Daddy's Dairies - 1

Ever since my bachpan I always wondered why people (in movies and real world as well) get ecstatic, excited when a little one is born. It took over 2 days to come to terms, sink in a feeling that I became a dad and that a certain little man arrived into this world taking my blood, genes and life into him. Aahhh !

It took me 32 years to understand what it takes to feel the world in your arms. That cosy embrace from a 2-day-old who looks into your eyes as if he's saying "I trust you, dad" - beats the biggest happiness and richest luxury. That's just worth a lifetime of waiting.

Since the time my wife got pregnant, we and the entire family were curious about how he would look, behave, whose looks and features he would inherit and we were desperate to skip few weeks to see the baby ourselves, if possible. May be the little one heard our inner voices, he didn't wait for too long as if he was prepared to get into our world of joy asap. May 07, 2012 - a day I can never take off my mind hereafter is the eventful day which arrived much in advance than the scheduled day. We rushed to hospital at 4:30 am and had our baby before our eyes at 9:44 pm.

The moment the little one arrived, we both went blank, we could neither think or feel anything. Hema didn't say a word for 15 mins as she was in trance and I didn't know what to say or how to react. It took an entire battery of doctors, nurses, staff congratulating us and few drops of tears to shrug off the statue mode to meet our destiny.

Honestly, that day I was happier and relieved that my wife came out of the process unscathed. Though I know every woman goes through this pain to deliver a baby, I had a tough time seeing my wife go through that hardship. I'm not a hospital person but here I was made to hold my wife and assist in delivering a baby in the birthing suite. Man, that was not easy, but it made me realize what a woman goes through to bring happiness into the family. Internet sources say that a human body can bear only upto 45 Del (unit) of pain but at the time of childbirth, a woman feels upto 57 Del of pain which is similar to 20 bones getting fractured at a time. My wife experienced this pain without any epidural or pain killer.

After her months of pregnancy, controlled diet, weight issues, and many common fetus / baby related precautions, measures, medicines and finally this childbirth trauma, I'm here reaping the benefits :) Now I began to love, respect my wife and mother even more. I don't think they can ask for a better gift on Mother's day which is around the corner :)

My dad was beaming with pride that somebody was here to take his lineage on :) and my mom who was with me in the labor room for a while was uncontrollably ecstatic at the first sight of her grand-son. They both helped me shift gears from labor-room stress to childbirth excitement. My in-laws, sister were sounding overwhelmingly happy and desperate to see the baby. But I didn't dare to take my son into arms as yet.

As of then calls, messages, best wishes started pouring in from all ends but I was unable to come out to normalcy by then. The hospital staff who were cordial, caring and very polite comforted me and my wife with their genuine glee. They had the policy to address newborn's parents as mom and dad and some 10-20 people among the staff addressed me as "dad" which rather helped me stand on my feet and accept the pleasant reality that YAYYYYY, I'M A DAD ! The kind of treatment (both medical and human) by the hospital staff was so congenial that we felt completely at home and we're glad that our boy's born there among positive vibes. Will be thankful to them, forever for whatever they have done to us.

The next day was a bit different as I woke up from a slumber and realized what my priority should be - yes, my baby, my son ! Everytime I saw him move, cry, yawn, sneeze, frown (which he's now popular for) - some unknown spark was passing through me. I simply can't explain that in words.

Last night (a couple of hours ago), a nurse helped me in holding the baby.....Initially I wanted to hold only for few minutes till he cries for milk or something. As soon as he came into my arms, he opened his eyes wide and sported an expression as if he understood everything I spoke. I had been speaking to him when he was in his mommy dearest tummy. May be he recognized the ever familiar voice (or may be that's what I feel to keep myself happy :)). I SPOKE TO HIM FOR 45 MINS FLAT and he listened to me with eyes wide open, looking into my eyes with frowns, expressions and mouth agape. All that I told him was how much I waited for that moment, how much he meant to me, what were the moments I was waiting for in future, what should he call me and ended the conversation with a couple of lullabies after which he promptly slipped into sleep :)

Now the feeling sunk in, the bonding started. In hardly 48 hours, I felt mellowed down and the world started looking much more beautiful, happening and exciting. It was not just a childbirth but also birth of a dad. And the baby better know that his dad can do any damn thing to keep his life happy...and I meant ANYTHING. As of now, I'm waiting to change his diapers, feed him, comfort him when he cries, take him for evening strolls and make myself his addiction and him mine.

Incidentally tomorrow (May 11th) is our 5th marriage anniversary and we were earlier planning for something big, but now something so big happened that everything needs to just wait :D We don't need a bigger gift for our anniversary, my wife can't ask for a better way to celebrate her first ever mother's day on May 13th. My sister's anniversary (May 14th) and parents' anniversary (May 16th) are now more special thanks to Mr. Little Someone.

Last but not the least, I felt overwhelmed with the kind of best wishes and greetings I received from loved ones who visited us in the hospital, wished us on phone, email, text messages, facebook and other media. I believe the positive vibrations and cheerful glee brought by such genuine and affectionate wishes make our happy moments even more special. I promise I'll reply to each one of them and will share pictures of the baby very soon. Since it was an early birth, doctors suggested us to keep the baby under observation for few days. We are waiting for that observation period to end to take good pictures. But let me tell you there are polarized opinions about whom he looks more like :)

Regarding the name, we again have polarized opinions but we're sure, we'll reach to a unanimous choice by this mother's day and his mom will announce the name. Thanks to all those who showed interest in knowing his name but a 2-day wait won't be too long :)

Finally, a request to all my well-wishers, friends, family, cousins and loved ones: please bestow your blessings on our little one that he should lead a very happy, successful, lovable life ahead; he needs those blessings for a peaceful life and to ward off all buri nazar without trace; and also wish me and my wife a very good luck in this new journey. Your good wishes and blessings mean a lot.

With Love

Love Affair Life Cycle

After writing a couple of posts on this subject, I didn't want to delve more or be a cynic especially when I myself am a product of love marriage; but decided to pen down some thoughts based on experiences of those whom I've seen from close quarters. My previous articles on the topic were:

• Love Marriage vs Arranged Marriage
• Love, Pyar, Prema etc

Parents are getting more liberal and progressive these days and we see lot more cases of love marriages than earlier generations or even a decade ago. That may be a good sign from one point of view but that means youngsters are completely given charge of THE most important decision of their lives at the age when they are not always ready or matured to take one.

18-25 is a really tricky age when one falls in love with almost every good looking / attractive or interesting person of the opposite sex because everybody is subconsciously looking for a prospective life partner. On the other hand everybody is subconsciously trying to impress those of opposite sex by projecting their best side, or sometimes an artificial or made up persona (again with or without their own knowledge). So it's quite a confusing situation.

Boys naturally get attracted to beautiful, charming, sexy, talkative girls who elevate their status in their circles. Girls get attracted to handsome, humorous, interesting, charming, romantic guys who can provide them some security. That's quite natural

When a boy and a girl start talking to and liking each other (due to factors mentioned above), they will have a lot to talk, share, discuss, express for a period of time. This is when they spend hours together on phone calls, instant messages, text messages day and night. That's really a beautiful phase of any relationship.This is when "love" blossoms because they find each other very interesting, enterprising and engaging enough to spend the rest of their lives. The problem exists in the fact that nobody realizes that's a temporary phase because no couple can talk or share things like that forever. The aura or utopia vanishes in an year, sometimes even months or even worse, in some cases days. This is the period when a lot of couples get committed for marriage or a long term relationship. That's what they call love and also convince themselves that they know a lot about the other person and hence it's not infatuation anymore. That's when they get into some kind of intimate moments or physical relationships.

But after the cloud of interesting phase passes away, comes a phase of strange silence, longing for those golden days, dearth of interesting topics to talk about, lack of time for each other. This is the phase where the bogeyman called "possessiveness" creeps in. This is when boy and girl start fighting and cribbing over some "extra-attention" she/he gives to other boys/girls. Things start to change. Restrictions, instructions, follow-ups on each other take place of sweet-nothings. Worse if arguments about family customs, conflicts in backgrounds, fear of mental, emotional and social adjustments post marriage take center stage. In short, it would be "mini-hell".

A lot of couples break-up in this phase and find solace in other people who try to get them out of their bad phase. Some people stay in relationships just because they don't want to hurt their partners or don't want to be selfish or even worse don't want to treat "love" as a business - without realizing that these foolishly romantic lines will ruin two lives and families one day. And those out of bad relationships would feel like free birds :) Thus love affair life cycle ends. But if the couple really falls in love with each other, this phase too would be a temporary one and they can lead a happy and beautiful life forever because their real love starts just here notwithstanding all earlier sugar-coated conversations, spending hours on phone etc.

This quite often happens in arranged marriages as well. Couple brought into arranged relationship by their parents too will go through the utopia phase of colorful thoughts, sweet nothings, flowery conversations which will end at some point, but they come to terms with the next phase because they know they are tied by social norms and hence secondary thoughts don't even creep into their minds.

I personally know people who jumped into commitments because they like the way other person talks or behaves or looks like and then struggle through the next phase of converting love into marriage or marriage into love, and sometimes it's too late for them to back-off. A relationship which begins on the basis of superficial, artificial, unimportant or temporary factors will result in a bitter end or a bad marriage. Its good such relationships remain as crushes or infatuations forever.

Handling Criticism

Every person / thing / place / object in this world will have fans and critics. Managing life and maintaining relationships is all about handling admiration and criticism one constantly receives from the society.

This post was long overdue and should have been written immediately after the one about handling admiration (Read: Handling Admiration). But better late than never.

No two persons in this world look alike and neither do they think alike. Even the simplest and most straight forward concepts vary in perceptions between people and that's the basic human nature. For example, few people utterly dislike a very popular song or actor just because they can't understand why all others like him/her/it :)

Another example: For middle east conservative countries, US is a shameless, culture-less country where PDA is way of life and women dress outrageously. Will an American agree to that ? No, on the other hand, they consider Arab countries as barbaric stone age nations. As far as Indian and American cultures are concerned, there is extremely polarized views about family system, education system, lifestyle, sex life, PDA, religious affiliations and even usage of toilet paper. Now who is right ? Nobody, because that's how they were brought-up and they are made to vehemently support, defend their points of view.

If we like a particular cuisine, culture, lifestyle, taste, social values, ethics - just understand that those are our choices and not necessarily be applicable for the entire world and vice-versa. If we understand this basic principle, then handling criticism would not be a big deal.

Here are few quick principles to handle criticism:

First principle:  If you don't like criticism, don't criticize others because

1. The other person will definitely have his point of view and that's why he has been following or doing something - regardless of his point being valid or not.
2. Even if he realizes he was wrong, he wouldn't want to admit that (human tendency) and hence can hit back, some times with harsher words

If somebody criticizes you,

Second principle:  the first thing you should do is to understand and realize that the other person comes from a different background and a different set of values (may not be superior or inferior  - just different).

Third principle: Don't retaliate, abuse or confront with vengeance especially if you want to continue the relationship with that person. Conflicts of opinions are temporary, relationships are more important.

Fourth principle: It may be because that person doesn't like you and hence he would not like anything you do. So don't try to appease. Just leave it as it was.

Fifth principle: Don't blindly change your point of view. May be, you were right.

Sixth principle: Some people don't mean their criticism. Understand whether their intention was lost in choice of words and communication medium. May be they were expecting better behavior or attitude from you.

Seventh principle: Don't invoke your ego for judgments passed by others. Don't make it a prestige issue for every criticism. Some issues are better addressed by silence.

Eighth principle: Don't assume that there is just one right and one wrong way to do something. Whatever you do or think or follow, there would be somebody around who would definitely criticize. So you can run, but can't escape :)

Ninth principle: Just understand, you may be liked by somebody for the exact reason you are hated by many. So judgement is not universal.

Tenth principle: Don't blindly go with your point of view. May be the criticism is valid and changing your ways can do good to you. So think from the critic's point of view. Still you are not convinced ? Good for you.

These ways of handling criticism should be well-balanced with ways of Handling Admiration

Mera Bharat is NOT Mahaan !

Every Aug 15th and Jan 26th, it has been a ritual to sing "sara jaha se achcha, hindustan hamara" and chant "mera bharat mahaan". Everybody does that and many believe in that religiously.

Internet facts that are shared through emails and FB posts claim how great India is for all its contribution to the mankind. Indian movies depict greatness of our Indian army, culture, heritage, pride. Its the kind of patriotism that's injected into our masses which sometime turns into blind jingoism for people who take those sweet words way too seriously to consider India as the greatest country in the world. It sounds so good and I love it to be that way but is that the reality is a million dollar (or rupee) question. Loving our country is not same as believing it to be the best in the world.

First of all, there was no country or a geographic unit called "India" before 1947. Much earlier to independence from British, the common point among all princely states (together which we today call, India) was a religion or way of life - which was termed as "Hinduism" and the related civilization "Indus Valley Civilization". Eventually Indian religions like Sikhism, Buddhism, Jainism were founded and Abrahamic religions like Islam and Christianity made inroads. After this development, the land couldn't even claim to have a common religion, tenets, scriptures, beliefs, language or culture and there was no tightly knit country called India centuries before 1947. The only common agenda in early 1900's was native people's angst and agony against British rule.

Its a common perception that Pakistan was split from India etc where there was no India before a country called Pakistan was created. India was born a day after Pakistan. After that historic date, what has been common in people of India was again a million dollar question !

Today, Tamilians claim that Aryans came out of nowhere to push them into a corner and hence hate North Indians and everything related like Hindi, Sanskrit, Brahminism (as Periyar and anti Brahmin Tamilians claim Brahminism and caste division is a North Indian stigma). Sikhs hate the entire country and Hindus for not giving Khalistan, ULFA terrorists are upset with India for mismanagement of North East, Naxalites were born to end the very fabric of democracy and they don't even hesitate to collaborate with anti-national elements like Maoists of Nepal, China and terrorists of Pakistan, Kashmiris are upset because they were not granted freedom. And we say Mera Bharat is Mahaan whereas every corner of the country is embroiled in some kind of protest and sulking.

Even those who have no problems with India as a whole, have problems with one another. Telangana-Andhra fight, Maharashtrian fight against North Indians, Tamil Nadu - Kerala fight (Mullaperiyar dam), Tamil Nadu - Karnataka crisis (R.Cauvery), Punjab - Haryana fight (Chandigarh, partition). We mask these turmoils with a nice sounding phrase "Unity in Diversity". As if these inter-state issues are not enough, there is factionism in Rayalaseema of AP, criminalization of politics in Bihar, casteist equations in almost entire country, underworld in Mumbai, smuggling in Nepal borders, illegal immigration in Bangladesh border and the list goes on. Forgot to mention, there are also fights between "fans" of movie stars ;)

Now if you thought that's the end, read on. We have our 65 year old Indian government which did everything to stagnate economy, stall development, FDI; walked in the footsteps of a failed state called USSR (which doesn't exist anymore), supported Palestine (which supports Pakistan now), increased distances with USA thus making it closer to Pakistan, provided shelter to Dalai Lama thus annoying China which is a perennial enemy now (but at the same time crib that Pakistan is providing shelter to Dawood Ibrahim - heights of hypocrisy), always belonged to and enjoyed being a third world country by successfully nourishing corruption, nepotism, black-money, witch hunting of whistle-blowers. Even now, anybody dare to say "Mera Bharat Mahaan" ?? If yes, they could be plain stupid or blind in thoughts and brains.

We still clamor about Aryabhatta (who belongs to a time when there was no such place called India), we claim Mohenjodaro, Harappa (which are in Pakistan), we claim Buddhism (which was founded in present day Nepal), we claim to be birth place of Sikhism and Jainism (which our constitution still regards as parts of Hinduism and hence antagonizing followers of those religions). Now what right do we have to claim greatness about ?

Indians are usually proud of their mental abilities and knowledge. But was there any notable invention or discovery after independence ? We claim the success of so-called-Indians who either brought success to US companies or those who don't ever claim to be Indians (people of Indian origin). Our media run programs and editorials when people like VS Naipaul, Venky, S.Chandrasekhar, Hargobind Khurana and even worse people of foreign origin like Mother Teresa or Ronald Ross get Nobel prizes. Can we still feel we are an intelligent lot ??? Is our country's administration capable enough to derive the best out of our talented lot ? If no, nobody can cringe about brain-drain.

Indian defense ? It's very good in movies like Border and LoC, but in the reality is not as fantastic. The very first upset being losing 1/3rd of Kashmir soon after Independence. We don't mention about humiliations our army faced during petty skirmishes like Dwarka attack (yes, most Indians don't know that). 1965 war and Kargil wars were not as victorious as they were projected. They were just compromises and cease fire brought about by various external pressures. We don't even talk about China war which we lost badly. Our NSG commandos who are depicted as super humans took days to flush out few petty terrorists from a couple of buildings. Do we still feel great and secure ?

What else are we good at ? Sports ?? We celebrate one Olympic gold medal for years together and we also lobby to grant Bharat Ratna to that one chap. That's our desperation. Commonwealth games (no, I'm not talking about the scam), Asian games, any pride ??? How many know atleast half of team members in Indian hockey team (yeah, national game) or football or any 2-3 players of other sport in India except cricket. Now talking about cricket, think about BCCI - which is led by Sharad Pawar and a host of politicians who might not know the difference between on side and off side.

Justice in India must be a joke of the millennium. To decide who killed Rajiv Gandhi, our judiciary took almost 20 years, Afzal Guru who almost caught red handed was not brought to justice even after 10 years, now don't even think about Kasab. Every politician who gets caught ( that's very rare though) has atleast 50 years to go before the judiciary and commissions take some decision and later that decision can be reversed by a higher court or atleast bail is guaranteed.  Once an issue is identified, immediately a commission comes into picture just to spend more crores and time. Justice delayed is justice denied and its always denied in India (except for rich and influential). Media, bureaucracy, corruption, population, illiteracy, poverty, casteism in India - each deserves a separate article.

This is all about various issues, points which only Indians are much aware of. Now just imagine whats outsiders perspective of what India is (without being hypocritical that we don't care and all that drama). India is not even considered to be a major force (except by those heads of states who visit India to make statements). Nobody cares what India says, feels or decides. India rushed to support US after 9/11 but was cornered after rude snub by Americans, UNO never feels the need of pulling India into permanent security council membership, those countries which support India (like Russia, Israel) do only because India purchases defense arms and ammunition from them. Even when Libya was in crisis, they sought the support of Russia and China but never minded if India was for or against the rebellion.

Even international entertainment world sees India as a very big slum full of elephants, snake charmers and naked sages. Show me any movie which shows richness of India, and that can be a world wonder. Indian culture (which is showed in our movies as if foreigners crave about) is often ridiculed and shown in poor light. Though we don't need anybody's certificate or appreciation, we should refrain from believing that the world looks upto India for guidance or salvation.

Now, some super-optimists may say we are far better than other poorer countries. But alas, we are in a dire situation to compare ourselves with malnourished, war-torn countries to feel good. Now how the hell is "Mera Bharat Mahaan ?"

Those who just see cynicism and negativity in my post must read the following posts to understand the difference between loving, respecting, feeling good about our country without blindly believing we are the best. Bitter it may sound, but, no - we are not. Its reality.

Also Read: Confused Desis
Also Read: Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani

Why is India still a developing country ?

India got its independence in 1947 and since then the country has been a "developing" country. If anybody was asked what could be the reason for this, pat comes answer that its because of "vested interests of politicians and corruption among law makers and bureaucrats" and this answer is 100% correct. But it would be interesting to analyze what triggered the corruption and how these so called law makers got an opportunity to sabotage country's economy for their vested interests. I have covered this marginally in one of my previous articles (Read: India: History of Corruption).

It would be shocking (especially for those who are relatively beginners to economics) to know that India's growth in per capita income (income per person in the country) was only 1% since Independence to late 1980's. Yes, that means the country was literally stagnant with nil development for almost 4 decades and entire credit goes to the great JL Nehru for his foolish economic policies.

Now during those 4 decades entire industrial setup, banks, everything were under Govt control who gave away licenses only to powerful businessmen who could "lobby" and "convince" the government. These lobbyists controlled governments, bureaucrats, officers and there started an ugly liaison between businessmen (who could spend money), politicians (who could rule in favor of businessmen), officers, media, judiciary (who were paid by businessmen, controlled by politicians). This era also called as "license raj" restricted the entire country so much that everybody who had some money tried to influence policy makers and thus gave birth to the monster called corruption in India, which we are trying to fight today.

Till 1990, GDP (total worth of goods and services produced) and GNI (total income of the country) of India were among the last 20 out of 180 countries, thanks to 44 years of misrule, mayhem and destruction of economic fabric. So it would not be an exaggeration to say that we actually got real freedom in 1991. Now let us see what happened in 1991 which triggered this 360 degree effect on India and Indian economy.

Globalization & Liberalization:

Those who were born in early 80's could remember that till early 90's, the only cars we could see on the roads were Maruti, Ambassador and sometimes Padmini; BSNL was the only telecom provider, Air India and Indian Airlines were the only airways, Doordarshan was the only TV network; Soft drinks were completely Indianised (Gold Spot, ThumsUp, Limca, Maaza). It means nobody from other countries could invest their money or introduce their products and services in India. So Indian public were deprived of international goods, services, standards in all walks of life.

PV Narasimha Rao directed Manmohan Singh (then finance minister) to open Indian markets to foreign investors to benefit from Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) so that Indian treasury could be bolstered by foreign currency and Indian public could be given access to superior products of international market. Immediately we saw American, Japanese, Korean, European companies flooding India with their products in automobile, telecom, FMCG sectors etc. This was long awaited; the quality of life standards, GDP, GNI, per capita income - all started to increase dramatically and soon India fell in the top 10 economies of the world and is now the second or third fastest (not exactly sure about the ranking) growing economy in the world.

It is predicted that if this growth rate continues, India will overtake France, Germany, Canada, Australia, Japan, UK in another 15-20 years. Beating US and China would be difficult though (at-least immediately). So India can fall under "developed countries" in another couple of decades.

Opposition to FDI & Globalization:

If we pay attention to news headlines these days, Parliament is being stalled, people are taking to streets protesting against FDI in retail. They don't want foreign retailers like Walmart, Costco to setup their shops in India. Their argument is that these big retailers can cause unemployment to petty kirana and general stores in India. Hmm, may be that's correct, but the pros of FDI are more attractive than cons for the benefit of Indian economy.

Earlier when Hyundai, Daewoo, Mitsubishi were allowed into India, indigenous companies like Maruti cried foul but the government didn't heed because the economy would be developed and common man would be benefited. Now Walmart will inject huge influx of money into Indian treasury. At the same time farmers and manufacturers can directly deal with these foreign retailers thus providing cheaper and better quality goods and services to common man. So what if middlemen and brokers get affected ?

Opposition is just playing to galleries to attract a few votes from these middlemen, but if the government succumbs to such pressure and rolls back their idea of retail FDI, the dream of becoming a "developed country" will have to continue as the reality evades, thanks to selfish interests and votebank politics.

Burst Crackers on Diwali !

As Diwali is around the corner; we will start getting environment friendly messages asking people to stay away from bursting crackers citing various theories as how crackers and fireworks could destroy the world and humanity in the coming years. ITS UTTER CRAP ! This post is dedicated to all those who unknowingly panic due to the triggered propaganda and all those who crib with half-knowledge.

The entire world is now aware of global warming, greenhouse effect and generic air pollution that will affect generations to come. There are many factors (most of which we don't even realize) which contribute to these ill effects and we never care, but raise alarm over few hours of celebration that happens once in an year which has been a tradition for years (or decades .err centuries). Firecrackers and fireworks emit certain smoke, sound, debris and create some inconvenience temporarily but doesn't harm global environment, ozone layer etc.

Biggest sources of air pollution as established by all major standards including AP 43 compilation of air pollution emission factors include predictable sources like automobiles, nuclear reactors, electricity power plants, volcanoes, wild fires and not so predicable sources like waste disposal, garbage, agricultural waste, cigarette smoking, fumes emanating from nail polish, petrol and even surprisingly gases emitted by cattle during digestion. But pollution caused due to fireworks was never ever discussed or acknowledged due to its negligible effect on a broader level.

So those who want to arrest pollution should first reduce pollution caused by vehicles, electricity, agriculture and industry which accounts to more than 60% of the air pollution.

Now lets come to a bigger topic called global warming. Again there were international conferences like Copenhagen climate conference which were held to identify and reduce sources of global warming. The reason for global warming is generation of greenhouse gases predominantly by oxides, methane, ethane and other radioactive sources; again nothing to do with fireworks or crackers. I don't understand how did these self proclaimed anti-Diwali cracker protesters got this idea - may be from the paranoia of smoke emitted from phooljadis and patakhas !

And the funnier part is that only Diwali is targeted by these campaigners. Nobody speaks about global celebrations and fireworks during New years eve, Christmas or every weekend fireworks of Disney Land, Disney World, Niagara Falls etc done by the most developed and environment conscious countries of the world. Why this special attention against Diwali ?

Diwali or Deepavali has been the biggest festival for millions and Diwali without lighting diyas and bursting crackers is like any other weekend. Those who want to resist our centuries old traditions can always stay back but those who are interested need not worry about any stupid propaganda.

As mentioned earlier, firecrackers create some inconvenience which should be addressed by socially aware citizens. There is a safety concern, but there is one even when crossing a road or driving a vehicle. Just like we take precautions and safety measures there, bursting firecrackers need to be done amidst safety precautions so that nobody is put to any kind of inconvenience.

Fireworks emitting light are more beautiful and sparkling than those which emit sound. Hence prefer those. Also clear the debris once the celebration is over. With these simple actions, we can stop people who campaign against Diwali celebrations. Have a safe, wonderful, memorable Diwali !

Dowry Harassment vs False Allegations

When I was younger, I heard innumerable dowry harassment cases which led to physical and mental trauma of women; newspapers, movies and later news channels were on forefront on exposing such inhuman cases; the media tried its best to create awareness and bring about some common sense among the educated and exposed youth and families.

Exposure to such torture cases begot a kind of intense despise and contempt for those who even think about dowry. And a direct consequence being our family never brought the topic in both my sister's marriage and my marriage and I feel proud that my parents were pioneers of the trend among our extended families, though I don't see it as any great achievement enough to proclaim. We all believe that's a social and human way of thinking !

I always believe anti-dowry and domestic violence laws are boons against such mistreatment against married women because of their support to women and strict punishment against grooms / husbands and their families. Incidentally I didn't come across any dowry harassment cases among my known circles till date (to my delight), but in the last few years I have been witnessing different kind of situations; those of false allegations, misuse of laws. Unfortunately most of the victims happened to be my very close people and I've seen (been seeing) the trauma they are undergoing. While I'm completely in favor of stringent implementation of these laws, I wonder if there is any way to check abuse of the same. An account of few cases where the laws were abused:

Case 1: The simplest of cases was slapping an anti-dowry case on a guy when he asked girl's parents if they could treat their daughter equally with her male siblings in terms of rights and assets especially when all responsibilities and duties were shared equally among sons and daughter (sic). He failed to understand that the demand was called "dowry". He claimed he never demanded dowry but was just being logical by helping his wife avail her rights (:p). However after some "negotiations" with local police, he was let go and the couple lived happily thereafter (!!!)

Case 2: Another situation was one of my friends who was not clearly happy right from the next day of his marriage; he shared his grief with few of his friends (including me) that the girl had a bad break-up before marriage and could not come to terms and hence had been aloof from this guy since their marriage.

I came to Canada and kinda lost touch with him. When I pinged him online one fine day to ask how was his married life, he told me he just came out of 12 month police remand and under-trial. I was shocked to know from him that his newly wed wife committed suicide because her parents forced her into the marriage; broken and depressed, she took the extreme step and her parents wasted no time to slap a dowry harassment case on this guy and his family. Reportedly, all of them had to be in jail, suffer atrocities which are usually reserved for murderers.

I was so moved by the whole narration that I could hardly speak to him. Eventually he was acquitted by court for lack of evidence but he still faces the social stigma, lost his livelihood, forced to relocate to a different and alien place to hide himself from the society. Again, if he had really harassed his wife to death, he deserved this treatment, but what if he didn't ? Who can compensate the physical, mental trauma he and his family faced ?

Case 3: My friend got married few years back and the couple were happy [sic]. But eventually the couple underwent some minor domestic arguments like any other couple and the girl moved into her parents' place. Her parents immediately filed an anti dowry case on this guy and his family (despite their living away from parents and no chance of his family to interact much with his wife).

The whole household underwent depression, but somehow implored the girl to get back to the family with a promise that no one will ever dare question her again. Fortunately, everything went on well after that incident and now they are a happy couple, thankfully !

Case 4: A distant relative got married recently but after marriage the couple faced severe incompatibilities and realized they couldn't live together. They made it a point not to get physically, mentally, emotionally involved. Practically they lived in different cities. Soon both families got involved, conducted many counseling sessions and unanimously decided to annul the marriage through legal means (which means the marriage was never considered to be happened).

Out of the blue, the bride's family demanded groom's family to pay a hefty sum worth 5 years of groom's household income, failing which they had to face anti dowry, domestic violence and many other cases which could have put the family behind bars for a long time. The poor family had to mortgage their only residence in addition to shelling out their lifelong savings.The girl is now happy; bought a nice car, sponsored her brother's foreign education et al.

Case 5: The case which I got conversant with recently. My friend of over 8 years married a long standing girlfriend some 6 years back through a registered marriage in Europe (against her family's wish). 3 years later when they returned to India to seek elders' blessings, the girl's parents house arrested her and filed dowry harassment and domestic violence case against him who has been fighting till now. He lost his peace of mind, senses, career, family, life and is also facing a threat to his life (sic).

Bottom Line: Now among all these cases, if boys were lying to garner sympathy and if they had really troubled their respective spouses, then they very much deserve all the trauma they were suffering. But the million dollar question is what if they are innocent ?

A police case can be filed by anybody on anybody due to different reasons. Genuine suffering could only be one of those reasons, but there can be hidden agenda, blackmail and arm twisting tactics, paranoia, schizophrenia, attitude issues, mental imbalance or innumerable other reasons. Its common sense that accusation can't be tantamount to conviction. But fake allegations and abuse of such laws can cost livelihood, peace of mind for many youth.

Agonizing factor in such cases is that public sympathy, police, laws, society always take girls' side, regardless. Good or bad, naive or conspirative, honest or fake - these qualities are not exclusive to any gender. If dowry abuse is a sin, so is fake victimization of anti-dowry laws. No two ways about it.

According to stats, its revealed that less than 10% of cases were genuine. It could only means two things:

• Most of the women who still face dowry harassment, domestic violence are not resorting to police and law due to fear of society and family. So the social evil is still there.
• Most of the women who file cases are fake. Thus creating another social evil called false victimization.

PS: Earlier when I wrote an article about female (in)equality in society (Read: Do women deserve special attention ?), some male chauvinists ridiculed me for having feminist views. I didn't care ! Now if ultra feminists get hurt reading this post, I don't care either !

My Misadventures Part - 4: Aimless at Amalapuram

Here is the fourth part of my misadventure series after previous posts

My Misadventures Part 1: Mumbai Masala
My Misadventures Part 2,3: Homeless at Anantapur, Kitchener

My Misadventures Part - 4: Aimless at Amalapuram

This happened in the first year of my working career (2004-2005). The incident was not as traumatic or painful as misadventures narrated in previous posts but if anybody asks me what could be the most aimless or worthless day of my life for which I have taken disproportionate efforts, this incident wins hands down.

I was in in my initial days of corporate career with a software company in Hyderabad. Soon I realized how important it was to keep my boss and senior members of the team in good spirits and be in their good books. One senior member of the team who was my virtual boss was getting married in a hamlet near Amalapuram, a small coastal Andhra town.

Few days before the groom-guy took off from work, I had a small misunderstanding with him which was blown out of proportion and I was in damage control mode; hence missing his wedding would be tantamount to inviting his ire which I could not afford at that point. I planned well in advance to join my other team members to travel to Amalapuram the day before his D day. But due to some last minute obligations, I ran out of time and as a result, missed the train. It was some 7 pm and his wedding would be at 8 pm the following day.

The first thing I did from the railway station that night (after missing the train) was to call my friend to locate where exactly Amalapuram was in the map of AP. My first mistake was to depend on that person to guide me because (1) she doesn't know a.b.c of AP as she was a northie, (2) she was realllllly bad at maps.

After some on-call support from me, I could elicit information that Amalapuram was near a town called Rajahmundry (which I heard a lot in Telugu movies and literature- thats my only connection). I asked the station enquiry desk as how I could go to Rajahmundry with a noble intention of traveling all night. He disappointed me with a news that the earliest train I could catch would be next morning at 6 am and I would reach Rajahmundry at 4'ish pm the same evening.

Nothing else to do, I reached home, asked my friend to pick me up next morning at 5 am and drop me at Secunderabad station which he did, thankfully ! The train was east coast express which was going Calcutta bound. I didn't know why I always happen to be in in such situations (refer to my Mumbai masala misadventure); I had to find some place in the general compartment. I ran like PT Usha to find the general compartment, but all that I could see were some desperate (more than me) souls hurling abuses at each other to reserve a slot to stand in the compartment; and it was a long 10 hour journey !

I, as an embodiment of foolish optimism, tried to find some place in reserved compartments (again with my Mumbai travel experience), but was literally thrashed out by ticket collector who didn't pay a heed or heck to my puppy face. Then I had to go back to the general compartment. Good news: All those who were on the platform fighting to get in, got into the general compartment; Bad news: I had no place except on the foot-board and heck it was a superfast inter-city express. I almost lost hopes and decided to go back home. But again the wilful laugh of the groom appeared before my face and I took no time to stand on the foot-board of that express.

Though foot-boarding in buses was OK, the same on train was a heck of an experience !!! The only solace was that train never encountered speed-bumps or sudden brakes. The foot-boarding experience was more tricky because I was feeling sleepy in that breeze (remember it was 6 am). This whole drama went on for almost 2 hours till the train reached Warangal (yayyy, my place) !

The toughest and most important goal of my lifetime at that moment was to get promoted from foot-board to the walking aisle of the compartment. I applied all my senses and concentration to barge in as soon as the last passenger got off at Warangal and hurray, this time, I had a luxury of standing near the wash basin (which was at its worst situation, smell, look and feel) in the compartment. But suddenly I remembered the saying "beggars can't be choosers" and in that situation I literally felt like a beggar.

The next notable station was Vijayawada, some 4-5 hours from Warangal. I spent that time sleeping while standing (and snoring - as was complained by co-passenger. I felt so thrilled because till then I never got that "compliment"). Whenever I opened my eyes, there was a guy who was narrating stories of his enemies, rayalaseema faction stories, his account of escapades from people chasing with sickles and swords. I thought snoring was a better alternative to hearing his bravado.

Vijayawada arrived. I disembarked myself hunting for some edible food. Finally found some chips packet as a consolation as I could not afford to go to another platform in pursuit of happyness. Hunger was better than missing train again. Otherwise my story would have been worse than Kareena's of Jab We Met, I happily got into the train and found a good samaritan who generously allowed me to sit on his suitcase (with its locks, chains, handles). Sitting on that was a pain in the ass..yup, literally ! But again the proverb "something is better than nothing" appeared before me in bold letters; But what appeared in bolder letters was the railway station board of the next station which screamed "Guntur". Before I could realize, the samaritan enlightened me that at Vijayawada , the train's compartments gets divided into two different routes, one towards Rajahmundry and another towards Guntur and as usual I was on the wrong side.

Cursing myself and everybody who came my came, I caught another passenger train from Guntur to Rajahmundry which took its sweet own time, stopping at every house, lane and villa. By the time I reached the destination, it was some 6 pm. I had only 2 hours to reach the wedding venue whereas the travel time from Rajahmundry to Amalapuram was roughly some 2 hours. And then I had to go to that small hamlet from Analapuram. But since its only a social event, I could afford to go late.

I came out of the railway station and saw a little bustling area where people were talking, yelling in an accent which I heard time and again in movies. I felt like Gulliver (except the size) traveling to alien land. People were courteous and I didn't find any challenge in boarding Amalapuram bound RTC bus. I must admit that the travel route between Rajahmundry and Amalapuram was breathtaking with Godavari canals, lush greenery, plethora of coconut trees. I then realized why coastal Andhra was called granary of AP. Rich canvas and scenery drove away all my frustration and disgust.

The bus reached Amalapuram town at 8 pm. Now my next destination was to reach the marriage venue some 20 kms from there. So I inserted my hand into my bagpack to dig out the wedding card and EUREKA....I forgot to bring the wedding card. What a timing, it was !!!

Then I shrewdly tried to call all my team mates who would have been at the venue by then. Bad news: The area was out of cellular network. Some bygoner said I was too ambitious trying to call cellphones in an hamlet where roads and school was a luxury. Immediate thought: Why the hell was that guy getting married in a place where normal person could't reach; anyways, time was not enough for analysis and introspection. I moved on.

Then I called my mom and asked her to ransack my cupboard, find that wedding card and tell me the address. She asked me to call 5 mins later. I called her 5 mins later, 10 mins later and 15 mins later. Finally caught hold of her and she said, "ok write down". I sincerely borrowed a pen from some guy around, took a piece of paper to write down when my phone battery got discharged. Wow !!!!

I kept calling her from a public phone and finally caught her after some 20 mins and took the address. I showed the address to the bus depot manager who said I had to wait for 2 more hours for the next bus to that area. It was already 9 pm. Then I beckoned a sharing-auto (shared driver's seat along with three more guys) and finally reached the venue (bride's house) at 9:45 pm and was surprised to see a somewhat deserted look :-s

After pleading some 5-6 guys, I was fortunate enough to find a guy who presented me before "alludu garu". Yayyy, finally I saw that guy, wished him, presented him the gift I brought. My common sense told me that dinner was wrapped up long ago. He gently asked me if I had my dinner. I said yes, so as not to embarrass him and myself. He enlightened me that in villages there, its a custom to have dinner at around 6 pm and hence dinner preceded the event. Immediately he asked me if I would join my team mates who just left for Hyderabad in an SUV. OMG !!! How could I miss that luxury.

I bid him bye with a promise to catch those guys but it was too late till I realized that my battery discharged cellphone was just a play-toy in that remote area which could as well be used as an experimenting ground for aliens and Mars !

By then I was strong enough to accept the fact that my team mates would have already left and I was left to my adventure again. I took a sharing-bullock cart (some good samaritan again) to Amalapuram only to know that last bus to Rajahmundry already left. Then took a lorry ride till Rajahmundry, sharing-cab till Vijayawada and private bus till Hyderabad and by the time I reached Hyd, it was 6 am. The exact time when the misadventure started the previous day. So out of 24 hours, I was traveling for 23.5 hours (except that 10 mins with the groom) in express train, local passenger train, RTC bus, auto, bullock-cart, lorry, cab and a private bus.

Highlight: After a month, the groom came to work fresh from his honeymoon and asked me "dude, why didn't you come to my wedding. I think except you, everybody in the team made it, (showing me his group photo with team mates at his wedding) !"

Never Underestimate Facebook !

I read this news headline few days back "Wife assaulted Husband who didn't 'like' her Facebook status". Reading that, I laughed out loud and I'm sure many would.

Now read these:

"An IIM student committed suicide because her boyfriend announced breaking up with her on Facebook"
"A 35 year old who lured a minor girl on Facebook got arrested"
"Youth robbed by his Facebook friend"
"Man arrested for Facebook status message"
"Woman arrested for 'poking' Facebook user" and many more. Even London riots that happened a couple of months back, Egypt uprising were fueled by Facebook.

At the outset, many think why and how a silly website can affect anybody's life so much; afterall its a virtual website and not a "real world". Those who are not active on Facebook will never understand the phenomenon of Facebook which affects (both in good and bad ways) mental, emotional, professional, psychological and social lives of thousands..err..millions across the world.

Life before online social networking

Before online social networking (eMail, Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, Orkut, Twitter and Facebook) came into picture, life was simple, straight forward and limited to known contacts who met us regularly in person. Social life was all about talking to relatives, cousins, friends, classmates, colleagues. We knew who liked us, who didn't, who cared about our day to day life and who did not. We knew how to deal if somebody had any problem with us because there was no way we could bypass them. With the advent of social networking, dynamics changed and obviously the "friends list" expanded beyond our managing capabilities.

Likes and comments

I believe Facebook is such a roaring success because of its features like 'Like' and 'Comments'. If these options are removed, I don't think many would write anything on FB, they would rather go blogging or write diaries for themselves :)

Now, talking about the example I gave in the first line of this post, the woman assaulted her hubby for not liking her status because that status message was in memory of her dead mother which was acknowledged by many of her close ones except her husband who was active on FB liking and commenting on all other stories and deliberately snubbing her status (sic). So the issue was not about liking a FB status, but was much intense, that of neglecting her mother's memory deliberately, which'd hurt her more. If there was no FB, obviously she would not have known even if he was having a gala time behind her :p

Those who are not active on FB are exempt from this kind of judgement for obvious reasons, but those who enjoy liking and commenting must be aware of such repercussions. Acknowledging and commenting on most of your friends, but consciously ignoring one among them is like entering a room full of guests, handshaking with everyone but conveniently snubbing one among them; they obviously feel hurt. Only that in FB, you can't read their expressions or any ill-feeling they nurture against you (unless and until you do that to deliberately hurt them :))

Making Relationships

Another reason for the success of online social world is the facility to make new friends, relationships which you could never have made in real life. Thanks to FB, the world abruptly exploded and you are thrown among hundreds of people who you may like or relate yourself with.

A reason for my addiction to Facebook or other online social forms is its wide canvas which allowed me to select my loved ones, choose those I want to be close with. Again there are pros and cons to this facility because all FB users present their best behavior and looks on FB, which can be quite deceptive. Steering across all such deceptions and finding right ones is a challenge in itself, but if you find one, you can have real fun.

Public Image

If we write any status message, that will be viewed by hundreds of people in our list who we may know well, know formally, don't know at all. Each person will have certain impression about us and anything we write may go well or against them, but the bad part is we never know how many of them judge us unless and until they present their views in terms of "comments" and "likes". So our public image is at stake (for those who care, of course, and even for those who don't :p).

If you write something utterly stupid, the whole world will immediately know how stupid you are, which is not the case in real world, because you never say anything before a crowd of 300 odd people. But the greener side is that if you are intelligent enough, the same entire world knows that regardless of whether they like it, comment it, acknowledge it or not. So you have to understand if you are really intelligent or not, before you post anything on FB while you don't have this risk in the real world :)

You can be an object of judgement based on groups you join, pages you like, articles you share, what you write in info about you, words you use (certain people suddenly stopped talking to me when they saw me using F word in some status message :p).

Invasion of Privacy


Your privacy can be invaded based on photos you upload, friends you tag (or you get tagged in). FB is a wonderful tool for voyeurs, peeping toms and if they are smart, they can pull out your entire janam kundali. Identifying who are close to you, who are not is not a big deal, thanks to your FB activity.

As mentioned earlier in this post, people are arrested for what they have written as their Facebook status message. So those who write inflammatory or provocative statuses are always subject to scrutiny. Some tech savvy thieves are always on prowl to see if anybody has posted a status message like "Hawaii, here I come", "Vacation to Europe" etc. These messages can be keys to your getting plundered :). So before writing anything, just imagine who can get mileage of your message.

Really Virtual - Virtually Real

Facebook can't be taken easy as just any social website or a tool for passing time. Its a world in itself. Whatever you say in real world will be multiplied in intensity if you say on Facebook. if you are good, it gets better, but if you are not so good at managing people and your words or behavior, God bless you !

You might have rubbed a lot of people in a wrong way, yet you don't know who they are. You don't know who all got paranoid that you don't like them despite no such intentions from your side. You don't know who all propagate negative things against you based on how you present yourself on FB.

Somebody is always watching and judging you !

Dealing with DEATH - Steve Jobs way !

Steve Jobs' death shook the entire world with a rude jolt. 10,000 mourning messages per second in twitter explains how much he is adored by digirati, gadget freaks, movie buffs, music lovers, mactards and residents of virtual world. Despite countless articles about his innovation, gadgets, his contribution to the world is still under-rated, because he was a freaking brain behind a concept called GUI computer (computer with monitor and mouse) without which our lives would have been diagonally, ruthlessly and helplessly different. 

As somebody said innovating atleast one among Mac, iPod, iPhone, iPad would have made anybody a legend. This man created all and hence can't be considered anything lesser than God ! A man behind alltime hit animation movies like Toystory, Finding Nemo, Cars has contributed immensely to the entertainment industry. Can you remember anybody else like him who single handedly influenced, indulged, changed lives of millions (er..billions), may be just Thomas Alva Edison or Albert Einstein. But this blog-post is not about his technological advancements, business acumen or marketing genius.

I think Steve was a bigger philosopher than anything else. He understood and explained life and death with incredible ease by setting an example. Born out of wedlock, adopted by somebody else, he slept on floor, walked miles to have a free meal - his life has been a long fight and he always won, except for the last time. A college dropout turning from rags to riches could only be a good fictional story, but for Steve. By 30, he was a head of a company which made him a multi-millionaire, something very few people can ever imagine, forget achieving.

But the real fighter in him emerged when he was fired from the very company he built. How many of us could get back from ashes to build another company and achieve a status and success to make same people who fired him begging him to come back. That needs real kickass conviction, belief, talent, guts and attitude. Not that he was always successful, but he knew how to come out of those failures unscathed to achieve bigger heights. Only REAL HEROES can do that. That's lesson of life, he taught the world by example.

Rejoining Apple was only the best thing to happen to the techie world. Still he lived, worked by his own terms which only Rajanikant could do in his films. He never dressed in a typical corporate style (atleast I never saw him in suits, blazers, tie, clean shaven look - which is being followed by Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg too). His focus was concentrated only on innovation and excellence, success just followed that making Apple richer than US Government (it's not a joke :p). He implemented what our favorite 3 Idiots proclaimed. That's some real heroism !

Now the tougher part: Death; When he was diagnosed with Cancer in 2004, he was given a deadline of 3-6 months before death. A billionaire, an icon for millions, "the" most successful innovator of the generation, a real life fighter-winner, a hero, a conquerer - became vulnerable to a disease at 50. How would we react if we were in his position ?

At Stanford's commencement speech at 2005 (an youtube video gone viral), he expressed satisfaction that his cancer was cured and confessed that he wanted to live more, atleast for few more decades (today, it was so difficult for me to stop dropping a tear or two when I saw this part of the video). He spoke at length about death, utilizing time sensibly before we see the deathbed. He didn't sound like a technocrat or a celeb innovator. He was just human, hellbent on turning everything in his favor, even death !

Most of his quotes are being forwarded, presented on web for the last 2 days, but my most favorite one was when he asked if we would continue doing the same work if it was the last day in our life ? It knocked me off my feet. As a person who witnessed death from such close quarters, he subtly but effectively presented the importance of time and life, which we take for granted. He didn't take life for granted both before or after his diagnosis. 

Eventually he had to come to terms that countdown to his death has begun; he famously said that he felt everyday was his last day as if he was waiting for his death. He also happened to read his own obituary accidentally published by some over-enthusiastic publisher when Steve was still alive. He planned his farewell dinners (:O). How strong should one's heart be to handle the looming death, languishing health, obituary messages, succession plans and invitations for farewell dinners? But even then, he chose what to do, whom to meet, how to spend his last few days (!) Mind-blowing. I saw this temperament in Gitanjali movie, nowhere else.

His birth, life, success, failure, death - none was ordinary. But he managed everything extraordinarily. Though we are talking about him because of his success stories, his life and death are motivational stories in itself, notwithstanding his professional success. I repeat, he is the best philosopher and a story-teller I've known who showed the world how to live and how to die - with an example that only legends can set.

May be, I should not get so melodramatic or sentimental about a public figure, but I genuinely feel the loss of this enigmatic, charismatic epic called STEVEN PAUL JOBS !

“I want to put a dent in the universe.” – Steve Jobs

A Tale of Five Cities

Warangal, Hyderabad, Kurnool, Bangalore & Toronto - for me, these names bring in a wave of memories, emotions, associations, love, nostalgia and a sense of belonging. These cities complete "Me". My association with these places in a nutshell:

Warangal: A person can go anywhere in the world but can't disown his birthplace. Warangal is intertwined with my life in a big way. That's the place where my roots lie; my parents were born and brought up there; I was born there; every anecdote I hear from my family since my childhood is invariably linked to the city. whenever I see my passport, it reminds me where I belong to; whenever news channels report anything about Warangal, a reflex action occurs regardless of how stupid or useless that news bite is; whenever anybody says good words about the city, an amusing happiness seeps in.

Ironically, I can literally count the number of days I lived in Warangal because I was just born there but was completely brought up in Hyderabad. In my childhood, 8 out of 10 families (5 paternal, 5 maternal) among my extended family lived in Warangal thus making it the only holiday spot or a getaway for me and my sister.

All my childhood summer vacation memories, bonding with cousins, train journeys, first hand experience of a rural milieu (my paternal grandparents lived in a village near Warangal city), witnessing my grandfather addressing village conflicts in his daily darbar, experiencing out-of-the-world respect from the entire village, being addressed "chinna panthulu" - these memories are injected deeply in blood and soul -to remain for life :)

Though my extended family moved to Hyderabad, there are many more relatives in Warangal. My parents and close relatives say there is our relatives' house in every street of the city at an average. When I visited Warangal to distribute wedding invitation cards, we visited around 40 households in a day; a Facebook group solely for my cousins (and a chain of their cousins) most of who belong to Warangal is 700+ strong :) This explains my social ties with the city :)

Hyderabad: If you ask my wife as what am I passionate and obsessive about, she replies "Hyderabad" without any hesitation. As said, once a Hyderabadi, always a Hyderabadi ! I'm a Hyderabadi by choice, chance and conviction. I think, behave, live like a pakka Hyderabadi so much that my orkut profile name says "Chandu Hyderabadi". Yes, I can replace my last name with Hyderabad. May be that's called IDENTITY.

The environment during childhood shapes a person but Hyderabad has been shaping up my attitude, behavior since the time I could remember (and earlier too). If I have to write about my love, experiences and association with Hyderabad, I should simply start writing my autobiography ;)

I wear my Hyderabadiness on my sleeves and the city runs in my blood. Enough said !

Kurnool: It often happens that we learn more about life when we are out of our comfort zone. Kurnool happened to me like a training center for life. 17 years of indulgence, whims and fancies were abruptly put to a pause when I moved to this city for my engineering (b'cos 4600 was too big a rank in EAMCET 1997 to bag admission in a good engineering college in Hyd). So initial few months were a unique blend of unlimited and unchecked freedom and emotional roller-coaster ride.

Being away from family was much more difficult than I was prepared for; I was missing friends, Hyderabad, love and affection while the entire world turned upside down to me. For the first time, I realized the need to take care of myself and build an attitude. There was nobody to guide, console, rectify. This environment gave me a golden opportunity of self realization which helped me get rid of my kiddish ways to give way to a more extrovert, practical and aggressive approach.

I don't know how my life would have been if I did my B.Tech in Hyderabad, but my stint in Kurnool has helped me mature in a big way. I slowly fell in love with the city, relished the exposure to a different milieu, culture, slang, attitude, ways of life. Four years in a place will automatically create some soft corner in the heart and I'm no exception. Now I take pride in my association with Kurnool and as in the case of Warangal, my reflex action works here too :) (Read: Remembering College Days)

Bangalore: Never in my life did I think, Bangalore would be one of the important places in my life. That was one of many other cities till I was 25, when my life swayed uncontrollably with advent of my girlfriend (now wife) in my life. When I proposed to her for the first time, she was working in Seoul, Korea and for the next 2 years she traveled between Bangalore and Seoul for every three months. So I had a chance to meet her once in three months. In those breaks, we made sure she traveled to Hyderabad and I went to Bangalore to spend as much time with each other as possible.

That phase is associated with so many sweet memories when Bangalore (and Hyderabad) witnessed our sweet nothings, blossoming love and romance. Bangalore was (is) so much like Hyderabad in terms of lifestyle and it didn't take time for me to relate myself with the city.

I got engaged, married in Bangalore and that made the city even more special :)

Toronto: If Warangal is my janmabhoomi, Hyderabad is my karmabhoomi, Toronto happens to be my dharmabhoomi (if this suits the rhyme :$). Toronto made an unimaginable, unfathomable difference to my life standards, lifestyle, career, image and what not.

Toronto is my first destination out of India. After studying, working and fooling around in India for 27 years, I got my first opportunity to expand my horizons in terms of career, knowledge and exposure. While I haven't done significantly more than what I did in India, returns were manifold. I'm blessed with opportunities, success, luck, good wishes, respect in such a way that today I feel I'm living a dream.

Toronto has bestowed me confidence and attitude that will drive my life in a different gear till the very end !

These five cities make my tale and hence I wrote this Tale of five cities !

Turning Point in Telangana Movement

This drama of separate Telangana or United AP has been a topic of intense and vitriolic debate for past many years in general and last 2 years in particular. But there is a stark difference in agitation before and after 2009.

Before 2009, there were some vocal Telangana separatists who went hammers and tongs, but at the same time there were equal number of people in Telangana (if not more) who were pro-united who didn't endorse separate statehood despite acknowledging and realizing problems Telangana has been facing. The very reason was they thought separate statehood would only benefit politicians and scamsters but will not serve common man in any way. And its 100% right.

But the day Chidambaram made the statement that Telangana statehood process will be initiated, the entire dynamics changed and the change was due to the flagrant expression of resentment by Seemandhra masses towards Telangana movement. Seemandhra agitation which started after that announcement openly questioned the rationale behind Telangana movement and started a campaign claiming Hyderabad was developed by them and hence can't yield the city to Telangana (the movement was actually for control over Hyderabad but ironically called Samaikhyandhra - though nobody from seemandhra wants to be united with Telangana districts (except Hyd)).

Though Telangana and Seemandhra protestors criticized each other after that announcement, there was a fundamental difference. Telangana protestors were abused only because they were fighting for separation of a state, nothing else. But Telangana protestors had more reasons

1. Seemandhra protestors were against their main objective of achieving Telangana statehood.
2. They have been facing issues with seemandhra people in terms of culture, economy, development, imbalances. 
3. Govt of India almost granted them their state but was wrested by a counter-movement by Seemandhra protestors thus arm-twisting the government
4. They had to bear new claims from Seemandhra protestors that they have developed Hyderabad and without their contribution, Telangana would be an under-developed, dark-age place.
5. They were dubbed as mindless thugs who were playing in the hands of politicians and nobody knows why they needed Telangana

These reasons obviously didn't go well with Telangana separatists, but also posed a grave identity and cultural threat to even those moderate Telanganites who resisted separate statehood movement. No Telanganite (regardless of his/her support to the separatist movement) could take a comment that their existence is solely because of somebody else. This was a major turning point for the entire Telangana movement which catapulted huge number of masses behind the movement and this difference can be easily measured with the kind of protests, strikes, bandhs going on today.

Till 2009 the issue was only development and exploitation, but since then it has become a true sentimental, emotional, egoistic and identity crisis related situation.

Contrary to the popular notion that Telangana protesters don't know the rationale behind their protests, a lot of them do know and yes, there are a hell lot of reasons. I have mentioned the most notable reasons in my previous blogpost in early 2010 (Read:My Take on Telangana Issue) in which I tried to present views of both Telangana protestors and Telangana pro-united people.

But there are still protesters and agitators who don't really know these developmental reasons for what they are protesting. They simply can't get along with Andhra people. That's because everyone of them has faced some kind of discrimination from Andhra people in their own Telangana land. This is something which a lot of people who live in Andhra and Rayalaseema don't know or can't relate with. Though Telangana people don't like Andhra slang, they never went to Andhra area and ridiculed them. While we can't generalize, that happened a lot in Telangana.

Whenever any Telangana slang or terms were used, their Andhra counterparts either laughed or "corrected" implying theirs is a correct way of speech. That happened with me too. My telugu teacher referred to Telanganites as "Telangana Vedavalu" with a pinch of agony that those "vedavalu" were adulterating the language. That might be correct but that's what these "vedavalu" were brought up around and they have been using in their own area. Their way of speech has been ridiculed in movies, literature and that's the baggage they have been carrying throughout their lives. Every person who is on streets today protesting for Telangana has faced this sometime. So they don't just need any economic, social, political reasons. Their identity has been subject to ridicule and discrimination in their own land and that's enough. Period !

The most important reason for the huge influx of Telangana protesters post 2009 is due to the claims that Hyderabad or even worse Telangana flourished only because of favors done by their Seemandhra cousins. A city with 400 years of history which was made a combined capital of AP only because of its rich infrastructure, wealth and resources and Telangana which is blessed with resources providing electricity, coal reserves for entire south India, which is blessed with affluent resources like almost 70% of Godavari, Krishna waters, an area which was the richest area in India before merging with Andhra - needed no "contribution" from any one region. (Read: Who Developed Hyderabad ?)

Telangana and Andhra were never together in the history, but were unified with a rider that they can part ways if they can't get along (Gentlemen's agreement) - which is now unfortunately not discussed. Ironically fore-fathers of same "united AP" protesters once protested for a separate state from Madras state because of the very identity crisis but cry foul if others implement the same logic.

Yes, politicians were reasons for this mess going on to an extent. But politicians can't drag students, housewives, trade unions, government employees to come to streets, commit suicides (600 since 2009 as claimed), lose their salaries, disrupt their own life, risk the brand of their city if they don't have that angst and distress in their belly.

I know that separate Telangana will not cure all issues faced by the region, but even independence from British didn't cure all issues India is facing now !

Handling Admiration !

However stupid or moronic a person could be, he will have admirers for sure. However practical or disinterested the person could be, he will get affected by admiration and respect he receives, period !

Our social behavior depends on how seriously we take admiration shown by others, how emotionally we connect with our admirers and how grounded we can be despite positive attention. This makes a hell lot of difference in public perception and self confidence too. So handling admiration is as important, if not more than handling criticism (handling criticism will be addressed in my next blog post).

Admiration - taken seriously:

Admiration or liking is often unilateral or one dimensioned. Except immediate family members and close loved ones, nobody likes us for whatever we are. So if others express their admiration, its only because they like certain talent, behavior or physicality in us. Such admiration should be wholeheartedly thanked, appreciated but can't be construed as unconditional love because if those admirers are exposed to us as a package, their admiration may (!) turn into resentment :) The best way to handle such situations is to enhance, develop, project traits or talents which are admired without letting the success affect our behavior in other areas.

Perfect example for this is political entry of Chiranjeevi. People flocked to his movies because they liked him onscreen. But he took the popularity way too seriously and rest is history ;) Most of the celebrities undergo this syndrome and unintentionally become susceptible to their ego and over-confidence.

Some people may genuinely like us but that can be due to misinterpretation or false projection. Virtual world including internet, facebook, twitter, instant messengers made easy for people to selectively and subconsciously present themselves to the world and there is ample scope for online buddies to misinterpret what is said, written, shown or projected. Any admiration based on such misinterpretation is always short-lived.

(BTW, there is a popular joke gone viral that nobody is as good looking as their facebook display picture and as ugly as their drivers license. LOL. Don't know about others, but that's apt in my case :P)

Time changes. So do opinions and tastes. Those who like us today may not really have the same feeling tomorrow. So unless and until the admiration is consistent, it can't be taken to head. Some people say good things out of courtesy which doesn't mean we should go overboard and start imagining ourselves to be on the top of the world. And not to mention, there will always be people who admire us with a preset agenda / hypocrisy. So always take flamboyant praises and lavish paeans with a pinch of salt before succumbing.

Connecting with admirers:

The first thing to do is not to take anybody for granted just because they expressed their liking towards us. Their liking or admiration can be temporary but the respect we can earn by reciprocating love by some genuine affection by smile, hug and other gestures will be permanent.

World is brutal and finding people who like us is not always easy. We may or may not always get close to those we like, but we always have an option of becoming friends and build relationship with those who like us. No two ways about it. We can't choose blood relations, but we can definitely choose friends, soulmates, 3-am-buddies and whats better than building up such relationships with those who like us. huh ?

But another aspect of connecting with our admirers is to project ourselves as a complete package so that they can decide if they can really tolerate us or not ;) And invariably we will see a lot of them drifting away which is healthy because we can understand whom to take seriously and whom not to.

I posted this status on FB few days back "Life is long enough to meet people who genuinely like us. Experiencing love from them is boon ! World is big enough to find people whom we genuinely like. Expressing love towards them is bliss !" and I meant every word. Just that we should identify who like us and whom we can like. Its not easy, but its worth !

Letting go of people who don't share positive feelings anymore is equally important. As mentioned earlier, times do change and subsequently people do change; circumstances and situations change. We may have to face days when somebody who admired us the most drift away; we should be large hearted to let go because they may have a lot of reasons to revisit their opinion and in that case cringing to retain the "impression" or opinion is futile and meaningless. Don't take it too personally. If some go away, new people come into your life (remember: life is long enough and world is big enough)

Being Grounded:

The direct and immediate consequence of being admired is steep rise in confidence levels in a positive way and ego in a negative way.

Whenever somebody expresses their admiration, try to think about all our negative traits and then analyse if that person can like us despite knowing those traits or not. This exercise will invariably keep us grounded even in case of the most mellifluous and liberal praises. Arrogance would give way to channelizing and streamlining the admiration into building confidence and maturity.

Though I don't receive a lot of admiration myself, all those who consistently liked me ended up being my favorites too and I treasure them and the bonding I share with those special people;

Slaves to Accent !

Just imagine yourself mispronouncing any english word or a white guy's name or speaking english in a desi accent; what would be the impression bestowed upon you ? You would be unanimously seen as a yokel.

Now imagine an english guy pronouncing your (desi) name or any hindi or telugu or Indian word. or even worse your fellow desi mispronouncing or "trying to" mispronounce desi names and words; now what would be the impression conferred upon him ? A westernized, modern, stylish etc.

I don't disrespect English language. Infact I love the language; my whole life, like most of my peers', revolves around english and most often I think in english. I know the importance of the language in contemporary communication, presentation and I completely subscribe to the idea of enhancing english skills out of love and necessity of the language. But does that mean that all those who are good at english are intelligent and all those who can't are mindless creatures ?

Mani Shankar Iyer, Indian cabinet minister recently ridiculed his cabinet colleague Ajay Maken that the letter written by him (Maken) contains complex english words and hence the letter could not have been written by him as he studied in so and so college (!!!). This is heights of snobbery and psecudo-elitism. English speaking or pronunciation is never a yardstick for intelligence or success. Did Anna Hazare speak sophisticated english to capture the imagination of India ?

Blood boils when some telugu anchors of Gemini TV, Maa TV shows talk telugu in "accent". I don't really understand the influence under which they were brought up, but even if they were completely westernized (which I don't think so anyway), nobody in India gets a firangi accent even if they talked in English at home, period ! But these chicks try to emulate that accent while speaking vernacular languages. That's BULLSHIT and stooping down to the shoes of English masters !

Pronunciation, grammatical accuracy, phonetics make the language sound good, not accent. Accent or slang is something which is developed by social influence especially during childhood. And Indian residents never had/have such society. Celebrated Indian english scholars and authors like JL Nehru too didn't have that. Accent needs a mixture of idioms and slang to sound authentic.

Among NRI's the perceptive discrimination is striking. For immigrants, its a vogue to "sound" like localites and since they can't bleach their skin, they try doing that with their tongue. But the hidden truth that can be applied to most of these neo-firangs is that they desperately want to conceal their inferiority complex of being an "Indian English" speaker.

Heights of inferiority complex: Some NRI parents never let their children learn their mother tongue and take pride in telling their relatives and friends back home that their kids are completely angrez and don't know their mother tongue. Pity on them !

The fact that most new immigrants don't realize is that white guy's accent is not uniform. In US alone there are almost ten accents and people of one region often find difficulty understanding others'. There is a brooklyn accent, south accent etc. Canadian accent is different, British accent is so much different. All these people take digs at each other's accent and we guys try to copy them, but we don't know whom we are copying among so many tribes :D

Italian-english is well acknowledged, east-european english too has its flavor. Unless and until italians or east europeans were born in US, they don't really change their accent or way of speech. Indian- english is unique too and is well acknowledged. There are certain words only Indian english speakers use, for example: doing the needful etc. But that's perfectly fine boss, every dialect has its flavor ! Nobody is a shakespeare !

English is important, but so are other languages. So when a white guy pronounces my name as "Shraawt" or "Churot" (yes, they even wrote this, once) instead of "Sharath", I don't really take offence because I know they are not made to pronounce Indian words, that's how they were raised in their society and that's perfectly normal. I would be confused and puzzled if he addresses me like my Indian friends. We should also share the same equation. We are not made to speak english (or hindi or telugu) in westerner's accent and that's normal and hence any artificiality only reflects desperation. I just agree that our pronunciation and phonetics should be right so that others can follow our speech, nothing else !

I've been an NRI for last 5 years and I didn't get a bit of accent and neither will I in another 50 years. Because that's something I can't get and don't want to get either. But I take pride in the fact that my english is better than 90% of those who try to ridicule desi accent-ed english and also many indigenious english speakers. I take EQUAL pride in my knowledge of my mother tongue (telugu), it's grammatical nuances like sandhulu, samasalu, chandassu, alankaralu and also in my conversance with my national language (hindi). I'm not ROOTLESS !

From Boyhood to Manhood

When I was in my teens and early 20's. I thought anybody who crossed 25 was an oldie and now am 31 but I feel this is my prime-time :) Amidst all hectic schedules, hullabaloo and struggle for existence thingy, I found some time to ruminate over gradual transition and development of "me", my thought process, values and attitude towards life. This post is just a reflection of what I understood as my transition from boyhood to manhood.

At my current phase, I can clearly and unambiguously categorize my post teenage years as 19-23, 24-28, 29- present, as my opinion about world and myself witnessed a paradigm shift with age.

19-23 for me was, like in anybody's case, wild, volatile and unstable phase. I was a boy subconsciously trying to behave like a man. With newly found freedom, exposure to the world, situations demanding and teasing my decision making prowess - that was an age which forced me to defy all rules and norms of society; ironically that was the age when I didn't know much but aimed at taking over the world. It was sheer ambition and rage of fire in the belly.

Superficial knowledge and limited exposure combined with unlimited arrogance is a lethal combo but that combo conferred upon me this attitude which some people refer to as devil-may-care-attitude. The obvious set of traits like carelessness, negligence, headweight, irreverence, idiosyncrasy crept into my head. Though I don't like this kind of attitude in others, I unknowingly fell into the same bracket at that age. When I see kids of that age group behave similarly, I see my old self in them :)

With age comes knowledge and a tinge of knowledge was bestowed upon me in the next phase i.e., 24-28. This is usually an age of revelation and confusion and I see people belonging to this age group consider their younger lot as confused and ignorant while they themselves fall in those traits :) and that's quite normal; I was no exception.

I was expected to be more mature, responsible and take decisions which shape my life forever. Diplomacy, machiavellianism, chutzpah took the place of innocent arrogance. I thought I could manipulate anything in the world and impress anybody with my smartass attitude; Always tried to impress everybody around with whatever I could, tried to take undue credit for every damn thing that happened around me, resisted any kind of value addition or pieces of advice from elders and more experienced. That's where confusion started, but the other side of the coin is that transition in mindset was initiated.

24-28 is also an age where people get settled in terms of life partner and career. These are the biggest factors that could / can affect any damn person to get back on the right track and understand what "life" is. Anybody who has not settled in either of these will remain confused for sure and if it doesn't happen till late 20's, the situation will become psychologically and socially worse and the worst thing is they never realize the effects.

Life before marriage is like a flight on runway. Until it takes off, flight can't be considered operational. Marriage makes a person more responsible, wise and stable in every way possible. Balancing life, balancing feelings and respect towards parents, life partner, understanding their insecurities and providing the much needed support to loved ones will throw any person into altogether a different world. But this transition doesn't happen in a day. It takes months and years to completely get into the idea and understand technicalities. It only comes with experience and once you are a pro in this, life seems to be totally under control. This happened to me and I feel so much lucky that my parents and my wife made this transition smoother than what it would have been for most of the people. Read: Whom to choose between parents and life partner

24-28 is also the phase when we tend to understand the difference between a job and a career, money and job satisfaction, vulnerability and stability, importance to professional and personal lives and a lot more. The kind of exposure and situations around will make a person more mature and thoughtful. Again, I'm no exception.

In this way my 24-28 helped me, exposed me to lot more situations, pulled me out of my boyhood and kept me in a staging or transition stage before I could become a man. It was a confusing stage as I had to come out of the shell created in my early phase and understand the reality of the world.

29 - present for me is a golden age, perse. As mentioned earlier anybody above 25 was an oldie for me but I believe I got my senses and controls back only after 28 :) By then I knew what the world was, faced many dire situations, knew how to handle stress, pressure, could handle any kind of offensive. I am now mentally and emotionally stronger.

With age also comes wisdom and I believe am much wiser now. I again broke the shackles of manipulative attitude and understood how important it is to be loved and respected. Human values, principles, social responsibility have become vivid. Everything in life is as clear as crystal.

The difference in attitude was that in early 20's I didn't care what others thought about me, in mid 20's I tried to impress others with smartass knowledge and kickass attitude but now I realize that we just need to be ourselves and be expressive and people will automatically love you. Life has mellowed down and eccentricity has given way to thoughtfulness.

This is also a phase where for the first time, I got close to a lot of people who are either much elder to me or younger to me. This gave me a 360 degree view of how life is perceived by people of all ages at the same time. I could see how people 10-15 years elder to me defied all rules of age and are living a life of their comfort. They never took their age seriously and behaved the way their heart wanted. They now do everything which a 22 year old guy can do (except flirting and courting though :p). And guys and girls younger to me showed me how world is getting faster and ruthless. I see teenagers and young adults with awe and feel good when they share their knowledge, ideas, treat me with respect which I never did in their age :) I know the times are changing and it has encouraged me to keep up to the world.

Most of my hobbies, travel, extreme sports happened in this age. I started interacting with more people now than I did in my mid 20's. I'm getting more compliments and appreciation for what I do; I'm garnering more respect when I'm not trying hard. I am clear as how to deal with negativity and worthless people (Read: Dealing with Negativity), deal with failure (Read: Dealing with Failure), how to be happy (Read: Rules to be Happy). My family life has been blissful (touchwood) with the only concern that my parents are not with me (which will be addressed very soon though). My parents, wife, sister, brother in law, parents in law, sister in law love me unconditionally. My word is well respected among all my family members and they all know I love them and care for them. 

This phase of age witnessed my complete settlement in career. I have no insecurities or qualms about making money. I'm in a stage where I have gained knowledge, experience and right attitude to sustain myself; I'm more than satisfied with my work, I'm happy with the kind of educational background I have and the way I'm putting it to use as well. Am the happiest when more than 200 people approach me and say I'm in someway responsible for their career. Bliss !

So I'm wiser, more intelligent, more enterprising, happier, richer, respected, more secure than I ever was. In short I'm happy with how my life is going on and can definitely say that this is the best phase of my life compared to younger days. This is the reason I don't miss being a teenager or younger.  I know I'm a MAN now, not a boy anymore and I'M LOVING IT. I believe my life in coming years will change further and am all game to take it into my stride.