Discovery!

Heard this song from the movie RACE and fell instantaneously in love with this simple but melodious song sung beautifully by Atif Aslam. Thanks Pritam.



Then I stumbled on this one. Congratulations Pritam for another discovery!!



Cheers!!

Manoos Vs Marathi Manoos-2

I was in grade 9 and we used to have a history teacher, Mishra Maa'm. One day,while discussing the concept of British India and Princely states, she digressed a little and exclaimed, "Just look, we have a 'rashtra' within 'rashtra' and that too 'maha'rashtra! " Thackreys are known to take this too seriously. What Raj Thackery is saying now has been the bread and butter statement of the senior one, Bal Thackery since the formation of Shiv Sena in 1966.

Ever thought why this sudden spurt of statements and speeches about North Indians Vs Marathi Manoos? The answer lies in the identity crisis that MNS is facing not only in Maharashtra but even in Mumbai. With much fanfare Raj Thackery defected from Shiv Sena. This when Bal T. continued the great tradition of Indian politics by naming his little known and almost politically inactive/unknown (till that time) son Uddhav T as his successor and not the popular nephew Raj T. With no power and no mood to work at grass root level and with goons at various party positions, nothing happened for MNS. Many Shiv Sainiks who became part of MNS after the defection went back to the parent organisation in a matter of months and then the masses just accepted it as a small regional outfit somewhere between Congress, BJP, Shiv Sena and NCP. Subsequent By-elections told the same story. This marathi Manoos drama is just to make his presence felt by Raj T.

The basic ideology behind this call of 'North Indian's,Quit Maharashtra' call is so trash that even writing a blog on it seems like a waste of time. The notion that a particular city belongs to its natives and the people from other states or regions cannot work in that city is against the very essence of our Constitution and the concept of our national unity. Our Constitution has given the right to every citizen to work and earn living anywhere in the country. According to Mr Raj T, all North Indians should leave Maharashtra as they are eating up jobs of the native Marathis. Now, does that mean all Marathi Manoos all over the world leave their jobs and go back to Maharashtra as certainly they are also eating up somebody's job in their respective part of the world? Call Centres in Maharashtra should follow the same fate? In fact all those who are working abroad should be beaten and dragged on street (as MNS guys did to a few taxi drivers and street vendors) as they are taking jobs of natives? I am sorry Mr Raj, we live in a more civilised society.

And it would be interesting to see his dictum for the marathis who are settled in North India but are currently working in various IT companies in Mumbai/Pune? Do they need to go back too or will they get the benefit of doubt? Divide and Rule worked in 18th century but hopefully it wont work now. Even after spitting so much venom, Mumbai largely remained calm. Literate and employed people understand this gutter politics better but unfortunately these politicians, as always, underestimate common man's wisdom.


In a time when India is getting polarised with each passing day, where on the same page of a newspaper you can read mob lynching a person and Indra Nooyi being named among 10 best CEOs, nobody is ready to work to bring these two poles together. Not that anything is expected from outfits like MNS and Shiv Sena. They should stick to their basic principles namely tearing Valentine's day cards, digging cricket pitches and slapping the hapless taxi driver from UP.

Cheers!

Resemblance...

Have you ever noticed this stark resemblance between Irfan Pathan and Monica Seles!

Manoos Vs Marathi Manoos -1

Disturbing is NOT the fact that somebody named Raj Thackeray is making inflammatory speeches and doing the politics of regionalism, Thackeray's are known to do that since last 40 years.


Disturbing is the fact that State govt is taking ages to act and arrest him fearing that there will be clashes and vandalism by MNS sponsoerd goons!


Freedom of speech has so many shades!

Malai wala department

During his stint as a journalist, my brother decided to take state civil services entrance. After a back breaking preparation, clearing prelims, then mains and finally interview, he was through the process. Ready to serve the civilians as the name 'civil servants' suggests.

The entire process took a little more than two and a half years, thanks to the snail paced MP Public Service Commission. More wait followed as he waited for his posting. A round of process and procedures started. Finally after 7 months of final results, postings were out. He became Area Organizer in one of the district in Schedule Tribe Welfare Dept. A class II post. Now it’s anybody’s guess that such departments receive loads of grants from govt for the upliftment of this section of society.

Relatives came to know about his selection, posting and subsequently his departments and the reactions followed.

One was legendry " Malai wala department mila hai. Upar ki kamai bahut hoti hai wahan".

Though I was not present there and came to know about this incident only through my brother, I could imagine the expression on the face of a guy who spent his last three years as upright journalist.

Talk about pleasures of life!

Fresh Innings!

Looking at the last few posts made me realise that i have more or less not posted here since returning from my last visit to India. And now, after nearly 8 months, its time for another visit! Its been 16 months here among white babes! Quite a long time! Still, Bombabes are better ;-)


My flatmate is currently on a visit to India and I am all alone killing my time on this laptop and stock market analysis. This solitude made me realise that i enjoy spending time all alone more than with guys around me (I always had this doubt ;-) ) and considering that in all probability i will be a married guy in next two or three years, its a scary realisation.


I am almost out of touch as far as blogging is concerned and the effort that this post is taking is more or less equal to the struggle that Mcgrath used to do while in batting crease. I wonder i was an active blogger once! Almost every body from those days have stopped writing. Even the last man standing, Deepak, is not posting these days. In the last few days, met a few bloggers which rekindled my spirits. Lets see how this innings goes. Just hope future posts wont be as crap and as time consuming as this one.


So..This was just to start another innings.