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The downside of democracy

The verdict is finally out on India’s most long-drawn trial, ‘The 93 Mumbai bomb blasts case’; and of all the acquitted and convicted, possibly the most celebrated, hyped and covered by media of all the accused, was Munnabhai Sanjay Dutt. He has been sentenced to six years’ rigorous imprisonment. There have been loud cries from his colleagues in Bollywood and his fans world over, about the ruling. They believe that he is innocent and six years’ imprisonment is too harsh a sentence for carrying a mass destruction weapon by an adult. Ever since the judgment (and even before the judgment day), TV channels have been airing the sympathetic reactions of the common Indian man for Sanjay Dutt. Fair enough, we are the largest democracy in the world and every one of us has a right to express our opinions about everything happening in the country. That, I think, is the downside of living in an uncontrolled democracy. Reserved and narrow-minded as it may sound, I think too much pressure was being put on to the judiciary system by portraying the sympathies of common Indian man in every possible way and through every possible means in Sanjay Dutt’s case. What we should understand is that democracy lets you express your opinions but this expression should be used with utmost care and responsibility; and now, in this flat world, more than ever, where opinion of common man counts.

It is a paradox, how we fail to understand in today’s world of specialization that it is not us but the judiciary system that is specialized in the skill of judgment. I am not saying that we should tight shut our lips even if we feel strongly against a decision, but converging general opinion to pressurize the judicial mechanism (especially by media) is unfair. We do not rely on general public opinion when deciding the monetary policy, the intricate details of our nuclear deal with US; because we know that there are people who understand these fields much better than we do. We cannot take every Indian’s opinion while we take policy decisions on important things like these.

Should a democracy not count on its people for the course of its direction then? Obviously it should. But we need to modify the phrase ‘where every opinion counts…’ a little to ‘where every sensible opinion counts…’. Audiovisual media, I think, is anything but sensible these days and deserves a control on its content. It may sound undemocratic, but I think, it is fair to say that control should be imposed on those who fail to understand their role and responsibilities in a true democracy like it is imposed on a criminal.

It is a fine line, between controlling public opinions and suppressing them. But that’s what separates a democracy from a successful one.

“Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”- Not worth the Hype?

As any other Harry Potter aficionado, the month of July 2007 is like a dream come true for me. This month, new movie in the Harry Potter series, ‘Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix’, released on 11th July and now, on 21st July, the last book in the HP series, ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows’, will be published. With two weeks advance booking even before its release, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, was the most anticipated movie release in the history of the Hollywood. However, I was thoroughly disappointed when I actually got to see the movie.

Movie, a failed attempt
J. K. Rowling gets better at portraying Harry’s character and the events around him with each book in the HP series. The most impressive aspect of Rowling’s writing style is the way she gets into details of characters and events. While reading the book, she easily manages to create each and every character and scene in the reader’s mind. The fifth book in the series can be most easily summarized as a pre-cursor to a final showdown between lord Voldermot and the magical world. I think it would be more than asking for a movie to match the entertainment quotient of the book but I find that the movie lacks depth and tries to include too much without really including too muchfrom the book, causing a bit of confusion, especially to the first time HP audience, who’ve no idea about the HP world. The movie has also ignored a few important events like ‘Rita Skeeter’s article in the Quibbler’ and ‘Hagrid’s journey to the giants’ land’. It is clearly seen in the movie that director is short of time and has managed to create a mess with the same actors, same writer and better visual effects. I think the movie is not worth the hype created around it.

The last book
I am very certain that the forthcoming book will be the best in the series and fans can expect sheer excitement as Harry takes on lord Voldermot in the final battle. I am hoping that it would be a happy ending with Harry managing to destroy the Darklord without losing many of his friends. Can’t wait to get my hands on the book…

Gratefulness…

Before I start this post, a word of thanks to Rahul Gaitonde, who posted one of my older posts on Nokia N-Gage (:-) Keep on writing buddy, someone is reading :-D) on his blog and rekindled my writing spirit. It is like Amitji watching Himesh Reshamiya’s attempt at acting in ‘Aap Ka Suroor’ and appreciating it. Gives me enough fillip to create ‘Aap Ka Suroor – 2’, nonetheless. The only sad part is that I have replaced my ‘N-Gage Classic’ with the ‘Nokia N-70 Music Edition’ phone. After much R&D, I managed to narrow down on this one. Other phones which I considered were Nokia E-62, Nokia E-61 and Sony-Ericsson w810i. This time, I wanted a phone that looked like a phone and thus had to eliminate both the E-series phones. Another shortcoming of E-series phones is the lack of FM tuner. What made me decide on N70ME over w810i was the 1GB RSMMC, familiar Symbian OS environment and the fact that I was upgrading from one of the first generation N-series phones (Yes, I’ve heard that N-Gage Classic and N-Gage QD were the first two N-series phones).

The Nokia N70 Music Edition



It's a 108.8 x 53 x 17.5 mm, 126 grams black phone with Triband GSM and WCDMA. It comes with 22MB internal memory, a 176 x 208, 256K colour TFT screen, a 2MP camera and a VGA camera. On the connectivity front, it supports GPRS, EDGE, 3G, Bluetooth 2.0 and USB Pop-port.

On the software side, it has Symbian OS 8.1a (S60 UI) and comes pre-loaded with a lot of software like QuickOffice suite, Acrobat Reader, etc. Has decent stereo sound output and comes with a 1GB RSMMC, enough to store around a couple of hundred mp3s. And this feature-packed phone comes at a price of INR 13200.

Pros and Cons

• Has looks of a decent executive phone


• Has next generation connectivity options like 3G and EDGE, lacks WLAN though


• Good PIM capabilities


• 2MP Camera comes with a cover


• Not very impressive battery life


• Decent Sound quality, but inferior to most of the walkman phones


• Comes pre-loaded with useful software


• Comes pre-loaded with 100 songs (No necessity at all)


• Visual Radio

Why Music Edition?
The things that differentiate an N70 from an N70ME are

• 1 GB RSMMC


• ME Headphones


• 100 pre-loaded songs

The music edition headphones are the ones that come with an N71. I haven’t really compared these with the N70 headphones but I’ve heard that they are better than the original N70 headphones. Visual Radio (FM Tuner) makes it a complete music phone.

What has changed?
One striking difference between N-Gage Classic and the N70ME is the ease by which I can set up the phone for different functionality. Settings’ Wizard lets me configure, GPRS and EDGE for any GSM operator in India at the click of a button. Configuring GPRS in N-Gage Classic was more complex. Things like connectivity with PC, Synchronization, etc have all become a layman’s stuff as opposed to techie stuff earlier.
All in all, N70 Music Edition is a great value for money buy.

Talking of music, Sleeveless Mini Mathur – 3 ;-) has commenced and this time the judges include Udit Narayan, Alisha Chinay, Javed Akhtar and the ever-available Anu Malik. If you have no clue what I’m talking about, it’s Indian Idol -3. Lack of Sonu Nigam on the panel of judges hurts but again, can be done away with so long as Mini is hosting the show. It still being the early, piano round episodes, I get to hear more of music and less of those emotional result declaration episodes where everyone takes Atalji-style pauses wherever possible.

Among the other things, I have learnt the macro-economics behind the relationship between inflation, money supply and appreciating Rupee, the hard way. Having bought a lot of tech-stocks on correction, and having averaged out on every subsequent correction, here’s my attempt at explaining the rupee appreciation.

The Rupee appreciation was a long anticipated event taking into consideration, deluge of foreign investment (FDI and FII) inflows in the recent past and around 200 billion dollars worth foreign reserves in the Indian exchequer. However, like india, most of the Asian countries have prevented their currencies from appreciating for a long time now in the fear of losing out on exports to their other Asian counterparts. However, in the backdrop of high inflation at the time when some of Indian states are going to polls, government took every possible measure from CRR hikes to price control threats to some industries to curb inflation. The appreciating rupee came to the rescue here as rising rupee means cheaper imports and thus lower costs. The RBI intervened as little as possible and let the rupee appreciate. Weakening of dollar against all major currencies was also one of the causes of rupee appreciating against the dollar. Now, with inflation tamed to a more acceptable level and exporters crying out loud against this sharp rise, government has assured the India Inc. against any such further sharp movements in the rupee. However, as told by commerce minister, Mr. Kamal Nath, appreciating rupee in the long term is a fact of Indian economy and that whether they like it or not, the exporters have to live with it. Huh!!! I think that is enough for today…

Media Blunders...

Here are a few media goof-ups I've come across in the last few months... One, hardly expected whereas the other one, highly expected... Have a look...

1. Moneycontrol.com website (Jan 07)

Poll Question: What is your trading strategy?

Choices for answer: a) Yes b)No c) Can't Say?

Now Come on... Even Udayan Mukherjee, who is generally very good at shooting impeccably obvious answers to equally obvious questions cannot answer this one ;-)... Or [;)] (Now, that's a lot of orkutting)

2. Zee News (July 06)
The news anchor was openly addressing former Maharashtra CM and now MP, Mr. Manohar Joshi as senior BJP leader 'Mr. Murli Manohar Joshi'. What can I say about this one? I am uploading the video which I could fortunately record...

Talking money... For a change...

After losing some money during my last few investments in the market, I've been reading some stuff about TA and FA in capital markets.

This is the best article describing 'Dow Theory' I have come across till now:
Check out here

This is another TA article which throws some light on the 'Elliot Wave Theory':
Check out here

Anticipating Nifty



Applying the Dow stuff to Nifty charts, we can see that there seems a Secondary Bearish move inside the overall Bullish Primary move. However, instead of eating into around half of the gains of the last move, Nifty has broken previous low during last correction. This means that though the market has almost recovered from the last correction, a further downside is possible in the Nifty in the medium to long term. It may possibly mean the end of the Primary Bullish move. Any how, TA tells me not to take any new positions at this time and wait for further signals.

Indian Retail Industry… What does the future hold?

US based Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's biggest retailer, is entering India's sprawling retail market through a tie up with Bharti Enterprises Ltd. In the future, we will have many such cases of global retailers entering Indian markets, given the huge Indian consumer base and growth across all sectors of the economy generating a positive wealth effect of sorts.

According to KSA Technopak, a consultancy firm, the Indian retail market is projected to grow from US$300 Billion in 2006 to US$637 Billion by 2015 as GDP rises from US$804 Billion to US$1.7 Trillion over the same period. The bulk of the market is unorganised with less than 5% being classified as ‘organised retail’. The urban market is 45% of India's retail market, with the top 784 cities alone accounting for US$105 billion in retail sales. The rural market is dispersed over 627,000 villages, though it has a concentration around a core 100,000 villages that account for 50% of the rural population. Indian retail has a unique concept of ‘Kiranawallahs’, family run small shops.

With global players all set to capture the Indian retail, the Indian businesses have also recognised the opportunity and recently few large businesses have jumped into retailing. Reliance entered the retail market by opening its chain of Reliance Fresh hypermarkets in the city of Hyderabad. Reliance is expected to pump in close to US $ 5 billion in the next five years to build a chain of thousands of such shops across urban and rural India. The Aditya Birla Group is reported to be putting together a plan for a similar venture in the retail space. The group may invest upwards of US$3 billion to set up 6,000 stores within three years, with the first stores set to open by middle of next year. Pantaloon Retail, an earlier entrant to retail in India, has aggressive plans to double its retail space to 8 million sq ft within a year and to 30 million sq ft by 2010. It owns the most successful Big Bazaar/ Food Bazaar chain of retail shops. Godrej Agrovet and ITC (e-choupal) are large payers focusing primarily on the rural sector. Godrej plans to launch 1,000 Aadhar stores in rural India by 2010. The Tata Group is also getting involved in the business in a big way with Infiniti Retail venture. It has already opened its Chroma chain of consumer electronics shops across Mumbai. Global players like French retailer Carrefour, UK based Tesco are some of the other biggies in the pipeline waiting for their share of the action.

The Left is opposing such a generous liberalisation of the Indian markets. They believe that the scale and efficiency of the operations of the mammoth global retailers will hit the business of small family run Kiranawallah Shops and will leave millions of people jobless. The global players, on the other hand, are arguing that they will be targeting only the cream of the Indian consumer base in the urban India and will not affect Kiranawallahs in any significant way. They also argue that large Indian retailers like Reliance, Pantaloons, etc are also posing similar threat to the small retailers, if at all. Whatever may be the fate of the smaller retailers, the consumers will surely win with maturing retail market. Long used to shopping in packed and dusty marketplaces, they will flock to the neat, air-conditioned malls, fascinated by the convenience of one-stop shopping, a wide range of products to choose from, and significantly lower prices than they pay today. The savings will likely find their way back via higher consumption, helping drive the economy. Tax collections will also increase as more retail sales flow through the organised trade. Farmers and other suppliers who are able to deliver against the stringent quality requirements placed on them by modern retail will benefit from higher prices as middlemen get cut out of the supply chain. Landowners and real estate developers will laugh all the way to the bank as multi-billion dollar investments compete for limited supply of space.

So, what does the future hold for big retailers, Kiranawallahs and consumers?

As I’ve already mentioned, consumers are in for a good time for sure.

Contrary to general opinion, I think that the local Kiranawallahs are in a vantage position. They already have a loyal consumer base in place in rural as well as urban India. The young Indian consumer may be charmed by the large, brilliantly lit malls, larger than life shopping experience and loads of so called discounts, but small shops can counter these by their customised, personalised services. They will have to unite and achieve the benefits of scale which the bigger retailers enjoy. They will have to drastically change the way they services their consumers and innovate and they can survive this revolution in the Indian retail. The Kiranawallahs are placed in the vicinity of their consumers and this is where they score over the larger retailers. My local Kiranawallah almost knows all my family’s preferences right from the brand of the oil that we use to the quantity of wheat floor that we consume every month. For all my sundry orders like a loaf of bread, a bottle of ketchup, a pack of Maggie, I cannot go to a large retailer’s shop. My local Kiranawallah turns to my help in such cases. Indian consumer is not used to doing all his shopping for the month at one go. With the increasing share of organised retail in the Indian retail industry, the consumer will also have to transform itself into an organised consumer. If all small retailers in an area come together to give a basket of services to the consumers in the area then Kiranawallahs can very well survive alongside the big retailers. I really think that Kiranawallahs can see through this retail restructuring if they believe that they can counter bigger retailers and innovate.

As for large retailers, not everything is as good as it seems. There are already half a dozen players who have either announced their entry or are already operating in the organised retail. There will be enormous advertising and consumer education expenses that these larger players will have to bear. Immense competition in the large players will see a fierce price battle and will reduce the margins drastically. Foreign retailers cannot mimic their US or Europe business models directly into India as Indian consumer has its own characteristics and Indian market is like no other markets they’ve been before in. Only a few players with superior supply chain and consumer reach will survive this revolution.
Indian retail is trying to achieve in a decade what other developed retail markets have achieved in a span of two to three decades. This very fact makes this transition period very interesting. No one knows who will survive and who will not but consumers are surely in for a good time.

Grasshopper

The other day, a nice little green insect came into my bedroom (After a bit of googling I found out that it is called GrassHopper ;-)). Interesting thing is that, it too didn't have much work like me and thus a stage was set for a long photo-shoot. These are some of the stills from the shoot:





These are considerably scaled down versions of the original images. I can even zoom onto the little baby ( that's my assumption) in the insect's womb in the original pictures... That reminds me... Are insects oviparous?

This is the view from my room's window... On one of those relaxed hot coffee evenings...



and this one's half an hour later...

The Donkey

One day a farmer's donkey fell down into a well. The animal cried piteously for hours as the farmer tried to figure out what to do. Finally, he decided the animal was old, and the well needed to be covered up anyway; it just wasn't worth it to retrieve the donkey.

He invited all his neighbors to come over and help him. They all grabbed a shovel and began to shovel dirt into the well. At first, the donkey realized what was happening and cried horribly. Then, to everyone's amazement he quieted down.

A few shovel loads later, the farmer finally looked down the well. He was astonished at what he saw. With each shovel of dirt that hit his back, the donkey was doing something amazing. He would shake it off and take a step up.

As the farmer's neighbors continued to shovel dirt on top of the animal, he would shake it off and take a step up. Pretty soon, everyone was amazed as the donkey stepped up over the edge of the well and happily trotted off!

MORAL :
Life is going to shovel dirt on you, all kinds of dirt. The trick to getting out of the well is to shake it off and take a step up. Each of our troubles is a stepping stone. We can get out of the deepest wells just by not stopping, never giving up! Shake it off and take a step up.

Update: 28th Nov 2008
I have been retold this story by one of my professors. The story is now called 'The Dunky Story'.

Can Dada make it into Blues once again?

Challenger Trophy is on. Though, Indian squad has already been chosen for Champions’ Trophy, this tournament provides much needed hope for many former Indian team members to get back into the team. Their performance vis-à-vis frontline Indian cricketers is their only chance of proving to the selectors that they have what it takes to be in the final 14 and who can know this better than Sourav Dada… Dada is playing in the Indian Greens (Least favorite team to win the tournament) under the captaincy of Mohammed Kaif. It is strange how life can quickly turn tables on you. Who could have ever imagined that the Legend, Sourav Ganguly will have to prove himself for a place in the Indian cricket team and that too under the captaincy of Mohammed Kaif? I don’t know why but when I saw tired-looking but determined Sourav Ganguly trying his every bit to perform, I felt sorry for him. I felt sorry more than I do when I see Salman Khan acting in the movies. I think Dada is really determined to make it to the final 14 and though his performance in the first match does not approve so, sooner or later he will stage a come back.

The challenger trophy reminds me of the chunk of time I have wasted watching the first two matches of the tournament. At times I ponder my sudden shot- term love for time consuming things as unimportant as the Challenger Trophy and prime time soaps as hackneyed as ‘Left Right Left’ when I am preparing for some exam or the other. I had developed a liking for ‘Remix’ last time round when I was to appear for my eighth semester exams.

Among the other things, I can now access orkut from my office… I am logged into orkut from 9-6 these days and every time I open orkut window to scrap someone, my ML peeps into my computer… I have a feeling that he thinks I am logged onto some matrimony site and badly searching for a girl to marry, thanks to the way orkut GUI has been designed… This has, by the way, softened his attitude towards me which is palpable from the kind of work I have been getting…

I have been thinking about saving tax these days… I have gone through considerable amount of material on investments, mutual funds and taxation in the past few days. I think the government is looting us of our salaries and that it would be better if we paid a monthly fee for all the services that the government is making us available. I have made a preliminary analysis of my risk appetite. According to it, I need to invest about 65% of my savings in the equity and related instruments. Now I also know that NSC is a damn bad idea for investing which yields 8% returns 5% of which is eaten up by the inflation. More about my investment tips in the posts to come…

Appraisal, Increment and Job of Receptionist

I was confirmed into TCS last week with a not so bad rating (this actually means outstanding… but I don’t want to blow my own horn you see…). There was a formal evaluation of my deeds (or misdeeds) in TCS by my ML which turned out to be not so bad :-D. Most of the people I know were unhappy about their evaluation and some more research made me realize that this is a very common thing in the IT industry: ‘People not being happy with their appraisals’. The very thing was enough to put me into my favorite contemplating mood. According to me current evaluation practices are a complete failure (take my case for example ;-)). Reasons of failure are:
• Most of us are miles away from the reality and perceive ourselves to be what we want to be rather than what we are.
• We have this perception that animals belonging to the “Boss” category are here to damage our career and can do no good to us. True as this may be to an extent; this is not the truth always.
• Then again there are some unavoidable stupid practices like curve fitting, etc.

I personally think that the task of valuation of human resource in any organization should be strictly quantitative and should follow quantitative performance measurement rather than subjective appraisals. Old fashioned as it may sound, I think it is the only solution to making us realize about our shortcomings.

My company policy document says that my confirmation also lets me enjoy a salary increment and access to a host of company facilities (I am yet to know these facilities though). Jubilant I have already spent a considerable future income last week to celebrate my confirmation. On my hit list this time, were:

A cool 5.1 MP Sony Cybershot DCS W5 Digicam



A sleek HS-11W Bluetooth Headset from Nokia



More on these beauties in the posts to come…

After my confirmation, increment and valuation by seniors I could not keep myself from floating my resume on a few job sites just to find out my real worth in the job market. The results were shocking… After a few call centre job offers, today my CV was short listed for the job of a receptionist.



Conclusion: I am not in any hurry to change my job just now…

KANK is Kyon Ki Saans Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi.zip

Last week everyone on this planet seemed to have only one thing on their mind. Karan Johar's Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna or KANK as they call it. A handful of channels had joined hands with Karan to trick everyone into watching this film. Yesterday, I was forcefully taken to the cinema hall and made to watch KANK and my verdict about the film is that KANK is Kyon ki Saans bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi (or any of its counterparts) zipped into 3 hours...

Karan has managed to sign best of stars in the industry so that lack of good direction can be done away with. It is a story of two couples. They do not have so called successful marriages but are afraid to accept this fact. First couple is Shahrukh Khan and Preity Zinta. Preity plays this ambitious, intelligent, charismatic career oriented girl whose boss has hots for her. Shahrukh Khan is a good at heart but eccentric ex-footballer. He has lost his leg and thus his career in an accident right at the time when his career was at its peek. Preity has to assume the responsibility of "Ghar ka Mard" due to inability of her handicapped husband to earn money. Being a complete failure himself, Shahrukh Khan has a lot of broken dreams which he wants to fulfill through his son.

The other couple is Rani Mukherjee and Abhishek Bachchan. Rani plays the character of a simple girl who loves cleanliness and is not sure if she is really happy with her husband. Abhishek Bachchan plays Rani’s husband and he loves her very much. Rani is incapable of having a child and Abhishek every now and then makes her realize that he is okay with all this and will never ever make her aware of her incapacity.

Amitabh Bachchan and Kiron Kher are also thrown in to provide some nonsense comedy and some equally nonsense philosophy about love and life. Then, somewhere down the line, not happy with their partners, Shahrukh and Rani fall in love with each other. They know that this is going to tear apart their marriages but have no control over them and rightly so as Amitabh says before dying in the movie, “Mohobbat aur Maut, dono bin bulaye mehemaan hote hain, aur kisikaa saath naahi chodte…” After cheating their partners for quite some time, Shahrukh and Rani decide to let know their partners, the truth. After this, Shahrukh and Preity separate and so do Abhishek and Rani. However, as they always do, for no particular reason, Shahrukh and Rani pretend to each other that their corresponding partners have accepted them even after their misdeeds. Around ten minutes before the film ends, Preity meets Rani in a party and tricks Rani into spending the rest of her life with her eccentric ex-husband.

Touchy? I did not cry this time…
I’ve heard this from a few people. They say the movie is really touchy and addresses some of the complexities of human relationships. I must make a confession here… I cried like anything after I saw Million Dollar Baby, Titanic, Rang De Basanti and a bunch of other movies… But I did not cry this time (but again, neither did I laugh). So, for me the movie is anything but touchy…

Misdirected Direction
Is it Comedy? Is it a serious portrayal of extra martial relationships? I think it is nonsense. The film (if at all it tries to) fails to send across any message to the viewer… KANK has finest actors in the industry but the story does injustice to the acting skills of these actors. All of them have acted well but as a whole, the movie fails to make any mark. So, in all, KANK is shot completely outside India, at some of the most magnificent locations, with some of the best actors in the industry and all of this compensates for the poor direction or lack of it.

Box Office Story
Box office, however, has a different tale to tell. The movie has grossed record high earnings in US and UK. In the first week, the total earnings of KANK outside India are more than those in India. The movie is rated “Super hit”. This only means that a majority of Hindi film viewers have a different taste and expectations from Hindi movies and will ignore my post.

Why Kyon Ki Saans Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi.zip?
Finally, if I want to summarize KANK, I will say “It is some nonsense comedy, nonsense emotional drama packaged in with best actors, poor direction by a lady ;-) and awesome locations. Though I may not believe it but people have liked it and I am now regretting my decision to watch it.” All of the above also hold true for those family soaps on TV at prime time like KSBKBT. Thus KANK is a KSBKBT.zip.

A wise decision... Huh!!!

I have banned some very entertaining Hindi News Channels for viewing from yesterday night. I'll surely miss out something on the entertainment front but again, excessive laughter is also harmful for your health. Actually, I have been watching a lot of TV these days because I was stuck in the house as heavens broke out once again in Mumbai. I was surfing through all the news channels, hoping to see any news regarding 'Citywide Holiday' being aired on any of the news channels. Each and every news channel was breaking this news that "It is raining very heavily in Mumbai". Deepaks (News Correspondents) of every news channel were reporting from each and every remote corner of the city and trying to prove that their area is the worst-hit area in the city.

News Centre Lady: Aaj Takriban ek saal baad firse Mumbai sheher main Jhama-Jham (I like that word) barishne apna keher barpaa hain... Log abhi 26 July ka woh hadsaa bhulne ki koshishhi kar rahe the ke kudratne apne takat ka Mumbai wasiyonko ek baar fir andaza dila diya... Pichle chaar dinse Mumbai mein Musaladhar barish ho rahi hain aur Mumbaike sare nichle ilakon mein pani bharne laga hain... Is bareme aur jankari leneke liye chalte hain Hamare sanwaaddata Deepak ke paas jo is waqt Mumbai ke Andheri ilake main maujood hain Deepak hamein batayiye ke ab waha kaise halat hain?

Deepak: (Suddenly realizing that he is on camera and bringing India-Pakistan war wala emotion on his face) Aparna Pichle chaar dinse yahan jordaar barish chal rahi hain aur sheherke sare nichle ilakon main ab pani bhar chuka hain... Log abhi dare huein hain aur gharse bahar nikalneko katra rahe hain (On second thought, I realized that Deepak had conveyed exactly the same message as the News Centre Lady). Aparna, main abhi yahan Andherike J. B. Nagar ilake mein maujood hoon. (One more redundant sentence BTW, thatÂ’s where I live these days) Yahan subahse jordaar barish chal rahi hain. (Aaaah... This Deepak guy is getting on my nerves now) Jaisa ki aap dekh sakte hain yahan ab pani ghutnese bhi upar ja chuka hain (Huh, finally something new). Camera suddenly moves from Deepak to a sort of swimming pool in the middle of a road. A lot of people are struggling to move into the camera frame. Kids are jumping in the water and throwing water at the camera. Pretty girls are moving gracefully through the swimming pool as if these few moments of fame are going to bring them their first Bollywood assignment. Camera again moves on Deepak and Deepak again wears that same "India-Pakistan war" emotion. Yahan ab sare nale puri tarah bhar chuke hain aur kai nichle ilakon main logonke ghar mein bhi pani ja chuka hain. Jaisa ki aap dekh sakte hain kai jagah gadiyan bhi pani main doob chuki hain. (Has Tata Motors finally come up with Rs. 1 Lakh car that drowns in Ghutnetak aya hua pani?) Surprisingly Camera actually moves on a Maruti 800 almost drown in water. In the middle of all this, I got up and walked towards my window as I heard people shouting outside and to my surprise I found our very own Deepak standing near the end of the road where one could see some jama hua water... Deepak and gang were busy in that corner only and they had managed to spot probably the only drowning Maruti 800 in the Mumbai at the end of the road... Most of J. B. Nagar was free from water and still Deepak was busy gathering reports on something which was only a fraction of reality... I was shocked but resumed watching the exaggerated news again.

News Centre Lady: Deepak, wahan aur kitni barish hone ka andaza lagaya jar aha hain?
(Question of the day, I must say)

Deepak: Aparna, agar logonka kehena mane to aisi barish Mumbai mein har saal hoti hain... Logonka manna hain key eh yahan ke 100 saal purani drainage system ki problem hain aur na ki kudrat ki... (This guy will surely get a 0 in PI for relevant content. :-))

News Centre Lady: Deepak, Mausam vibhag ka kya kehna hain ke aisi barish aur kitni der chalegi? (Slightly changing the question so that Deepak can comprehend it)

Deepak: Aparna, Mausam vibhagka kehna hain ke kudrat ka yeh keher aur teen-char din tak chalega. Agar yahan aur do-teen din aisihi barish chalti rahi toh yahan ka sara janjeevan ast-vyast ho jayega. (What a short and sweet answer to probably the only sensible question)

News Centre Lady: Deepak, wahan prashasan kya kuch kar rahi hain aise halat se nipatne ke liye? And the news continued...

This tickled the ever busy contemplating neurons in my brains. I remember how media put an entertaining touch to the Mahajan story with news titled "“Bhai bana Khooni"” etc some time back... The other day some news channel was trying to find similarities between Rahul Dravid and Krissh. (C'mon how stupid can you get?) During Kargil war some channels had imported experts to discuss what will be the next move of Pakistan and the list goes on... I, therefore, in the best of my interest decide to give the same treatment to these channels as I did to those Prime time soaps long time back... From now on I will only be increasing TRPs of some quality news channels like CNBC TV 18 and CNN IBN...

Http://office.google.com

This URL is soon going to be a reality. Google launched its online spreadsheet editing software Google spreadsheets last week.

With reference to my earlier post, I reiterate that google is thinking about waging a war with Microsoft in its very own, dominated market of ‘Office Automation Software’. Think about the scenario where your boss has asked you to give a presentation on ‘Recent Bear Run in Indian Markets’. You go to Google’s search engine http://www.google.com/ and quickly search some statistical data about the recent crash. Next, you prepare your report using Writely, an online document editing software that Google has bought recently. Google provides you with a G-drive of 5 GB capacity. Your report is stored safely online on Google’s powerful servers and you don’t even have to worry about the backups. You also create a small presentation using Google’s online Presentation software (Google Presenter or something?). Then you mail a copy of the report and the presentation to your boss using Google’s Gmail, a web based mailing software. Next day you walk into the office without carrying your presentation. You can easily download it onto your desktop in the office from Google’s G-Drive. After your presentation, some of your colleagues show interest in the topic and tell you that they’ve lost a hell lot of money in the crash. They ask you if you can guide them about investing into a bear market. You decide to start a blog, ‘Baring the Bear’, that allows not only you but also many more people to write about their trading strategies in the bear market.

One thing to notice here is that you have carried all of the above activities without using something you are so used to, the ‘Microsoft Office’. Google has launched a lightly loaded, online alternative for almost all the software in the ‘Microsoft Office’ suite as can be seen in the table below:

Microsoft Office Software	Google’s Online Alternative
Microsoft Office Word	Google Page Creator/ Writely
Microsoft Office Excel	Google Spreadsheets
Microsoft Office PowerPoint	???
Microsoft Office Access	Google base (I’ve heard)
Microsoft Office Outlook	Google Gmail

All these alternatives are not as feature packed as their Microsoft Office counterparts but most of the small businesses can manage their daily office work with these alternatives. For example, most of my work in the office and at home involves creating some documents with basic formatting, creating spreadsheets with embedded formulae, etc and I could almost manage it without ‘Microsoft Office’.

Next in line should be an online alternative to “Microsoft Office PowerPoint’. Google also needs to do a lot of work on adding a few advanced features to their software like ‘Automatic Index Creation’ in Word and so on.

Sometime back I felt that replacing software that resides on your desktop with some web based application is almost impossible. However, Google has already proved me wrong with all its new generation web applications. I have already started countdown to the day when the term ‘Microsoft Office’ will be replaced by the term ‘Google Office’.

My N-Gage

Ever since I got my first smart-phone I wanted to write about "The New Generation Mobile Phones" and especially "My Nokia N-Gage Classic". I had bought it in the month of November year before last to celebrate my so-called good score in the 7th semester engineering exams (So-called because it was good when compared to my entire engineering academic performance till then… ;-)). It is a 3’’ X 7’’ black beauty that made my wallet lighter by around 10K rupees (No, I was not looted… It includes a 256 MB SD MMC). Actually it was the most precious thing I possessed then and it continues to be the most precious thing I possess till date (Yes I am earning these days but again I’ve become too lazy to go to mandi and buy some stuff apart from the fact I don’t like spending my hard earned money ;-)). I had done a lot of research on the Internet before narrowing down to this piece and among the other factors that influenced me to buy this one were its modest cost (other smart-phones where almost twice its price) and the fact that I can use it as a repellent for street dogs to bhagaofy them when I return home late in the night. Poor quadruped creatures really think that it is a stone and run away. :-D.

Going a bit technical it has a 104MHz ARM924 Processor, 3.4 MB System Memory, 3.5 X4.15 cm TFT screen, FM Radio, Hardwired MP3 Player, is enabled with Bluetooth 1.1, J2ME and GPRS and uses Symbian OS.

Going a bit aesthetic some people find its shape really sporty whereas some people think that if aliens use any mobile phone it is N-Gage.

I have increasingly grown dependent on the phone and now a normal life seems impossible without N-Gage. I get up in the morning with N-Gage alarming me at 6:30 sharp. The ‘Talking Clock App’ can play all sorts of monstrous sounds to wake me up. I am seriously thinking of recording my ML’s “Prasad, what are you doing today?” wala dialogue that he says with a “God, what an over smart, idiot you are” expression on his face to use as my wake-up alarm and frighten me up in the early hours. At eight o’clock it reminds me of important events of the day including anniversaries and birthdays. I never send any “Wish you many many happy returns…” SMS though, as ‘SMS-Timer App’ automatically does the job for me at 10 o’clock. While I am traveling to the office, I put on the headphones and listen to Malishka blabbering some useless stuff on 93.5 or at times the loads of Junglee Songs stored on my MMC. N-Gage has stereophonic output giving you an acceptable sound quality (though not as good as an IPod or a sony-ericsson W800i). In the meantime I update my daily expenses using ‘Money Manager App’ by adding an entry for the 11 rupees that I gave to the Rickshawwallah as I was a bit late as usual and was most likely to miss my bus. At this point, my analytical mind demands all sorts of statistical data about my expenses and I watch a tabular representation of all my expenses ranging from food to traveling. I frown after looking at a big 0 against the row having “Expenses on Girlfriend” header. After my bus reaches the office premises, N-Gage automatically switches to “Silent Mode” with ‘MiniGPS App’. It is one of the most intelligent Apps on my cell that actually uses and remembers the cell ids of different cells as I move around them and does anything from “Reminding me about buying a magazine when I pass by local Paperwallah or switch the cell off whenever I enter the office conference room. I immediately head towards the canteen when my ML calls up to know my whereabouts. Damn… I have ‘smartAnswer App’ working for me here… I press a short-cut key that plays traffic sound in the background and I tell my ML about the deadly Mumbai traffic and how I get stuck on road everyday (Probably he will give me a release from the project after listening to my sorrow story everyday ;-)). After making an entry of the lunch expenses in the canteen in the afternoon, I return back to my beloved chair and put the headphones back where they belong. Dhawal drops by in the lazy afternoon hours and challenges me to a one-on-one ‘Virtua Tennis Game’. After beating him badly in the game (He thinks I have better playing conditions as N-Gage's 9-way round cursor joystick allows me some magical shots that his bulky 6600 does not allow him to play) I get back to my work. At around 5:30 or so Yogita sends in a message on ‘Bluetooth Messenger’ to ask if I am going to join in for another half an hour of tea break in the canteen. I lock the PC, message Rohit on the Messenger about the important meeting in the canteen and get going. Late in the evening at around 8:30 Varun calls in from Chennai to update me about the newer problems that he’s introduced in his life on the day. He also uses some very decent language for our ML. I obviously have ‘Call Recorder App’ switched on to save our conversation for re-airing in the canteen at the evening meeting the next day. While coming back in the evening, I use ‘SmartMovie App’ to watch my Friends Collection on my cell. Watching on tiny screen is not very interesting I must say but kills time nonetheless. I go home and switch on my computer. I synchronize my mobile with the computer and also use ‘ProfiMail App’ to download my Gmail Inbox onto the mobile so that I can read mail whenever I have time. There are a hell lot of other things I do with my mobile like looking up meaning of words in the middle of a meeting when someone uses a word outside my limited vocabulary, Browsing from the mobile by sharing my computer’s internet connection over Bluetooth using ‘OperaMini App’and so on…

I wanted this post to be an informative one mentioning latest advances in the world of mobile phones and capabilities of Smart phones but it turned out to be an ode to my “Nokia N-Gage Classic”. I will cover technicalities of S60 phones in some other post.

By the way I still cannot stop myself from appreciating my phone a bit more and the latest news is that someone has recently offered me a resell value of Rs. 6000/- for my phone (Yes this time it is without that 256 MB MMC :-D). I am not going to give it up at any damn cost though.

World War 3 is Happening... Its between Google and Microsoft

Yes... I confirm it from my side... Goggle is ready to take on Microsoft...

Look at this... This is an online substitute for Microsoft Office... It is called Google Page Creator.
Though in its early development stages, it promises to be a sufficiently feature-packed tool very soon... At least feature-packed enough to meet my needs and needs of millions of people like me. Creating and editing documents on web appears a bit too weird but not when Google Page Creator is around. They've again got AJAX working for them along with a good interface design resulting into a fairly responsive web application.

You can put in images, do basic formatting like bold, itallics, text color, bullets, fonts, alignment. All in all a nice idea implemented into an excellent product. I did not really like the name though. Innovators as they are.. they could have come up with a better name I guess...

Only missing thing is a Spell Check feature (I'm sure I make more spelling mistakes than the number of words in my posts) and a Search feature for Images and Content... But looking at the overall package that is absolutely pardonable...

Cancer cures Smoking...

We’ve come a long way from those old Nirma Nirma washing powder Nirma… adds to these more mature and entertaining ones…

The Reservation Thing...

BCCI to introduce 30% reservation for backward classes in Indian Team…

Indian Railways introduce 50% reservation for backward classes…

Passing percentage for backward classes reduced to 20%...

Backward classes need not pay taxes… Prime Minister…

Backward class people will live 30% longer… The Almighty (what the heck)

I will not be surprised if I get to read any of these in TOI in the morning some day. I had decided not to react on this “Reservation Thing” and express my views anywhere or sign any petition as petitions and protests are hardly paid any attention these days. But later I realized that this political stunt for votes has much more to it than just being a political stunt. This is the time when India seems to be making a mark of its own on the global map, thanks to its skilled workforce. This is the time when graduates from IITs and IIMs are recognized world over for their brilliance. This is the time when Indian IT biggies are being known for their processes and efficiency. I really think that introducing (or rather increasing) reservations in premier educational institutes in India as well as in India Inc. is not an ideal way to support the massive growth we are witnessing today.

Facts:

1. Government has almost made up its mind to increase OBC reservations in IITs, IIMs and other such premier educational institutes to 49% from current 27%.

2. Government has been urging India Inc. to introduce reservations in jobs for backward classes and is now hinting at introducing a law for the same.

India edging over India:

Indeed there is a huge population in India that still does not have access to good educational facilities. There is large rural youth population that does not have access to opportunities as in urban India. We have a problem at our hands here and it needs to be addressed but introducing reservations is going to make matters worse rather than improving them. There is more to the current reservation policy than what meets our eye. First, we need to think from the point of view of an underprivileged student, who will use such reservations…

Where’s the Competition?

Reservations kill the very element of competitiveness. We can introduce better basic education, schools and colleges, more seats and scholarships if we want more people to be a part of modern, developing India. According to me, assisting backward classes to grow is a better option than securing their growth and that too at the expense of someone else’s. We need “National Talent Schemes” for spotting and promoting talent in less privileged sections of society. An underprivileged student surely needs financial assistance for his studies but does he really need assistance in terms of “seats solely reserved” for him? In fact “reserved seats” keep him from trying his best as he surely knows that he does not have to compete with all the students to secure the seat but it’s only the students of his category he is competing against.

Brain Drain:

Thinking from the perspective of a student in general, if he is not able to fulfill his dreams here in India, he will go abroad and fulfill them. We are already seeing this trend in urban India. If the government continues to continue with its reservation policies, the “Brain Drain” is just going to get worse. I strongly oppose reservations introduced in higher education and especially those in IITs and IIMs. We need to keep in mind that IITs and IIMs are not just educational institutes but they are “Best Education” that India has to offer. People go to IITs and IIMs not only because they are brands that assure highest of salaries but also because they are home to some of India’s greatest minds. Interaction and competition with like minded peers is one of the greatest offering of these institutes. It is really unfair to introduce reservations and thus bring down the quality of students in these institutes.

Government’ Stand:

Here's what our respected PM Mr. Manmohan Singh had to say about the stand of the government on the issue:

"We all need to ensure that no group feels excluded from enjoying the fruits of rapid economic growth"
Surely, we need to make sure that India as a whole profits from the massive economic growth we are going through today. At the same time we should not forget the reasons for this rapid growth. It is highly skilled low cost workforce in IT and ITES that has helped our economy gain this momentum. It is those ambitious entrepreneurs from IITs and IIMs that have catapulted India in this vantage position. The very concept of introducing reservations reduces the competitiveness and thus our advantage in these fields.

"Opening up the economy has meant diminishing job opportunities for the socially disadvantaged"
If there is a considerable difference between the skill set of “Socially Advantaged” and “Socially Disadvantaged” people then it’s a failure on the government’s part. It means that the government has failed to narrow down this gap. It is highly foolish of the government to expect the Indian industry to pay the price of its misdeeds by introducing reservations in jobs.

India Inc.’s Stand:

India Inc. has clearly signaled its disapproval on this matter. Industries should concentrate on increasing their stake holder’s wealth rather than anything else if we are to survive in the opened-up economy against other global players. Industry thinks that everyone should come forward and do something voluntarily to improve the condition of the socially disadvantaged but introducing a law and forcing things is not a solution.

Solution:

India has to manage two things at the same time if it has to progress in a true sense. At one hand it has urban population that is living like people in any of the developed countries. These people are rich, have access to best of facilities. On the other hand, it has a large rural population devoid of all such facilities. This rural population cannot afford and does not have access to good educational facilities. But this distinction should solely be done on the basis of income of a family and not on the basis of “which caste it belongs to”. Again, scholarships would be much better as compared to “reserved seats”.

What next?

After strong opposition from the Indian Industry on “reservation in jobs”, the government has softened its stand a bit. Even the IITs and IIMs have not been informed about the new reservation policies. I hope this “Reservation thing” was a mere vote-magnet for the assembly elections and will soon be forgotten by everyone. If not so, we are surely in for a lot of debate and controversies.

Teams of the world... It's Showtime...

A new season, a new beginning and a whole new look... Teams of the world... It's Showtime...

2006 promises to bring one of the most closely fought battles on the F1 circuits with Alonso all set to defend his crown and Kimi n Schumi fired up to challenge him. While everyone was away from all the action, there have been a few changes in the rules, teams and circuits as well.

Major rule changes this year include:

1. Teams now have to use 2.4 L V8 engines instead of 3.0 L V10s last year. This theoretically means lesser power, lesser speed and eventually a safer race. Some teams like Toro Rosso have been allowed to use last years V10s with a limit on their Revs which I'm sure is going to raise some eyebrows. For engine manufacturers, this change means that they'll have to work harder to make their new V8s stable and extract as much power from them as possible.

2. Last year's most controversial rule has now been taken back by FIA. So teams can now use 7 sets of dry-weather tires, 4 sets of wet-weather tires and 3 sets of extreme-weather tires. Does this mean that Bridgestones are back in the race? Only time will this but racing is surely going to get more interesting as drivers can draw out that extra bit of performance from cars without worrying about the tire ware.

3. Following its tradition, FIA has yet again introduced a new Qualifying format. It seems complex and promises to lessen advantage for front-runners. It consists of 2 mini-qualifying sessions of 15 minutes in which 6 slowest cars drop out. These are followed by a 20 minute session for top 10 positions. These first 10 cars have to start the race with the same fuel load as they had in the 20 minute qualifying session. The remaining 12 cars can change their fuel strategy as they wish. This means that teams at the end of the grid can be more flexible with their fuel strategy as compared to their counterparts starting at the head of the grid.

Teams for Formula1 Season 2006:

There have been loads of changes in the teams this year. Narain couldn't bag a race driver's seat in any team but managed to clinch a test driver's assignment at Williams. There have been a few additions in the F1 Family and a few divorces and marriages between engine and chassis manufacturers. Different teams and their drivers this year are:

Team name: BMW Sauber
Engine: BMW
Tires: Michelin
Drivers: Jacques Villeneuve, Nick Heidfeld

Team name: Ferrari
Engine: Ferrari
Tires: Bridgestone
Drivers: Michael Schumacher, Felipe Massa

Team name: Honda
Engine: Honda
Tires: Michelin
Drivers: Rubens Barrichello, Jenson Button

Team name: Midland F1 (Earlier Jordan)
Engine: Toyota
Tires: Michelin
Drivers: Tiago Monteiro, Christijan Albers

Team name: Mclaren
Engine: Mercedes-Benz
Tires: Michelin
Drivers: Kimi Raikkonen, Juan Pablo Montoya

Team name: Red Bull (Earlier Jaguar)
Engine: Ferrari
Tires: Michelin
Drivers: David Coulthard, Christian Klien

Team name: Renault
Engine: Renault
Tires: Michelin
Drivers: Giancarlo Fisichella, Fernando Alonso

Team name: Super Aguri (New Entry)
Engine: Honda
Tires: Bridgestone
Drivers: Takuma Sato, Yuji Ide

Team name: Toro Rosso (Earlier Minardi)
Engine: Crossworth
Tires: Michelin
Drivers: Vitantonio Liuzzi, Scott Speed

Team name: Toyota
Engine: Toyota
Tyres: Bridgestone
Drivers: Ralf Schumacher, Jarno Trulli

Team name: Williams (Earlier Williams BMW)
Engine: Crossworth
Tires: Michelin
Drivers: Mark Webber, Nico Rosberg

My Predictions:

Now the most interesting part... My predictions for the season. I think Renault have done good enough to maintain their Drivers’ Championship. Constructors’ Championship however is a tough one to predict. It is going to be a cut throat competition between Mclaren and Renault but I think in the end Mclaren will have a slight edge on Renault in Constructors' as their Kimi-Montoya duo seems to be more promising than Alonso-Fisichella pair. All in all, good teams, good venues and good competition... What else can you ask for?