Is history for textbooks only?

Will we learn from our history or it will be limited to textbooks only?
Any one who knows a bit of post independence Indian history and has given it a thought to it will agree to a point that Sardar Vallabh-bhai Patel should have been preferred to Jawaharlal Nehru for the first prime minister of India (Don't mean to say that Chacha Nehru was incapable, but only the best should be doing the job). If Sardar had been PM, one significant change that would have been for sure, is that we would have never known any region like PoK. Rather, there was every possibility of having IoP*. This was one faux pas which is still haunting us, 60 years after, and will probably do so for ages. The point is that we have been longing for such an aggressive PM since then. We got Indira Gandhi, but she inherited her father's socialist ideology and helped sabotaging Indian economy even more by undoing the process of liberalisation, which Lal Bahadur Shastri had initiated one month before he died in Tashkent.
The point i made about learning from history is because we do have one man in India now, popularly known as NaMo in his native... Narendra Modi. Well, he has been marred with the controversies (Post-Godhra incident riots) . But who has not been!?, even senior leaders of present Government were involved in 1984 sikh riots (the only reason why they are let-off is because of lack of media reach in 1984). But, the development in Gujarat is Astonishing, to say least. Whether it be infrastructure or education, whether it be reduction in corruption or improvement in over-all administration.. Gujarat has been awesome! and all this in span of mere 5 years!
so will we acknowledge Narendra Modi and much needed aggression that he cultivates, and work towards making him a country's head or will we allow another iron man to melt down and fade away!?

*IoP - Indian Occupied Pakistan ;-)

2001 v/s 1984

As the Gujarat elections come nearer and nearer, we see more and more coverage in media criticizing Modi government and congress rallies targeting Modi for his way of handling Post-Godhra riots. But the only thing which pinches me is why only Modi is being targeted? Why not congress leaders who were the main culprits in 1984 sikh riots? How can media allow congress to get away with criticizing Modi’s acts, and doing nothing about carnage of Sikhs. On the other hand, Congress has never been able to do the kind of development in decades of being in power which Modi govt has done in just a matter of 5 years, and it is quite evident!
I have a feeling that TV media is being too pro-congress in this issue and I have started losing respect for it.

2020 SUPERPOWER?!!

Today I read in headlines in Economic Times 'INDIA superpower in 2020' … well, who expected India to win the 2020 world cup?!, but they WON !…
and who expects INDIA, as a economy, to really become superpower by 2020,.. People say it's a bit far fetched dream of Abdul Kalam (our Ex-President had quoted that INDIA will be superpower in 2020, during his 5 year stay at rashtrapati bhavan)
one thing I am sure about is that its not only 11 men's job as it was done yesterday in a cricket 2020….
it's a job of more than 50 crore young Indians!!! … so can we prove it !? .or we will simply be a spectator of others' achievements,… bask on hardwork done by someone else and keep waiting for INDIA to become superpower…
well, INDIA will become superpower, but now it's a matter of how soon.. whether in 2020 or 2050!?.. that answer has to be given by us!! .. not just by talking, but by DOing!! .. as SRK says in LEAD INDIA advt.… DOMINATION starts with DO…

well, coming back to lighter mood.. the T20 WC was indeed a fairy tale journey for team india , and for that matter, Pakistan too.. both teams miserably knocked out of the WC of bigger version of the same game… both teams in the hands of a young captain… both teams devoid of experienced minds (rather slow legs) … so much in common.. but there was one more thing in common about this whole event .. INDIA has never lost a WC match against PAK.. and thankfully, law of averages didn't catch up yesterday!!, YES, INDIA won .. team who had bid farewell to the top 3 contenders of WC, that's England, SA and Australia…
and also corroborated one thing yesterday… 'The probability of winning is inversely proportional to the expectation of people ' .. well, I did end on a sarcastic note about INDIA.. but sarcasm is my middle name (again, taking nothing away from my DAD, who officially forms my middle name .. hehehehe) … ;-)
thanks for reading guys… had just written this for fun, by the time I wait for my INFY service desk to install some stupid software tool on my PC …

Home Sweet Home

The moment I stepped out of an airplane in Mumbai this time … I felt the tickling of cool breeze flowing across the airport fields (mumbai and cold breeze sounds a bit of a paradox, but i was back from chennai, so talking on relative terms )… the aroma of the Mumbai air, which had made me a big time complainant till 1 and half a year back, gave a mesmerising feeling to my nasal senses…
Embarking out of airport on mumbai streets, took an auto and started towards home sweet home… enroute to home, I saw the common sight on andheri-kurla road.. thats the the sign boards, warning you to ‘Go slow. work in progress’ ... I have always and seriously felt that they have misplaced a punctuation mark, the more apt message is ‘Go. Slow work in progress’… anyways, each instance of that sight used to resurge the frowning half of me, when I frequented that road in my college days...but this time it brought a bright smile on my face, as many times as it made me curse then! …
The beggars, the stink of mithi river (which was known only as one big gutter before 26th july rain made it famous), the rash driving of auto drivers... all gave a feeling of homeliness and made me Blissful :)....
back home.. however tired you are, somehow miraculously, all weariness disappears ...

And the moment I entered my home, I saw the most beautiful face…mom standing in front of me with a beaming smile and loads of satisfaction clearly evident on her face…HEAVEN! ...

Janma Din Mubarak Ho, Bharat Mata !!

Happy independence day guys! so it's been 60 long years since we have had our freedom.. even if we have not seen a fight for the freedom, we surely know the pain that our great grandfathers have undergone, just for the sake of a place where we can live the way we want, .. the freedom of speech, freedom to move around, or for that matter, freedom to do whatever we want, irrespective of our religion and color!... isn't that great... but have we ever given a thought what have we given them back?!!! ...Don't worry, I am not blaming anyone here.. just requesting you to ask this question to yourselves... question yourself 'What have I done and what will I do to give back those freedom fighters, so that wherever they are, they will feel proud of having great grandsons like me?' ... No need to measure sacrifices or the charity one does for country, ONLY by the amount of money or time you spend... Most of the things that you can do to help our motherland are often in our day to day life .. like not wasting the resources... for instance, how many of you switch off the lights/ fans/monitors while leaving office... its not that difficult to do that.. we just have to be a bit more conscious and it could be of great help as we are facing acute shortage of electricity (we wont notice that, living in big cities and high tech offices, but it's a huge problem that we are facing rite now in India)..the same thing goes for water also... the amount of water people waste is just outrageous.. I am not asking you to stop taking bath, (that will cause problems to people around you .. ;-) )... but use it judiciously!! These things are easy if you consciously try!!
The other thing which I really find disturbing amongst us is people's attitude towards participating in our democracy.. it is surely the biggest democracy in the whole world, but I think we can do it better and easily break our own record... again I am not asking you to go out and fight for elections... that is not as easy... but at least 'VOTE', my friends.... people refrain from voting saying 'NO CANDIDATE in my constituency was good enough to get my vote.. '.. you say that very boastfully, putting yourself in a portrait of a smart person, but in my view, you are the most irresponsible person ... as most of you never tried to know the candidates just because you want to sleep on a holiday (i.e a voting day) .. if you ever took pains to know, u can at least go and vote for the better amongst the candidates, rather than none.. at least u will make it a point that whoever comes into lok sabha/vidhan sabha will do less harm than others will, if not good...
I remember this saying by George Bernard Shaw .. ' Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve' ... so its us who can make things happen!!.. thats the beauty of Democracy!!
we are awarded with a citizenship of a FREE COUNTRY, we never had to fight for our freedom, ... Well, we will surely have a happy independence day by feeling proud of what our ancestors have achieved by sacrificing their lives, but ever thought of making our grandsons and great grandsons also proud of what we do today...we dont even have to sacrifice our lives.. only be more responsible...a few things which u can easily adopt in your life... nothing extravagant, is it?!
Thanks for reading it... don't just appreciate and forget it ... give It a thought...Let us all contribute towards an AMAZING INDIA :-) ..
And happy birthday to our mother-land who is 60 years YOUNG now.....

Hail Supreme Court ... & ISRO too

24th April 2007 was one of the most interesting days I had reading newspaper. No, it was not about some war raged by west on Middle East, nor was it another boring article on birthday boy, Sachin Tendulkar(well, he is God of cricket, no doubt, but just leave him alone) or a cowardly terrorist act, but it was about Supreme Court’s decision and commercial success of ISRO.
I, along with many other Indians have indeed gained back trust on Indian judiciary when they thwarted government on reservation policies reiterating the point that government has to be more practical and reasonable when they decide on imposing any policies. And then it was the remarkable achievement of ISRO, when they launched an Italian payload with a pricing twice as any other space center around the world would. The preciseness with which ISRO has launched recent satellites in an orbit is worth receiving a huge applause.ISRO could indeed become one of the most profiting government units in a near future. Move over NASA, ISRO is here!!

Update : For ISRO(29th Apr '08): http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/PSLV_launches_India_into_space_history/rssarticleshow/2993110.cms
Supreme Court (Reservation, 11th Apr '08) : http://malaylakhani.blogspot.com/2008/04/sc-questions-effectiveness-of-quota.html

Infy Special (dedicated to all my infy batchmates)

I was in an examination hall and surprisingly I was answering to all the questions, fired at me by IIMs puzzle-masters' brainteasers. Thought came into my mind that this tie, I m surely going to make into the biggest of BIG B schools and then suddenly a harsh cacophony hit my ears, and shockingly I fell down from my bench and vroom … Off I came out of my dream, and that sound I heard was nothing but that of an alarm clock in my mobile phone…
Well, 6 AM in the morning and looking forward to another day of monotonous work along with 70000 odd other people all around the globe working for Infosys and of course , far far away from that IIM-A dreams ;-)…. had a long weekend as Christmas fell on Monday giving me 3 consecutive ALARM-CLOCK less sleep…
Still in my sleep mode, I reach FC of MCity, take a coupon for idly wada and coffee (what else)… hmmhmm… that’s the best meal of a day… those crunchy medu-wadas, fluffy idlies, delicious coconut chutney, and the aroma of filter coffee gives a kick start to the day, but doesn’t last for long as after that breakfast, when I push my body resting on those poor legs towards my office, I wonder how legs get heavier and heavier as I approach nearer to my desk.
Finally, after that marathon walk (at snails pace) from FC to my desk, I turn on my PC to see that my account is over its size limits, thanks to all the workless fellows or rather euphemistically speaking, all of my colleagues who are in bench phase of their SJLC (software job life cycle)…
Well, being a part of that flock of 1250 odd herd of donkeys (or is it Software Engineers, .. well, not much difference, both are made to work like mad) taken in Infy on 26 June, breaking all sorts of world record...Most of the mails which choked up my account were greeting happy half-anniversary at Infosys. I was wondering how these 6 months had passed so quickly because of the wonderful friends I had made and I really cherish my time being with them. I am really grateful to all of them and especially our very own Amey Kelkar...urf ‘baba’, ‘ keli’,… etc, who used to always remind me of completion of office hours at sharp 5:45 and force me out of the training room by saying, actually shouting his trademark sentence 'Chal Malay, nikalte hain…' (man , I am longing to hear that again,,,,heheh) … Arguing with him was always futile because of his quick laconic reply…
Well, coming back to 26 Dec 2006, it was also a 2nd anniversary of that disastrous catastrophe called Tsunami that hit the eastern shores of India… 2 yrs (24 months) of Tsunami and 6 months of our stint at Infosys… Statistically, calculating 24 months to 6 months , the result concludes that we are 25% as dangerous as Tsunami. So you can imagine the fate of Infosys few years down the line...(I advise all shareholders of Infosys to sell all Infy shares off… ;-) ) … I was really sympathetic towards directors and stakeholders of Infosys…
But that fear didn’t last long as I looked around me and observed all workaholics, south Indian engineers persevering …
Suddenly a thought of bearish run of infy transformed into a bullish one (ok… I take back my advice…. U can hold onto ur Infy shares) … and I Don’t think any things going to happen to Infy in a near future too, because the way engineers are getting manufactured here in the colleges (found at every nook and corner on the outskirts of the city) ,that if one extrapolates the growth of these technical professionals, by 2030, 90% of the south Indian population will be engineers ( I have left 10 % because they would be those kids looking forward to become engineers).
That day is not far when you will see ads in news-paper, where they will show requirements for electronics engineer to fill up an electrician’s place, a mechanical engineer for tightening wheels of the car, and a civil engineer at a building site for mixing cement and water…
That’s all for this blog of mine guys, or else my PMs gonna make me measly paid computer repairman, demoting me from a fairly paid\nlife of a software engineer… well, it wouldn’t be that bad either(may be I will have some challenging thing in that job.. ;- ) ) …adios…