There is something about Single in the City.

Every Sunday , with abated breath I wait and wait eagerly curious to read what's on the menu of "Single in the City" , a weekly article occupying the not so obscure corner of Hindustan Times , yet managing to win over millions of readers and flooring a few , myself included . The person conceiving the idea calls herself Sushmita Bose . She seems to be a darling to one and all for reasons beyond gender bias that we males are inherited with. Although the articles talk of mundane , dour yet enticing occurrences, the perspective that it has of a hallucinating pretty lady adds to the zing. It makes one delve into the insights of fairer sex , whose aura of incomprehensibility still persists.

The articles are rash , daring at times , atrociously light and refreshing and on occasions more than a few denigrating the modesty of womanhood , a stuff that all grown ups long yet are deprived of. It has elements of Aphrodisiac, amorous tales narrated to keep the readers hooked (at least the lady has succeeded with both hands up on this front). Besides the pretty damsel playing with the hearts of so many readers with concocted tales is the yielding of all male idiots before the might of pen, myself excluded. Yet i cannot let myself to be left out in the lurch . So willingly I have jumped into the fray and been bugged not bogged.
I must confess it's all in the name. The damsel's name and the maternal linkage to a state notorious for sloppiness yet celebrated for the prolific lineage of beauties ranging from sensual Suchitra Sen to the sensational Sushmita , adds elements of sensuousness though far removed from the Debonair flair. The lady herself seems to of the opinion that what sells should be flaunted. Articles on very intimate womanly things are on her menu. Exactly for this purpose do I regularly find mention of alone in the city vulnerable to a stalker , a sensual discussion of the Bra , quite to the amusement of women readers, a lively concoction on office boss accosting the lady , and the lady willingly offering herself as a quid pro quo , the pestering guiding on the part of parents keeping a tab on their credulous daughter preventing her from going astray in an unsafe city such as Delhi. This is not the end . What makes her so distinct and special is the mocking and hilarious use of expressions , that colloquial English the articles are aw ashed with.
But this fan following has come at the cost of Upala Sen , who seems to be playing second fiddle to the lady. I hope I could bail her out of the readership crisis. But Alas ! For that bitch Single in The City, even I am smitten.

The Great Political Felony.

The political dust has settled . The year of lull is marked by great political naivete . Madam for whom till recently the world was a playground , has beguiled the electorates to an extent where they are will boomerang. An idea that from the very outset had dubious longevity is imminent to cease.
You cannot be a scabbard for differing , antagonistic , repulsive and divergent ideas , which if not sooner then later will cross each other. The concept of the support of Upper Castes to Dalit outfit as a Social Engineering is an apocryphal . If you actually look behind the curtains , read between the lines , the fallacy comes to the fore.
This UP election , the voting percentage was a dismal 45%. And it is widely acknowledged that affluence diminishes political / franchisee obligations. With advent of prosperity and the forward castes garnering the major chunk of benefits , it is very likely that they majorly constituted the somnolent electorates. So the voters that seated Behenji at the Hot Coveted Lucknow Gaddi , belonged to her own clan only.

Scrap... Shit ........

A time comes when one finally takes a plunge and tastes the forbidden fruit. A moment of intense passion engulfs , subserviences and puppets you to the pangs of ecstacy. These are the moments where an inherent desire , longings long suppressed unleash emotions of immeasurable unprecedented scale. Yet one lets himself be swayed by them. For ignorance is a bliss and the fear of known , delimits the unknown.
Something very similar occurred to me by virtue of my misfortune , that has maimed me and myself despite the herculean efforts to overpower , all that remains is another attempt concocted to the endless tale of failure to live in vanity.
I am sozzled up , I am inebriated , I have been decimated , I have been plummeted to abysmal troughs yet the pains never awashes hope . It is rightly said or rather hoped , a moment of reckoning can take in its fold years of agony , miseries . It is this ecstatic moment , the feel and the ambivalence that keeps me afoot and belligerent. Man is pugnacious , and I no exception. However there needs to be limits set , milestones identified and alternate plans erected for you never know when you may be bereft of perseverence.
I learnt my lessons the hard way though at every point a chimera me learning from the repentances of others , obliterated any possibility of me also going the Satan's lane . Alas the misconception realized , what awaits is a battle of survival . How not all is lost . There finally seems to be a glimmer of shine , maybe the one where the apocalypse is to strike you. But pessimism is a word of the cowards , not of idiots , unreasonable who sanguinely cling to hope , faith .
In life as in business , one must keep all his options open . Though this by extension does not apply to matrimony where infidelity and polygamy are still a taboo. Opportunities are all about jumping at appropriate time . What can identify an opportune time , the answer cannot be more lucid than this. Why you stop believing that no opportunity awaits you.

This is the text of the Commencement address by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, delivered on June 12, 2005.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, its likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

Short Introduction of Che Guevara.

THE CUBAN REVOLUTION WAS FIVE YEARS OLD in 1964 when Ernesto Che Guevara was offered financial compensation to speak at Havana University. Guevara was one of only a handful of foreigners who came with the Castro Brothers on the Yacht called "Granma" to fight against the Batista dictatorship.

Upon landing in Cuba, most of the 81 men on the yacht were caught or killed, and only 16 escaped into the Sierra Maestra Mountains, where peasants and farmers aided them until their forces grew into the revolutionary army that defeated Batista.
By the time his troops marched on Havana with Camilo Cienfuegos' troops in January 1959, Guevara was very popular with the Cuban population. Stories of his bravery and leadership circulated widely, and he was considered one of the most important figures in the Revolution.

In his response to the offer from Havana University, Guevara showed the contempt for money that he openly shared with the Castro Brothers and a number of the other revolutionaries. "It's inconceivable to me," he wrote, "that a monetary payment should be offered to an official of the Government and the (Communist) Party, for any work of whatever kind it may be. Among the many payments that I have received, the most important is to be considered a part of the Cuban people; I would not know how to gauge that in dollars and cents." (The letter was printed in the Mexican magazine SUCESSOS, January 2, 1967.). The word "che" is the familiar diminutive for "you" in Argentina, as in "hey, you!" It was an affectionate term that became his "official" name and the one which he used for a signature, always with a lower-case "c."

Born in Argentina on June 14 1928 (he was ten months younger than Fidel Castro), Guevara studied medicine at Buenos Aires University, where he also became involved in opposition to the Argentine leader Juan Peron. He later went to Guatemala, and in 1953 he joined the government of Jacabo Arbenz Guzman, who was overthrown by a CIA-sponsored coup.

An intellectual and an idealist, able to speak coherently about Aristotle, Kant, Marx, Gide or Faulkner, he also loved poetry, and was equally at home with Keats as with Sara De Ibáñez, his favorite writer. It is said that he knew Kipling's "If" by heart.
"I don't think you and I are very closely related," Che wrote in a letter to Señora María Rosario Guevara, "but if you are capable of trembling with indignation each time that an injustice is committed in the world, we are comrades, and that is more important." It was this "great sensitivity to injustice" that forged his political views and led him to distrust imperialism, specifically the American government.

It is said that Guevara played an important role in converting Castro to communism, often quoting Marx, Engels, Mao Tse-tung and others.

Guevara suffered from a life-long asthmatic condition that might have prevented any other man from participating in guerilla warfare as he did, but he was determined to not let his ailment interfere with his ideals for a just society. This condition may be why, as a doctor, he specialized in allergies.

Journalist Herbert L. Matthews writes about Guevara in his book, REVOLUTION IN CUBA: "His dedication to his revolutionary beliefs was deeply religious. Che had a missionary's faith in the innate goodness of man, in the ability of workers to dedicate themselves to ideals and to overcome selfishness and prejudices. It was the other side of the coin of his passionate indignation against injustice and exploitation of the humble. He saw the solution in an exalted form of Marxism that would bring freedom and brotherhood. Such men are born to be martyrs."

While living in Mexico, Guevara worked in the allergy ward of the General Hospital and supplemented his salary as a photographer. It was at this time that he met Raul Castro, who told him about the situation in Cuba. In early July 1954, Guevara met Fidel, and after talking through the night for ten straight hours, he joined the Cuban Revolution.

Guevara went on to become the official doctor of the rebel army, and an important leader and strategist. Before leaving for Cuba on the Granma, he told his wife Hilda Gadea (whom he married on August 18, 1955 in Mexico City) that he joined the expedition "because it was part of the fight against Yankee imperialism and the first stage of the liberation of our continent."

After taking on many important jobs in the Cuban government after the Revolution (he headed Cuba's Ministry of Industry from 1961 to 1965) he led a force of 120 Cubans into the Congo, but the mission ended in failure.

In 1966 Guevara went to fight for revolution in Bolivia. He was captured by the Bolivian Army and executed on October 9 1967.

A few Good Men.

In a country plagued by scandals , government apathy the need of the hour is Honest People who can lead , inspire this nation. The recent attack during an election rally on a prominent politician brings this decadent nature to the fore.Though the attacker is fighting for his life on rudimentary medical infrastructure , the politician is being administered the best of medical aid.The brutality , grotesque beatingthat he was subsequently administered to by overzealous supporters makes him a victim himself rather than a criminal.The circumstances that led to this extreme step can be traced to the failure of the govt. to discharge its duty , the concentration of power in the hands of who themselves need to be brought to books, the defunct juidicial system where justice comes out as water dripping from some Delhi Jal Board taps leading to econmoic , social stagnation is a quintesssential example of where we are heading to.

The person must have his own valid reasons which are being shrouded by the media which itself is subservient to the feudel politics of sychophancy.........this is sheer blasphemy where the victim is being subjugated to serve the vested interests of a class which is least interested in discharging it's duty .....

May the Revolution live and a day come when the justice is done to the concept opf equity which the founding fathers of the country strived for...

What is in a name .

The recent spurt in schemes being named after Nehru/Gandhi scions points to a decadent sycophancy to which our government and ministry officials have plummeted to . For them it is their only way to impress upon their immediate powers .It is an instrument in their hands to fulfill their motives .
Well some may argue what concern it to them, the name , when the schemes so envisaged accrue benefits to the people . The issue cannot be skirted on this argument. A deeper understanding of the problem is required with serious repercussions.In fact the embodiment of values , ideals projected by prefixing the names of some specific persons to schemes and projects is a shibboleth. Therefore the scheme's name should be after the persons entrusted with implementation or the post/authority at the helm of affairs. The efficacy of this approach is the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana. This way the lynch pin stakeholders will discharge their duties to the best of their ability.
Now the question may arise why such a simplistic approach will produce magnificent results. The answer dear reader is within ourselves.
As Shakespearean classics have aptly documented the desire for fame , recognition is inherent in every individual. T o meet this end different modes ranging from pervasive to forbidden are adopted. If we provide an opportunity with stakes , the person leading the schemes will leave no stone unturned to make it a grand success and thus leave an indelible mark ...for opportunity comes but often knocking at your door and if the purpose be so noble it is just an icing on the cake.

Much ado about Nothig.

So I am back after a brief hiatus. In between many things have transpired which have impacted my life course. Begining in the series was a disaster at a exam considered not the least easy to clear yet the most coveted to drive any sane person to profanity ... next followed the shocker of realising that all the four years slogged at as India's creme de le creme turn out to be a naught when you are not in cognizance with market demand.. cruel intentions but such is the way of life
Life has to be recollected from the shattered bits left over after obliteration..to move on ahead is pervasively about learning the unlearnt and putting to trash the learnt..

Do you sense some elements of withering of a person who suffered at the hands of destiny ,,,if the answer is in the affirmative then I could not help blaming you ... yet on another platform it is about a new found confidence that seems to have engulfed a person who refuses to bow down ...
All said and done ....why should i become a narcisst...when I am egoistic....scrap it for I am in a delirium

The year preceding saw some more interesting developments on Political front with BJP making a tremendous comeback from Nowhere , Congress entangling itself into a quagmire of Sychophancy , inept and Aggrandization...Advani despite resurrecting the party leaving from the helm of affairs as their lynchpin leaving the reins to a person whose efficacy will be put to test ...anyways a begining has to be made and a better opportunity could not have presented itself to man on lookout for one...A whiff of change is in the offing which is always pleasant from mundane chronlogy...

Lesson has been learnt and message suucintly put forward that idealogy reigns supreme ..person's charisma comes second..

A party which so recently was in turmoil can make a turnaround ,,then there is no reason why it should not be applied to individuals...

And this article that I have just chipped in falls aptly in the juxtaposition of things

The gruelling week .

The week preceding was one hell of a time for me...for I was actually entrusted to do coding tasks in a language whose reminiscences of Greek..
I did my best to accomplish the tasks allotted to me and andon occasions not more than a few, I succeedded but more often than not it was a big cipher..
Probably that is the fate one meets when you enter a domain one has had no formal training...it is I hope a passing phase which I will overcome sooner or later and if formenr the better it is for me for nobody but I have the urgency to come to terms with technology..Am I really grateful for having being provided with this valuable opportunity to ..????????????
The immediate problem is coming to terms with an architecture that is humongous to say the least , employs a vast range of scripting languages and to add to the misery is the hard fact that the task assigned has to be met within the deadlines ..but who said that the corporate culture is easy..it is the way the businesses are done ..
The past week had me so engrossed that I rarely paid attention to happenings to the world outside with time for news ,magazines being pruned to my utter dismay and regret..I hope to correct the mistakes henceforth ..
The week was also sensational in another way with me receiving a call from my college friend with whom I have shared a convival relationship..the chap is working on a summer internship in Delhi .he briefed about the latest happenings ,,the topmost being what I always suspected but could never confirm that "HE IS A GAY".And I am realizing now the urgency to learn driving but despite my every effort the dream seems to be turning sour...wow man when I look back I realize that so much to be accomplishED and so little achieved I guiltily end another feather in my cap with a promise to make a conmeback with the embeliishments of words that i have now been exhausted which never the less is splendour of English ...
Any Takers !!!!!

No news is good news.

For time immemorial it has been the norm rather than an exception that news which lacks substance is the one that hogs the limelight.Issues , Opinions , Polls on subjects , matters aimed at the amorous readers ,to up their TRP ratings hog the limelight.
People who matter less , opinions bordering on glib , events fastidiously packed to embellish them somehow remain in our claustrophobic mindspace which has been hijacked by the copious news channels which cater to a market rather than creating an enlightened market viewer.
So it comes as no surprise for the sorry state of affairs and that too despite the omnipresence of media it's broadening influence ,things have still come as a cropper on the governance front...
However we cannot absolve ourselves from this .We live in a consumerist society and despite of our talk of paramount interest of the consumers we have been not able to enforce the clout that we can exert. It is still more surprising that no dissent has been raised and people rather than taking things in a manner compatible with facts , digest at it's face value.
The media on the other has taken this as golden gooose egg laying opportunity with they playing subservient to men in power for furthering their personal interests. Infact the media enjoys an influence which is second to none.The need of the hour is therefore to put an onerous effort to put things in place lest we will stay as laggards.
The proponents of Socialism ,Secularism while exhorting the altruist virtues allow themselves to become pawns to men and women whom they need to expose for this is the conception for working of effective democracy...