work. What's there in their life that is satisfying other than work? I have no idea. I never felt so when I worked. And I don't want to be so when I get to work again. May be I should take more breaks to just take "rest", like I take Twitter breaks!

Ok. May be I am a bit too apprehensive. May be it's just that I was writing some random stuff! :) Yeah, this post is just a filler as I was not able to sleep and I remembered about the blog lying barren for so long!

In dire need of Healthy Humour!

2010-07-20T23:09:00.002+05:30

I don't think humour is something that one can write or do willingly. If something one writes happens to be seen as funny or humorous by others, then it can be called humorous. That also means that it's personal choice. Most of the times, what others find humorous may not be humorous to me. The issue starts when many who are desperate to show off. To show off that funny bone, many resort to even the lowest quality and cheesy stuff, which looks funny at the first look. But it's self-deprecating and shows even how much self-respect the person has, leave alone respect to others.

The trend of laughing at anything is good, when it doesn't belittle anyone else. The kind of humour which was there in the Malayalam movies of 80's and early 90's were purely intelligent stuff. Even when we laughed, we thought through them. But later, it made way for double meanings and slapstick comedies, which make me feel disgusting at even such lame attempts at humour. Many bollywood movies are treading similar ways and they are called brainless comedies by the makers themselves. Their argument is that the audience laugh at their distasteful one-liners, racist jokes, sexually targeted comments at women and what not. They come in front for fighting against injustices and all that real life drama too. Then, they say the reel and real are different.When their work represents them, doesn't it seem like double standards?

We are a sensitive nation. We have many sentiments such as language, regional, cultural, religious and many more to associate ourselves with. We get outrageous at the drop of a hat. We can laugh at ourselves too. The problem is when we have to resort to the level where we make a joke about something, hurt someone, create controversy and have to lament that we don't laugh at ourselves. It's just because we thought our lame humour to hit off with the audience, when we don't realize that we are dimwits to have resorted to such cheap tricks. A little more intelligence could have saved the day.

Why don't we try healthy humour? Why don't we try humour that doesn't hurt anyone? It may be impractical as somehow or the other everything and everyone is connected to each other. Still, doesn't it look a bit more intelligent and healthy and thoughtful than the desperate stuff we continue to do? Isn't that a better choice?

When religions don't evolve

2010-07-17T17:40:00.001+05:30

Women started to take up many jobs in research, teaching, science and technology, engineering etc. when there was not enough men left to be found qualified for these jobs . May be, if the jobs didn't grew to a level that it outnumbered the qualified men, we may have still had the all-men setup everywhere. Anyway, it was a natural phenomenon which was also triggered by the fact that many jobs shaped up where women could get into without breaching the societal constraints. But, we have come very much a long way from that distant past.

But, fortunately as the world progressed, economically as well as socially, the engagement of women in workforce helped humanity to move forward, which ensured a more participation in the society. To look form an industrial perspective, 50-60 years back, the producers, customers, marketers etc were targeting only men (I should say, it would have been so boring!). But now, we are even designing workplaces and fixing flexible schedules to accommodate women, young mothers etc., which explains the importance women has gained by themselves and their own efforts in current scenario.

It's good to gush about the things said above. But, I feel that much of the threats to these success stories are coming from some institutions within the society itself. Yes, I'm talking about Religions. I agree with all "good" things associated with them. But my worry is this; Aren't we still practicing and holding strong allegiance to some age old beliefs which didn't evolve with times? Why are we still not allowing religion as a personal choice? The dark ages are called dark ages because of the lack of free thought in the society. I believe that he Renaissance mainly helped the Church also to evolve. So, when such an evolved church say that ordaining women should be considered a crime as serious as pedophilia, I don't get where are we heading to? Ok, let me continue with this.

The main argument Church pits against ordaining women is that Jesus selected only men as his disciples. In past, men were controlling everything. It happened naturally as a result of the human evolution, beginning from when man had the role of taking care of the family. For the basic needs of food, clothing, shelter and may be even transportation, women had to rely on men. But when conditions improved and even in case of these basic needs, women could help themselves. Ok, here I'm not sure if the religions were designed to continue the status quo of men controlling women or if it was a natural result of the collective social thinking at that point of time. In any case, when women started to move out of men's shades, these directives, not only from religions, became shackles and gave rise to many movements such as feminism and the growing support to individualism gave much support to it.

Now we are in a society where men and women can be equal on any grounds. Even for the basic needs, there is no conventional stereotyping applicable on men or women in the present world. The demarcations between the conventional roles in any profession or responsibilities or duties are going away. But, the same old patriarchal set ups are holding firm ground, citing the religious text books which are based on that period's society and take the then social roles into consideration. The surprising fact is that every other product of human thinking such as science, politics, economics etc has evolved continuously with time, but in case of religions, we stay right at where we were.

It's time for religions to evolve. I believe that women can be ordained priests or bishops because, in a society where men and women are equal, even Jesus would have selected women as his disciples. Consider it as a profession with equal rights for men and women, in the institution called Church. The problem is with the arguments the Church cite in the current social context. We are now more than 2000 years hence the religion was born. And a religion at the present should be in sync with what a society wants at the present. So the religion of 2000 years back was good for the society of that period. 2000 years hence, we need a religion that is suited for the current society. Period.

Whose 'honour' are they trying to honour really?

2010-07-09T03:24:00.000+05:30

The boy and girl are very much in love with each other. When they felt that the right time has come, they informed their respective folks. The boy's parents even pursued it with the girl's parents. But, the girl's dad and mom are adamant that they won't allow their daughter to marry the boy because, actually the only reason is that, the boy is from a lower caste. When we friends were discussing the same issue, many came up with similar instances and surprisingly I found that it's a common issue that's going on all around.

But, fortunately, the young people who committed the 'mistakes' are still very much alive, compared to many who have lost their lives because of 'honour killing' (WTF it may mean!). To talk about such unfortunate lives, the issue is that they have been brutally killed by their own fathers and mothers or they have initiated the killings. I have nothing much to discuss in this topic. I find it not worthy to even think about. I have only some questions.

What is this honour all about? Who do they fear? The community? The caste leaders? Leave all that! What do they achieve by killing young people who were in love? What right do they have to kill the daughters or sons? Why do they value the stupid castes and their norms above the lives of their children? Wouldn't have these young and vibrant people lived happier, if they had been allowed to live with their partners of choice? How can they comfortably continue a life after doing such heinous crimes?

Whose damn f***ing 'honour' were you trying honour with these killings? I don't get it at all, you idiots!!!

Expectations. Aspirations. Envy. Mish-mash

2010-07-01T02:02:00.002+05:30

Last week there was an article written by Chetan Bhagat in TOI about what he calls as “Ash-envy”. He, in his simple English, pointed out, as a society, how much we envy Aishwarya Rai’s achievements. She is one of a few recognizable Indian faces across the globe. Yet, for us, she still acts with a “plastic face”. She can’t emote. She can’t express. Basically, we (all genders included!) conclude that she can’t act. Ok, I'm not saying that she is the best actor and all that. But, do you know that still she has no dates for some directors who approach her because she is busy all year round? Isn’t it our male chauvinistic society that places Shahrukh Khan and Amitabh Bachchan over Ash when, actually, she is the biggest superstar among them? I was again surprised to see how much people were slamming Chetan Bhagat for that article. Many pointed out that it’s about himself, the standard was high school level and many other high-handed opinions. Whatever simple idea he pointed out, surprisingly, the same just played in front of me, from many unexpected quarters. I felt a bit disappointed too.

India’s Saina Nehwal achieved some rare feats in past few days (She won three tournaments in three weeks!) and she is currently ranked No.3 in the world. As an other article pointed out, many used this occasion to slam Sania Mirza. The author was spot on. How many of us have compared Tennis to Badminton? For many it was just the gorgeous-media-hyped-married-to-Pakistani Sania vs. focused-soft-spoken-Saina. If one compares these two sports, he/she can clearly identify why a tennis player is more prone to injuries than a badminton player. A Rank 31 in Tennis is also as worthy as a Rank 3 in Badminton in a country like India, where the sports culture is either rare or absent. I still don’t get how people can say that Sania didn’t do anything great for Tennis in this country. They say she was distracted, she couldn’t live up to the hype etc etc. Why do we discuss about her personal life? And, did she claim that she is going to be the best? If I remember, once she told that a rank in Top 10 is her priority, but the continuous injuries pulled her rankings down as she missed many tours. Similar things have happened to many other international women Tennis players of current generation too. But we don’t miss any chance that comes in our way.

Ok. I am talking mainly in sports context. The same stuff got repeated when prominent teams lost in the initial rounds of the World Cup Football 2010. The same thing happened when Roger Federer crashed out of the Wimbledon yesterday. People even say that they are happy to see Federer losing. Why? But nobody thinks about the fact that at his opponent’s age (four years younger) no one could match Federer’s game. Next year, he’ll be past 30 and that simply means, for a tennis player, he has become old, really old. When Vishwanathan Anand won the world championship, we chided our Cricket team which lost some important games in the T20 world cup. The trends in all these examples worry me a lot.

We expect everyone to be the best. The similar aspirations we apply to the people around and on ourselves. Everyone wants to see extra ordinary. Everyone wants to see the rich. Everyone wants to see the accomplished. Even in a 100 m Olympic dash, we are concerned about the fastest man on the earth, but the ones who get silver and bronze are the second and third fastest men, who finished the race within milliseconds from the first man. And that’s no less a great achievement. But do you know them? No. So, is it only the aspirations and envy playing out here? I don't know. May be yes, and may be there are other factors too.

Another aspect. We feed our expectations based on what we want to achieve rather than what one is capable of achieving. So the aspirations grow and reach a level where even spectacular achievements don’t get the glory because they are not extra ordinary. So, for a really huge majority, the aspirations and the actuals have huge gap between them and we are in turn producing a less contended society in this process. My point is simple. It’s not extra ordinary or uncommon to be an ordinary person. It’s just that more and more people are falling into this trap of being extra-ordinary or aspiring to be extra-ordinary. Many a time, the ordinary make this world more interesting and lively than the extra ordinary. No one will know about it. But they are a contended lot and they will do what they continue to do and make this world a better place to live in and on.

Sorry for such an unstructured post. I didn't want to edit it. It's as raw as I was thinking. Please bear with it.

The MAN in my life

2010-06-20T14:59:00.001+05:30

He used to get angry so easily. I thought only my mom loved me and he didn’t care at all for me. But later I started realizing things. Life unfolded with the greatest experiences through him.

He couldn’t learn further in what he was good at and so couldn’t reach the heights because of monetary constraints. Further, being the elder one and due to familial constraints, he had to limit himself a lot. But, he knew everything. He knows everything. And he’s capable of many things. And I've never seen anyone who can match his eye for detail and commitment, if he takes up anything.

He wanted his children to achieve, what he couldn’t. But there was no pressure. And he saw it really happening through his children or I believe, we could do at least that for him. The great acknowledgment for any of my achievement is a pleasant look on his face and a faint smile he gives my mom, and it’s far far better and greater than any of the congratulatory messages or high-fives from others. It’s still the greatest feeling of achievement.

I never understood whether “making ends meet” had any other connotations unlike it is being used and misused everywhere. As the sole earning member, I still don’t get how he managed everything. But, the greatest lesson is; he practices his principles, even in dire straits.

I remember the time when I was a child when I literally felt so protected in his hands. Even now, he’s the greatest support I have. He never taught his lessons. But he lived through what he wanted to teach us. On this day, these are some random thoughts on him. As he is, what is not expressed is more beautiful and meaningful than what he does. So I leave it at that.

Can't we change, at least a bit?

2010-06-15T13:14:00.001+05:30

    If someone can read what I write in this post, I can count them in the privileged people who got access to education in this country. They may have qualifications and degrees too. Ok, it’s an expectation. I believe that Education is the most powerful thing a person can possess in this country, which help them to stay out of any form of exploitation. But, sometimes I feel quite disappointed about how people crib and crib and crib. So, I’m just randomly thinking. It may go off tangent sometimes, but I’m just digging into our usual mental state when we crib and feel cynical about our nation and our own people.

   Like someone said, if a hungry person or a poor person cribs, I can understand, because they are being exploited or they don’t know how to manage their finances or because of the information asymmetry or for whatever reason. But what’s the problem with an educated person? Yes, we have limitations. But, can’t we do something about following very basic laws and rules and normal norms, which would help a lot in making our society better? Why do we become so impatient and cynical about the whole system as such? I really don’t get it.

    Who does corruption? Everyone corrupts and practices it. Then why do we blame others when we are also doing it? When you jump signal and don’t’ follow even any simple traffic rules, it’s corruption. When you bribe, that’s corruption. When we show less prices for our assets to evade taxes, that’s corruption too. I have heard about a facilities manager of a reputed company in Bangalore, who looted crores of money during a new campus construction and he was caught and fired and currently he runs a resort outside Bangalore. What I really don’t get it is, why don’t we think that I’m responsible to the society even if you have got no help from it? When people like you and me use our privileges to corrupt, who else can save the system? What’s the point in cribbing about all these, when we are also part of it? Why so always blame government and keep off doing our part? It’s because we want the easy way out.

    Our religious and caste identities are very much significant in the scheme of things. I think about a 10-15 years back, our society was not as polarized as it is now. This is happening along with our supposedly high growth story. May be it’s now in the open because of many forms of open media. I have seen the caste and religious identities coming into play even during the official matters n companies and educational institutions. Here, I’m not quite sure how can a person with less administrative power can influence a higher authority. The onus is on that person to change. But we don’t that too. And we crib about reservation and caste based census and like. About following religions, it’s one’s personal choice. But, why should it influence one’s work, which surely doesn’t have any religious or caste biases? A higher authority in aviation sector in the past denied a person entry to the pilot training course based on the claim, “How do we travel in the carriers flown by ‘clobbers’ like you? ”. What’s the point of education in our country?

    There are some practices, especially against women. Our society is still highly patriarchal and I don’t’ think it will go away soon. Manual jobs of the past have restricted women inside our homes. But, education and the flourishing services industry has given women many opportunities which is now spilling over to other sectors, which is helping a more inclusive participation from women. But, the main issue is that we don’t value our women. I remember a friend during my graduation asking, “Why is she studying so much? Isn’t she supposed to get married soon?”. She got married soon. But she is studying in a Top 10 university in the world now.

   The important thing here is the mindset. The status of women is still of the second grade citizens. Attaching activities like eve teasing to the macho acts, even from the personality formation stages, even now many men consider women to be inferior to them. Again, how much we practice ourselves to avert these inequalities? Why don’t we respect a woman’s mind and body, considering her as another individual? Yeah, the male ego is highly inflated in our country. Even women support it because of the patriarchal compulsions. But why don’t we take initiative ourselves and try to change at least what we are now? Why can’t we tell young boys that, girls too are normal individuals like them and they should respect and consider them equals than falling into the same trap as their previous generations? It may take many generations, I know. But still can’t each of us try our own part?

   When we come to marriages, we have the same old stories of dowry and the ‘girl should stay with husband’ norms. I have heard from some people that, there were instances where the guy was ready to take no dowry and said this directly to the girl’s family. The girl and the family felt insulted and they claimed that they are giving it because they are capable of and it’s according to their ‘status’. I appreciate women walking out of marriage when groom-to-be’s family asks for high amounts of money. Likewise, I was thinking, should he have walked out of this marriage? I have no answer. The status in Indian context is always “false pride”, to flaunt you money and wealth and your family lineage and may be your caste too. Then there is this mother-in-law vs daughter-in-law angle of marriage, which is relevant still in our country. For a change, I had a first-hand experience of seeing a father-in-law getting into same mode recently. There are many families which were left financially devastated because of this practice. For me, the appalling thing was about the level of this practice in families with highly educated people. Is conservatism highly pursued more eagerly and aggressively in affluent families now than before?

   Coming to education, we passed a “Right To Education (RTE)” only now after 67 years of independence. I strongly doubt that there were conspiracies before, to ensure that we spend very less in education because an educated and thus liberated society will think and become conscious about their rights and we won’t be able to play the dirty caste and parochial politics and practices. The people at the helm of affairs of industries would never want people to be highly skilled and educated at the bottom of the pyramid because, it may bring out the levels of exploitation. Here too, I’m quite not sure of how much we took our own initiatives in our country, of course except in Kerala and a few north east states such as Mizoram, to ensure that education reached even to the lowest level of the society. It may be related to our caste politics. Still, I should say that, only in this case, the political will power was not there.

   So, my point is pretty simple. We follow high standards of activities if we go outside our country, especially to western societies. I don’t understand what the incentives are where everyone follows it. Why can’t we follow such discipline and norms like punctuality, respecting an individual irrespective of his/her qualifications/positions/designations, here inside our country too? Actually, isn’t here we have the incentive to do well and get noticed and show ourselves as examples to others too? Why don’t we do it? Is it because of our family, religious, caste-based background or are we being just cynical? I don’t know. I have no idea. As we end everything, “we are like this only”, but it’s better to “be the change that we want to see” than cribbing and feeling cynical. And it’s hard to practice. But, from my own experience, get your hands dirty, it’s worth it.

Comparisons - Boon or bane?

2010-06-12T22:47:00.001+05:30

    Comparisons are inevitable. They are natural. They just happen. Again and again. It can be a double edged sword, which can motivate or demotivate, according to the circumstances. And the examples are plenty and in surplus around us.

   As a kid, in India, the life is mainly about academics and the comparisons one has to face during this period is 'incomparably' vast. If you are an achiever, then it’s multiplied by several times. Your parents will compare, your teachers will compare and even your fellow students’ parents also will not miss a chance to compare. The way in which we find a frame of reference for these comparisons is amazing. So, in our cultural setup, where everyone cares (both in positive and negative sense!) for the other or at least it seems so, one can’t avoid comparisons. We even compare our Gods. Most of the times, our religious ‘fights’ are to prove which God is powerful by killing humans and destroying public properties.

   How is it in a western oriented culture where individuality reigns supreme? I don’t think the comparisons would be as firm as it happens in our culture. It’s because, since you are not concerned about what other persons achieve, it never disturbs you or you don’t need him/her as a frame of reference to see where you are. So can we conclude that comparisons are a natural outcome of a more of social being than an individual being? I clearly have no answer.

   Do comparisons help? I don't know. But, to be honest, I have felt too irritating about comparisons during my life. But, many a time, I came to know about a lot of things around me through comparisons. Again, I don’t know if I have taken them positively anytime. But still, to take a stand, I hate comparisons., because I have found only unhealthy ones prevailing and healthy comparisons are not pursued so keenly. It can even lead to suicides. The core reason for almost 75% of suicides should be because of unwanted comparisons , which should be mainly the inferiority complexes that develop due to them, than just mental issues. I believe, even healthy comparisons can be so dangerous, as there is always one is better than the other.

In a corporation or a company, comparisons create huge problems for everyone. A person won’t be happy or satisfied with himself/herself if he/she compares his/her job, the pay, the working conditions, personal possessions like an own house or a car etc., which will most probably result in inferiority complexes and also superiority complexes in a few cases. By the time you realize that you wasted your whole life comparing with others, age will catch up and you end up even more a failure as a loser. It’s tough to separate personal life and professional life. Still, by avoiding comparisons, many can have more positive outlook than they have now in their lives.

Comparisons are natural. But, knowing yourself and your own limits and ambitions, you can avoid them and lead a life with more positive outlook. In a current, fast paced consumerist world, it’s tough. But, avoiding them will promise a fairer and far greater world and better individuals, and thereby, a better society.

Battle of the classes!

2010-06-06T15:33:00.000+05:30

"Class" is a word with a universal meaning, or rather many universal meanings. The "classification" in any context qualifies with a class qualifier. The upper class, middle class, the lower class, the upper and lower within each of these classes, then the working class; all are classes. And they are classifications based on some factors.

So, when the castes were introduced in India, it happened to be the worst thing that happened to the majority of the people, who belonged to the lower castes, which stays even now. The upper two castes, who were real minorities enjoyed every resource and service, even at the expense of screwing up a whole lot of the lower class people. It continued to remain in our blood and flesh that even reserving some official positions for them became an eyesore for the higher castes. But now it's an irony that there are sections who are fighting for even reservations. That's a different story. Anyhow, the caste based classes still live on.

When movies became our main source of entrtainment, the movies which had Hindi as the medium ensured a pan India presence and they looked upon the South Indians as funny creatures. Whatever they speak, whatever they wear, whatever they eat, whatever they do were made fun of by many narrow minded filmmakers. Even a famous movie song in Hindi is being termed legendary in name of the style of singing by a legendary singer, which is simply make fun of a south Indian's accent. People now call it a classic. How pathetic can it be. When Mani Ratnam and A R Rahman made their presence felt in the Hindi movie belt, many felt uncomfortable. Whatever is the case, they do their work and the work speak for themselves. Now everyone knows, whos is the best.

So, are south Indians different? I have seen that Bangalore itself is a glaring example where the higher caste people, even after 2-3 generations here, consider it fashionable to say that they are Mysore Brahms or Mangalore Brahms and also TamBrahms. Even though the "Brahms" usage makes it sound cool, they are just enjoying the secret pleasure. But, as the whites made the blacks conscious of their skins 'color' in US, here and in other places too, these 'high caste' people are quite ready to remind others of their castes which happen to be the subservient ones. And, there is still information asymmetry maintained by the higher castes and the well off lower castes, which forces the majority of lower castes to remain the underbelly of our social fabric.

An amusing example. As a "Latin Catholic other than Anglo Indian" (designated by Govt. of Kerala), I have seen many Syrian Catholics claiming themsleves or their ancestors to be converts from Brahmins, which implies the obvious. So, even when there is a religion which supposedly have no caste differences, the ones who follow the religion want to classify themselves. So, do they think that the God or the Holy Trinity considers them special or for what? I dreally don't know. And even after being highly educated, they think that the white skinned ancestors' blood flow through their arteries and veins. Again, the classes based on castes. How more ridiculous can it sound?

The fighting classes based on economice conditions is a long journey and it will continue and I don't have to talk about. The struggle in this case always ensure results as there is a balancing happening along with the struggle or as final results. But the skin colour based, religion based, caste based classes are all so dangerous and it shocks me when I see even highly educated people falling to these class based analysis of people and their uninhibited urge to be in some higher class, which means nothing in the scheme of usual things. but in name of some false prestige in the society.

#BangaloreRainTweets - A tweet rainy experience!

2010-06-03T21:48:00.002+05:30

I just thought of doing this only in twitter. But yesterday I saw a blog post done through tweets. I can't find the link now. :( I also thought how will it look like if I convert the whole thing into a blog-post. So this is not an original idea, it's "inspired". So, the following explains an experience in rain on Bangalore roads, today. #BangaloreRainTweets is the hashtag I used in twitter to qualify these tweets. That's it. Read on!

So it's all in tweets. It's in the same sequence.

5.55 pm. Starts the ride. #BangaloreRainTweets

Traffic is too much. #BangaloreRainTweets

9 kms hence. Heavy drops fall on my face. Pains my eyes even though I wear specs. #BangaloreRainTweets

Being on service road, I stop bike and get into a shop. #BangaloreRainTweets

Rain stops for a while. #BangaloreRainTweets

Starts my journey again. #BangaloreRainTweets

The clouds cheats me, actually everyone. #BangaloreRainTweets

Rain drops pounding. So painful on eyes and face. No Visibility beyond 5 metres. #BangaloreRainTweets

The strong wind sways my bike. #BangaloreRainTweets

Reaches a signal. Just standing and getting drenched. Can't even move. #BangaloreRainTweets

Everyone is jovial around. Autowalas, bikers are all happy. #BangaloreRainTweets

Chilly wind makes a guy on bike shiver. Me too felt a bit. #BangaloreRainTweets

Rains pounding and ravishing. Roads are all full of water. #BangaloreRainTweets

The next traffic signal. Again waiting and get drenched. #BangaloreRainTweets

Now raindrops lash on my back due to wind. Painful #BangaloreRainTweets

Gets an idea of sharing this through tweets. Good or Bad idea. I don't know. #BangaloreRainTweets

Fell on 1-2 gutters. Luckily didn’t fall of the bike. No visibility. #BangaloreRainTweets

My sky blue “Good looking rascal” shirt is fully drenched. And dirty water. :( #BangaloreRainTweets

Reaches Silk Board signal. Waits. #BangaloreRainTweets

Wanted to tell a Honda Accord driver that he’s missing the rains. Also wanted to ask him to come outside. #BangaloreRainTweets

Once more stop at same signal. Waits. #BangaloreRainTweets

Some chirpy girls are running all around. #BangaloreRainTweets

Again stop at same signal. Waits. #BangaloreRainTweets

Getting drenched royally all this time. #BangaloreRainTweets

Saw pillion riding girls clinging on to the guys riding the two wheelers. felt a bit jealous. #BangaloreRainTweets

Amused by people waiting under the flyover to avoid rains and blocking traffic. #BangaloreRainTweets

Scolded a guy who was riding without headlights. It wasn’t working though. #BangaloreRainTweets

The final stretch was surprisingly peaceful. Less intense rains and moderate traffic. #BangaloreRainTweets

7.15 pm. I reach my hostel room. #BangaloreRainTweets

Removing wet clothes off is a hard task #BangaloreRainTweets

I loooooooooooooove Bangalore. *muaH* #BangaloreRainTweets

The End. #BangaloreRainTweets

Hope it was not boring :) And yeah, the rain was so lovely! I want to go once more and many more to get drenched!!! And once more, I loooooooooooooove Bangalore.

Aren't we losing much because of being selfish?

2010-05-31T11:28:00.001+05:30

When I was in school, I think the competition that I saw around me was not as much as what I see around me now. I had lessons of sharing through experiences and not through some moral science classes. It was perfect, if I look back.

But things changed too fast. When I moved past high school, entered college for Under Graduation, then for work and now MBA, the competition I see around has nothing healthy in it. I don’t deny that we indeed require healthy competition. But I see only pure selfishness. A senior never takes an advice from a junior even if the latter is entirely correct, because it hurts the former’s ego if he/she admits that he/she is indeed ready to dilute his stand and also junior is more correct. The result. Everyone loses. The junior may lose confidence in himself/herself. Also the rest of the group or team or any affected parties lose.

Then there are opinions. Yes, everyone has an opinion. But, I never see how many people think deep about it. If I take a stand and if I realize that I was wrong, I should be able to admit that I was indeed wrong and change my stand and take a position, which may add value and indeed carry on the discussion, not necessarily blindly joining the other side. Most of the times, there are only half baked opinions as people tend to pick out stuff that helps their own stand and they ignore others. But this reduces involvement in any discussion because no one knows what the other person says and why he/she says that. The result. We are just at the opposite ends and lose out much on the results that could have helped every party involved in the discussion to involve themselves in working towards a common result. What usually happen at the end will be just the “might is right”. Office discussions, Group projects, Panel discussions, political discussions; everything just fails to produce positive results through proper discussions. Usually an important or mighty one’s opinion becomes the final word.

In Indian context, the traffic on our roads in cities show how selfish we are. The way in which we drive, the way in which we rush through peak traffic caring for no one else, the way in which we ignore traffic rules, all add up over the woes of congestion and poor infrastructure. We collectively lose. TRo quantify, the wastage of fuel on Indian Roads amount to billions every year and our cities have the highest number of respiratory diseases.

Again there are many manifestations of selfishness such as emotional blackmailing, creating information asymmetry, creating tensions among communities and one can go on and on and on. Yesterday I went to meet some friends at the place where they stay. One guy asked another to switch off a light in the kitchen since the latter was standing near to the switch. The reply was, “I won’t switch off anything which I didn’t switch on”. May be, we require some healthy self-criticism as a prerequisite to become selfless and unselfish beings.

A letter to the BMTC Chairman

2010-05-29T03:05:00.000+05:30

Dear Sir,

I'm an admirer of BMTC's services. As a person who is really interested to know and learn about urban planning, I am glad about how much it serves the people in Bangalore. By people, I mean all the sections of society who use your services. I'm also impressed by the fact that you are one of the few public sector corporations which continuously make profits YoY, in the transport sector. I really admire the fleet of new Volvo buses too. But I have some concerns which I want to share with you.

First thing is the drivers. I know their difficulties. In Bangalore traffic one needs real presence of mind when you drive a vehicle, especially the bus. But, my concern is about some of the drivers who drive as if no other vehicle exists on roads. For eg. the manner in which the BMTC buses enter the service roads from Outer Ring Road is so dangerous. If I remember, it was KA05-FA1574, the bus was going zig-zag on the main road, it entered the service road in a bizzare fashion and it overtook through left and was speeding anywhere above 65 kmph. The sight itself was so scary. Please give some serious lessons to the drivers to drive in urban traffic. Half of the Bangalore traffic will be ok if the BMTC buses follow lane traffic. Also, please ask them to stop the buses only at the designated bus stops. People who stand at the traffic signals also will follow suit. These are two main points I have to suggest about the driving.

Secondly, it's about some age old buses. The pollution these buses cause is so bad and metal parts are so dangerous. It's pollution is really harmful for people and it even blocks the visibility. Do you add anything along with the fuel? Because sometimes, it's thick black. And also, it isn't a good picture in the interiors too. It's so dangerous an unsafe inside the bus. So, my humble suggestion in this regard is to just throw these buses away. Just phase them out.

Now the next issue. I have always wanted to ask this. Why do we have such bulky buses? In the available road space, wouldn't it be easier if smaller sized buses can be used? Those will ease the traffic too. And also, why do you have two bodies connected and have that longer version of bus, which takes ages to cover the traffic signals? It's too heavy for a single engine so that it goes very slow and the it is so hard for the drivers to take the turns. So, please have only single body buses and please try exploring the possibility of having smaller sized buses.

Another aspect I wanted to ask was about the Volvo AC buses. They are very good. They are very comfortable for the amount you charge. But, have you tried getting near the AC compressor outside these buses on road? I have had first hand experience and it's really painful because it's too hot near them, even about a meter far. So, this is just an opinion. Do we really require such powerful AC compressors that 'warm up' the surroundings? Can't we have some nature friendly ones? It would add to the "going green" portfolio of the corporation and is largely significant in the context of global warming.

I'm just another ordinary citizen who want to see equal opportunity and equal treatment to all. And I really admire BMTC for the fact that it carry around almost all sections of the society together in the buses. The specialised services for IT companies, Airport services, the JNNURM scheme buses etc. are all good examples for many others to emulate. I believe that I have the right to give the suggestions above because I have used all of these services. But, I find some of the issues I pointed out could be addressed, which would help BMTC to become a world class leader in the public transport.

Wishing more successes in future.

Thanks,

An ordinary citizen.

The Great Indian Petrol Bunk Trick

2010-05-21T21:55:00.001+05:30

I enter the petrol bunk and go near one of the pumps to fill petrol in my bike.

The attendant asks me, "How much, sir?" Note: He stands on my right as the petrol dispensing machine is there.

I reply, "Rs. 200". Note: I have opened the petrol tank of the bike after my reply.

Simultaneously, another attendant comes on my left. He too asks me the same question the other guy asked. "How much, sir?"

I reply again to him. "Rs. 200". Note: Now I am turning left so that I'm not seeing the display when the first attendant is dispensing petrol.

Some eye-to-eye 'communication' goes on between them. Then something happens.

Now, when I turn right, "The Great Indian Petrol Bunk Trick" has happened. It's Rs. 50 and 00.00 LTRS on the display. This takes just 1-2 seconds.

Both of them say, "What Sir, you should have told initially itself. Already petrol for Rs. 50 is filled".

Now, they say together. "Sir, we'll fill petrol for Rs. 150 now". Note: They know the Math.

Here ends the "The Great Indian Petrol Bunk Trick".

Now, do you think I lost Rs. 50? No.

What can you do?

Just raise the voice. And tell them that you won't give the money, if they don't fill for Rs. 200. And just be adamant. As simple as that. They yield after some time. Problem solved.

So, if you want a Moral of the story: Be careful when you spend your money, even if you are earning a fortune.

PS. I'm not earning a fortune!

Advanced Moral of the Story: You are tricked/conned only due to your own faults. So just be careful, ALWAYS!

Man. Woman. The Battle.

2010-05-16T20:36:00.010+05:30

The post is a bit......too long. Sorry for that.

I am a man and I'm proud about it. But that doesn't mean in any case that women are secondary individuals. I believe that women too should think similarly. Even when we talk a lot about men and women, considering them as just individuals, we never try to understand the element of sexuality involved. If we could have understood that, the "battle of sexes" usage would have been a meaningless phrase. In modern times, I think, there are some things which can be viewed differently. I'm just thinking a bit and trying to jot them down. Serious? I don't know. These are just my view points. Some random thoughts. You can term me a male chauvinist or feminist or whatever at the end. Just personal opinions. I'll put them across in first person.

I have no sisters. So, I have no idea what a girl would think about who is within a range of at least a plus or minus two years of the age of mine. And I think there is advantage for guys who have sisters and they know women more a bit, compared to men without sisters. I'm talking about the growing up part, both physically and mentally and not in general. I believe even parents' attitudes will be different. And this is applicable to girls too.

We make our children grow in an environment where we typecast him or her. A boy or a man is always associated with a "know&handle-it-all" league. This has gone to epic proportions where people tend to agree with a person whose name may be written as Clinton or Ms. Clinton, instead of saying Hillary or even Hillary Clinton. Check some research papers to see what I'm talking about. There were female scientists and mathematicians, who have had male professional names to get attention in the past, which I believe is a thing of distant past. And, even when she is an achiever beyond normal benchmarks, a woman has to get the help from a man. I read somewhere about a "Cinderella syndrome", where even a woman think by herself that there is a prince charming on the way and she has to find a man to fulfill her life. Is it because of a woman's maternal instincts, where she want to become a mother at some point of time in her youth? Or, is it because of a notion that she sees around herself in the society? I don't know. I'm just asking. Even men are with insecurities and self-doubts and they too are emotional beings. But he is forced to move out of them forcefully while he grows up.

There was a news about a young man who killed his wife of just six days. The reports said different things. One says that he was insecure about himself because of his salary being only half or one-third or one-sixth of his wife's salary. And another report says that she humiliated him using these mentioned facts. I don't know which version is true. But if first version is true, a man's insecurities is quite natural, but this incidence indicates that it can be dangerous. So we have to realize that if a woman put more effort or if she is more brilliant, she deserves to be better that others, including men, including her husband. But, it's quite natural, right? Still, I agree with the fact that there "are" men who want a wife who earns less him or not working and even women who wants to earn less than her husband, to not affect his ego, which I have seen in my friends and even I have thought a lot about it. But in this case, unfortunately she lost her life because of his insecurities.

If second version is true, I should say that she was initially a victim of the patriarchal mindset where she too believed that men should be better than women and it had hurt her that her husband is not worthy enough, which she vent through humiliating him. And it hurt his ego, which I will discuss later, that made him hurt her physically and at last ended in strangulating her. So she is a dead victim of her mindset which may have triggered the dark side of his. And likewise, isn't he a living victim? I mean, of his own beliefs and the system in which he grew up, which now has ended his life and which he may not get back even if he's out of the prison? So living with such guilt may be the worst punishment he could get. Here again, questions remain, is it only the individual to blame? Or the system, involving his parents, her parents and the society in general?

Now coming to ego. A person's ego is not natural, I think. That grows when you achieve something and keep on achieving. It's not bad. Not at all. But, most of the times, men have a privilege of having pampered his ego when he grows up. And I've found that most of the case, it's his own parents, especially mothers. But, now I have seen the same happening to girls also as parents, unlike in the past, knows that she to should be brought up as an individual and not a marriage material. I have uncomfortably stood in instances where girls' ego too getting inflated and I always think, how will it be in future when a man and woman with such inflated egos come together in the same marriage or even in a simple project with team-work involved. I remember a cousin sharing a story about an instance where, the husband and wife fought over the fact that they will share equally the responsibility or mom or dad will individually pay Rs. 60000, they had to pay in a pre-school for their son. So, is it worth it, when you have to use your ego for silly reasons? Aren't we using our egos more in useless situations, when it needs the most in resolving problems, by respecting other individual too? May be our egos won't allow us to think straight when we are in a situation where we are fighting to put down the other person, which can even result in killing the other person as we have seen above. I don't know.

Now, the most important thing that happens in a man-woman relationship. That's about motherhood. I really don't know how it is to be a mother. And also about being a father. But seeing some bios in social networks and in even some official introductions, motherhood is a part of every woman's existence and her identity. And not so in case of fatherhood. But, at the same time, it's a natural process. It's something for which we shouldn't consider her divine or something that is super-natural. It's a beautiful thing. But nature has prepared her body for that. But, she needs help and that doesn't mean she is weak there, which is the normal portrayals which I see around me, which again typecast people and create stereotypes in everyone's mind. But it's an irony that, there are women still dying while giving birth because there is serious ignorance about a woman's requirements during that time. Again, are we overdoing some things and under-handling some other things? I mean, I don't get this irony.

And a last thought. It's something I think many times. Why do many guys have a perception that women have to be conquered and all that? Movies are the main culprits here. Women too are human beings and individuals, who are of the same make, with same kind of flesh and blood. So, my whole point is this, even after a lot of discussions, movements etc., we still suffer a lot from the battle of the sexes. Husband and Wife. Mother and Father. Boyfriend and Girlfriend. We always typecast ourselves. How many problems could have been avoided if both parties could understand and discuss even silly things? How many constructive discussions could have even avoided umpteen number of divorces, which happen because of silly reasons or even no reason? May be many.

Thank you for reading till here. I know that it's a bit too long. But I just wrote as it was coming to my mind. And this is from a 25 year old person, who has not much of a knowledge about women and who is still single, in case you need to typecast. But, if I made you think a bit, that's all I wanted. Shoot your comments. :)

Road Messages

2010-05-13T23:17:00.001+05:30

Messages issued in public interest which are intended to bring some revolutionary changes on our public roads. I take no incentives for doing it. Thank you. Read on.

1. To the elderly/young woman who doesn’t care about her sari and also doesn’t care about her shawl:
Please take a little more attention as it is usually flying all over the place and it is pretty damn dangerous for you as well as others, especially the two wheelers. I would appreciate the “fluttering” if you were standing on a beachfront.

2. To the ones who, with their age old scooters, try to compete with the new age two-wheelers:
It’s impossible. I.M.P.O.S.S.I.B.L.E. Technology has gone so ahead. So, please don’t do. Nothing more to say.

3. To the people who think that they can cut lanes with their four-weelers.
First message – Two wheelers do exist and they don’t have any other special roads or space to drive. And when we are talking about lanes, I’ll clarify one thing. Even if it’s marked or not, on roads, the lanes exist because of four-wheelers. So please avoid cutting lanes swiftly. Please use your indicators, if you have to do so. Would be of great help.

4. To the people who try to overtake through left and turn towards right, and vice versa.
I too overtake through left and right, but I won’t do the turn towards opposite side. It’s F***ing dangerous you SOAB!!!!

5. To the young and beautiful lady who tried to race with me:
Yours is a gear-less two-wheeler. Mine is geared. When I accelerate at the higher gear, it goes a bit faster than your vehicle. If I sound like an MCP, it's your mistake This message is also for the men who ride gear-less vehicles. And by the way, I was not trying to overtake you. I had to get to bank before it’s closing around 4 pm and later a work at my institute office around 5pm. And the smell of your perfume when you came near me was very good. I liked it.

The rest of the messages anyway won’t help, but still I’ll give them out. And yeah, these are very earnest requests (Basically, I’m pleading…)

6. To the auto-rickshaw drivers:
You guys drive public vehicles and you are doing a very good service to the people, in the cities. I know all that. But, the roads are public roads. Yes they are. And please don’t turn your vehicles in acute angles (less than 90°). Please don’t block the way to left when you are stopped at a signal. Please don’t try to compete with other technologically advanced vehicles. Please don’t compete among yourselves too by running parallel. Most of the times, no one goes past the other. Nothing really happens there. If you have a really hot or beautiful or cute girl in your auto, riding fast will end your ride within a short span of time and she will anyway go away. So, please enjoy the ride and go slowly. Please use petrol or LPG; the black smoke because of your traditional additives is sometimes so blinding and suffocating.

7. To the bus drivers and lorry/truck drivers
Yours is also public service I know. But, please don’t barge into the service roads and also please don’t change lanes in the bus stops or traffic signals. It just takes some time and also much space, which leaves no option for other vehicles, but to wait for a long time. And please think about the size of your vehicles too. They are really huge and occupy a lot of space on the roads. Also please go ONLY straight on straight roads when you drive. Please.

Hope this is enough for now. More will follow later. Thank You for reading. I hope that you, as a responsible citizen, will follow them too.

A tale of two cities

2010-05-12T23:40:00.001+05:30

There should be a law. Everybody must learn to love a place other than the one of her birth. Not only will this raise demands for both to adopt the better practices of the other, it will cure the country of parochialism. Somebody please find cross-country girlfriends for the Shiv Sena types.

Out of the Ashes - A Journey

2010-05-01T23:18:00.006+05:30

Theirs is not a story of some heroes and their heroics. It's about some pretty ordinary individuals, who loved playing cricket. They had to fight. But their passion and hope took them ahead. From a bunch of amateurs, they have become professionals who are now able to brush shoulders with top players of world cricket. They represent their nation's urge to get out of the shackles, which some fanatics put them in, due to the deadly mix of politics and religion. They just played cricket, with their heart. And the result is that they play in 2010 Twenty20 Cricket WorldCup. Their first round exit is so likely, but no other team would be as spirited as this bunch.

"Out of the ashes" is a documentary film made about their amazing journey in International Cricket. Only a trailer can be found there.

Please find an excerpt from the article in Cricinfo, dated April 8, 2009, about the documentary film, which talks a lot about the team too.

Most members of the team were introduced to cricket when they heard the firing of celebratory gunshots in the refugee camps when Pakistan won the World Cup in 1992. The team has overcome war and poverty to get where they are today. Cricket began in a dusty refugee camp with a tennis ball. Most in the team have lost family members to war. When the Afghans almost lost Division Three against the Cayman Islands in Argentina, Hameed Hassan, the fast bowler, came off of the pitch in tears. When I asked him why he was crying, he said, "I have seen people die and I have not shed a tear. But there is something about cricket that gets me here [pointing to his heart]. Cricket is our chance."

Read the complete article on the film here.

Even though they have lost to India, we should celebrate their hope for future and spirit. It's a triumph of humanity. Respect. Pure Respect.

"Thank You"

2010-04-30T23:13:00.000+05:30

I don’t see much of smiling faces around me when I am in any public space of any cities I have visited till now. People look so serious all around. I don’t know if they are not satisfied with what they have achieved. Or maybe the life’s tough experiences have forced them to forget how to smile. People seem to be so hostile to each other. Then came the famous “Jaadoo ki Jhappi”, which was a bit exaggerated. But I liked the idea. I just thought of trying it.

No. I didn’t give hugs and all that. But I thought I would mention a “Thank You” with a smile to anyone who does some or the other help for me. The good thing is that everyone understands what it means. I didn’t know how people will respond though. But, surprisingly the results were so positive. To the bus conductor, to the waiter, to the person at ticket counter. Whoever. They all replied with a warm smile. Some car drivers on roads, when they give me some space to squeeze through in traffic signals, sometimes a “thumb up” will elicit the same response or a smile.

Yeah, it’s not a sophisticated case study. I know. My conclusion is that people need some recognition, whatever small they are. They don’t expect any fortune from the people around. But just a realization would suffice; that they are considered and recognized for the seemingly insignificant duties they perform every other day, which we blissfully never mind.

Faith vs. Logic

2010-04-24T11:47:00.000+05:30

When miraculous things unravel in front of our eyes, we always believe that it’s not explainable using human logic, beyond a point. And we always quip, “There is a God”. Almost 99% of people I meet tend to think so, and they are believers, ranging from doubtful to firm, but still they are.

I too was brought up to believe in God . To pray to God for you needs, to give strength and to give a healthy life. But when I grew up, may be because of the influence of learning science or may be due to the experiences, I became a bit doubtful about my faith. It switched between being religious, being agnostic, being an atheist and then back to religious and all that.

There’s a thought which crosses my mind whenever I pray. At the end of the day, I am so selfish. It’s all about ‘me’. I pray for ‘my’ well being, for ‘my’ people to be healthy and happy, for ‘my’ studies, ‘my’ job and the ‘my’ list is endless. It’s all about me. Sometimes, I would even think, “do these prayers make us more selfish than we actually are?” I really have no idea. But, even now, when a tough situation comes, I find solace by praying to the power, whom I have never met or touched or felt, but feels that somewhere he is there. Now I pray to give me strength to put me through.

I always think how it is to be an atheist. I have met some very staunch atheists against whom we, a bunch of believers, couldn’t even stand after sometime with our arguments. Even a simple question like, “How do you believe in something when you have not seen, touched or felt it?”, could easily counter our arguments in support of the God. The answer was simply “We don’t know”. In my capacity as a normal human being, honestly I have no answer. But I can only say what is said above. I always turn to him to give me strength. Then they would argue that it’s because of low self confidence. May be. I don’t know about that too. But there are very confident people, who are firm believers. So, the debate continues. But still, it’s so unconvincing on the believers’ side.

The latest being Lisa Ray’s miraculous escape from Multiple Myeloma and some comments followed made me write this. The essence of these comments is “There is a God, who saved her”. But then, are we disregarding the achievements in the field of science that has saved her? Are we disregarding the human ingenuity which worked behind these innovations which can cure such diseases now? Definitely, science faltered/falters/will falter many times. It has even caused some critical damages to humanity. It’s a constant argument that goes on and on in my head.

Huh! I’ll go mad.

Mathemagics - Maths meets Magic

2010-04-22T01:22:00.002+05:30

Check Arthur Benjamin's bio here.

Why Shashi Tharoor is just another non-issue

2010-04-20T02:37:00.012+05:30

This writeup consists of some personal opinions. I don't represent any political ideologies. These are some thoughts and it's a very random writeup. And yeah, I warn you, it's a bit too long.

                I came to know about Tharoor through his fortnightly column in “The Hindu”. But later when he moved to TOI with his Sunday columns, I found him changing his style to theirs. It was a bit disappointing as I used to read and found him writing some hollow stuff and something was missing. For me, he transformed from "a prolific writer with some thoughtful and make-you-think opinions" to “just another writer with some petty observations”.

            He was a UN official for about 24 years. Towards the end, he was the Under Secretary General (USGs), the designation which is just below Secretary General (SG), for multiple disciplines in UN. That means one can find many USGs in UN. During the campaign, rationalists raised their voice against Tharoor because he supported Sai Baba. But it is so insignificant in a country where each of us have faith and many who follow god-men and god-women. Obviously, he lost because of internal politics played in UN by US and European nations as Tharoor knew too much about UN and its internal affairs. As far as I remember and know (I may be wrong!), a person who lost UN SG post election cannot hold a post in UN again. And that’s what media reported then. But Tharoor claimed that the current UN SG asked him to join his team, and he denied it politely, which I still find a bit hard to believe. This happened even before he contested the May 2009 general elections.

                In his book “India: From Midnight to the Millennium and Beyond”, Tharoor writes about Mani Shankar Aiyar (who is another public personality with a 'scintillating' profile); “If people like him do not squirm at the prospect of pledging allegiance to a leader whose only qualification is to lead is the name on her marriage certificate, obituaries for the dynasty are premature indeed” (Page 26). The leader and the name in question is "Sonia Gandhi", whom Mr. Tharoor disregarded and showed so much discomfort to be seen as the leader of India’s biggest and the oldest political party and subsequently the nation. But when he became the chairman of Afras ventures, he became so insignificant as he did not get the public and diplomatic air time he used to get in the past. Then, when the call miraculously came from the “leader whose only qualification is to lead is the name on her marriage certificate”, he forgot what he himself wrote more than 15 years ago.

                The Congress badly wanted to project their ‘changing’ (the random meaningless stuff they continue to generate) face. It was/is a political gimmick. Tharoor somehow got an own house in Thiruvananthapuram (I don't know if the Afras Academy for Business Communication has anything to do with this) and claimed himself a "pakka Malayali", when he describes himself otherwise again in the same book “India: From Midnight to the Millennium and Beyond" (Chapter 3. Page 69 onwards). He even got a Voter Id within no time, which is still being debated whether it was illegally done or not. But suddenly he became the face of youth and changing India and our very own Malayali for the Keralites. Also, he became the force who was going to resurrect the state of Kerala from its 'backwardness' (Remember that except in Economic Growth, Kerala is an outlier among Indian states, in any other aspect). The anti-incumbency worked wonders for him as Keralites usually give such a person a warm welcome. He became one of the 16 MPs that was on the Congress side, but he was special and different.

               His disconnect with the Indian sensibilities, pulled him to controversy when he tweeted “cattle class”, which is a common usage in English. In a country with almost 60-70% poor or people with poor backgrounds, it was considered to be a disrespect to the nation, by many (I too!). Our PM took it just as a joke (ha ha ha) and the chapter was closed. His five-star stay was another thing, his claim that he paid from his own pocket, is still unbelievable as appalling as it sounds. The “interlocutor” thing was a blooper from media. He connected with people on twitter, but not more than even 0.1% of the Indian population. His audience was enough for him to share his public life and to tell them what he did everyday. But no one realized that he was just executing his normal duties vested upon him. The ones who followed him thought he was doing something different, everyday. The tweet-ups made him approachable and meeting him in flesh and blood made people to believe what he says, whatever may be the truth. But he was just making a bubble of his own.

                When the IPL controversy started, the same media through which he projected himself as “a reputed UN professional with an unblemished career track of 24 years”, he had to take a back foot when his role became more than just “mentoring”. The can of worms unleashed with Lalit Modi’s (That's another ball game altogether, which will be unveiled in coming days, I suppose) tweets and some desperate mudslinging from both sides trying to explain the facts and their roles made the erstwhile friends into foes of a lifetime. Will they patch up and go back to the status quo? That too is unpredictable considering the style of murky politics and the money behind all these. The angle of a woman in public life is still indigestible for India. Even the self proclaimed “progressive media” in print, internet and TV, shamelessly dug up the whole angle of “woman” and moreover the "beautiful woman (somebody reported her nose-job too!)" in the stories to increase their TRPs. The Congress too justified it by taking into account the “courting another woman, who may be his third wife, when he’s not yet divorced his second wife” and discussed in their ‘core’ (What does that mean, btw?) committee and asked him to put his papers down. And yeah, the rest of the action will be after the intermission and this short lull.

                Tharoor is a publicity inviting person. His supporters and critics won't hold a different opinion here. He has lived his life through all the publicity he wanted and I don’t blame him if he’s publicity seeking. The problem is that we just know that Mayawati, Lalu and the likes are corrupt only because the media dubbed them so. Even now, they are yet to be proved. In a recent verdict, Lalu was even acquitted and SC told Bihar government that they can't appeal against his acquittal. But these news have no takers. We consider news only if it's what we like. We don't want see even our 37.2% officially declared poor. In a media who consider themselves educated and upper class, a dalit woman leader will make you uncomfortable. Okay, that doesn’t mean that they are corrupt or not corrupt. The problem is that they don’t connect well with the media the way we want to see as Tharoor does, who does it so fluently with his soft and literary skills. Mayawati doesn't even know English, but no one could win the most populous state on one's own, like she did. Now, when he is in public and connected than any other politician, he didn't take the care, which others take by staying behind the scenes and not being a very public face. When you are very much a public face, you will be more accountable for even very small things. When Sunanda Pushkar got rid of the “sweat equity”, it was dubbed as an admission of guilt, which went against him. But the Finance ministry clears him of any misdeed. Also, the non-support from Kerala Congress indicate that they were not happy with Tharoor hogging limelight when they worked hard till the elections. They just waited for their chance to make him step down, so they maintained the silence.

                We can’t conclude whether he is corrupt or non-corrupt. May be, he just happened to be there at the wrong time. And we, including Tharoor, have to realize that Twitter is not the world. But, still everything one writes there, if not a protected account, is in public for everyone to see and interpret in their own ways. The discussions in government have to be done inside the government and any criticism or opinion has to be done by discussions there and not through twitter. And, the work that has been done is nothing special. Even if it’s more than what his predecessor has done, it’s his duty. Because, even when you are a representative or a leader, you are a public servant. At least you have to project such an image. He’s still the MP, the role in which he can do many good things for the people who have elected him as their representative in the Parliament.

                So, what to conclude? He obeys the dynasty and the leadership that represents it (Page 23), which he criticized in the past (Sweet revenge from Sonia Gandhi, may be). His idiotic description and substantiation (Page 65) of the famous or notorious “Ganesha milk drinking” and his certificate of it being a miracle. His support to the Coca Cola in Plachimada, without realizing the truths. The illogicality of comparing Israel-Palestine situation with India-Pak situation. And his prolific profile. All these, speak of the man.

He may be a changing face for Congress (embarrassment now?), as they claim, but not for the nation. But, I too hope his political life is not cut short and he will make a come back as a minister, because he seems to be a lesser evil among all of them. Still, for me, he is just another normal and opportunistic human being with some fallacies. And, I don't conform to the call for supporting him because I have my own reasons.

Banking On Change - About a REAL Role model

2010-04-17T18:50:00.003+05:30

Banking On Change (12 min version) from Pilgrim Films on Vimeo.

Two-thirds of India’s population of a billion people live in the nation’s 600,000 villages. Despite India’s economic growth, the disparities between wealth and poverty are enormous. Many villagers migrate to the cities in search of work and end up begging on the streets. South Indian bank manager J S Parthiban set out to do something to help their economic circumstances. He encouraged beggars to open bank accounts in New Delhi, and pioneered micro-loans to villagers in his home state of Tamil Nadu. This is his story—and theirs.

I feel so small in front of what he has done and continues to do. And I wish I could do something like this in future.

And yes, somehow humanity survives. The world is in safe hands.

Hating & Loving Bangalore

2010-04-15T18:57:00.002+05:30

After almost 4 years now in Bangalore, I don't claim myself a Bangalorean. I can't even claim myself belong to my hometown, as it has changed a lot now. I really don't know where do I belong now. I think, I'm lost somewhere.

Anyway, I have my reasons to hate and love this city. These are just personal opinions. Nothing meant to offend anyone.

I hate Bangalore because of the apathy of the people I see around me. Every newbie here claims he/she is a Bangalorean; but their attitude towards the city in one word. Irresponsible.
I hate Bangalore because of disconnect between sections of society which is painful and so alarming.
I hate Bangalore because even when it’s the capital of the state, it’s still someone else’s.
I hate Bangalore when it rains. A walk on any road will tell you why. The city still has a long way to go.
I hate Bangalore because of the hostility I see in public life; from the local people as well as many who are now being settled here.

I love Bangalore because it is fast becoming a microcosm of India, although withstanding numerous issues.
I love Bangalore because of Vidhan Soudha, an architectural marvel, Lalbagh, and such numerous landmarks.
I love Bangalore because I started working here and now I’m at one of the premier educational institutions in India.
I love Bangalore because of its warm welcome. I never saw anyone facing difficulty to settle down here.

I love Bangalore because of its salubrious climate, although Summer is a but tough this year.
I love Bangalore because of a reason which is very close to my heart. I won’t tell anyone. ;)

The 'hate' reasons can be easily turned into "love" reasons, if all involved parties do the right things.

And, any day if you ask me if I hate or love this city. I love Bangalore.

Heineken - The Marketing Experiment

2010-04-12T16:21:00.000+05:30

Full of Life

2010-04-10T13:14:00.001+05:30

Opposite to the Old Naval Airport in Kochi, there is a slum like area which everyone calls “Chinna Madras” because of a majority of Tamil speaking population present. That was my idea of slum till I was in Kerala, during my school and college. Then it was completely changed, four years back, when I spend a whole day in Mumbai . Unbelievably vast and large areas. Then for work, I came to Bangalore in June, same year. The slum area just across the road and our plush office this side was a contrast that I have never seen in my life. They are a part of the invisible life in any Indian city.

In a city which is developing in such a fast pace such as Bangalore, it’s pretty easy to observe these usually invisible and ignored sections. A BMTC bus-ride which takes at least an hour in the evening throws many images. Real images. Some young guys and girls in funky and modern dresses and always on their mobile phones. Smart looking professionals who didn’t even get time to remove their neck ties. Children returning after school. Men and women returning after a day of hard labour, who still carry the dust and sweat. The stinking smell of sweat, paan and cheap liquor. Some look content, some disappointed, some tired, some optimistic, some sleepy. Sometimes the inequality pains me, but I love to observe them all.

Money is a means, primarily required for transactions. After a point, normal greed takes over and everyone wants to accumulate it. The malls portray a rosy picture of the accumulated wealth one can spend and waste and throw away as he/she wishes. Then there are many migrant and poor mothers and children on streets who suffer from serious malnutrition. There are construction sites for five star hotels and luxury accommodations, where the workers don’t even have basic security measures. The one who will stay there is a high net worth individual. But who cares about the one who builds it. Sometimes I feel that even the A/C Volvo buses increase segregation. Rich have no time for poor and Poor have no time for even themselves. Still life goes on.

The gross inefficiencies because of the usual age-old vehicles, traffic indiscipline, bribes, poor infrastructure etc plague Indian cities to an extent where everyone turns and is, so cynical and apathetic. But somehow, I feel that our cities are full of life. Or may be I feel so. I don’t know if it's real or not. But somehow, people survive. May be it’s because of our people who can absorb such inequalities, inefficiencies and irregularities, with such a liveliness and an adjusting mentality. Above all disappointments and sadness, I see lots of smiles around and I too smile at them. May be they have learned to live the hard way and think it’s the way of life and indeed it is the life.

The Hate list

2010-04-08T09:08:00.002+05:30

This is a very very random post. It was written just to pass time. Nothing else. Read at your own risk of wasting time. :)

I hate....

…the obsession of people with money

…the Forbes Billionaire list

…the International Schools

…the substandard music (according to my listening) which are made anywhere in the world.

...the commoditization of women, especially in some distasteful ads to sell some random products

…the religions when I see people fight and kill themselves each other. (I think religions have killed more people than any diseases, war etc. in this world)

…the Unites States of America and the erstwhile Soviet Union for f***ing up many parts of the world

…the traffic on roads of Bangalore and moreover the indiscipline. I think it’s the same everywhere in our country.

…the Times of India. Anything by them.

…the Indian English news channels for their pathetic attempts at “news-making”.

...the obsession Indian psyche with fair skin and especially the Fair & Lovely ads.

…the Indian caste system which is the root of all problems in this country

…the Bollywood movies except a very few by some sensible directors

…the distasteful comedy shows

…the summer heat when I get so dehydrated

…the men who beat women and don’t respect them as individuals.

…the women who think their men are the best and rest are all chauvinists and rascals.

…the flaunting of money

…the rich, anywhere

…the contempt rich shows towards poor

…my obsession with internet

Share yours, if you wish. The comments section is open. I expect even a "I hate you and this list" too. ;)

Five "New Age" Advices

2010-04-06T08:23:00.002+05:30

1. You should work hard for “Citi moments of success”. Haven’t you heard the proverb “Failures are stepping stones to Citi moments of success”?

2. You should always aim higher. Sky is the limit. i.e the “DLF maximum”.

3. You should always be proud about your youth. Always work towards your goals with that in your mind. “Youngistaan ka WOW/HOW/NOW”. You can avoid those costumes.

4. You should ensure that there are instances in your life that can be eternally etched in your memory. Simple “Karbon Kamaal moments” show and capture the beauty of life.

5. When you feel that your life is moving so fast, you have to slow down a bit. You have to take “Maxx Mobile Strategic Timeouts” to rearrange and restart.

More advices will follow in the next edition....

The Philosophy of "Failing Oneself"

2010-04-05T01:40:00.003+05:30

This is very much an inspired piece. The source is a speech during the Good Friday service. It was about how Jesus “failed himself” by allowing the perpetrators to crucify him. The resurrection is a symbolic eventual success, which is reiterated by the fact that even time is split “before him” and “after him”.

The world too has worked very much in this philosophy. Mahatma Gandhi was a failure in the eyes of leaders who fought wars to reign supreme. Martin Luther King is a failure in the eyes of people who fight with all fury to get their rights. Nelson Mandela never used an army to fight against the injustice. They all “failed” themselves in the eyes of the "fighting standards", but they all lasted with the highest number of followers. The eventual success they all achieved has placed them in the eternal memory of humanity.

Coming to each one of us, just think about the roles parents played/play/will play in our lives. If they had pursued their own selfish ambitions, how would have we been? One can’t even contemplate such a situation. They fail themselves and taste eventual success, which for them becomes bigger than what they would have achieved, through their children. This success tastes sweeter. Here, a special mention should be given to mothers, who hold the family together almost in all cases and letting no one know about her difficulties while doing one of the most hard and unpaid work inside homes. Then there are teachers who have allowed their disciples to grow above them are next to God.

So, in this age, are we ready to fail ourselves? The answer is a big NO. We are not ready to fail ourselves. We are forced to run this rat race which is guided by numbers quantifying the money you earn, the grades you obtain and the time you save, all of which are not known for whose satisfaction. We hate people who are against us. We don’t take back any of our steps forward. We want to resolve everything through fights and wars. We want no blame to be fallen on us. To sum it up, “we fail to fail ourselves”.

The world would have been a better place if we had learned to slow down a bit, by lending a helping hand or make way for weak at times. But for that we have to fail ourselves and the question is pretty simple. Is it possible for me to fail myself?

The 'advantages' of observing "Earth Hour"!

2010-03-27T18:04:00.004+05:30

1. It's just for an hour. Before or after, who cares?
2. Indians don't have to participate. Because every other electricity board here observes it daily; day and night. We observe "Earth Day", actually.
3. Rajdeep Sardesai, Barkha Dutt and Arnab Goswamy can discuss, means they can allow no one to speak.
4. You can see how Eiffel Tower, Sidney Opera House etc look in dark without lights.
5. America, Europe and Australia can know what do Load Shedding and Power Cut mean, where we are experts from medieval ages. Indians should have been given Nobel Prize in Physics before itself, for our Energy Conservation Practices mentioned in Point No. 2.
6. Earth Hour can fulfill your Corporate Social Responsibility, whatever it may mean.
7. You can even have a website. http://www.earthhour.org/
8. You can start the candle business on the previous day of earth hour.
9. "Switch your lights off". Fans, ACs. It's ok in Summer. Let it be on.
10. Abishek Bachchan can speak Hindi in American accent.

Does it defy logic? Or...am I missing something?

2010-03-26T21:01:00.005+05:30

I came across a case study about a company, which was started by a man and a woman together (also husband & wife). But, later in the case, there was no mention about the guy. It was all about this woman. She took the company from strength to strength.

The thing that intrigued me was one fact about this particular company. It's a company run by women, for women (only women's products) and employed only women.

I had a doubt. If a man starts a company in the same manner; run by men, for men (only men's products) and employed only men (Ok, we are talking in a 20th-21st century context!), is there anything unusual here?

Wouldn't one (both men and women included) think that the company in latter case, is sexist? And in the former case, it's a part of women empowerment and not even think the other way?

Nothing for or against anything. No propaganda. Just a thought. Please do comment.

Magdelene - Nick of Time - Gospel Rock!

2010-03-25T19:00:00.005+05:30

Loving it from the first hearing! Loving it because it was made in India (Mizoram)! Way to go guys. What a track!

The (dire) need for 100% Literacy!

2010-03-23T19:32:00.004+05:30

“100% literacy is not only about writing the alphabet or you name in mother tongue”. I have seen this statement being made by a lot of people on Internet, including Keralites. Yes. I agree. But it’s a beginning. To explore more things to read. To know. To discuss. To understand. Let me digress now.

Now, about Kerala, we shall explore past a bit. There is a respected girls’ school in Kottayam (near Baker Bakery Jn., if I remember), where I have seen and read myself on a plaque that it was established in 1830. The Maharaja’s College in Ernakulam was started in 1875. There are several schools in Kerala which have at least 50 years of history. So, it means that in the area of education, Kerala already had a leap start, and it should be because of the Missionaries’ influence.

Then, about the caste system, the ancient and inhuman practices were rampant and prevalent in Kerala too. But history says that the agitations against such atrocities have already started before 1900 itself, through people like Sree Narayana Guru, Dr.Palpu etc. Then there were people like K Kelappan and AKG, who fought for equality, which resulted in some revolutionary developments such as Temple Entry Proclamation in 1936. Then came the growth of ideologies like communism, which became part of Kerala mainstream life which, I believe, had lots to do with education and the fights against inequalities.

Now, this is the background that has helped Kerala to achieve 100% literacy so easily and helped the state to top every other social indices. So, when someone say that ‘100% literacy is not only about writing the alphabet or you name in mother tongue’ with a tinge of sarcasm, it surprises me because there are many things that will go beyond this 100% literacy.

Putting some things in perspective, a divide still remains in Uthapuram after the demolition of wall that separated people in the name of caste. Note that the year was 2008. In India, more than 50% children suffer from malnutrition, except Kerala, which indicates our insensitivity towards our next generations. And there are many more pieces of info like these are easily available over the internet.

So, am I gushing and boasting about Kerala? No. Not at all. But, in a social perspective, Kerala is an example. When we have only the economic growth indicator as our benchmark (where Kerala moves in a pace lower than the national rate!), we are doing some things wrong. Really wrong. For that, education is the only way out. Literacy is the key. It’s so surprising that our spending in education and literacy is still very low. If we want 100% benefits of women empowerment programmes, we need education for women as well as men. To come out of the patriarchal shackles in our society, we need education. To wipe out the widespread exploitation, we need people who know at least about their fundamental rights.

So, the only answer is Education. Literacy rate is an indicator. We need a 100% rate of literacy in every state of our country, to make the exploited know that it’s not the exploiter’s right to exploit him/her. And, in that aspect, Kerala is a proven success.

Message from a guy to another guy.....

2010-03-20T21:20:00.002+05:30

....to how to use the loo! Found in one of the hostel blocks in our campus.

"Please don't use, with the flap (seat cover) open. If it's open, please don't close it!"

Whoever has written it, he knows the 'traits' of his own clan very well! Simple and Sensible!

Role models for young women – Some thoughts

2010-03-18T15:57:00.004+05:30

Lots of qualified people have talked about the topic. Lots and lots of discussions have happened and are happening. So, mine is just a personal opinion.

I am glad to see that women are empowered than ever before. I am glad that they are on their own. They are free, economically and socially. They have reached top positions which were dominated by men. Yes. Women have advanced a lot. But, I have a small worry.

Do young girls have the right role models to look up to? When men control the visible media like Cinema, Politics, Communication Media etc, are we giving them only wrong signals? Are we telling them that being beautiful or sexy is the eternal goal for women? I don’t know. I’m not an authority to talk about this.

I can go to even an official meeting, without combing my hair and caring nothing about how I look. But, I have seen a lot of girls who are wasting time and money to just look better. When a Deepika Padukone has to appear in a national integration video showing her legs, what is the message that we convey? Item numbers, by Aishwarya Rai or Rakhi Sawant, or the “IPL cheerleaders” are for entertainment. Again, it’s their job and they do it perfectly. But my concern is how we show these things in perspective. See what reason was given when Mandira Bedi was ousted from this edition of IPL!

Citing the same and lame excuse of “male dominated society”, every form of media shows what is “needed” for the audience. Why don’t we report more about Vandana Shiva and about her work more often? Erin Brockovich was a woman who fought against a billion dollar company. Why are we still hesitant to give more space in media for women on top like Naina Lal Kidwai or Meera Sanyal for what they have done at work? The sad part is that when many men and women work on ground level to empower women, the media run by highly educated people shows how much the necklines have plunged and how much the hemlines are risen. So, my worry is whether we have really wrong role models for the growing up and the young girls and women and also about the fact that there is no visibility for the right role models.

I have only a small message to young girls and women. It’s nothing worth getting attention from every other man around, including me. So, what we see in movies, ads etc are not right. They are all living in past. And beauty is just skin deep. You have very good opportunities now in the work, academic and public spaces. If you utilize them, you can be independent and it is rewarded and you'll feel more satisfied. And you have every right to be equal with men or even better.

It’s nice to hear “First woman to reach”, "First woman to achieve" type phrases. But world requires second, third and many more to make everything more inclusive. So, be the part of the change by becoming role models for what you do and can do. In any case, an Intelligent woman as a role model is far better than having just another beautiful woman as a role model.

Again, it's just a personal opinion. Any comment is welcome.

Best of A R Rahman - The Ultimate Mix

2010-03-14T11:27:00.002+05:30

The mix is WOW!

Playing to an audience – A Perspective on Union Budget

2010-03-10T00:01:00.002+05:30

The Union Budget Presentation is over for 2010-11. Surprisingly, one of the notable things about this budget was that no one felt bad about it. Everyone had something or the other to feel good about it. But I found it a bit unbelievable.

While Union Budget happens, even though it is affecting everyone in this country, only a few knows that it affects them. The media, the capital market enthusiasts and investors, the upper middle class, the economists, some politicians, academicians etc. Even if I take highly exaggerated estimates, these sections constitute only about 10-20% of our population, considering the fact that our population is 115 crores and growing. So, simple mathematics will tell us that the Finance Minister has to play a game catering to just 15-25 crores of people. To make it simple, the Minister has to entertain only these sections to get a feedback that the budget is forward looking, smart and futuristic exercise.

The voice of the rest of around 90-100 crores of our population is unheard in this context. We don’t know whether they even know about the budget. Even if the increase in prices of petrol and diesel is a bold step to pull the Oil marketing companies out of losses, we are not even able to measure how is it going to affect the food inflation which is currently hovering around 18% in official records and actual statistics indicate that it has been around 40-50% and even 100% in case of some food items. Tur Dal crossed even Rs. 100/kg in 2009 in some retail markets and Sugar touched Rs. 35-40/kg around February 2010. Although people have started talking about a reversal in trend within 1-2 months, no one can substantiate with any data that is currently available.

So, when our country’s 80-90% population struggles because of food prices, I fear that we are looking forward without making our foundations strong. Something is missing somewhere. I’m sounding cynical because the reality is having no visibility anywhere. It is really appreciative that the schemes like NREGA(rechristened MGREGA now) intends inclusive growth, but I’m still wary of the implementation part of it where it promises 100 days of jobs for households and not persons and in several areas the implementation is in limbo because of corruption and bureaucratic shackles. The pressure due to increasing food costs and health-care costs add to the woes.

I’m so apprehensive here. But the ever growing divide between rich and poor because of the currently followed non-inclusive growth and the invisibility of poor in the mainstream are so alarming. Are we on a sustainable growth track? Or are they just numbers to divert the attention from real issues? What is the real situation? I don’t know. But it’s a bit scary, I feel.

History in the making on International Women's Day

2010-03-07T12:18:00.005+05:30

If it goes as everyone’s wish, this Women’s day will have something more to cheer about. Not only for women. But for the entire nation. Subsequently, if the Women’s Reservation Bill can be passed in both the houses of parliament and if it can be passed in two-thirds of states, it will become a milestone in our nation’s history. In a country where the patriarchal hold is stronger than elsewhere; where beliefs and even superstitions ensured women to remain in shackles of the past, this is a great achievement, if done.

In a way, it is a shame that we have to force ourselves to reserve 33% of political representation for women. But unlike developed nations, this is the only way in which this may be possible in our country. It’s not to say that our women are not capable, but to point out that how much chauvinistic and patriarchal our society is. We have successfully implemented this in local self governments. In Kerala, now it has been increased to 50%, which will be implemented from the next panchayat elections. So if we can make it possible in the bottom of the pyramid, it is quite natural that it should be possible and as a nation we can work it out in the higher echelons of power.

The development of the currently developed nations, was contributed mainly by the development of women in all walks of life. When tremendous changes happened all across the world, the increasing participation of women ensured that there is an inclusive growth, which resulted in healthy social, economic and political advancements. As a growing nation, economically and socially, India was slow to accommodate women in the mainstream politics. To take a cue from the local self governments, there has been several panchayats in Kerala which have seen better social development when women were at the helm of affairs. There has been many examples from other states too, which has resulted in the much needed inclusive growth at the ground level, when women came into mainstream. So, this move is definitely in the right direction.

I have only a small apprehension in this context. There have been instances like Lalu Prasad Yadav making his wife Rabri Devi the chief minister and shadow-ruling the state on his own. I fear that the politicians who currently hold positions may do the same since they have become so power hungry. I hope that such things could be averted with right clauses and right restrictions in the bill and also that the bill comes out without any such loopholes.

Happy Women’s Day to all, especially to the women of our country. I believe that women should be socially, economically and politically developed, and free in a society, to ensure that it's a developed society.

The Art of Spamming!

2010-02-28T14:59:00.002+05:30

I love Gmail because it effectively filters spam. But still, I sometimes take a look at the spam mails. They are pretty interesting you know. How much concern these guys have about me and my supposedly "beloved one". So we will see some of them and how I can (everybody can!) enjoy spam when your empty looking Inbox (ok, I meant mine! No offense meant!) pales in comparison with "Spam" where it's always flourishing and active big time.

1. Dear myownniche, Viagra 70% off. Cialis 75% off. And blah blah blah...

First of all, if somehow the sender can find my blog, I'm declaring that my age is 25. I'll show you my birth certificate too, if you want proof. But please don't insult me. I believe (ok, it's only a belief and no experiences yet!) that at my age, I can definitely have the same effect with a Redbull or a Cloud 9 or a Current. Nevertheless, I appreciate the fact that you are giving me a huge discount. I hope it's not a stock clearance sale, ok?

2. Congratulations! You have won British lottery worth GBP 5000.. (ok I lost count of zeroes most of the times!). The mail goes on telling me to send them my account number and all other details.

Thank you. I never thought I was so lucky to win lotteries. I have not taken any lottery ticket till now because even if a ticket has some pre-draw luck associated with it, if it comes to me, it's no different from a blank paper. So it's a helping hand you know. But I would have believed this if you had send the money directly and not through email. And yeah, if I count the no. of times I had won, I should be a multi billionaire now and I would have appointed Britney Spears on my left and Paris Hilton on my right. So again, thanks for giving me such chances to dream!

3. P**** enlargement packages at cheap rates/Show her the effectiveness of your t***

It's serious you know. I know that all the p**n addicts will feel really bad about theirs. I know. But sorry boss. I have no time. Seriously, I don't care about my statistics. But still, I like your concern about me. I appreciate your efforts. Thank you.

There are plenty others which fall into same mode. So to avoid being repetitive, I'll stop here.

But the anonymous commenters at my blog are smarter people. I have written about them before. Sorry that I mentioned only the orients. Now I'm getting globalized attention.

I appreciate your efforts. But, why do you ask money at the end? Don't you understand that I have no money to spend on these matters? Or that I'm no Tiger Woods! So please be considerate and send me only links where I can download free. So you are happy that I have visited your site. And I'll be happy that you are happy. Wow! What a happy world it would be considering tons of such spams being received by many online.

I request you to please don't feel bad about the fact that I don't publish your comments. (Secretly) It's just for keeping the links with me only!

Stereotyping - Do we trap ourselves in it?

2010-02-17T20:53:00.005+05:30

About one and a half years back, when my friend and I went to take a DD at a nationalized bank in Bangalore, we saw a young lady at the counter. It’s always a pleasure to see a confident young lady at any workplace since it indicates a welcome change. She was speaking good English. Smart. Positive. Likeable. And it was evident that she was relatively new at her job. We had to wait to get our job done, which was scheduled with tokens. So we sat down and started talking.

Suddenly, we heard a high pitch female voice and saw the same lady engaged in an argument with two young guys. They were collecting some multiple DDs and there was some problem on what they got. And I found them unusually calm. They made their statements clear and crisp and surprisingly I found them not raising their voices like the lady did. From their talk, we got to know that they were engineering students. Everyone was noticing what was happening and people were really curious to see what really happened. The lady finished the argument and rapidly went to another room, where we saw another elderly lady following her. The elderly lady came out and out of curiosity I asked her what happened to the young lady. She told me that young lady was crying. Later when she came out, it was evident that she cried, but finished the work by herself. The guys looked so sorry and their faces said that they felt really bad that they felt they made her cry.

I was confused. I couldn’t believe that such a smart girl was so vulnerable. Her dedication to her work was unchallengeable. The surprising fact was that the guys were not even arguing. They were just telling what has to be told with utter clarity. So my assumption was that some mistake happened from her side. And they were just asking her to correct it in the most decent manner. They were not rude even for a second. Did she feel threatened by the guys? What made her cry? These were not one-off incidents. I have seen many girls just breaking down in such occasions and almost every time, and usually, according to my perceptions, they were the strong ones.

Was it the stereotype of “weak sex” made her cry? Was it the thought that everyone watching her and realizing that it was her fault made her cry? I really don’t know. I find only one thing. I feel that from childhood, girls are allowed to cry and boys are forced not to cry, but they cry too. I think it continues even now. So when they grow up, it’s a natural reaction for a girl to cry. In similar instances, boys are forced to act rude, raise their voices and they may even physically fight, as the last resort. So there is a stereotypical lens through which we generally see men and women. Everyone believes that he/she belongs to that stereotype and may be he/she should just follow that. But it’s still confusing.

The impact that it creates on others is so significant. If some people who were present in the bank at that point of time had such stereotypes in their mind, uch an incident was enough for them to cement their stereotypes and argue that women are “weaker sex”, the usage I always see as a product of rampant male chauvinism of the past, which continues even today.

So others will definitely stereotype us. But most of the times, aren’t we who make ourselves fall into those stereotypes? Isn’t it our own choice? Isn’t it our own duty to break those stereotypes? Just a thought. Still, I’m confused.

I chose an incident about a woman, not because I am sexist. It’s just that I don’t remember anything involving guys like this, apart from the usual fights we used to have on playgrounds. And this may invite some opinions from women too.

The mom song!

2010-02-14T03:40:00.002+05:30

It reminds me of my mom and I love every bit of it. I hope everyone feels the same too. :)

When I talk something personal...The 40 questions tag!!

2010-02-04T15:08:00.013+05:30

It’s been so long since I did a tag. So, I was so keen to do this. I hope and pray that you won't sleep by the time you reach the end of the post! ;) Thank you for tagging me!

1. What is your current obsession?

Music. Music. Music. Not only current, it's always been an obsession. Exploring genres and genres and many many artists from all across the world, thanks to internet. It sometimes even distracts me from day-to-day activities. But I don’t mind.

2. What are you wearing today?

White tee. And pants. I chose not to divulge the ‘scandalous’ details about the accessories! ;)

3. What’s for dinner?

Whatever in the menu in our mess. Ok let me check. Yeah.
Chana Dal, Chana Masala, Gobi masala (dry), Black Chana (dry), Rumali Roti, Mushroom Pulao, Shahi Tukde, Kadai chicken (gravy), chilly paneer. Oh! that's a bit too much. So, I usually have only Chapathis. Because nothing much can be done by the cooks to Chapathis. You got what I mean, right? So we’ll move on.

4. What’s the last thing you bought?

My current cell-phone. After some people successfully ‘harassed’ me for my beloved Nokia 1100, my mom felt so bad and forced me to buy the current one. :(

5. What are you listening to right now?

Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin. It’s the one that is playing in a play list of some 4500 songs. By the time we reach the end of the tag, I’ll change.

6. What do you think about the person who tagged you?

I feel that she is a highly creative person. And she was nice to talk to and yeah, thanks for the Cappuccino. And she writes better than me. So overall, I am happy that I came to know her.

7. If you could have a house totally paid for, fully furnished anywhere in the world, where would you like it to be?

My beloved Kochi. I love the place. I miss the walks through marine drive, Music World and just roaming around the place, a lot.

8. What are your must-have pieces for summer?

Numerous shirts and tees as I usually need to change a lot because of usual profuse sweating.

9. If you could go anywhere in the world for the next hour, where would you go?

London. That’s the one that came to my mind now. I can come back after one hour. So it's ok.

10. Which language do you want to learn?

I want to learn French, the main attraction being the “zh” sound, which is very much a part of my mother tongue.

11. What’s your favourite quote?

Change is constant. From good to bad. Bad to good. Instant to instant, nothing else makes sense to me as this one does.

12. Who do you want to meet right now?

I would like to go to A R Rahman’s studio and meet him. Just to watch the whole process of making music and to tell him, “Man, you make great stuff. No. The greatest stuff!!”.

13. What is your favourite colour?

Red. Anytime. Any context except my wardrobe!

14. Give us 3 styling tips that work for you.

Comb the hair.
Wear a light coloured shirt and dark pants.
Roll up the sleeves.

Btw, I don’t know if it’s working for me or not. ;)

15. What is your dream job?

Music composition.

16. What’s your favorite magazine?

Nothing favourite. But I will read any crap that comes my way and I don’t dislike any of them.

17. If you had $100 now, what would you spend it on?

I’m on cost cutting mode now. So it will go to my account and will stay there.

18. What do you consider a fashion faux pas?

The really “low” low waist jeans. I really can’t bear the sight of the same on both boys and girls. The “cleavage” is unbearable for me. I don’t know if it’s a faux pas.

19. Who according to you is the most over-rated style icon?

Amitabh Bachchan. Period.

20. What kind of haircut do you prefer?

With normal scissors and comb. I am being utterly honest here because the high hair-fall rate doesn’t allow me to have anything else, even if I prefer. ;)

21. What are you going to do after this?

Sleep. I didn’t sleep properly last night.

22. What are your favorite movies?

A lot of Malayalam movies during 1980-90s. All movies by Mani Ratnam. Shawshank Redemption tops the list of Hollywood movies. Then a lot of world (French, Korean, Spanish) movies. I don’t remember the names.

23. What inspires you?
Commitment. Hard work. Radical thinking. Thinking out of the box. Creativity.

24. What do your friends call you most commonly?

Emmanuel. Some call Emma, Emmu…it sounds a bit odd, but it's ok.

25. Would you prefer coffee or tea?

Tea. Any form. Any variant. The requirement is that the basic ingredient should be tea leaves.

26. What do you do when you are feeling low or terribly depressed?

“When I am so privileged and capable of a lot of things, I don’t deserve to feel low and depressed” – The thought more than enough for me to move on.

27. What makes you go wild?

Kingfisher calendar! You know how ;)

A lot of things!

28. Which other blogs do you love visiting?

I usually do blog hopping. But I visit some regularly.

29. Favorite Dessert/Sweet?

Anything with ice cream except chocolate flavour.

30. How many tabs are turned on in your browser right now?

Six. I can’t tell some of them! I know what went through you mind now. Just kidding. ;)

31. Favorite Season?

All seasons. But especially rainy season. If I’m outside without umbrella, that’s the experience!!!

32. If I come to your house now, what would u cook for me?

No. I don’t know much. I will make you an omelet and a cup of tea (if you insist!).

33. What is the right way to avoid people who purposefully hurt you?

Ha. Just ignore them. But if they were very close, it really makes me sad. It haunts me. But I try to come out myself.! To be honest, I don't know how to handle it!

34. What are you afraid of the most?

Nothing much as of now. I have never been to any wild jungle or dangerous cliffs. So I’m not sure if I’m scared of anything in such situations. Then, some people for their unexpected behaviour.

35. When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what was the first thing you thought?

Wow! Cool dude! Now I know why you don't have any girl friends! Just kidding. To be honest I look at mirror just to comb my hair! No thoughts!

36. What brings a smile on your face instantly?

Babies. Beautiful faces, especially women. Old people. A R Rahman’s music.

37. A word that you say a lot?

“Actually”. When I explain things to others, this word comes in lot of the time.

38. When was the last time you did something nice?

I do only nice things. So whatever I did last should be nice. I’m not kidding! ;)

39. What would you do if you were made President of India for one day?

President of India have only nominal powers. Prime Minister has the real powers. So nothing much can be done here. But without wasting much time, I’ll sign the bills and will ask to start parliament session on women’s bill. That’s all I think of as of now.

40. Do you know who Master SHIFU is?

Is it the Kungfu Panda character?

Whoa! What a tag that was. 40 questions! I’m tired. But feeling so refreshed. It was a cool tag to do.

Once more, Thank you Shikha chechi, for the tag. Hope I didn’t let you down.

And, now I’m hearing “Aaromale” from Vinnaithandi Varuvaaya. Music by A R Rahman. The bluesy Malayalam track from the Tamil film, is simply an amazing composition.

The system bugs me sometimes; still I don't lose hope!!

2010-01-30T01:08:00.004+05:30

Place: Bike Dealer cum Servicing Centre
Time: Around 6 pm
Date: January 29, 2010

As usual, I got my bike after service and took it out from the basement where the service station is. I had to enter the office for just 2 minutes. So I kept my bike just outside the entrance. Since the parking lot was a bit crowded I just kept my bike behind the ones which were already parked there.

Suddenly a towing setup came and I saw my just-now-serviced bike being pulled so harshly, without any concern, by a guy and the police man looked like a seasoned man in this activity. I came running down from the office. I tried to argue. He refused. They towed my bike as well as others' two-wheelers and just went about 10 metres further and stopped. Someone who was seeing all this advised me to go to him and remit the fine and within 5 minutes, everything was done. I got my bike back.

There are somethings to note here.

1. The place where I parked was not a footpath. Even if one goes by the "No Parking" board at the other end, I kept my bike much away from that and very close to a tree and was not even obstructing the pedestrian path. And the area completely belonged to the service centre and they never told me not to park there.

2. The way in which they pulled and towed my bike was heart-wrenching. How I controlled my temper is still a surprise to me. I don't know why they do it always like that.

3. The person who towed my bike, was ruggedly dressed and looked tough, although he was shorter than me. When I tried to request him not to tow and that I was ready to pay the fine, he behaved like a seasoned rowdy. I thought he will foul mouth and hit me. If police was not present, I am confident that if I had hit him, one real punch would have been more than enough to pull him down (Ok. May be I just felt so!).

4. The charges included Rs. 100 for parking in a "No Parking" area. And Rs. 200 as towing charges. So if they had not towed, I could have escaped with a Rs. 100 fine. But he didn't let me. So, I consider the Rs. 200 as robbery. Period!

5. After paying fine, they behaved so well. I don't understand why.

6. If it was not near month end, I am damn sure this would not have happened.

7. Why only bikes? Why not cars? Why not the bulky lorries? As far as I know, the system doesn't exempt them from these rules.

This is one among the many such incidents that happen every day in Bangalore city, which is developing at a rapid pace. There is a generation, whose size and apathy towards the whole system is growing, day by day. Since people are earning more, since they don't have any time to waste, they are even ready to give bribes and get away. Extending this; they look at any public policy initiatives with the same contempt due to such incidents.

I believe in our legal system. For instance, if they do it (the incident I mentioned above) regularly, I agree that it is the system working. But this is ridiculous. Such incidents let everyone down big time and a lot of people move away from contributing to the society. And the development of urban centres is essential for our country's growth. But I have doubts about that. Pretty clear doubts.

So, even when I hear and see corrupt stories about policemen, I still believe in the system. That's why I asked for the receipt so that it is at least recorded and he gave me without any dissent. But I'm not sure if that was real stuff or not, because there were separate receipts for Rs. 100 (in English) and Rs. 200 (in Kannada)! But if even one policeman behave like a sw*** or a r****l, you are giving the person at the receiving end a chance to corrupt himself/herself. And that makes the whole system worse than one can't even contemplate.

At the end I asked him whether it was part of his month end collections. He told me, "Alla Sir"(No, sir). I was not interested in a further chat or small talk!

The climate factor in Bangalore is the biggest positive which counters every negative experience I have in this city. And I LOVE Bangalore for that. And I too want to see the city grow and flourish. I hope for good, anyway!

Farm suicides: a 12-year saga - P Sainath

2010-01-26T04:08:00.006+05:30

When our nation, as a Republic, turns 60, there are some real domestic issues which question our self-proclaimed-sovereignty.

Where will we go from here? (Click on next para for details)

Between just the Census of 1991 and that of 2001, nearly 8 million cultivators quit farming. A year from now, the 2011 Census will tell us how many more quit in this decade. It is not likely to be less. It could even dwarf that 8 million figure as the exodus from farming probably intensified after 2001. The State-wise farm suicide ratios — number of farmers committing suicide per 100,000 farmers — are still pegged on the outdated 2001 figures. So the 2011 Census, with more authentic counts of how many farmers there really are, might provide an unhappy update on what is going on.

I'm really sorry to all who commented to whom I didn't reply......

2010-01-22T13:12:00.003+05:30

The comments are very less in my blog, except for the abundant anonymous spam comments that I receive. But today when I was just going through my previous (of course path breaking, ground shattering and earth moving!!) posts, I realized one thing.

I missed a lot of comments. I mean, I didn't reply to many genuine comments. Even though the number is just a few, I really value them. It was a late realization. I don't know how I missed them all. I'm sorry guys. I'm really really sorry.

And, this apology is not for making you comment. Comment only at your own discretion. :)

To Chinese/Japanese Commenter, with love....

2010-01-17T19:44:00.006+05:30

I mentioned Chinese/Japanese because I don't know which language is that. So please don't take this to start a China vs. Japan fight.

I am not much keen on getting comments on my posts. But I don't deny the fact that I feel happy when someone comments on my posts. To see that some have completely read my posts, and then take the pain to comment really gives a good feeling, and sometimes even a high!

But for past a few (actually many!) posts, I don't get comments from non-anonymous people ( I don't have any issues with that!). I get comments only from you. I'm not sure if you are single person or a group of people or groups of people. I really appreciate the links that you attach with your comments. But I know sites for my "requirements", better than what you send me.

You have even forced me to enable the "Comment Moderation", which is not because I don't want to make your links public, but it's easy for me to reject them by not publishing on my blog. There are a lot of blogs in the Internet which are very much better (and a few worse!) than mine. Please spare them too. I don't know if they like the fact that I'm representing them. But I'm taking this as an opportunity to voice their concerns too.

Please take this as an earnest request. In these kind of requests, I know that we usually use some really 'nice' words in English. But I usually use simple words because of my habit. That's why. Please take it as my humility! So please avoid me and my fellow bloggers.

Why us yaar? You have a lot better options like Times of India, ibnlive,.com ndtv,.com rediff .com etc where they don't even mind and will publish it as their own "breaking news"? See I'm not at all against you!

Status Update!

2010-01-10T20:52:00.005+05:30

Ok. I'm not going to write a sexist post. But it was funny. It was quite intriguing at the beginning for me too. But "googling" did break the surprise for me within 1-2 mins. I am talking about the status updates by girls in Facebook in past 2-3 days.

The message was like this. See a news item here.

"Just write the color of your bra in your status. Just the color, nothing else. And send this on to ONLY girls no men …. It will be neat to see if this will spread the wings of cancer awareness. It will be fun to see how long it takes before the men will wonder why all the girls have a color in their status… Haha!"

And many girls updated their status with different colors.

So what's the message here? The real awareness? And what is it about hiding from men? Or as usual the same cheeky and useless stuff in Facebook?

If it had created the awareness that it intended, I really appreciate it. But the discussions I saw in Facebook made me wonder whether it was reduced to just something everyone had fun with because of the "how long it takes before the men will wonder why all the girls have a color in their status" part. But I really hope at least some percentage of women (and men) googled and found out about the disease. If it was about just having fun, I have no comments! But even if one is aware or not about the disease, it's really serious!

The song turns 25 years!

2010-01-06T00:33:00.003+05:30

It was a pleasant news that the song is as old as I am. Even though it is a Christian devotional song, I think there is no one who doesn't like or never disliked this song. The lyrics and more over the music is so captivating. And Chitra's voice is..........I have no words!

Wishing you a prosperous and peaceful 2010!

2009-12-31T14:27:00.003+05:30

When we pass the first decade (If you believe this decade started with 2000, else this message is for next year!) of 21^st century, wishing you all a great year ahead!

Work hard to make your dreams come true! Let the resolutions prevail! Let's make our lives beautiful and meaningful by helping and caring for each other!

I wish each and every second of 2010 belongs to everyone on this planet!

Neglect, Cruel Neglect....

2009-12-29T18:54:00.003+05:30

Everyone talks about future generations. In climate change summits, public forums and wherever.

One of the main problems that developing nations face is the Malnutrition of Children. In that scenario, our nation gets a dubious distinction of topping the list!
(See Pg. 102 of the document. Download and check the file as it's more than 4 MB)

So, that's again a reminder that our economic development is not translated to social development. The gap between the haves and have-nots is alarmingly rising! And in this case, we are destroying our future generations through cruel neglect.

Perspectives!

2009-12-21T12:48:00.002+05:30

A: I feel some kind of sensual arousal when I see a girl driving a car.
B: Me too.
C: Me too.
D: Me too.
E: Me too. But I feel scared when I see a car driven by a girl!

Of still births, bad roads and malnutrition in Kokmar

2009-12-14T15:03:00.000+05:30

Cycle of poor health care and anganwadi facilities continues in Melghat region
Every year, at least 400 to 500 children below the age of six die in the Melghat region
Substandard medicines, delivery kits; ordinary razor blades used instead of surgical blades

"Spectacular" blunders!

2009-12-11T19:50:00.003+05:30

1. I search for spectacles, wearing them.

2. I splash water on face, with spectacles on.

3. I keep spectacles in shirt pocket and bend down, almost always. Not even a single time, it has never fallen off.

4. I don't take the case when I travel. So my spectacles always lie in the dark corner of the bag and you know what is my first prayer in the morning after!

5. I consciously selected an unattractive and cheap frame with an uncool look. But people say I look like a 'geek'. :(

Breaking (not so much!)......News!

2009-12-10T00:35:00.003+05:30

I turn 25 today.

Although I'm still feeling so young and immature, I am scared by the number!

Anyways, Happy Birthday to me! :)

When images explain Life!

2009-12-08T21:09:00.003+05:30

(Click on the image. Courtesy: Flickr)

Finding the right moment to click is instinctive and genius. Moreover, these instants are enough to explain the whole. These images explains so many aspects of life, actually they explain Life.

Crimes are always man against man. What happened on December 3, 1984 still affects people so badly, generations after generations. But Life just goes on. Again, Life through images.

The Great Bhopal whitewash

2009-12-07T23:15:00.002+05:30

If the government agrees the waste is not toxic, we don’t even need to clean up the waste. Just build upon it. And if there’s another generation that’s maimed, instead of blaming it on slums, the next report could blame it on global warming.

When corporates consider human beings as just "resources", when governments consider these incidents as one-off mistakes, when people even lose their livelihoods because of greed, I can't convincingly say that "Life is beautiful".

What if you miss a "vowel"?

2009-12-05T22:48:00.002+05:30

I wrote "Gal programming" instead of "Goal Programming" in my notes.

Good that it was just my notes and not the exam, considering my Prof. being a woman!

Socialism & Communism

2009-12-03T15:12:00.004+05:30

No. I'm not going to write an expert thesis on these. I don't call myself even a follower of these. I'm still trying to understand these and other "isms". When I move around in the net, I see a lot of educated people "cursing" these two especially. That's the trigger for this post. This may look as an advocacy for these "isms". Anyway, what I write here are just my personal opinions and any opinions are welcome.

In Europe, during the Industrial Revolution, the industry owners or captains used to bully the workers to get the job done. They used to use "sticks" to beat the laborers even for minor lapses. The workers used to get subsistence pay and never used to get anything extra because they feared that workers would not come to work next day. This was the background for Socialist theories and, a step above, the Communist theories, which got prominence and support from across sections of society which mainly included workers. The privileges that we enjoy at workplace surely has something to do with this history. So, when one can easily accuse these principles, just think from the point of view of a normal worker who still have fight for his/her basic rights.

So was Capitalism evil then? No. Definitely not. But, the practitioners of Capitalism were wrong. They were the problem. If they had followed policies to give the workers equal rights, I believe, Communism & Socialism would not have held ground. But later when these "isms" gained prominence, the practitioners tried to use Communism as their political framework and could not handle it properly. Even religions were against it because of the threat free-thought posed to their ideologies. And wherever it failed, it failed because of being in the wrong hands. So now should we back only Capitalism then? That's a contentious issue.

Capitalism doesn't require much of a background to grow. Because it just requires Human greed. But I believe it's a wrong notion. I don't think that it's capitalism. The financial turmoil that we still experience is not because of Capitalism, but how Capitalism was practiced with greed. But the nations which have used it properly, has used it for good. I should say, real good. The human rights are preserved unlike in the initial phase of Industrial Revolution because of the 'counter' "isms" that came up, which were conspicuously present in every welfare policies. I believe Europe and US are best examples for using both the sides. The observance of May 1 as Labour Day started in Chicago, US. Still, US & Europe has strongest worker unions.

I believe that whatever we enjoy in our day to day life has the right mix of right parts of these principles and ideologies. But, we still live in a world where the top 7 wealthy people "can" pull the bottom 25% of human population out of hunger and poverty. The problem is that they don't have visibility. No one gives them visibility. And because of this, we are blind. Even if we know, we act blind.

So just Think and Analyze. On your own.

World Aids Day

2009-12-01T14:19:00.002+05:30

Re-posting what I wrote on Dec. 1, 2006 in this blog with slight modifications

Today is World AIDS Day. A day to remind ourselves that we should live safe. A day to remember that humans can be easily defeated by the “not-even-visible-by-powerful-microscopes” virus. A day to remember the value of such a beautiful life. A day to remember that each human should join the biggest war humanity has ever fought and fighting even now.

The number of people succumbing to this dreadful disease is still growing. It is even breaking all the barriers such that man is standing helpless in front of such an enemy, with all his developments in every walk of life. It is an irony that sex or the physical expression of love plays a major part in the spreading of this disease and killing more and more people. So what about future? Live Safe. Be faithful to your partner. Keep yourself away all the means that spreads the virus. Keep hold of family values, the value of which you may not have realized by now. But wait patiently. Also be kind to the persons who fell into this trap. Forgive their mistake. Let us, as a responsible society, empathize with them. As all disasters and calamities affect us, we try to face it. We are facing it head on. Take it as a part of life.

I have nothing much to add. Just google for AIDS. You would know more about the disease and its history and also clarify any remaining doubts and also the present scenario.

Time has tested human race with so many difficulties. We overcame many of them. Hope that we come out of this too. We can only look forward because past will anyway haunt us. Leave it behind.

Maps of India - The Google Maps!

2009-11-27T23:23:00.003+05:30

Just try......

http://maps.google.co.in/

http://maps.google.com/ (Just go to India!)

http://maps.google.cn

Check the International boundaries at Jammu & Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh!

How can one person change the world?

2009-11-26T18:36:00.004+05:30

This is a question almost 99% of the people ask when they face some critical or ethical issues or rather dilemmas. To be brutally honest, they are right. I don't deny. But what if one person doesn't even try that?

Consider a scenario. A man takes his two children to school everyday morning. He jumps traffic and foul-mouth other people who may cause some troubles. The children will definitely learn that it's 'cool' to do all these. Right? So, unknowingly, being irresponsible, one person is imbibing such values in his "two" children. Anyone can think of even more scenarios like this. And the math is simple here. It'll just multiply like anything.

When one behaves like this, it's instinctive. But, being such role models, we are so much pushing the next generation also to behave and act in the same manner we behave and act. And we say that one person can't change the world!

So, I believe it's not a great thing to achieve; to change the world. It's just something extra-ordinary that will slowly happen if one does things, I mean Right things, as an ordinary person. You may see the results only in future. But it will be worth the wait! Sure!

3 Idiots - Making of the movie at IIM Bangalore

2009-11-25T21:58:00.002+05:30

A bit sad that I was not here last year!