Kshitij Sharma

14 years of work-ex

2011-06-03T13:54:00.002+05:30

I will complete 14 years of working on 1st July. Non stop, no breaks in the middle and still no end in sight...

Ram's vanvas ended in 14 years and a life term sentence also completes in 14 years.

Driving to/from work in Bangalore

2011-05-31T09:35:00.003+05:30

I started driving again to/from work. Key takeaways:

The traffic in Bangalore is exactly as chaotic as it is made out to be. People do not think while driving...
Driving in a car protects you from the evening rain.
It is a major fun to splish splosh the car in the next lane
Kishore Kumar is still THE BEST.
Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, Kay Kay and Abhijeet could come close, but there are some limitations.

It is important to choose a time to commute. Starting from home before 8:15 AM is necessary and leaving around 5:00 PM is absolutely essential.

Tuesday superstition

2011-05-24T15:30:00.003+05:30

I need to find out the root cause behind the Tuesday superstition in South India - essentially no one starts any work on a Tuesday. Someone needs to tell Microsoft though - they are unveiling the next update of Windows Phone 7.x on a Tuesday :-)

Return of the blogger

2011-05-24T10:00:00.003+05:30

After spending too much time on Facebook, almost to the tune of an hour daily, I have decided to give it a rest and return to the platform I love the most - blogging. This again needs to become my favourite pass time.

As I see it, the 140 character limit on twitter and few character limit on Facebook does not allow me to express my literary skills :-) to the fullest. I am fed up of trying to create one liners just to keep the humour going. I will now start blogging again - few blogs a week here and more on my astrology page. I am planning to start investing some serious time on Astrology blog as well.

Prestige Shantiniketan News Site

2010-12-15T10:04:00.002+05:30

Since I am a part of Shantiniketan family, I am proud to be associated with the website. This is the site - Prestige Shantiniketan and associate blog Prestige Shantiniketan News.

In coming days I wish to start blogging for this site as well, apart from posting just news. Facebook is denting my creativity by making me think of one liners for status updates... I need to get back to some serious blogging both here, on PSN site as well as on the Astrology site

Hooray, I was a sitting duck !

2010-04-19T17:27:00.003+05:30

I went to watch the Mumbai-Bangalore IPL match and heard one of the blasts at around 3 PM. Did not understand what it was - it never crossed my mind that it could be an act of terrorism and I was so close to the epicenter of the blast :-) It was only after they started flashing a message about the match being delayed, did people started talking about bombs.
I will be very honest, at no point was I scared. Ticketgenie.in (the online ticket site where I purchase the tickets) had earlier lost my tickets in courier. When I confronted them, they gave me Rs49/- tickets (the guest pass to pavilion). Now the issue was what if the match gets canceled, what refund would the organizers give me :-) This was the only thought that crossed my mind, apart from the fact that I would not be able to see Sachin Tendulkar play... Basically, my brother put it succinctly - "haath to aaya, par muh na laga", roughly translated as "I had (food) in my hand, but could not eat it".
But the match happened - and it was a good match. I shamelessly cheered Sachin's team, much to the chagrin of my fellow Bengalureans, but I did not care. After all, Mumbai's team is called Indians and I am an Indian first and a Challenger later. The only thing I was pissed about is Bangalore's fielding and that they chose to hold on to Tendulkar's catch alone.

Mile Sur Mera Tumhara

2010-01-28T19:31:00.001+05:30

In tune with, pun intended of course, with my current state of mind of cribbing against anything substandard, I would like to trash the new “mile sur mera tumhara” video that is being telecast now on television. This reincarnation essentially belongs to the same category of Karzzz and Sholey (RGV ki Aag) and brings out the following points:

The population of India has grown a lot in last 20 years and hence all these additional hero/heroines from Bollywood needed to be accommodated.
The egos of these people are inflated and all of them wanted separate screen space for themselves.
Shah Rukh Khan misunderstood the meaning of phrase - “passion towards one’s own country” and portrayed the same expression in this video as he did in “Suraj hua maddham”.
Salman Khan had to compromise with a vest because he was not allowed to take off his shirt.

Let put an end to sequels and remakes…

This is a test

2010-01-12T14:54:00.001+05:30

Aman ki Asha

2010-01-08T20:42:00.001+05:30

From my office, I can see a huge billboard displaying an advertisement for “Aman ki Asha”, a joint program by Times of India and Jang Group, Pakistan for peace in the Indian Subcontinent. It is supposed to be a people-to-people initiative type of confidence building measure between the two countries and any such programme should be encouraged. Everything about this initiative is in right spirits.

However, as a common man of India, I do not feel connected with this initiative. For me, this is just another full page advertisement in TOI, very much like the Mercedes-Benz ad that came last week. The objects of both these ads remain unachievable for me. I don’t know about Pakistan, but in India TOI has roped Amitabh Bachchan to represent the Indian face. Somehow I am reminded of the other campaign Mr. Bachchan was part of - “UP me dum hai, kyonki jurm yahan kam hai”.

If they were really serious about it, why not get the man from street in Bangalore, Mumbai, or Karachi and ask him to act in such commercials? Why not have reruns of Dhoop Kinare or Bakra Kiston Par on Zoom?

Call me cynical, but this too will fizzle out in a few days and in no time TOI and its sister channel Times Now will be back to their jingoistic campaign against the Government, ISI, the Army and all the related institutions in Pakistan. I am sure Jang will resort to the same cheap tricks on the other side of the border.

Multiple Idiots

2010-01-02T15:20:00.001+05:30

For the new year, we treated ourselves with a Hindi movie in a cinema hall after 1.5 years. We went to see “3 Idiots”, which turned out a treat to watch. It is an excellent movie with almost no loose ends.

When I came home in the evening, I figured that this really is a story of multiple Idiots. There was a full spat on television. The producer Vidhu Vinod Chopra got offended on a question regarding sharing of credits with the writer of Five Point Someone, Chetan Bhagat and asked a journalist to “shut up”. With such dirty laundry being washed in public, I felt like the first Idiot who went and paid for this movie. I should have just waited for the DVD to come out.

The second Idiot is Raju Hirani. Raju, if you really lifted the “setting, characters, plotline, dramatic twists, one liners, message – almost all aspects” from “Five Point Someone”, give due credit. I am a blogger who writes on Astrology and hates it when people copy passages from my astrology articles and post on the web as their own. Chetan is at least the author of this book and deserves something better. Even when I copied assignments and xerox’ed others’ notes at IIT, there was an implicit, heartfelt gratitude - “tu God hai, boss…”.

The third set of Idiots is the pair of Aamir and Vinod Chopra. Guys, shut you mouth and let Chetan make some noise. Your opinion has even less weight than mine. I actually paid money to watch this movie.

Lastly, in my very humble opinion, Chetan Bhagat is also a pretty big Idiot. Dude, lets face it… your novel is not a work of literary genius. It is a five pointer story through and through. I did not feel either happy or excited or surprised while reading it. There was nothing that I already did not know. My first reaction was of indifference and felt I would have had much more fun during a cack session with my wingies.

Raju and Abhijat took this five point something story and modified it to score a nine point something, making it a rare case of a movie being better than the novel. The best elements that make this movie a pleasure to watch are not present in Chetan’s book, however fantastic they may sound. Whether it is a moron pissing on a spoon/light bulb or the “aal is well delivery” happening in a hostel mess, it comes from the mind of these two writers. Chetan’s book does not have the irony of an inventor being discovered dead using his own invention. There is no Sept 5 and Laddakh angle in this story. Chetan’s heroine is nowhere as charming as Kareena.

Someone might argue that such characterization is not possible in novels – to which I would like to politely direct to the Harry Potter series (which score a perfect 10, btw). My suggestion to Chetan is to only ask for as much credit as the book really deserves. Also, I would like to ask everyone to remember the fate of the other movie “Hello” based on the other novel “One night at the call center”.

If “3 Idiots” is a big hit, it is not because of 5.someone’s plotline, but because of the treatment it got from the writer/director. They could have as well walked into any IIT, interviewed a couple of hostellites and got the plots from there. Chetan’s book was successful, no doubt, but what really matters is excellence and success naturally follows excellence, jhakh mar ke.

Life is like ad only - II

2009-12-04T15:08:00.006+05:30

Why I want a girl child...

Daughter behaves the right way. Firstly, she has the right dreams, then she studies well and then buys a car for her dad.

Son does this... the pest first wants his father to plan for his future and then goes on a car buying spree. Look how the pest treats his grandfather.

ps: I have a son.

Life is like ad only - I

2009-12-04T15:08:00.004+05:30

Life of a poor, typical software engineer:

(1) Does not know how to deal with girls.

(2) Cannot think of anything other than his place of work.

(3) No scope of girlfriends, therefore pakka arrange marriage.

Apples and Oranges

2009-10-13T10:02:00.003+05:30

Media in this country has a habit of comparing apples to oranges and declare themselves intelligent in doing so. One more example is this news story - Rumours about Twenty20 cricket killing the one-day game may have been a bit exaggerated.

Ms. Author, can you at least tell us if you did any other research than just comparing TRPs? The IPL relied on "in your face" marketing to succeed, much like the crap movie Om Shanti Om. People watched Champions Trophy due to patriotic reasons. Poor fellows at Champions League had no such weapon in their arsenal, demonstrated by the fact that they still have intelligent folks like Harsha Bhogle and Sunil Gavaskar doing the commentary, and not Mandira Bedi.

The Champions League also comes after a long cricketing season. There is a factor called fatigue and law of diminishing returns.

If only our journalists had more than just a degree from college...

Nobel prize for what?

2009-10-10T14:37:00.003+05:30

The intention behind the Swedes sucking up to the US for is everything but noble. There is otherwise no reason to give the Peace prize to Obama. The guy has been in office for just about 8 months, has not done anything other than make speeches and still has a long way to go in really making a difference to this world. Giving Obama all the benefit of doubt in the world, the award committee should have waited at least till his last year of Presidency.

In the current circumstances, a US president should be a peace award only if he/she manages to get out of Iraq and Afghanistan and get rid of at least Pakistan's nuclear proliferation if not the whole worlds...

Water on moon?

2009-09-23T13:25:00.002+05:30

There is some speculation about Chandrayaan finding water on moon. Does the news media really believe that is possible? People should think about all the other NASA and Russian satellites that have been roaming around that area did not do anything till now and this kal ka chhokra chandrayaan comes and discovers water !! To kya woh amereeki aur roosi satellites jhakh mar rahe the?

Two new items in TOI answer this question for us beautifully... Did chandrayaan find water on Moon's surface? and Chandrayaan-1 was 'killed' by heat stroke.

Therefore my detective mind reconstructed the truth like this - when Chandrayaan-1 was dying from the heat stroke, it wished for water on Moon's surface and would have imagined it during the process. This imagery made scientists believe that there is really water there :-)

Up for grabs

2009-08-24T13:57:00.001+05:30

With the credibility of BJP reaching rock bottom, I think I am seriously reconsidering voting for them in the next elections. Congress suddenly looks so much better. It is a bitter pill to swallow, but my vote is up for grabs...

Sanatana Dharma

2009-08-20T08:53:00.005+05:30

Moved to the planetarypositions website - Sanatana Dharma...

62 years of bhashan-baji

2009-08-16T08:46:00.005+05:30

On the morning of 15th August, I did not even wake up till 8:00 AM since the gym was closed. My son also slept beatifically. My wife did not switch on the television as she made a quiet cup of tea for herself. We essentially missed the bhashan given by the Prime Minister at the Red Fort. When I woke up, I felt sorry for the old man who had to get up so early in the morning, reach Red Fort and give a speech who almost no one wants to listen. The group of people and dressed up children were there only because of an official dictat.

At about 9:00 AM, the breaking news was that SRK was detained at Newark's airport because he has a Muslim surname. In fact, on CNN-IBN, the order of headlines was (1) SRK's detention, (2) Bombing in Kabul and at a distant 3rd place - the PM's speech. Even the TV channels had other important things to show.

Which brings us to an important question - why do we keep up with these age old practices and unnecessary rituals in name of democracy? If the PM really wants to address the nation, he can surely use 15 mins of his time each week and talk to people on radio and television. What kind of status update can he provide to us once a year from 15th August? In our country where food prices go up every week, does just once a year of communication make sense? If it does not, lets put an end to this bhashan-baji. It will save us from a ritual and save 100s of crores of tax payers' money in organizing such events. Every year, what do we get by displaying the military hardware? Is it meant for us or for China and Pakistan? It looks ridiculous when we put the display against the backdrop of delays in defence equipment procurement, CAG rapping the whole Gorshkov deal and frequency of aircraft crashes.

PS: I think SRK created this whole drama and episode at Newark Airport just to get publicity for his next film - "My name is Khan"... Sorry Shahrukh Bhai, I really don't trust you. I think you are very much capable of such stunts :-)

Anti Doping

2009-08-03T13:19:00.004+05:30

Everyone is aware of a the dialog between BCCI and WADA - World Anti Doping Agency with ICC in the middle. The whole dialog can be summed up as:

ICC: Kya hua, tera wada? Woh kasam, woh irada?

BCCI (while saying yes): Wada raha sanam...

WADA (while doing the policing): Jo wada kiya woh nibhana padega...

But the players are essentially bewafas, in no mood to comply. I fully support them because I feel that they are correct about all their objections against various clauses. The arguments are pretty convincing:

I am not addicted to cigarettes - otherwise I would have already appeared in ads for Nicorett by now.
I am not addicted to crack/cocaine otherwise it would have already come out in open.
While at home, why should I remain away from the cheap stuff available in outskirts of Delhi, Chandigarh or Ranchi? You just tell me 2 days in advance and I will stop.
Once in a while I go to exotic places for vacation... the local economy needs to be supported.
I can't tell you where I am going for vacation, otherwise photographers will start following me. If I don't ever take a vacation, that too is bad for my image.
Finally, I don't do performance enhancing drugs otherwise Team BCCI would not have lost so badly in T20 World Cup.

Team BCCI, we are with you on this one. No one can tell you what or where you can or cannot smoke.

Selling India's Poverty?

2009-07-30T15:37:00.002+05:30

The charges against ISKCON Bangalore that they are trying to sell India's poverty abroad are ridiculous. If that is really the case, the following people should be immediately put behind bars.

(1) Arundhati Roy

(2) Aravind Adiga

(3) Salman Rushdie

(4) Danny Boyle

Futher, Arundhati Roy and Aravind Adiga should be declared as traitors and charged for treason. The other two folks should be treated in the same way as Ajmal Kasab and tried for waging war against India.

Kalam's Mistakes

2009-07-24T13:44:00.002+05:30

If there is one person who is guilty in this whole frisking episode, is Dr. Kalam himself. There are three mistakes that I can point out:

(1) Who asked him to open his mouth after three months? The incident happened in April. This is July... WTF was he thinking?

(2) He was the President of India for full 5 years. Why did he not fix this commoner vs. king mentality where the protocol protects the kings everywhere?

(3) Who asked him to travel by Continental? Did he not look for reviews on the customer service by any US based airline?

What is done is done. He needs to first fire his travel manager now.

It hurts!!

2009-06-22T10:23:00.007+05:30

Right now, I have one thing against the nation of Pakistan... a feeling of pure jealousy that is burning me from the inside. I could not watch the T20 world cup finals on 21st evening till the end. It was pretty clear early on which is the better team and who is gonna win this cup.

On 22nd morning when I switched on the TV, I changed the channel immediately that was showing all the Pakistanis dancing in streets on Islamabad and Lahore. However, it was pretty depressing to watch India specific news on other channels that were showing Lalgarh and Kashmir violence. On one other channel, Dhoni was busy selling the PSPO with koney koney me jyada hawa, while his cricket in the tournament was Pretty Stupid, Pretty Ordinary. Suddenly India seemed a depressing place to be and the only glimmer of good news was that some Indian scientists had managed to clone a buffalo.

What hurt more is that the winners from the 2007 world cup exited without a fight because they were too weak to put up one. They got hurt making money for themselves in some WWF style lousy fist fight.

Indian cricket was not always like that. I am sure you all remeber that in 1893, a bunch of villagers managed to beat the then imperial powers over a small issue of few hundred rupees in taxes and a big issue of pride. Almost a 100 years later, in 1983, we beat the then reigning kings West Indies and became world champions against all odds. In 2007, a bunch of kids playing for nothing but joy of cricket beat the mighty Aussies and SA and went on to win the finale too.

This Pakistani team is a lot like the 1893 Indian team that beat the British. They are playing for themselves, against the system and against the mega power the Imperial Premier League. None of the players were allowed to play for the IPL and worse, one of the major bowers Razzaq was a part of IPL's poor cousin the ICL.

Hats off Younis Bhai. You are the real hero. May God bless you.

Whats the point?

2009-06-10T21:10:00.002+05:30

Whats the point behind wasting time in doing this identification parade? Did the whole world not see this guy wielding weapons in CST on camera? Even his mom and dad recognized him seeing his photograph...

Come one guys, give us a break.

Aila? Storm?

2009-05-25T10:40:00.003+05:30

I read this news item in Times of India - Kolkata stares at cyclone Aila and thought that even though IPL is over, there is one last match left between Kolkata Knight Riders and Mumbai Indians... to know more why I thought so, please read fakeiplplayer.blogspot.com.

There is no storm left in Aila, btw. One of the guys at work called him Bhishma Pitamah of Indian Cricket - no wonder all the shikhandis in the world keep taking his wicket.

Mr Ruler, Suck on It!

2009-05-12T11:53:00.002+05:30

At the beginning of IPL-1, India Today ran an article on KKR and Shahrukh Khan where he mentioned what his son thought about owning a cricket team. I would like to quote from India Today's article. And lets cut some slack to the kid, afterall he is just a kid, but of course no such courtesy's for Mr. SRK...

“He told me, ‘Papa, we are rulers, not servants. Let’s do this alone’. I woke up my wife (Gauri) in turn and told her this. She wasn’t very happy.”

Cut to IPL-2 and there is Mandira Bedi's interview where he essentially tells all his critics to go "Suck on it".

Based on these two interviews and after losing all these matches and reading through the juicy posts on the fakeiplplayer.blogspot.com, I would like to ask Mr. Khan - so, have you sucked on it already? Did it taste good? :-)

Swine Flu

2009-05-04T19:17:00.002+05:30

Question: What would the swing flu be named by US administration if the flu had originated in India?

Answer: H1L1 flu

BTW, whats with the H1 visa now? Seems it is still available... see here

While you were sleeping...

2009-04-25T09:34:00.002+05:30

Dear Mr. PM,

It was very heartening to see this statement that you made to the press - I'll revive economy in 100 days: PM and to know that you indeed care about this country's poor and middle class citizens. Thank you for the gesture during the elections at the least.

To make you understand your job and what you need to achieve, I would like to tell you that while you were sleeping for the last 5 years, my grocery bill has gone up by 50-70%. I spend much more on petrol even while my commute to office is reduced. Expenditure on clothes has gone up as the shopkeeper explains that raw material has become costlier.

I cannot understand how our salaries and net worth have not gone up that much though, because when I was reading the newspaper the other day, it told me that one of your esteemed colleague and boss Rahul Gandhi pays about 11lakhs in income tax and is able to maintain shops and properties in prime location in Delhi - yet his sources of income remain mysterious. AFA we all know, he has no job and earns some paltry amount as MP. Can you tell us the magic of making such money, Mr. PM? Tell me the trick, buddy... who do I have to suck up to?

Last year you were so good to farmers and gave free money to rich farmers all over the country. Can you please waive off my car loan and house loan also? I too would like to do nothing and get money, you see.

Prestige Shantiniketan Bangalore

2009-03-24T20:05:00.008+05:30

I have been asked to take this message to all people who have booked a flat in Prestige Shantiniketan in Whitefield, Bangalore and would gladly do so.

If you are one of them or know anyone who has done a booking, please spread word this group in yahoo-groups: prestige_shantiniketan _at_ yahoogroups dot com. It is a pretty neat group with lot of action and information and ongoing discussions about project completion status, VAT/service tax, guidance value of the property, etc.

Recently, Prestige Shantiniketan Apartment Allotees Welfare Association (PSAAWA) was formed and the current strength is close to 350 PSNs. The group conducts regular meetings and is very active in answering questions, right from what is the correct paperwork to who is good supplier of kitchen fittings in Bangalore to some of the experiences of folks already living in the apartment complex.

As Prestige have started sending letters to PSNs informing that their flats are ready and that they pay the balance amounts and take possession of their flats, it seems that there are a lot of queries and open issues. PSAAWA as a group has been able to initiate a contact with the top brass of Prestige (a fruitful meeting happened with bigshots @ Prestige last month on 30-Jan-10) and achieve significantly which an individual would have normally found it difficult. I would request all PSNs who have not joined PSAAWA to join and strengthen the hands of the association. I am a proud member of PSAAWA.

Please get in touch with Mr Narayanan (mn1959@gmail.com) or Praveen (psn1042@yahoo.in) for details.

Do channel par "Jay" ho?

2009-03-09T21:49:00.002+05:30

I think Arnab Goswami of Times Now pulled a fast one on viewers tonight.

This happened between 9:32 and 9:34 PM on March 09, 2009.

Mr. Jay Panda of BJD (you can get more information on him here) was live on CNN-IBN talking to Rajdeep Sardesai and Chandan Mitra of the BJP. I happened to flip the channel to Times Now and heard Arnab say that he will shortly have Jay Panda of the BJD on the program shortly. I was naturally curious and was wondering how was this being made possible. Jay Panda did appear on the program, answered Arnab's question and then vanished. At the exact same instance, Jay was also talking to Rajdeep.

From whatever little forensics my brain understands, I could make out that Jay was indeed having a conversation with Sardesai and Mitra and Arnab could have very well inserted a recording with tremendous effect. Just that he did not expect a detective like me watching two channels at the same time :-)

Mind you - this is supposed to be LIVE television... Or is it deferred live? How deferred? 5 mins, 10 mins?

Not been there...

2009-03-04T16:36:00.002+05:30

I did not expect this kind of an article from a person who heads HSBC in India.
In an article in WSJ, Mr Tarun Kataria, who is the top boss of HSBC India claims that Obama's policies of capping bonuses and directing lending to a special segment of industry has strong parallels in Indian economy... Read his full article here.
Totally wrong, I would say. In case of US, the cap on salary is not on the best and the brightest brains. It is on the blokes who screwed it all up. They first misled everyone, took huge bonuses and then when the truth came out, ran to the Gov saying sorry. WTF?!?!
Mr. Banker, please don't take ordinary people like us for a ride.

Question of Pyaas

2009-03-03T13:52:00.003+05:30

Two ads on India television recommend Pepsi and Sprite to quench thirst. Could someone tell me if cola drinks really help if someone is thirsty?
I googled and could not get a good answer. If cola drinks are diuretic and if body loses more water by drinking them then it would be really harmful to drink cola when you are thirsty. It would also be 180 degrees opposite of what these advertisements claim. कोई न बुझाये प्यास, सब कुछ है बकवास...

Seven second delay

2009-02-23T14:45:00.002+05:30

While watching the oscars this morning, I kept reminding myself that there is just about seven second delay between the actual event and the transmission to the whole world. It does not look that way at all. The performances, lighting, live music and the presentation was perfect.
Compare this to any award function in India and you can only feel bad. National awards are too formal and boring. Filmfare/Stardust/Screen awards are shoddy in production value and are not even telecast the same day. It take almost week to edit and telecast. IMHO producers of such functions in India lack basic औकात (au-kaat).

Two political parties, one voice

2009-02-18T13:29:00.000+05:30

Nope, this does not mean that the parties necessarily agree with each other. In fact, these two political parties could not have more divergent views on any topic. I am talking about the political advertisements on the telly.
One of the ads is by Behenji Mayavati (मेरे पास उनका साथ है) and other by Government of India, i.e. the Congress (Sonia). The voice in both the advertisements is same - belonging to Kailash Kher. Pretty cool for him since the grass is green on both sides of the fence :-)

Greenathon BS

2009-02-08T15:16:00.010+05:30

A leading news channel in India - NDTV is indulging in an exercise called Greenathon to supposedly increase awareness about green technology among its viewers. It is a 24 hour long telecast, being called a first in the television history. Indeed it is and IMHO is the biggest bullshit any TV channel has ever produced in the name of environment, awareness, humanity and what not.

I would like to ask the owners of NDTV:

How much money did you spend in brainstorming about this program? The money is directly proportional to the amount of night oil burnt.
How much money is being paid to the anchors, artists and celebrities performing on this show? Because if it is in name of awareness, I do expect them to perform for free. Otherwise, they are going to take this money, spend it and add to carbon emissions.
You gave ads in newspapers, right? How much money/ink/paper/trees could have been saved otherwise?
The set looks phenomenal. How much did you spend on lighting and sound? Please remember each paisa saved on these items will add to saving carbon emissions.
What about post production e.g. editing the program? How many computers were used to add special effects? Could you have done with switching few off?

It was funny to see:

Toyota is one of the advertisers. I know of Toyota as one of the companies that makes cars. Cars burn petroleum products.
A senior person from Nokia was on the show asking people to recycle old phones. He should have rather asked everyone to keep using the old phones and buy less of the newer models that Nokia keeps bringing out. Now that would be committing suicide, isn't it?

It is sad that no one seems to understand that this problem is worsened because of consumption beyond what we really need. We ought to pledge for environment by doing one thing we all can - LOWER OUR STANDARD OF LIVING. And that includes watching less television; especially channels like NDTV.

"Tare Zameen Par" Zameen Par?

2009-01-23T12:17:00.002+05:30

In the din of A.R. Rahman's music, I think we are forgetting that "Tare Jameen Par" is not selected as India's entry to Oscar. I am sad today.
Lets not forget that Slumdog Millionaire is NOT an Indian movie. It is a British movie, directed by a British dude and it caters to British sensibilities. It is a poverty porn no matter how much Danny Boyle denies it.
It is also not Rahman's best work. If he gets an Oscar for this movie, what about Roja and Bombay? What about the combo of Guljar and Rahman for the Chhaiya Chhaiya song in Dil se?

Ads mimic life

2009-01-19T11:11:00.002+05:30

One more intance of advertisements mimicing life. See this ad first - Motoyuva and look at the guy drawing a picture of his teacher. Then this ad for center fresh shows the same person telling his father that he flunked again.
Pretty cool, right? If the guy was busy making merry in class, he had to flunk, isn't it :-)

Who elected this guy?

2009-01-14T10:23:00.003+05:30

It was very interesting to read this article in WashingtonPost.com - The Bush Verdict Is In. It is funny to see all these journalists outdoing each other through news articles, editorials and blogs in trying to vilify this outgoing President Bush. While I have no sympathy for Bush, I would like to ask a very simple question - who elected this guy to run America? You did, right? All of you are therefore as wrong as Mr. Bush. Clearly, the voters in America screwed up big time, and that too not once - twice... twice.
People in western world should no longer call India a flawed democracy, because this title should now go to the USA. When our leaders screw up, there is a Bofors scandal, chara ghotala, Din Dayal Upadhyaya Trust case etc. This is minuscule compared to Iraq wars, trillion dollar deficit, world wide economic depression etc.

Should mercinaries be hired?

2008-12-11T13:10:00.004+05:30

It is very obvious that leaders/politicians in this country will not allow any police reforms to take place. And, it is very obvious that all other steps like creating a national agency to fight terror will be forever forever bogged down under babu-dom in this country.

It is clear that the terrorists who attacked Bombay were poor people from Pakistan who agreed for this task only for money. Therefore, I have an idea. Indian government should announce a fund where such terrorists can come, confess, take more money and go back and attack Pakistan/Taliban/Lashkar/al-Qaeda and whever other god-forsaken organisation they initially belonged to. These guys are anyway trained well. They are motivated and this motivation can then be put to good use!

What say you?

Prasoon Joshi's Poem

2008-12-01T21:02:00.003+05:30

This needs to reach as many people as possible...

इस बार नहीं

इस बार जब वो छोटी सी बच्ची मेरे पास अपनी खरोंच ले कर आएगी
मैं उसे फू फू कर नहीं बहलाऊँगा
पनपने दूँगा उसकी टीस को

इस बार नहीं

इस बार जब मैं चेहरों पर दर्द लिखा देखूँगा
नहीं गाऊँगा गीत पीड़ा भुला देने वाले दर्द को रिसने दूँगा,
उतरने दूँगा अन्दर गहरे
इस बार नहीं

इस बार मैं न मरहम लगाऊँगा
न ही उठाऊँगा रुई के फाहे
और न ही कहूँगा कि तुम आँखें बंद कर लो, गर्दन उधर कर लो मैं दवा लगाता हूँ
देखने दूँगा सबको हम सबको खुले नंगे घाव

इस बार नहीं

इस बार जब उलझने देखूँगा,छटपटाहट देखूँगा
नहीं दौडूंगा उलझी डोर लपेटने
उलझने दूँगा जब तक उलझ सके

इस बार नहीं

इस बार कर्म का हवाला दे कर नहीं उठाऊँगा औजार
नहीं करूंगा फिर से एक नयी शुरुआत
नहीं बनूँगा मिसाल एक कर्मयोगी की
नहीं आने दूँगा ज़िन्दगी को आसानी से पटरी पर
उतरने दूँगा उसे कीचड में,
टेढे मेढे रास्तों पे

नहीं सूखने दूँगा दीवारों पर लगा खून
हल्का नहीं पड़ने दूँगा उसका रंग
इस बार नहीं बनने दूँगा उसे इतना लाचार
कि पान की पीक और खून का फर्क ही ख़त्म हो जाए

इस बार नहीं

इस बार घावों को देखना है
गौर से थोड़ा लंबे वक्त तक
कुछ फैसले और उसके बाद हौसले
कहीं तो शुरुआत करनी ही होगी
इस बार यही तय किया है

- प्रसून जोशी

Prevention of Cruelty

2008-05-01T19:17:00.002+05:30

According to this Times of India story, Animal welfare board has accused Vodafone of indulging in cruelty against animals in the ongoing ads involving the pug.
I say, what the hell... what about cruelty against humans who are subjected to these ads after every over and sometimes after just 5 balls in an IPL match?

Yellow Colour

2008-04-28T21:45:00.002+05:30

It is my theory that the Chennai Super Kings is winning only because of the yellow colour jersey. If you have not noticed, it is a good colour to have. The world champion Australian cricket team left it in favour of the baggy green and promptly lost the series to India.

The tag and dress colour of "Men in Blue" must change if we have to become the world champions and rule the world of cricket.

Budhdhu, Mamta and Despite Mamta

2008-01-10T20:51:00.000+05:30

"Budhdhu", "Mamta" and "Despite Mamta" where three names in consideration for naming the Lakh rupee car from Tata. Finally they decided to play it cool and small and called it Nano.

Not my joke, Ratan Tata's... Heard on TV just now. Pretty funny.

Loser Ponting

2008-01-07T13:06:00.000+05:30

Ponting has proved to be the biggest loser in history of cricket. Just because he was not able to negotiate Bhajji's bowling on the field, he spins this web to get him banned from the next two test matches.

Incredible India?

2007-12-08T20:27:00.000+05:30

So much for the incredible India campaign by the ministry of tourism. No tourist spot in India appears in "53 places to visit in 2008" by the New York times. I can not believe it, but Iran makes it to the list...

WTF?!?

2007-07-21T12:06:00.000+05:30

For people who stood in the queue at 4:30 AM for the latest HP book, a huge and rude shock was awaiting them at home - the news channels promptly reporting the fate of Harry and Voldemort as "breaking news". The news channel like Times Now, NDTV and CNN-IBN were cool but some of the others like Zee News, Star News and that sabse-tez Aajtak did all they can to frustrate everyone. I have only one thing to say to them... A-holes, if you do not understand abc of journalism, shut shop and get lost. I hope I become a death eater and administor Cruciatus curse on you till you lose your mind...

Deathly Leakage

2007-07-18T23:29:00.000+05:30

Yeah, HP-7 is indeed leaked. Someone has taken pictures of each and every page and posted them on the internet.
I have had a look at it and trust me, it is not worth it. You can make out only a few pages coz they are such low resolution pictures. If you have reached this page trying to find a copy to download, I suggest you stand in the queue in front of bookstores at 5:00 in the morning on 21st and purchase your copy.

Thinking

2007-07-04T21:41:00.000+05:30

Saw that Hero Honda CBZ motorcycle's ad has a tag line "Thinking is such a waste of time...". This ad was being telecast on National Geographic, whose ad line is "Think again."
What do you think?

Moving nightmares

2007-05-03T21:52:00.000+05:30

I recently shifted my house from one part of Bangalore to another. Mine is a typical two BHK house with basic furniture - sofa, bed, fridge, tv, washing machine, dining table etc. After talking to a few movers and packers, I decided to go with Kaiser Packers (P) Ltd. (http://www.kaiserpackers.com/) because they were one of the first to send a representative to my house to inspect and give me a quote. They claim to be an ISO9001 certified company and the first impression was good. I was very particular about the date and time of the move and had told them more than 10 days in advance. The representative agreed and promised that 5 packers would come to my house by 8:30 AM on the day and that entire process would be over by 4:30 PM.

Two days before the day of move, I get a call from the representative asking me if we could prepone the move to Friday. I refused.

On the agreed upon day, I get a call that the packers would come at 10:30 instead of 8:30. Finally, after umpteen phone calls, only 3 packers instead of 5 turned up at 12:30 PM and started packing. The material that they brought was not sufficient and a few items could not be packed. They had to be transported just like that. Instead of usual 2 hours, it took 4.5 hours for packing and then 2.5 hours for loading . During loading, we figured that the truck sent to transport the items was smaller and I had to carry a few things in my car. After reaching the destination, it took another 2 hours for unloading and that too after begging the driver of the truck to help out.

The move finally ended at 11:30 at night and I was left with a hole in my pocket, a badly hurting back and a broken washing machine.

नहीं, यह Deathly Hallows नहीं है

2007-04-17T21:47:00.000+05:30

मुझे मेरे एक मित्र ने एक pdf फाईल भेजी जो की इन्टरनेट पर हैरी पॉटर की असली कॉपी की तरह बाँटी जा रही है। Times Now न्यूज़ चैनल ने भी इसी कॉपी को ले कर एक खबर दिखायी थी। पर जैसा की भारत में अक्सर होता है, मीडिया कभी भी कोई भी खबर दिखने के पहले जरूरी शोध करना तो उचित समझता ही नहीं और अपने दर्शकों को बेवक़ूफ़ भी समझता है। एक बार अगर यह वेबसाइट देख ली होती तो अच्छा होता।

Airport Tourism

2007-04-07T17:43:00.000+05:30

This photograph is of the runway of Bangalore airport from Wind Tunnel Road. There was a lot of crowd was gathered there to look at the planes landing and taking off. Good to see that people in India find avenues of entertainment where there aren't any...

Ministry of Aviation should seriously collaborate with the Ministry of Tourism and consider developing tourism hot spots in and around the airports in India. The money charged for this display could as well be used for developing the much needed infrastructure in and around the airports in the country.

Sunrise

2007-03-30T20:03:00.000+05:30

The Sun has finally risen. Aruba Networks debuted on NASDAQ - ARUN and got a warm reception.

Hutch Ad, anyone?

2007-03-27T20:58:00.000+05:30

Is it time to run the ridiculous Hutch ad featuring Rahul Dravid again? Please see my earlier post on Rahul and the Hutch ad for clarification...

Amitabh's UP ads

2007-02-20T21:16:00.001+05:30

Those who have seen Amitabh's ads on Uttar Pradesh will understand what I am trying to say to him:

सजन रे झूठ मत बोलो,
खुदा के पास जाना है.
वहाँ न बैंट्‌ली है न रौयस है,
वहाँ पैदल ही जाना है...

Oh dear, please don't lie. Afterall you have to go to His place one day. There is no Bentley or Royce to take you there. The only option is to walk.

Disclaimer...

2007-02-16T17:16:00.000+05:30

Saw this at Mysore Lancers Pump House near RT Nagar on Thursday. One of the best disclaimer messages I have seen in recent times. Couple of guys from inside the office saw me taking this picture, but I was on my scooter and managed to quickly pull away.

:-)

Person of the year

2006-12-24T12:57:00.001+05:30

Celebrations!! I have been declared Time magazine's person of the year. But don't be jealous and lose heart, so have you been. Check it out.

Harry Potter and the...

2006-12-22T17:00:00.000+05:30

Deathly Hallows.

We at least now know the name of the book that we are all waiting for. When it comes out, I will shun all human contact - letters, phones, mobiles, chats, emails, newspapers and shut myself in the house - till I finish it. Coz the last time, I reached office and there was a chat window from my brother that said - "XYZ killed ABC!!!". Man, I was pissed. I cannot do that to him for book 7, because he too is a Harry Potter fan and more so because there would not be a Harry Potter book after this one (as claimed by J.K. Rowling herself).

The guessing game about how Harry is going to finish off Voldemort has been going on for some time and will continue till the final book is published. I too do not want to be left behind. Here is my take on it -

Voldermort will end up in St Mungo's Hospital, Fourth floor, Spell Damage section. He will be admitted to the same ward as Prof. Gildroy Lockhart, next to Neville Longbottom's parents. People will no longer be scared of him and would not be scared of speaking his name either. JKR has given ample indications that she does not want Voldemort killed. Towards the end of Book 5, Dumbledore tells Voldemort and I quote: 'Indeed, your failure to understand that there are things much worse than death has been your greatest weakness -'.

Naturally, Harry has to die. The prophecy says so and also JKR has said that evil does not target extras; it goes after the main characters. Remember, the real hero of these books is not Harry. He is one of the main characters. The main character is Lord Voldemort. He is the one who chose Harry.

Apparently, the last word in the last book is scar - and it will not be Harry's scar. It will be a similar scar on Voldemort's forehead.

</speculation>

Joke of a case

2006-12-20T11:22:00.001+05:30

What was CBI thinking when it brought about a case of disproportionate assets against Lalu Prasad for just 46 lakhs? Its a joke of a case since CBI itself would have spent more than this amount on prosecuting Lalu. What is 46 Lakhs anyway now a days? In Bangalore you cannot even get a flat in a nice locality for 46 Lakhs.

Need some info from readers (with citations, of course)... which Harayana minister said that 1400 crores is a small change in politics?

Nuclear Deal

2006-12-09T20:10:00.000+05:30

Whats the deal here? I am tired of seeing continuous "Breaking News" banner on all the television channels and the amount of time being alloted to this. Take a look at Washington Post and the New York Times web pages in comparison. Need I say anything else?

Spam in Gmail and Windows Live

2006-12-06T12:12:00.000+05:30

Has someone noticed that the amount of spam coming in Windows live is much much less that in Gmail? There seems to be a difference of almost 1:50.

Has Microsoft managed to develop a genuine spam killer -OR- have spammers lost interest in spamming hotmail/msn accounts because they think nobody uses them anymore? :-)

Rahul and the Hutch ad

2006-11-22T22:02:00.000+05:30

Need to find out who conceptualized the new Hutch ad about Rahul, the Cricket world cup and a clueless guy who is the winner of the Hutch contest. Unfortunately, the ad is not available on Youtube yet for those who are not in India.

If the ad is supposed to be funny, then I must say that the creator of the ad has a weird sense of humour. I am not sure what he is getting at. Maybe the only reason why the person in the ad cannot recognize Rahul Dravid is because it is World Cup 2011 and the Indian team no longer qualifies for such tournaments.

Sikh nahin, Sick...

2006-11-08T20:34:00.000+05:30

Mr Jethmanali, it was not a sikh man who shot Jessica Lall, it was a sick man who did so. And you too are a sick man who is trying to spin such stories.

Attitude

2006-10-24T19:24:00.001+05:30

A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.

— James Joyce (1882-1941), writer

Need help with Wordpress

2006-10-23T10:15:00.000+05:30

Hello Readers,

Its once again my turn to ask for help. This time, it is regarding the Wordpress installation and problems that I have been facing with permanent links (permalinks in Wordpress parlance), since I have not been able to customize it to my liking. I have version 2.0.4 of Wordpress installed on Godaddy's linux hosting package.

As you can see, I have a lot of posts and under a few categories on my Astrology blog. When it comes to category links, a trailing slash at the end of the URL is making a lot of difference. i.e. for the category link:

http://www.planetarypositions.com/notes/category/astronomy/

if I remove the last slash and then refer to the URL as follows:

http://www.planetarypositions.com/notes/category/astronomy

Then Apache returns an error of 404 and the page does not appear at all. I suspect it is a problem/bug in the Godaddy's wordpress installation. I searched on the net and found out the following thread on the wordpress support site:

http://wordpress.org/support/topic/81515?replies=6

I have also been playing around with the .htaccess file under the notes folder. As of now, the exact text of this file is:


# BEGIN WordPress
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /notes/
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /notes/index.php [L]
RewriteRule ./category/(.*)[^/]$ ./category/$1/ [L]
</IfModule>
# END WordPress

Any ideas?

Supreme Court Rules!

2006-10-12T08:03:00.000+05:30

We need to kick these politicians out completely. What right did they have in asking for clemency for Mohammad Afzal? None of the politicians died in the parliament attack of 12/13. The people who died where policemen who were doing their duty.

Also, what right do they have to comment on the judicial process? There was a fair trial and the court found the person guilty. It punished him to be hanged... thats the law of the land and it must be respected. Period. How can we forget that our country nearly went on having a war with Pakistan after this incident.

Good article in TimesofIndia.com - "Considerations of religion, caste or political loyalty are irrelevant and fraught with discrimination"

No military rule, no democracy... we need Supreme Court rule in this country.

Date of Expiry?

2006-10-10T19:02:00.000+05:30

I travelled from Bangalore to SF over the weekend and a very funny incident happened at the airport. The Singapore Airlines folks were distributing a form to everyone who was going to the USA. It was mandatory to fill out that form with an ominous "Homeland Security" cited as the reason.

The form had fields in the following order:

Name of the traveller
Passport number
Date of birth
Date of expiry

I was zapped looking at questions numbered 3 and 4. I pointed to a Singapore Airlines official that I do not know my date of expiry :-) She asked me to fill the details of the passport there. Then I pointed out that my passport was issued and not born and it did not have a date of birth :-D. The person just looked at me, could not even smile and walked away.

Water is cheap

2006-09-25T21:04:00.000+05:30

And Deepa Mehta is acting ultra cheap. She figured out that this year India has some really good movies lined up this year as potential entries - Lage Raho Munnabhai, Rang De Basanti, Omkara etc and her movie Water would stand no chance as India's official entry to the oscars. Thus, she got her movie Water to be nominated from Canada!

I do not care how good this movie is. I would probably not even go watch it even if it was released in India without any cuts. India's entry to Oscars should be a movie that really represents the spirit of this country and showcases the performances of some of the leading actors of Indian film industry. At the time of "Monsoon Wedding" and "Lagaan", there was absolutely no competition. Lagaan was superlative.

Just heard on television that Rang De Basanti is the official entry from India. It is a good movie and I really home it goes all the way.

Reduce the Petrol/Diesel Prices

2006-09-23T12:21:00.000+05:30

Dear Petroleum Minister,

Can we see some reduction in the petrol prices please? The crude prices in NYMEX have been around 60$ for the past few weeks and I am sure with the quality of crude that we purchase, the prices for all the oil companies are much below that.

Now don't tell us that since crude companies were selling us petrol at a loss over the last few months, they have a right to sell it at the increased prices till the end of the year. Also, do not let state governments increase sales tax since by reducing the base price of petrol, their revenue comes down. State governments like Karnataka and Maharashtra have been sucking consumers dry since the last time you increased the prices.

Review of Indialinks

2006-08-15T10:02:00.000+05:30

This post is also appearing as a review of Indialinks in Mouthshut.com.

I am a hobby astrologer. I have a small site on the net where you can find tools for generating kundalis and birth charts. I used to run this off of free Geocities. As the site grew, I needed something more than 4.2 MB per hour bandwidth and an ability to do some server side programming.

I did not do a lot of research and quickly chose a Mumbai based hosting provider Indialinks. I thought it would be good for the site to be based in India as getting in touch with support would be easier. I was also impressed that the engineers helped me bring up a sample application even before I paid any money.

As it happens with any Hindi movie, the actual movie was much worse than the trailer. Right from the beginning, the server was unstable. I regretted my decision in the first week itself when the site went down three times. On reminding them of the SLA and refund policy, the support engineers quickly blamed the servlet application and asked me to fix the problem in my code.

I started getting frequent emails from visitors to my site complaining about the performance and some even offered to help pay for the transfer to other hosting providers.

I am not much of a systems administrator and have never understood how Apache/Tomcat works, but during my interaction with the engineers, I realized that neither do these guys! They lack basic knowledge and troubleshooting skills to help the java developer pinpoint the problem. "Sir, abhi to chal raha tha, pata nahin abhi kya hua..." was the standard reply to a simple question - "Why is my site down and what is the problem?".

As I mentioned that I am a hobby astrologer and my working hours on this site are 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM. That is the time when I update the site, run into issues and try to solve them. Many a times, it is required to talk to the sysadmin. Indialinks has no concept of 24/7 support. After 7:00 in the evening and on weekends, it is rather difficult to catch hold of support engineers. If your site goes down on a Saturday, you can be rest assured that for the entire weekend, support would be sluggish.

I would not get into specifics of pricing, but there is only one word for it - atrocious. US based providers give 2,000 times more space and 50,000 times more monthly bandwidth for lesser amount of money. I found the servers to be ultra fast and very dependable. Not that you would really need it, but 24x7 support means 24x7 support. I see no reason why anyone should even think about renting servers from Indialinks.

As for me, I quickly realized my mistake and moved out only after six months even though I had paid for one full year in advance. I figured I would save on STD calls to Mumbai this way and would have peace of mind during weekends.

B.Tech Project

2006-08-01T21:44:00.000+05:30

A paper was published citing my final year B.Tech Project ... The only publication that I can claim to have :-)

Intelligence Failure

2006-07-13T20:28:00.000+05:30

Even after six months of the IISc incident and after 3 days of the Mumbai bomb blasts, there is nothing substantial on the ground that the police has to show. The only official line that we keep hearing is that the needle of suspicion points towards Pakistan. What I would like to ask the Government of India is - why not lodge an FIR against General Pervez Musharraf in Srinagar or Bandra police station, arrest him and try him out for all the hand grenade attacks, bombings and tourist killings in India.

If that cannot be done, the people grabbing seats of power in police and in government, especially the ones sitting in the Home Ministry should stop blowing their own trumpets and concentrate on catching the real culprits. The people of India are tired of being misled and of all the inconclusive cases right from blasts of 1993 to these ghastly blasts in Mumbai.

There is surely an intelligence failure. Either there are no intelligent people left in the in system or there have failed miserably.

No Rang De Basanti

2006-06-01T11:27:00.000+05:30

I understand the risk of being branded a fatalist, but I am still going ahead with this post in my blog.

Nothing is going to happen with the current state of affairs in India. The issue of reservations is not a real problem. It is a symptom of a bigger malaise that is affecting Indian polity, something that we have inherited from the British and something that is as incurable as AIDS - the politics of divide and rule. Anywhere and everywhere, this government is busy dividing people, in the name of religion, caste, language and what not.

The new breed of politicians that join politics also fall prey to this disease. Look at the dashing new face of Indian politics - Mr Dayanidhi Maran, Telecom minister in the central cabinet. He is still a part of the system that bans movies like Da Vinci Code in his home state. Being a minister for telecom, and for all the good work he has done for the sector, I am sure he believes in open communications and reasonable censorship. He is young, he must have new ideas that he wants to try and implement but is he holding himself back?

Why have not politicians like Jyotiraditya Scindia, Sachin Pilot and Milind Deora who belong to the new generation come out against reservations? Is this because they have already had a reserved seat in politics for themselves? Is it because they are scared to venture out in open -or- just too damn lazy for their own good. I would never accept Rahul Gandhi as my leader but at least he tried to listen to the arguments of the anti-quota protesters before being silenced by the senile brigade of ministers. I would give him credit for at least that.

That we disagree with politicians who have long crossed retirement age is much more than a generation gap. I wonder how they are able to maintain their lust of power even at these levels of mental ability. They have long back learnt how to suppress their inner voice and how to manipulate the system for their own benefit. And it is a pity that the same would happen to the Pilots, Scindias and Gandhis in future.

Rang De Basanti is just stuff for movies and the poem in my last post is just a poem.

Aag

2006-05-29T17:20:00.000+05:30

Ho gayi hai peer parbat si, pighalni chahiye,
Is Himalaya se koi Ganga nikalni chahiye,
Sirf hungama khada karna mera maksad nahin,
Meri koshish hai ke ye soorat badalni chahiye,
Mere seene me nahi to tere seene me sahi,
Ho kahin bhi aag lekin AAG JALNI CHAHIYE.

हो गयी पीर परबत सी, पिघलनी चाहियें
इस हिमालय से कोई गंगा निकलनी चाहिये
सिर्फ़ हन्गामा खडा करना मेरा मकसद नहीं
मेरी कोशिश है कि यह सूरत बदलनी चाहिये
मेरे सीने में नहीं तो तेरे सीने मे सही
हो कहीं भी आग, लेकिन आग होनी चाहिए

Will Watch "Fanaa" Twice

2006-05-26T10:45:00.000+05:30

Aamir, (and I say this, to quote the great George, with an unblemished record of staunch heterosexuality), I am a fan.

I like your movies (except Tum Mere Ho and Mela and have not watched Mangal Pandey) but do not care if you are for or against Narmada Bachao Andolan and what your personal views on the matter are. I hope the thick headed Bhajyumo members in Gujrat understand this - but do not worry. Even if Fanaa turns out to be a typical Yash Chora movie, which I generally hate, I will watch it twice - once for myself and other on the behalf of a poor fan of yours in Gujrat who cannot.

Can someone liberate Gujrat from this goondaism?

Geese Extermination

2006-05-24T13:30:00.000+05:30

There was a goose that lay golden eggs - one egg per day. The owner of the goose got greedy and killed the goose to get all the eggs out in one day. The goose died and owner could do nothing but repent. This is the story all of us have read and memorized. And we are expected to learn from this story such that we do not find ourselves in a similar situation.

But the Government of India does not seem to have learnt anything from this old tale. It kills one golden goose after another and would probably continue to do so till such geese are extinct in India.

After India became independent, it killed the aspirations of people. Ordinary people like your and my grandfather were expected to be like saints - don't ask, don't question and don't aspire. A very negative connotation was applied to word ambition and if someone became successful, they tried to tell the common man that it would only be through wrongdoing and corruption.

The second goose the government killed comprised of the industries and public sector units. There was no global competition and complacency gripped these PSUs through and through. The recruitment procedure in all these industries became a way of money making by corrupt with a tacit support of local MLAs and MPs. There were no rewards and no recognitions for the real hardworkers. Promotions happened only based on time and sifarish. The more well connected you are, the smoother would be the path to the top.

In late 80s and early 90s, something happened that the goverment had absolutely no control over. Inspite of the over regulation, some enterprising people brought a technical knowledge based revolution to India. A lot of jobs were created and hardworking and talented people brought a lot of name and much needed foreign currency to India, in short became a goose that is laying golden eggs. This, along with the educational system is the latest set of geese that the government intends to kill by bringing in reservation for SC/ST/OBCs.

The intention behind reservation is utopian, but the implementation is draconian. The government is trying to hide its utter failure in bringing the downtrodden to the mainstream of Indian society. Now it is trying to forego its responsibility of social justice by trying to push reservation down the throat of Indian industry.

Reservation was meant to be in place only for the first 10 years after independence, but it has not been able to achieve the goal of social justice even after 55 years. Do we not need to look back and try to see why we failed so badly? Does failure not call for a review of this system? How long are we, as a society, going to carry this baggage only because our government is not honest about bringing in true social justice?

These decisions are totally one sided. Few days back there were voices within the government about taking care of the general category of students and improving infrastructure in educational institutions. Today, nothing, nada, zilch. The proclamation just said that the reservation in educational institutions will happen from June 2007. If you read between the lines, it means that there would be no new IITs, no new AIIMSs, no new law colleges and nothing will be done at the level of primary schools because the goverment has neither any intention nor any money for doing so. The bright students who belong to general category can go to hell, or to the US if their parents have sufficient money.

If reservation has not worked for the last 55 years, there is no guarantee that it will work in next 355 years. If we do not do something about it now, it will be too late. The story of India is just becoming interesting. The goverment is trying to end it here by bringing in an anticlimax.

Four Years

2006-05-17T22:15:00.000+05:30

It will be four years since I moved back to India. Not that I was in the USA for such a long time, but still, it is a country with a wonderful idea called an American Dream. This idea has an instant appeal and who can not but get infected by it. I was one of the victims of the dot com bubble burst and leaving USA was one of the hardest decisions I have made. However, I stuck to it as it seemed right at the time.

The next year in Bangalore was the worst. Although I started my career in Bangalore, I was in for a shock in the second innings here. I used to look for similarities with USA everywhere. I looked for a Starbucks in baristas and cafe coffee days, a Safeway in foodworlds, nilgiris and fabmalls, Century Cinemas in dilapidated theaters of Bangalore (no, PVR and INOX have opened fairly recently) etc. I had the same feeling when I left home at the age of 17 to join IIT Bombay - homesickness. I just wanted to run away.

Things were not bad jobwise. I had a decent job, somewhat exciting, but definitely not of the sucky variety I had in the US. Money was never a problem. I was just married and had found a wonderful companion in my wife; parents were around and family life was good. I survived the first year. A Maruti Zen is no replacement for a Mustang GT convertible, but things have been better since then.

I have not yet grown to like the situation here. No one can get used the traffic situation and the daily commute in Bangalore. There is no explanation for the way people behaved when Dr. Rajkumar passed away. I cannot, for the love of God, understand the psyche of people like V. P. Singh, Arjun Singh and Ramvilas Paswan and hate the fact that I have to share my country with these morons.

But, I have definitely changed - I am once again comfortable purchasing vegetables in the local market. I do not ask for mineral water bottles in hotels and restaurants (those who have seen Swades, the transformation of the hero revolves around the bottle of Aquafina, very true!) and I love eating rice bath and set dosa for lunch. I have finally managed to purchase an apartment. The transformation has not just happened; I have worked towards it.

In this post, I will not include methods to cope with India on your way back, because I am planning to open a consultancy for relocation advice. Coz one thing that I have learnt really well after coming back here is that NRIs are there to fleece.

I am still living the American Dream... ;-)

Da Munshi Code

2006-05-17T16:59:00.000+05:30

Every Indian who claims to be well read should protest against Information and Broadcasting Minister Priyaranjan Das Munshi. He did not do anything when Dan Brown's book was released in India and became bestseller almost immediately. Every person who read the book immediately went online to find out more about the new theory or Jesus's marriage being put forward. Nor did he do anything when both Discovery and National Geographic showed TV programmes on the book and on the Gnostic Gospels. Then why this furore now?

Is normal public in India really that dumb? Why would they react only when something is shown on the big screen and not when it is broadcast on television in prime time? Why not ask National Geographic to be banned in India?

Comments?

One More Move

2006-05-10T21:35:00.000+05:30

You must be wondering what happened to the astrology posts. Well, there has been one more move. I have finally moved all the astrology specific articles to the new website on my service provider's account:

http://www.planetarypositions.com/notes

I am also hoping that Google picks up these pages as soon as possible. I am sorry for the inconvenience, but I am sure you would understand that it is for the best...

I request you to spread the word around and let as many people as possible.

Does merit have any meaning?

2006-04-07T17:25:00.000+05:30

I was forced to write this blog because of HRD ministry's decision of imposing 49.5% reservation in all universities across India. Come to think of it, the whole higher education system in India is going down the drain. There is a whole generation who thinks that it is not worth studying beyond 10+2 as that alone can guarantee a job in a call center. We have a sports minister who thinks that mathematics should be optional. There is a serious lack of talent in India right now. It is true for software and I am sure it is true for other industries as well that it is really difficult to find good candidates to fill vacant positions. And we aspire to be a "Knowledge based society". How ironical!

I do not know about IIMs because I never went there, but I can talk about IITs because I was a student of IIT Bombay from 1993 to 1997. The students at IITs are the best because of a gem of an examination called JEE, but the standard of the institute is not the greatest among the world. There is a serious shortage of staff at IITs. All steps have been taken to fill these positions, but to no avail. This means that the IITs are nowhere close to a US university when it comes to original research and to prove that we just need to do count the number of research papers published by post graduate and Phd students at IITs. We have never tried to understand why a B.Tech. student does so well when he/she get a scholarship at a US university compared to his classmate of almost the same calibre who does an M.Tech. at one of the IITs. This M.Tech student effortlessly sails through the entire course, at the top of his/her class, joins a job and thats it...

There is a lot of difference in quality of students between various colleges and this present government is doing all it can to bridge the gap. Just that the path they have chosen to do this seems a little weird. Instead of bringing up the standard of other institutes, it is bent on lowering the standard of IITs. I only talked about general category students in the preceding paragraph. Reserved category students can not even cope up with the pressure and a lot of them just drop out. Has any survey been done to find out how many reserved category students join IITs, at what grade did they pass out, where they are working now and why should their children get the advantage of reservation again?

The government seriously and honestly needs to reconsider its priorities. The people who really need help are the deprived sections of our society - the poor farmers in Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Haryana who are committing suicides because they are up to their neck in debt and are not able to find buyers for their produce. They cannot even send their children to school, let alone dreaming of a college education. Are they going to benefit even one bit by this decision of increasing reservation in IITs? This deal, in its present form, is good only for the kid of a rich politician who is really bad in studies and would rank nowhere if it were for fair competition. Even if we do have to live with this reservation for now, there has to be some schedule when these classes come out of backward status. Other Backward Classes --> Almost Backward Classes --> Not Backward Classes. The politicians cannot keep giving reservation to the entire community/caste till the last individual is deemed backward.

Guys, India is not shining yet. We are celebrating too soon. The middle class, whose purchasing power powers our economy to 8% growth, would not be able to sustain this level of spending for long. Very soon, we will be the "Knowledge based society that could not be". And very soon, we would be back to stage where we were in 70s and 80s of the last century, defined again by an insulting phrase - "Hindu Rate of Growth".

Advent of Kaliyuga

2006-03-21T16:26:00.000+05:30

In Kaliyuga, God does not show Himself so often and has left humankind to deal with the problems pretty much on its own. Yada yada hi dharmasya... seems a bit far.

The Kaliyuga in Indian cricket has truly set in over a period of just about three years. The two articles that sum it up beautifully are:

Right-arm over to God - published in Rediff.com on March 02, 2003, after the WC clash between India and Pakistan.
Joining the rank of Mortals - published in cricket.org on March 20, 2006, after Tendulkar got out so cheaply and so outrageously and got a well deserved booing from a knowledgeable crowd of Wankhede Stadium.

Now that Tendulkar has stepped down from that pedestal, it is time for us cricket fans to start scrutinizing his form and questioning his contributions to the team. He has now joined the ranks of Sauravs and Laxmans and if he is so much required to maintain the morale of the team, kick Greg Chappel out and make him the coach. If BCCI cannot kick Chappel for contractual reasons, they should create a new post of motivational speaker in the cricket team and appoint Tendulkar for life. The selectors dropped Ganguly because they wanted to make way for youngsters. After a sequence of 16, 23, 19, 14, 23, 26, 16, 28*, 4 and 1, time has come to dish out the same treatment for Tendulkar.

Indian Idol

2006-02-15T16:28:00.000+05:30

<non-astrology-rant>

Last week, I happened to watch the Indian Idol on Sony. I saw almost all the episodes last time, but have not been following this season's shows at all. I was puzzled by the behavior of two of the three judges - Annu Malik and Farah Khan. The comments that they kept on making against the Indian public and television viewers were simply apalling.

Annu and Farah, I have a piece of advice for you - if you have agreed to the rules of the programme that these rounds are going to be decided on the basis of viewer votes, then understand the fact that a normal Indian television viewer does not understand classical singing, ragas, rhythm and what you call X-factor. (S)he goes more by whether the song was sung properly or not. Here, the choice of song itself is very important. So, you need to stop making comments like - "how can the Indian viewership keep such a talented singer like you at the bottom of the chart". Are you kidding yourself or are always that arrogant? Everyone who makes it to that level is not just good, he or she is probably one the best. Someone among them has to be at the bottom, right?

And if you keep making fun of people like me, I will have to remind you -- Annu, you are just a copier of songs and very few of your original compositions are really worth listening. Farah, the less we speak of your understanding of music, the better. If you guys think that the singers are really that great, give them chances in your songs and films. I am sure that you are not prepared to do.

I have a piece of advice for Sony Television too. Reign in these two and stop calling them judges. Technically and theoritically, they cannot influence the result. They just sit there, get free money and say whatever they like. The Indian public is the real judge. It is we who are actually pay money to vote (remember, every phone call and SMS costs 6 Rupees) and on top of it, get insulted!!

If the Indian public is capable of deciding which Tom, Dick or Harry can rule the country, then this is just a music competition. Are you going to decide the next finance minister of India based on the result?

Out of the three judges - I really respect Sonu Nigam. He is indeed talented as a singer, and even as a person, he is simply brilliant. His comments are crisp, clear and always to the point. He does not mince words and at the same time is never disparaging. The other two have a long way to go before they can match up to him.

</non-astrology-rant>

Let it go...

2005-09-19T15:28:00.000+05:30

Let it go Saurav... It is not worth the fight, because you are not worth it. The Indian cricket team is and will be better without you. Let other youngsters come to the frontlines.

Do this bit for the country and the country will be proud of you. We cricket fans will forever be indebted to you. We will dedicate the World cup 2007 win to you.

No, not again !!

2005-08-12T15:29:00.000+05:30

<non-astrology-rant>
The Maharaja of Kolkata has been again appointed the captain of Indian cricket team... Why can't selectors be a bit more prudent and get rid of this person once and for all? Here is a letter I had sent to Times of India earlier this year (which they did not publish, of course)

From: Kshitij Sharma
To: lettersbg@indiatimes.com
Date: Apr 17, 2005 9:32 PM
Subject: Indian Cricket team - I want my money back
Dear Mr. Editor,

When it comes to the Indian cricket team, who are they answerable to?
a) The BCCI, under whose contracts they play?
b) The brands and corporate houses whose products they endorse?
c) The Indian fans, for patriotism’s sake?

I don’t think it is the third option; otherwise, they would not lose without putting an iota of effort. Let us keep patriotism out of this discussion, and realize that directly or indirectly, they are answerable to the Indian consumer whose spending habits power this economy.

Saurav gets his paycheck because someone buys a particular mobile connection or a television. Rahul waits for someone else to get impressed by his acting skills. Sachin lends his smiles to a motorcycle manufacturer. For every bottle of cold drink that is sold, a portion of the money is paid to the cricketers.

When I, as a consumer, buy a product, I expect a sense of satisfaction. However, a portion of the money that I spend, however miniscule it may be, is being paid to these cricketers, which they do not deserve. It's a waste. Aamir, Amitabh, Shahrukh, as other celebrities who endorse products, at the least entertain us. What do these cricketers do?

All the members of this cricket team, if you have ever endorsed a product, or even otherwise, you are answerable to me. Either get your act straight or make way for others. If you cannot do both, I WANT MY MONEY BACK.

Kshitij Sharma
Bangalore
</non-astrology-rant>