2010: happy new year

As i bid adieu to 2009 and eagerly wait for 2010, i just wanted to highlight 10 things from the top of mind as i recall

1.) Swimming : learnt swimming and could complete a full lap in a 50 m pool.

2.) Touched snow: My manali trip.

3.) Had a camel ride in a desert safari: Jaisalmer Trip

4.) Started blogging regularly. This site was created in 2005 and had only 2 blogs till June, 2009

5.) Quit tobacco, the biggest economic boost which i got. My savings has gone up. 20 rs saved each day for the last 6 months. Roughly a saving of 12K in last 6 month.

6.) Booked a flat in costly gurgaon : Expensive. Still reeling in the aftermath ( read bloodbath)

7.) My sister wedding.

8.) Joined the football club in my company.

9.) Exceeded the 80 KG mark. Now painfully trying to get back to the 70's. Its tough especially when you are lethargic and addicted to chocolates and coke.

10.) Saw good movies like Avatar and 3 idiots. Thankfully, good movies were released at the fag end of the year.

All these things would not have been possible without the able support of my wife :)

Thats it. Hope 2010 is more eventful and i see more good movies, visit new places and learn/ experience new things ( read Bungee Jumping). And i ll try to update more in this log.

Wishing you all a Happy and Prosperous new year.

3 idiots

Its munna bhai MBBS deja vu.

Just try co-relating these character instances.

• Munna Bhai here becomes the Rancho, the protagonist, who swims against the tides in a "dead poets society" brandishing against all the norms. So the Doctor/ Radio Jockey is replaced by an intelligent engineering student.
• Here the role of Arshad Warsi is played by the duo of Sharman Joshi and Madhavan. They also double up the hapless "Jimmy Shergill" of both the version of Munna Bhai.
• Jadoo is Jappi / Gandhigiri is replaced by "ALL IS WELL".
• And eternal villain Boman Irani with his comic behaviour and predictive apologies at the end.
• Mistaken identity of the protagonist.

Raju Hirani has tread the tried and tested path of the formula for making a hit movie.

And able marketing. Trying to tap the large alumni market of all colleges in the growing indian economy who are willing to succumb to their newly inhabited habit of emulating the west and shed more money to be taken back to their memories by watching this movie. What else will make Aamir Khan still in demand and it just confirms that it is the same public who have grown watching Aamir movies since school days.

And it did have its result. Its is predicted this movie will the highest grosser of all time ( excluding Inflation and due respect to Sholay and DDLJ).

Without sounding too acerbic, this movie has its place and that works. And the new actor Omi Vaidya ,who palys Chatur, the alter ego of Rancho is a revelation. His dialogue delivery and his comic timings are second to none ( even Aamir's). Watch out his scene where he delivers a speech in "glory" of his professor.

Although all the jokes were a rehash but they were utterly enjoyable.

Overall, its a MUST Watch...in case you need to be taken back to your engineering days. And watch it with your friends if they are around.

AVATAR

My take on Avatar. Another interesting reading comparing it to the fight of vaishavism and Shaivites. Very apt and creative

Namak Haram revisited

If you remember the plot of this Hishikesh Mukherjee classic - Rulling class plants their agent amonsgt the working class to dictate norms. The agent turns "Rogue" ( doing a David Headly) and fights for the cause of working class.

Creative Insights

And we add global warming, more greenery, more creative angles and shoots by James Cameron. Each canvas of the pandora is colorful and fascinating. That might be the reason that all the creative directors like Cameron's and Zemekis of the world are resorting to Anime to fulfill their creativity. Where else can you shoot a burning horse without offending the PETA and the animal lovers.

Salwa Judum gone wrong

Salwa judum, is a state sponspored group supposedly formed to revolt against the maoist extremism in Jharkhand.At the same time, a few reports indicated that people had been displaced in large numbers and were living in miserable conditions in camps. While this was officially attributed to Maoist threats and retaliation against those joining the Salwa Judum, stray news also came in about the forcible emptying out of villages as part of the government's anti-Maoist policy, and of excesses committed by members of the Salwa Judum and security forces. It was alleged that it was covert operation to vacate the tribal population from mineral rich areas as a gift to India's Private sector.

These are some random thoughts. Would appreciate comments.

Kur "BAN"

It was a deja vu scene of the numerous movies starring Prabhuji, Dharmendra, even Amitabh in (Ganga Jamuna Saraswati) which i had seen a decade earlier . Hero hit by bullet and heroine helping him pluck out the bullet from his body with such elan which can put the tea picker from Assam to shame. Overall you ll get a feeling that the director had given up by the last frame. Brilliant Build up unsupported by a lack lustre climax. My sixth sense says that somehow the prior release of "New York" played the spoil sport in the weakened climax. There seems to be a forceful effort to make changes in the characterization of the key actors and plot to make them different from New York which added to more confusion.

First about the plot: Mix of Fanaa and New York. A undercover terrorist having a massive detruction plan using the leading lady as a shield to get his work done. And more confusion. The climax scene was a utter mayhem.

About the actors: All are good. Just wished they were supported by good screenplay.

Music: Background score had traces of "Pirates of carribean" theme and songs were good and well picturised.

Effect of Feedbacks on the global Financial systems

This is the work currently pursued by one of my Professor Prof. Indranil Chatterjee ( AKA IC).

The following is a transcript of a lecture given by George Soros at Central European University on October 27, 2009.

Negative feedback occurs when the output of a system acts to oppose changes to the input of the system; with the result that the changes are attenuated. If the overall feedback of the system is negative, then the system will tend to be stable.Examples are : Geasers, Appraisals

Positive feedback seeks to increase the event that caused it, such as in a nuclear chain-reaction. It is also known as a self-reinforcing loop. Positive feedback loops are more interesting because they can cause big moves, both in market prices and in the underlying fundamentals. But positive feedback processes do not necessarily run their full course; they may be aborted at any time by negative feedback.

Using this logic we can understand the pattern for each Boom Bust behaviour in our markets.The current boom bust process is not over yet and there might be more skeltons left in the cupboard .Also it is very complex as we have mortage, green, and much more complicated instruments involved in it. We will try to analyse the another comprehensive bubble of 1987 in the global markets using the feedback system.

I have developed a theory about bubble-bust processes, or bubbles, along these lines.

• Every bubble has two components: An underlying trend that prevails in reality and a misconception relating to that trend. A boom-bust process is set in motion when a trend and a misconception positively reinforce each other. The process is liable to be tested by negative feedback along the way. If the trend is strong enough to survive the test, both the trend and the misconception will be further reinforced. Eventually, market expectations become so far removed from reality that people are forced to recognize that a misconception is involved.
• A twilight period ensues during which doubts grow, and more people loose faith, but the prevailing trend is sustained by inertia. As Chuck Prince, former head of Citigroup said: we must continue dancing until the music stops. Eventually a point is reached when the trend is reversed; it then becomes self reinforcing in the opposite direction.
• Let me go back to the example I used when I originally proposed my theory in 1987: the conglomerate boom of the late 1960s. The underlying trend is represented by earnings per share, the expectations relating to that trend by stock prices. Conglomerates improved their earnings per share by acquiring other companies. Inflated expectations allowed them to improve their earnings performance, but eventually reality could not keep up with expectations.

i realize that my theory of financial markets is still very rudimentary and needs a lot more development. Obviously I cannot do it on my own. So I may have been premature in putting forward my theory as the new paradigm. But the efficient market hypothesis has certianly prooved inadequate: has been conclusively disproved. The entire edifice of global financial markets that has been erected on the false premise that markets can be left to their own devices has to be rebuilt from the ground up.

http://www.soros.org/resources/multimedia/sorosceu_20091112/financialmarkets_transcript

Indian Media

It was a memorable day for Indian Cricket. It witnessed the surpassing of 11000 mark by a living legend. It was a hectic day at office and i was following the web news religiously throughout the day in expectation of watching the highlights which i thought would be flashing incessantly across all news channels. All the classic pulls, hook and cover drives of the hero has been replaced by the brazen ( read stupid) news discussing the criticism of Mumbai patriarch against Marathi Manoos batting genius quipping that he is "Indian" first. All the biggest "brains" in Indian Politics, Cricket in greed of TV footage also hogging to this opportunity rather than appreciating the "poetry" created on the cricket pitch in today's match. They say that Indian Viewers have very short memory. The media could have played its part in elongating this memory. It was a small expectation considering that it was the same media which carried out a week long campaign to celebrate the completion of two decade of successful cricket by one of greatest cricketing Icon. In the frenzy to out do each other this occasion, they conveniently forgot to celebrate the children's day and 120th anniversary of our first prime minister. One leading daily carried a front page full of eulogy for our cricket maestro.

Its high time that they should do away with some commerce and give importance to the sole purpose for which they exist.

Now some of the records broken by the cricket legend which should have been highlighted today are:

Highest number of 100+ partnership is now 78+

Second Indian to cross 11,000 Mark.

Steve Waugh toppled from the 5th position from all time highest run getter.

Congratulations Rahul. Looking forward for more records from you.

2 video

One , the Israel Gymnast team dancing to a Bollywood song in the beijing Olympics.



Two, a nice song featuring Adnan Sami and Germaine Jackson about Mumbai.

Quiz on Bollywood

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Hindi Movies Final Cut

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A cute love story - APKGK

Rajkumar Santoshi (RKS) always lives up to his reputation of being a class apart director. I am not sure any director who can follow up a social drama "Hala Bol" with this cute love story.

The story is a simple as told earlier in many of Katrina Movies i.e Singh is King, London Namaste etc. I believe the story of multiple suitor for Katrina is quite apt given her Cleopatra like beauty which just spell binds all the writers and prohibits them to create something new.

Taking analogy with corporate presentations, this movie stands out on 3 pillars:
No pretension of being a stupid film - The director goes out of his ways to entertain the viewers even Making Lord drive a Van with a Good Shepherd nameplate. Also, creative spoof on melodramatic dialogues, bollywood names - Jenny, Tony Braganza, Rahul ( who always is the first favorite for girls), hero named Prem. You must see to the trivial detailing that is taken care in the film making. Only a director of RKS could have done justice to it and apt he has done it.

Simple Story: After a deluge of complex stories in the recent movies it was a welcome change. Its the same story of a silent lover going all way out to impress the girl who is already in love with ubiquitous lover boy Rahul. The interval scene where the hero falls from the terrace is symbolic of his desperation of being so close to his love and still far from her. He is hurt but still smiles with a thumbs up.

Hero: Had it not been the hero who has intertwined all the missing links, the film would fallen flat on the ground. It required screen presence and acting of Ranbir Kapoor caliber to make the film what it is today. Good to see the scion of our first family of bollywood keeping up the good name.

Its a good movie and may be RKS could arrange for a better music composer for his next comedy which i am eagerly waiting for.

Jaisalmer Trip - To be completed

Day 1:

We took the delhi - jaisalmer train intercity express.
About the train: Very Slow. It takes around 19 hrs to reach Jaisalmer.The train has around 38 stops between Delhi Interesting train- It separates out as 2 different trains from Jaipur. The 3rd AC compartment was dirty. Please be sure to carry your own bedsheets for the journey. The sleeping gear provided by the IRTDC may cause some inconvenience to some of you.

Journey till Jodhpur and Lost Baggage:

We had a nice time with our co passengers who were travelling to Jodhpur ( which is around 400 km before Jaisalmer). We gelled along well. The train reached Jodhpur in the dawn hours after 12 hrs of Journey. The family along with their luggage mistakenly took our luggage with them. We couldnt have known about that had priyanka not asked me to check our belonging. The luggage had all our clothes. Luckily all the expensive items were in a different bag which was with me. Immediately i rushed outside the platform to trace them. But as usual they had gone. It was a horrible time. The train stops for around 1 hr in Jodhpur. I utilized this time to put a complaint with the railway official. I was sure that it was by mistake and we could get the luggage once we trace the family once we are back in Delhi. Still i was hopeful that the family once they realised that they had mistakenly taken our baggage would definitely make an attempt to return it in the railway station as the staoppage time was whopping more than 1 hour. And it happened. While unloading their luggage at their home they realised about the extra "bag" and immediately rushed back to railway station to return the bag. So nice of them. Meanwhile Priyanka had made her mind about all teh extra cloth shopping she would be doing in Jaisalmer.

Jodhpur to Jaisalmer - the desert journey:

After a stoppage of more than one and half hours, Train began its journey again. It was a journey where we will be travelling in the desert for the next 5 hrs. As there were no prominent station where we can find decent food, it is advisable to have full stock of water and food from Jodhpur. The one station in between where you can find food and water falls midway - POKHRAN. I always wanted to visit the site which is supposedly the temple of Military prowess. But you see the number of people who got down to have the delicious "Mirchi Vada" and water at the station

Salute a car or speak english

In a heated lunch table discussion, i had fervently advcated for India being a better nation than our neighbour who forced the school going children salute the car on roads. But evening news diappointed me. In one of our states, children were punished and humiliated for speaking in their native languages and not in English. Just curious enough, i dig deep into such interesting diktat which were imposed on People of late:

1.) a peculiar style of Salute by a Diplomat raised couple of eye brows

2.) Diplomat need to salute the minister in a peculiar style in a particular state.

3.) Producer forced put a disclaimer in his movie for using the word "Bombay"

Although most of the these were not approved by Govt but they still happened. Does it mean that i was wrong in my passionate argument for my country. May be Not.

On a separate note, i today pulled up the first music video which i had seen after the advent of cable Television. It was by a group called Erasure and song called Always

Odisha Coastal Tourism

As Orissa evolves into Odisha and we become Odia from Oriya, i take this opportunity to write something on it. In my career i have traveled 4 states to do 4 jobs- Andhra Pradesh ( Vishaka Patnam), Karnataka ( bangalore) , Maharashtra ( Pune ) and now Haryana ( Gurgaon). Everyone irrespective of the states recognised Orissa of 2 things, rather 3 things - Jagannath Puri ( in case they had been with their Parents on a religious trip), Poverty of Southern districts of KBK ( Koraput, Bolangir and Kalahandi) and the supercyclone ( May be Bill Clinton Mentioned about it).

In this blog, i ll mention about four coastal region places which can interest the viewers:

1.) Chandipur on Sea : Usually identified the missile testing center of India. The resort is on the Bay of Bengal and is approximately 16 kilometers from the Balasore Railway Station. The beach is unique in that the water recedes anywhere from 1 kilometer to 4 kilometers during the ebb and returns at the time of high-tide. The beach, due to this uniqueness, supports a lot of bio-diversity.

2.) Gahirmatha is the only marine wildlife sanctuary of Odisha.Olive Ridley sea turtles migrate in huge numbers from the beginning of November, every year, for mating and nesting along the coast of Odisha. Gahirmatha coast has the annual nesting figure between one hundred to five hundred thousand, each year. there has been decline in the population of these turtles in the recent past due to mass mortality

3.) Chilika Lakes: It is the largest coastal lagoon in India and the second largest lagoon in the World. Its a Sea lake surrounded by land masses. Apart from the migratory birds which fly from the artics every year, you also the see Jumping Dolphins.

4.) Sun Temple : The Wheel you see in a old twenty rupees note, is not asoka chakra, its the wheels of the sun chariot of Konark. Its a engineering Marvel made in 13 th century. It was initially made within the sea but the shore has receded. The poet Rabindranath Tagore wrote of Konark: "here the language of stone surpasses the language of man."

These are the few of the many. I guess this can be a good starting for you regarding tourism in Odisha.

Custom Gmail Message

Interesting customised messages which my friends have posted on their gtalk.

Time is a great healer, but a poor beautician.

Pride is the recognition of the fact that you are your own highest value and, like all of man's values, it has to be earned -Ayn Rand

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield!

I'm the helpless victim of countless bad influences. An unwholesome culture panders to my undeveloped values and pushes me to maleficence

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Quiz on World Capitals

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Quiz Worldcapital

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Dhabeleshwar- the river island temple

Finally back to the hectic worklife at Gurgaon after a lazy holidaying at bbsr. This time i took the opportunity to visit the Shiva Temple at Dhabeleshwar, a small island in the Mahanadi River. It is about 50 km from Bhubaneswar. Alternate route can be taking a motor boat from mahanadi banks from cuttack. Of late, Orissa Govt is plying some interesting tours surrounding all key temples in the area.

Although the Shiva temple is relatively new, the place consists of relics from 11th century. Also, i would like to mention the organised ways the pujas are held in the temples. Apparently, there is segreatation of devotees based on the district they belong to. For example, as my ancestor belong to Kheojhar district, we had a specific priest catering to us who did all the pujas and arranged for lunch. The Temple visit was very pleasant to say the least. And , how can i leave out the only Hanging Bridge of Orissa. The walk through bridge over mahanadi river offered us picturesque views of the river banks, turtles swimming below and the idle boats waiting for the incessant drizzle to stop so that they can go fishing.I have to tried to capture these in pictures.

The Majestic mahanadi
The Suspension Bridge
Unemployed Boat
Another View
The Island Temple - Dhabeleswar

Me myself clicked by Priyanka

View from Temple

"Green Bank"

Cuttack the other end

Vastness

Bollywood Politics

Being a supposedly "good in statistics" person i wanted to stretch its boundaries by drawing some of my understanding of Hindi movies and its gradual progression with Indian politics. My experience and research got me involved in some serious facts as i made my journey from the pre Independence days to the current times.

First talkies was released in 1931. Interestingly it was the same year our leaders took a cue from it and became vociferous for their claim to freedom. Wish they had released "alam ara' earlier.

As we moved towards 1947, India got its freedom. So did our stars from playback singing. Till then the poor guys were giving their own vocals. At last, they don't have to sing it themselves. What a freedom for the audience.

1950's. We had color movies, Which also saw emergence of other political parties in India like Jan Sangh adding more variety/ colors to the political picture of India giving more vibrancy to our democratic system where in a viewer ( read voter) can recognize a red from a black.

1960's, fresh out of our defeat from our neighbour spelled a doom for people with small eyes which became a noticeable trait in almost all the villains.

Mid 65's we basked under our glorious victory from our other neighbours and fought the food shortage with Manoj Kumar dose of patriotic movies and

emergence of hero named rajesh who fainted the entire ladies population with his slight tilt of his head.

70-75. it was the practice ground for our messiah to make his field with no major things happening politically. He gave 13 flops in row in competition to the flawed policies of our Government. 1975 it was emergency. That year 3 movie character made news - Vijay ( the underworld Don of dewar), Gabar Singh and Santoshi Maa. Deadly combo. May be people faith in god increased and people wanted to be anti social /anti heroes. Till 1980's it was the same angry young man acting as anti hero.

When our angry young man took a hiatus for short span, it was terrible time for the ladies playing sister roles to our superheroes like Mithun and Dharmendra. Poor, they had to suffer all the attrocities of villains and formed the "revenge points" for our middle class heroes. It was the worst phase of Hindi movie, same can also said be of the indian political system.

with 1990's liberalisation, came a fresh air of life. we had more people working in front of computers with easy money , credit card calls and all world class facilities. That laid the foundation of a hero who can travel places and was geeky. Cried with girls and was mean and lean. We rechristerned ourselves as "Bollywood".

2000 on wards it was "me too" attitude with our rising forex reserves. We now compete with hollywood as India is progressing towards becoming the next super power. More of Krish, Drona, Dhoom with all special effects and big budget movies.

Lets see whats in store for future.

Dog Race and Venetian

Recently, Priyanka had visited Macao. She had captured couple of cool stuff which i thought should be shared. One was the Dog Race, which is one of its kind in World and Other is the interiors of the Venetian Macao (is the largest single structure hotel building in Asia and the fourth-largest building in the world by area).

Cool Gadgets

Now added some new gadgets to my blogs. Now you all the more reason to visit this site frequently. Some of the new features are :
1.) Bollywood/ hollywood stars born today.
2.) Daily Horoscopes
3.) English language trivia
4.) My twitter updates

This will also ensure that the site has something unique updates to offer when someone visits this site. At least the top three points in case i also lag in updating the twits.

Anything else if needed can be added. Please give in your comments.

Wanted is a must watch

Salman is back and that too is a big way, A true star he is, makes a awesome comeback to the Silver screen after delivering few duds. Its a movie which stands stron on only one platform,i.e., Salman. The story and direction are decent but needless to say they are over powered by the star power of the hero. The screen presence is enigmatic ( see the last 45 min of the movie).
A star is one who makes all the ridiculous scene believable. It was earlier done in 70's, 80's with Amitabh, Dharmendra , Mithun da/ But somehow with the onset of liberalization, the movie got somehow more softer and honey coated where the hero cried and was weak (may be to sympathize with the generation which spent most of the time working in front of the computers and had a very physical nature of work). The absence these movies definitely created a niche demand which made "Ghajini" a huge hit last year. One key thing in these type of hardcore action movies is that if the hero doesnt have that screen presence, the movie stands a risk of biting the dust.
Wanted has brilliantly showcased the 'star power" of Salman. The movie has all the key elements of 80's potboilers - romance, songs, foreign locales, bad villain played brilliantly national award winner Prakash Raj,tinge of patriotism and garnished by little suspense.Its a story of a gangster and an under cover cop. Salman excels in all the scenes with able support from Ayesha, Vinod Khanna , Mahesh Manjrekar, Sarfarz Khan, Inder Kumar and other actors. The first half may be a drag but have your patience because the climax just lifts up the adrenalin levels. WELCOME BACK SAL MAN.

Dreamy Music

There comes a time when you really appreciate good music. I am doing that for the music of " London Dreams". Its Indie rock with Indian Soul full of Raagas. Each track has the capability of becoming a chart buster. None of the songs gets " i heard it earlier" reaction from me. The Lyrics are penned by Prasoon Joshi and he has done admirable job. My pick of the chart is the "Barsoon Yaaron" where Vishal and Roop Kumar Rathod have given the vocals with excellent guitar work. Hats off to the trio - Shankar Ehsaan Loy.

A small Obituary

In 2004, he had walked his way to Victory in AP assembly election when it was certain that his opponent was invincible. I thought his success would be short lived against his formidable opponent who would easily overshadow him as a massive leader. He surprised again by retaining the chief ministership and that he did it with elan with two AP Goliath leader biting the dust this time. One of them was a superstar and worshipped hero who had made his maiden foray in politics with full support. Not only the hero was marginalised, this AP chanakya made it a strategy to combat the other Goliath by making the contest a three pronged one resulting in marginalising his votes.

No wonder he was one of the "tallest" leader who stood his ground when the earth around him shook with the Satyam/ matyas scandal. He may be vociferous leader with allegation of corruption eating away his reputation but he ll always be revered in the heart of the poor people and general public.

And India had never seen such an unprecedented search operations - Sukhoi, Satellites, ISRO, CRPF, ANti Naxal Grey Hounds etc when his helicopter went missing.

India has lost a good leader. And i am honored that i lived in this time.

Football Save and Must Watch I say

And finally got a good game of Football. Our club being heralded with the champions tagged were challenged by the rest of the "stars". Till mid time, our team was down with 1 goal and the goal keeper had to quit due to some unforeseen circumstances. So literally i was picked from the crowd to play as Gaolkeeper. As expected i rose to the occasion and saved 3 back to back goal attempts. The one which was favorite to me is given below. The reason being that it was a good kick and was at an angle which could have easily gone into the post had it not been the timely block from my end.

ToastMasters and Sine Die

I have recently joined Toastmaster Club, SAP Chapter. It is a club dedicated for improving public speaking and the systematic way the proceeding takes place does impress one and all. Its all about removing the fear of public speaking. As a part of curriculum , i gave my first public speech today in the ice breaker session. The sole purpose of the ice breaker session is to get to know each other. And generally , these are very light and humorous session wherein every one shares their lighter moments of their lives. It is very informative and the first window where we get to know the speaker in a better way. BUT...i am different.

I took this opportunity to depict a college riot situation about 11 years ago and how i had actively participated and created ruckus in the campus. I spoke about how i charged the policemen , hit them , narrowly escaped being caught and was absconding for couple of days. I could write a comprehensive details about this but i leave it to some other blog.

Jai Jagannath

If we trace the origin of "Juggernaut", we will obviously see that it comes from Jagannath. He is the most revered god in my part of the country. Famously know as the God for the poor people, he is a integral member of every oriya family. The fact is anything auspicious always starts with his name. The first wedding invitation is given to him in person. Jagannath Temple Puri is still standing tall with 11th century. It is the testimony of an engineering marvel. Very few large structure still stand strong beside a sea for so long. None to my knowledge. You have to see it to believe it. The Puri Temple Kitchen feeds more than 1,00,000 people every day. Supply Chain Marvel.

BJB travesity

Humty dumty sat on a wall
Humty dumpty had a great fall
The fall was big and hollow
To shake the earth below
Responsibility blame game
What a shame
Throwing out the mutineers
Wonder what would be left overs
As the ruling party celebrate
We should deliberate
On what the situation would be
With no strong opposition to be
Do we call this democratic
With party system autocratic

Humty Dumty sat on the wall
Humty Dumpty had a great fall

Prince Danced

The Reality Show "India's Got Talent" had a grand culmination with Prince Dance Group wining the coveted title for the year 2009. I would not delve into their team composition of Daily laboureres nor how under priviledged they were and how it was a typical "underdog" story who managed to win everyone heart.

But i would like to mention how "mature" Sekhar Kapur was in his role as a judge. I have been tracking the judges long enough to say that he was class apart in his comments when he gave his comments. He was honest, humble and honorable. His comments were very informative and ofter reflected his artitistic imagination. In the final episode, when "other" judges were "beautifully , magificently etc" giving accolades to a gymnast group from Ujjain, he referred their act to be a painting in a canvas where their each discoherent individual performance were filling up the canvas and making it beautiful. I doubt any current judges will have that level of maturity to appreciate an effort. Truely, he was the actual prince and the actual content of the show for me. And he "danced" beautifully for me.

Looking forward to see Sekhar in the second edition.

August 20

Apart from being the birthday of one of my closest, it was marks the 65th birth Anniversary of Late Rajiv Gandhi, the youngest prime minister of India. He is credited with with some landslide changes in the India History. He represented youth and was the one who reduced the voting age to 18 years from 21 years. He increased the sports budget by manifold. He brought the telecom revolution which saw setting up of "PCO" in every nook and corner of country bringing in higher connectivity as well as more employment. He sowed the seed for the IT development in India which now employees largest number of people in India.

I still remember standing on the barricaded road along with huge crowd to see his caravan passing. He was waving towards the crowd standing on his jeep. He stopped and talked to few people. He was leaving for Sriperembudur after his Orissa trip as part of election campaign......

Jaswant Singh Ordeal

BJB finally did it. As expected, it had to act and it did not disappoint all by expelling Jaswant for writing a Book. That brings about a question deep inside me - in case we are affiliated to any organisation are we not allowed to think on our own. I don't need an answer neither do i have one but that leaves with some question which has started haunting me.

Does one shows his loyalty by blindly following the path of organisation. I know that there were some common ground based on which one joins the organisation which can be either ideas, ambitions and goals. One of my Management professor had put it succinctly with a simile to the ways Algae survives. Algae consists of amoeba. Amoeba in search of food come together and form a a algae. When the optimal size of algae is reached, it takes the help of wind/water and other medium to reach to a position where they can find food. Similarly people make an organisation to satisfy some of their needs - ambition , goals etc. But is the organisation that binding enough that we are forced to change our basic thought process. Then it can be visually seen as an amoeba forcing its way out algae and the algae unable to reach it destination. So whose benefit is it do be out of the association. Probably both and hence the necessitates separation. Here the Algae (BJB) with their Hinduvta mindset made this decision to dissociate itself with one of its amoeba ( Jaswant) as they felt that it was detrimental to their longer run. No wonder the amoeba should be sulking.

Now putting the liberal hat, now the logic should be applied to the citizen of a democratic country. We should be devoid of any rights as exercising any right may lead to any conflict of the general charter of the country. Slowly it will evolve to a dictatorial democracy leading to ultimate dictatorship. Then there would not be any difference between a taliban chalking out Sharia and government rule. Hence, apt utilisation of our rights are an necessity to maintain a healthy democracy. Thought should not be suppressed and appropriately vented out. They cannot be.

Still debating whether BJB did the right thing or not. And i am not at all talking about the way they did as i don't have much information of it.

Wall is Back

"Old soldiers never die; they just fade away!"
- General Douglas MacArthur, 1951.

I am delighted with the fact that now Dravid can now time his retirement from Team India playing in his blue jersey rather than playing for any domestic/ IPL side. For critics, who say that he is too slow, he has hit one of the fastest 50 in ODI ( in 22 balls). For people who say that he is only " test fit". he was instrumental in Royal Challengers reaching the IPL T20 Final. A man of his caliber deserves better treatment and he has got another chance to don the Indian cap. Hopefully, the younger brigade around him will learn to cope the shorter balls and about 100% team commitment. After all, he is the only Indian to be named the ICC player of the Year (2004) and all the highest scores which other Top Indian batsman made had able support of Dravid on the other end of the crease - Ganguly's 183 in Taunton, Dhoni's 183 in Jaipur, Tendulkar's 186 in Hyderabad, Laxman's 131 in Adelaide. Its only ODI statics. Team India will surely benefit with this inclusion.

All the Best Dravid for this stint in ODIs.

Happy Independence Day

Xcelcius : It seems finally i got addicted to this fascinating analytical tool. The graphical power of this tool is great. Was planning to upload a xcelcius file, which will give a geographical view of an analysis. Pulled out some statistics from 2001 census about India to make this flash file. I believe this is only the tip of the iceberg. A lot can be done by leveraging this analytical tool with Ondemand capabilities.

(Please hover the mouse over the states, to see the related statistics.The Top right corner shows the state population and the pie shows the breakup)

Flash File 1

And talking about religion and literacy rates, i got vinatage datapoints of 1991 ( when the new states of Jharkhand , chattisgarh were not yet created.

Flash File 2

"At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new…India discovers herself again."
Jawaharlal Nehru
(on Indian Independence Day, 1947)




And Wishing you all Happy Independence Day.