KolkataMusing, A Kolkata Blog

Quest for new 7 natural wonders

2009-07-13T20:01:00.005+05:30

A little over 3 months back NDTV conducted a survey to choose 7 wonders of India. The grand finale took place in a glittering function in New Delhi on April 3 last.

All the 7 selected were man-made monuments, and predictably the Taj Mahal won the ‘race’.

Taj Mahal was also one of the New 7 Wonders of the World that was declared on 07/07/07 (July 7, 2007) in Lisbon, Portugal in a star-studded function which the Indians would remember as one where Christiano Ronaldo allegedly kissed Bipasha Basu.

While there is nothing wrong about Taj Mahal, it’s an irony that in the NDTV contest no natural place made it to the final list. India is blessed by having the highest mountain range as its crown and an ocean at its feet. Yet the voters couldn’t get at least one natural wonder in the final list.

Now the New7Wonders have embarked on finding 7 new natural wonders. The process has commenced last year, and the initial list of 440 places is now pruned to 77 last Thursday.

There are only 2 places from India in the list – the Sunderbans Forest, and the Kaziranga National Park in Nagaon district of Assam. The Sunderbans Forest is jointly under India and Bangladesh, while Cox’s Bazar is also in the list from Bangladesh.

No other natural place qualified in the list from India, though initially the Ganges and Nepal’s Mount Everest did figure in it.

Among the other places selected, and one I’ve been to, is the magnificent Table Mountain of Cape Town, South Africa.

The list 77 selections will be further pruned to 28 finalists in a function on July 21 at the New7Wonders headquarters in Switzerland. The final voting will start after that while the grand finale is expected in 2011.

The venue is still in the process of selection, and you can suggest a location of your choice.

Amid the quest for discovering newer wonders, not many perhaps remember the great The Great Pyramid of Giza in Cairo, Egypt, the only wonder of the ancient world that nearly survives intact.

The Great Pyramid of Giza [Image source]

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Table Mountain

2009-07-11T15:57:00.003+05:30

It’s been several months that I visited south of South Africa with family. The pictures we took remained unattended for various reasons until I decided to do something with them some time back.

The video below (the first one) puts together 14 still images of Table Mountain, that fantastic ageless wonder in Cape Town.

Below it is yet another video of the Table Mountain, a fantastic time-lapse video of 560 individual images, done by Keith Pickersgill.

1/ Video Of 14 Still Images

2/ Time Lapse Video Of 560 Images

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Bone of spelling contention

2009-07-10T11:40:00.001+05:30

Some things are better ‘now’ than ‘never’. Take change for example. I resisted social networking for months – ages in cyber parlance – hoping better sense would prevail to the gung-ho enthusiasts of modern web generation.

But no, no amount of my ill-wishing could do any harm to the Facebooks and Twitters striding ahead. People laughed at me. Mocked they, “How could a silly, pot-bellied, do-nothing Kolkattan could ever wish such a thing!”

I tried to hold my own even as sand slipped below my feet so rapidly that I almost went off-balanced at times. “To hell with my wish…” I said at long last and joined the bandwagon that rode piggy-back on Facebook and Twitter.

Oh, dear me, look how I’ve deviated from what I was to write! What was I saying?
Yes, change is something that is better done now than kept pending for long. Today’s TOI reports that the schools in Kolkata are now favoring US spellings.

That shouldn’t be a big story, because frankly who cares! But some still do like Sunirmal Chakraborty, the principal of La Martiniere for Boys. He says, "We discourage US spellings. Even though marks are not deducted, we do not encourage students to use them."

Aha, there lies the catch. You don’t deduct marks, which is like taking the side route to the main road, admitting that US spellings are not wrong after all.

Devi Kar of Modern High School is more practical. "Students have to be consistent in following the UK or US spellings," she says. That’s it, really.

Meanwhile, there is no stopping the lots of staycation, webisodes, vlogs, shawarma, frenemy, locavor and others join the hallowed precincts of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.

Wonder what the fuss? Well these are the words spoken in the American society, and yes like it or not, we’re now more ruled by the US societal spellings than the Queen’s English. Ahem.

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2 million ebooks for free at 4th World Ebook Fair

2009-07-08T21:04:00.003+05:30

The World eBook Fair enters 4th year with this month, and the month-long event will continue from July 4 to August 4.

There are some 2 million titles for free download. Among contributing organizations are Project Gutenberg with 100,000+ titles, World Public Library with 500,000+ titles, Internet Archive with 1,385,000+ titles, even 17,000+ titles from IMSLP (International Music Score Library Project), and more.

Interested readers will require Adobe Reader to read the downloaded PDF ebooks. There will however be no grief once the fair gets over. One can enjoy access to over 500,000 ebooks at the World eBook Fair website for just $8.95 a year.

Here is a video from World Public Library:

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27 years later

2009-07-07T20:39:00.005+05:30

[Image Source]

Old memories must have been passing through his mind when he rose to present this year’s budget in the parliament. The man on his left as he spoke was the Governor of the RBI when he last presented the budget. Now he is the Prime Minister.

Pranab Mukherjee was perhaps setting a record of sorts being the only person in the history of India to hold the high-profile finance portfolio for a second time after a gap of quarter of a century. History will remember that but Pranab Mukherjee is a person of different league.

He is a man of learning, his awesome talent of deep understanding of a wide gamut of issues overshadowing the small stocky built of his.

In the last government, he started off as defense minister, shifting later to external affairs, and when the PM took ill in January this year, held both external affairs and finance portfolios simultaneously and effortlessly…all that in addition to being the head of the largest number of ministerial groups as well as trouble-shooting political crises whenever need arose.

There were and are tall persons in Indian politics of varying caliber, but Pranab Mukherjee’s caliber is the rarest of the rare even as he stands the tallest among his contemporaries.

The reason I think why he cannot hope to become the PM is not the dearth of talent – he has too much of that – but the fact that he has a mind of his own. And who knows better than him that nurturing ‘own mind’ is never a good quality in Indian politics.

Let me turn a little ‘parochial’ at this juncture. I am proud of him because like me Pranab Mukherjee is a Bengali, and I have no hesitation to say that he is yet another addition to the long list of luminaries from Bengal that perhaps no other state in India can (ever) boast of.

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Fans from all over the world to bid MJ goodbye

2009-07-05T20:26:00.004+05:30

His was the world stage. He belonged to that vast humanity that has no geographical barriers.

No surprise then that Michael Jackson’s public memorial service to be held on coming Tuesday is going to have visitors from all over the world.

A total of 17500 tickets to the event to be distributed on the Internet already have half a million applicants. The figure is expected to be more as the registration has ended.

The Los Angeles police warn the fans and the media not to crowd the place without tickets or accreditation because they will not be allowed at the venue, the Staples Center.

Here are the details of the event:

Michael Jackson Public Memorial Service
Tuesday, July 7, 2009, 10:00 a.m.
STAPLES Center, Los Angeles, California

Below is the Michael Jackson Staples Center Rehearsals 2009 "This is it". Can you believe this is a rehearsal!

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Bounty for Bengal

2009-07-04T20:01:00.006+05:30

Not since the underground Metro did Bengal stand to receive so much from the Indian Railway. It’s stupendous by any standard, and what is a surprise is that not many from outside Bengal are wagging a finger at this shower of ‘gifts’ on Bengal.

Nitpickers may argue where from so much money will come, the railways will suffer loss, and so on! As if they are losing sleep over those concerns!

The reality is however different, and looking at the rush of people moving to and from Kolkata all through the day and deep into the evening, one can be reasonably certain that the new suburban/metro railway links announced will prove to be success.

There have been hopes to improve suburban railway system - the double-deck Dum Dum station or the frequency of locals to Bandel - but nothing really happened on ground.

Kolkata lacks decent infrastructure yet it hopes to attract investment in droves. Look at what other cities in India offer by way of easing commuting – the just opened Bandra-Worli sea link for example – and it’s a shame that Kolkata is still locked in the pride of a Bypass or 2.

Things have to improve…and fast. Bengal is economically too starved to refuse any help that comes in the way. In that respect the railway’s bounty is heartily welcome.

Who knows there may be more changes in the not-so-distant future! For better!

[Image source]

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Saina’s dilemma

2009-07-03T21:05:00.005+05:30

Yesterday, the t2 headline is a quote by Saina Nehwal:

I appeal to parents to allow their children to pursue their dreams. If they have the talent for badminton, please allow them to pursue it.

Saina is 19, which according to many doesn’t qualify her to be called an adult, though technically she is because in India 18 is the age of adulthood.

I bring in the talk of adulthood not to obfuscate Saina’s fervent appeal, rather to make the point that it required her to suffer pain to utter those words. It is not difficult to understand why.

Sports and games are hardly the first choice for most youngsters. Their parents will be happy to see them become doctors and engineers. The greedy parents make their young ones suffer the grind of reality shows in order to become rich overnight.

Cricket is another passion. It’s a funny game that is played in 3 formats, occupies more space in newspapers and time on the TV than any other game, and engages players who are long past their prime. The last happens because – no matter what anyone says – cricket hardly needs supreme fitness of body and mind.

Some time back the union sports minister made an immature remark about India’s football. Not to be outdone, the national football coach gave vent to his frustration at the state of affairs in the country.

Let us look at what Bob Houghton said:

I’m amused at times (when people talk about how poor the Indian team is). I remember the Sports Minister saying this Indian team would lose even to an Australian school team. I don’t know what prompted him to say that but I feel, instead of being cynical he should’ve asked himself why the facilities aren’t there.

How true! In his column, Free Kick, in The Telegraph, even the redoubtable PK Banerjee wrote:

A close look would reveal that top Indian sportspersons in almost every discipline train in foreign countries these days. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have made global impact. Even world chess champion, Viswanathan Anand mostly stays in Spain because of better training facilities.

The fact of the matter is that except cricket we the Indians don’t like sports or those who play them. Whenever there is a success the media rushes in to start the game of adulation making the sportsperson a temporary hero before dumping the news and the player altogether.

And yet we are a billion strong country!

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Breaking Wrilence

2009-06-29T20:34:00.005+05:30

Getting rubbed off by Sukumar Roy’s talent may be a good sign of better days on the way, so I'd ask for your little indulgence as I combine 'writing silence' to 'wrilence' in the heading.

But what is writing silence (I can see the creases on your forehead…)? Well, it is my way of saying that I haven’t been writing for a long time in this blog. Which I now intend to break…

The occasion to cause the silence has been my project on online video making course, and the occasion for the silence to apparently come to an end is the completion of that project.

I'd much rather like you to see the video below than grudge my essay about the video project. And while there, the interested souls may take a peep at how some 30+ best video software – over half of them being FREE – can shape up a very decent web video.

I've another reason to feel good. Around the same time of my smallish effort coming to fruition, Wordpress, the blog giant, has announced VideoPress, which in their words is an upgrade that makes it easy to upload, embed, and share video on your WordPress.com blog or any site around the world, even in full HD.

Here is the Wordpress video on VideoPress.

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Bengal at crossroads

2009-06-05T17:38:00.005+05:30

Though feed-readers to this blog are steadily increasing, I feel guilty for not writing posts for a long time.

This would perhaps have continued for some more time had it not for the fact that I somehow felt compelled to pen my thoughts on the failure of the left parties in the elections just gone.

Any major social event needs introspection, and the last month’s huge electoral upset for the left parties in Bengal was no exception. Yet I was not finding the right answers to several puzzles in my mind.

To give examples, many pundits argued that at last Bengal joined the mainstream political wind to align with the Congress supported alliance because it felt that the Congress alone could take the country ahead.

I’ve no argument against that, but the question is why now?

Some people said it was the anti-incumbency factor that played the crucial role. If so then why it did not ‘play’ in the last 3 decades?

No, the reason should be something else and I was groping in the dark to find it until I came upon the article by Kalyan Sanyal, a professor of Economics in the Calcutta University, in the editorial column of Anandabazar Patrika of May 29 last (a small image below).

Sanyal wrote that a massive social rejection was the reason for the left’s defeat.

Now, having lived in many parts of India in the past, I can tell you that it is perhaps not possible for anyone leaving outside Bengal to understand what Sanyal meant by social rejection.

What is common to most of India but largely absent in Bengal – at least in electoral politics – is the division of people along caste, creed, and religion. But Bengal is unique in that it has sharp ‘political divide’ which you find nowhere.

In Bengal the left ideology demands unconditional subservience to the Party. If you are ‘in’, you are privileged. If you are ‘out’, you are doomed.

This deep political divide, nurtured and ruthlessly enforced over the last 3 decades, has resulted in talented people leaving or having left the state in droves, and their places being taken over by the self-seeking, mediocre, and inefficient people.

There are many ills that plague Bengal today, and examples are there everywhere that show how grossly inefficient the government has now become.

What will happen in the assembly elections 2 years from now is anybody’s guess. But there is no doubt that many people have voted against the left front out of sheer agony and helplessness that have been accumulating over the preceding years.

This result could have happened earlier if there was a close alliance among the principal opposition parties. That alliance happened this time and hence this result.

The situation now in rural Bengal is very tense what with mindless political violence taking its huge toll.

I often wonder that given such deep animosity among people along political lines, how will the state ever make any progress!

But I’m hopeful that even though dividing people along caste, creed, and religion may not go away in a hurry in other states, Bengal will ultimately eradicate the menace of political divide among its people.

The chance of that happening may appear slim today, but then wasn’t Europe a hell-hole a century and a half back, changing to what it is today!

Let Bengal reconcile to the fact that living in harmony is a far bigger virtue than mindless killing. When that happens we will be beckoned with a glorious future that was once ours.

If I’m looking for a change, I’ll want a ruler who is honest, capable, and who loves its people irrespective of political affiliations.

Let us keep our sufferings behind… can we?

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2008 – A year like never before

2009-01-02T21:35:00.006+05:30

The year gone by was so eventful that I instinctively waited for the last day to pass and then another before venturing to write about it.

I’d say I’m rewarded for holding patience a tad bit longer for otherwise I could have missed mentioning the historic landslide win of the Awami League alliance in neighboring Bangladesh, and the sad demise of Premjit Lal, a 60s tennis icon of the country on the last day of the year.

2008 has been a year of tumult like never before. It has also been a year of cheer like never before. Here is a small account of both.

Rarely had the year progressed into the tenth day that we saw the benchmark BSE Sensex breaching the never before 21000 mark. Alas, none could foresee then that the same index would nosedive by more than 50% in the last quarter of the same year.

The story of economic meltdown in the US that was going on since early 2007 finally became a reality around mid-2008 causing an unprecedented misery all over the world. Several US financial giants sank without trace, and rightfully so, sucking in money like night without end in the process.

India, akin to virtually all ‘globally connected’ countries, felt the heat, and suddenly all that seemed rosy awhile back started paling fast.

Luckily the pall of gloom that soon descended has thus far remained confined within the torch-bearers of ‘shining India’, and not to the relief of the government extended downward.

Of course the sharply declining inflation rate on the back of equally – if not more – fast declining oil price helped. The latter looks like a skeleton of its very recent past, having tanked at $147.27 a barrel on July 11 to hit the nadir at $35 a barrel on December 24.

Despite whatever the experts now say the movement of oil price has completely baffled them, and perhaps very few would risk making predictions for 2009.

India meanwhile made the nuclear agreement with the US a reality at the cost of one crore rupees that lay scattered at the central hall of the parliament, marking an ending happy yet mixed with a bizarre twist of shady doings.

If you are a person who likes sports, the Beijing Olympics would have come as a real stunner.

Notwithstanding the impossibly elegant opening and closing ceremonies, the 2008 Olympics would forever remain etched in the memory because of superlative performance by Michael Phelps and Usain Bolt.

Beijing Olympics has been lucky for India for having got its first ever individual gold medal through the shooter Abhinav Bindra. I say ‘lucky’ for who knows how many more Olympics should the country wait before seeing its next individual gold medal coming.

I won’t do myself a favor if I don’t mention the AFC Challenge Cup win by India in August after 24 years. What does this win mean?

It allows India to play in the Asian Cup in Doha 2011, the winner of which will compete with the best of football playing nations at FIFA Confederations Cup.

October is the month when Nano finally moved away from Bengal to Gujarat thus firmly burying the nascent hope of industrial revival in the state. The onus for denying the state a great potential lies not only on the main opposition party but partly on the ruling party as well.

It’s a painful pity that the world’s smallest car that could have rolled out from Singur will now be made elsewhere.

October also saw stock prices falling like ninepins the world over even as the currencies traded at alarming levels against the dollar and euro.

However in the midst of turmoil, a history was in the making as the US elected Barack Obama as their first black president who will take charge on Jan 20.

He will have his hands full with serious issues to deal on after he moves into the White House, though many are of the opinion that the worst is perhaps over.

The year of tumult that it was, was it any surprise that even the last months would land a nasty blow on India’s face that nobody imagined!

The terrorists’ raids on Mumbai on Nov 26 were the worst sufferings of the kind the country has been facing for long that emanated from Pakistan.

It won’t be wrong to say that Pakistan is a failed state which no one quite knows who runs. Yet the country is a strategic ally of both China and the US, the 2 largest powers in the world.

If the past is any lesson it would perhaps be a folly to assume that the outrage after the Nov 26 happenings would stop any future attack on the nation.

But just as countries like Israel, the US, the UK and others have the highest grade of intelligence network to make them virtually impenetrable for the terrorists India must also put in place similar armor to safeguard its interests.

2009 may be quite different from its predecessor so far upheavals are concerned. Going by some of the present indications let me guess a few of the likely happenings in the new year:

Come what may, the ban on poisonous smoke emitting 2-stroke autos in Kolkata, the last remaining bastion of these pollutants among Indian metros, will slowly but surely take effect like the ban on book fair in the Maidan.

This I forecast only because like elsewhere the people of Kolkata too want a better life to live. But then it is pretty dicey to predict anything good with Bengal’s political parties.
The Bengal government will find the reasons behind so many incidents of tigers straying away from the jungles into human habitation, and more importantly take steps to make the Sunderbans a restrictive yet popular place for tourists.
While Saina Nehwal will go from strength to strength doing the country proud in badminton, her Hyderabadi name-alike Sania Mirza will perhaps follow the enchanting ways of Anna Kournikova and land up as a hot thing in Bollywood.
As the Sri Lankan army captures Killinnochi, the erstwhile capital of LTTE at the time of this writing, it’s more certain than ever that peace will ultimately return to the island state.
And going by what Sheikh Hasina has been saying since her historic win early this week, and in view of the end of Maoists’ struggle in Nepal, who knows the South Asia will after a long, long time see real peace reigning…till maybe the next round.

With those hopes and beliefs I wish all my readers a very happy and prosperous 2009.

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Are you hopeful? Perish it.

2008-11-10T22:11:00.003+05:30

[Image source]

The spectacular debacle of the world financial order will resonate longer than we can imagine. Experts say India may not suffer beyond some deep cuts and bruises from the catastrophe precipitated by the greedy US financial institutes.

And that will be for the reason that India is not yet highly exposed to the global financial system.

In other words, since the foreign money – the FDI or the foreign direct investments – has restricted entry in India, the amount fleeing the land in the aftermath of the crisis has been less.

However, the FII or the foreign institutional investments that go to the bourses left in droves causing the severe stock market crash in India. Indeed the picture is the same at all the bourses across the globe.

The scenario is so dismal that no one is daring to make any forecast as to when the situation may turn good. No amount of learned guesswork seems to hold any water. It’s unprecedented to say the least. No living memory can recall if ever in the past such turmoil has happened from which no nation could insulate itself.

With that in perspective it’s no wonder that the left parties will attempt to reap electoral benefits by sowing doubts in the minds of the people about too much of liberalization. Here is an article in the Wall Street Journal.

In a way the coming general election in 2009 is unique because there have been so many vote-swinging issues that have come and gone in the past few months. Something like this has perhaps never happened in the past.

Thus, while the BJP feels the recent blasts are an issue for them, the Congress wants to crow about the success of the nuclear deal.

The left in their turn will try to bag the issue of economic turmoil, the latest to appear on the scene, to their kitty.

None of the three however is an issue the rural voter can be expected to be concerned with. These therefore are essentially urban issues and the poll watchers will keenly observe which of the three – or maybe some other…who knows – makes the maximum effect.

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Can he? For now, yes he can.

2008-11-05T18:11:00.001+05:30

I sat glued to the TV this morning to watch the historic moment in the US unfold. Nearly all Indian channels have been telecasting live the sequence of vote-counting – tying up with the Fox, the NBC, etc. – but I settled with the time-tested BBC where David Frost was holding the center stage with aplomb.

The US presidential election 2008 has been unprecedented, and judging from the avalanche of congratulatory messages pouring in from all over the world (an example) there is no doubt Obama’s win has kindled a rarest of rare chain of hope and aspiration across the globe.

This is phenomenal to say the least.

What exactly is there in him that catapults him to such great heights? Is he only a big hype, or there is lot of substance too? We’ll get the answers soon after the first ‘black’ US president steps into the ‘White House’ come Jan 2009.

Meanwhile here is his first speech in Grant Park, Chicago today morning India time accepting people’s verdict.

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An election without parallel

2008-11-04T21:10:00.002+05:30

2008 has seen many unprecedented events, and the list is pretty long. We can mull over that when the year draws to close which is still 2 months away.

Meanwhile it won’t be wrong to say that many of the news-savvy eyes are firmly riveted on the outcome of the presidential election in the US. The winner will be known in a couple of days but the heat generated by the event over the past year will take a long time to cool down.

Barack Obama, though frail in appearance, seems to have a capably strong pair of shoulders that can carry lots of load. What about expectations?

Indeed Obama is perhaps the first US presidential hopeful who has received international support even from nations that are traditionally anti-US. In case he wins, will he be able to live up to the mountain of expectations people want him to fulfill?

Since Obama is a black, McCain a white, many discussions occurred around history to be created if Obama wins. America has come a long way from racial discrimination, yet several cases of violence there in the run-up to elections happened.

This shows that racial preference is something that cannot be easily wished away. It is like a boil ready to inflame on the skin whenever conditions permit.

Many people seem to think that Obama is the man who can douse the flame of the global economic downturn that started in the US. The situation however is so bad now that things can perhaps only look better, albeit slowly, irrespective of who wins the elections.

Those who are in the knowing say India has less to gain from Obama’s win. Maybe, but why who knows many India Indians appear to be rooting for the senator from Illinois to triumph.

Call for votes in Barack Obama's website

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Best airlines

2008-11-02T17:18:00.004+05:30

If you are a frequent flier and a long-hauler at that you’ll surely prefer the airline that cares the most. Air travelers almost always have their favorites which they like to be with every time they fly.

And when you spend half or more of your yearly time up in the sky there is no doubt you’ll like a homely home away from home.

Skytrax, a privately owned London based company from 1989, fills in the vital gap of providing information as to what to expect from different airlines and airports. Its clients are mostly the different airlines, who it seems borrows the research documents from Skytrax for improving their business.

A recent ranking of the World’s 10 best airlines done by Skytrax sees 8 from Asia. Isn’t that a surprise!

The list is headed by Singapore Airlines, and the 2 that make it from outside Asia are Quantas (3rd) and Air New Zealand (8th). The complete list is as below:

Singapore Airlines
Cathay Pacific
Quantas
Thai Airways
Asiana Airlines
Malaysia Airlines
Qatar Airways
Air New Zealand
Emirates
Etihad Airways

I’ve the privilege of flying in 3 airlines in the above list, the latest being Etihad Airways during my recent trip to South Africa.

Etihad is good but I found the services of our own Jet Airways better in the first leg of my journey from Delhi to Abu Dhabi than Etihad’s from Abu Dhabi to Joburg and back to Delhi.

A Singapore Airlines A380 about to land at Changi Airport [Image Source]

P.S. I’m back from my lengthy holiday. And now ready to let my ‘literary sparks’ to fly.

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Watering the mouth

2008-09-29T11:33:00.005+05:30

Today being the extended Mahalaya, the curtain rises for the long-awaited yearly arrival of Uma with her entourage from the heaven. As if to welcome her the heavenly pouring is also on hold since last evening.

Spending quality time during the days of festivities is something everyone looks forward to. Indeed for many the plans date back several months.

Petpujo, I believe, is perhaps one popular recurrence on all pujo days. And why not? Thronging to eateries you pass by throughout the year is an alluring prospect never to be denied.

Talking of worshipping one’s own stomach reminds me a Khushwant Singh piece of Sep 20 in the TT that partly talks on the fares at Beijing Olympics. Here it goes:

To tempt Western tourists during the Olympics, the Chinese shopkeepers displayed following banners:

At a tailor’s shop: “Ladies and gents tailor. Ladies have fits upstairs.”

Baker’s Shop: “Best loafer in town.” Optician and dentist’s shop: “Eyes and teeth inserted, latest Methodist!”

Furrier’s shop: “Coats made to order from your own skin or ours.”

Restaurant: “Famous for chicken dishes: eat chicken before it is born (egg) or after it is murdered”.

While these may or may not rightly describe the quality of Chinese offerings at the greatest sporting event thus far, the pictures below of some (sent to me by a friend) certainly bring water to my mouth each time I look at them. What about you?

P.S.
I’ll be away from Kolkata for nearly a month. So the next post may be quite some time from now. Here’s wishing all readers a very happy time ahead.

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As you sow, so you reap

2008-09-27T21:53:00.005+05:30

The debate has begun in earnest…whether Nano factory would have been good for the state. In teashops and street-corners animated discussions could be seen that catch the mood of ordinary people on the street.

In one such where I chanced upon, the prominent view was that nothing much would happen if Nano moved out from Singur. Yes, jobs would be lost, but not many to their estimate. And no, the impact of the car plant would definitely not spread beyond Singur.

I looked closely at them. They didn’t appear to be supportive of Tata Motors’ exit. In fact some of them I would vouch were surely followers of the main ruling party.

It became clear to me that the motley group there – you can imagine them to be nearly representing the common people of the state – did not have a good idea of what a car factory of the scale of Nano could do to the economy of the nearby places including Kolkata and the state as a whole.

Early this week I was watching a late-night discussion on Nano’s exit on Star Ananda. An economist there said that the latest compensation package by the government would ensure that a farmer would earn at least 2-1/2 times (from bank interests) that of the maximum he could ever earn from the crops he would produce on his land.

The advantage to the farmer is so obvious that to not understand it is perhaps humanly impossible. Yet the impossible is happening right here at a place that is just next-door to a big city, not in a remote village.

Of course the opposition leader is spearheading the ‘Nano No No’ agitation in the hope of reaping political dividends. But I refuse to believe that she can prevent farmers to take compensation if they really want to.

And herein lies the million-dollar dilemma as to why the farmers – remember they are much better informed and are close to Kolkata – still ‘cannot realize’ the obvious monetary benefits.

Social scientists will probably explain the reasons behind this, but I feel the 3-decades long left rule has progressively ruined all scope of hopes and aspirations of common people of the present times.

The political highhandedness of all these years has amassed a huge mountain of moral and social bankruptcy. We are paying the price of the accumulated debts.

It will be a long while before the slate is clean to start afresh. And that is a very, very big ‘if’.

Let us hope this happens, sooner than inordinately later.

Also see my article, Uprooting smallness.

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Google’s Chrome

2008-09-11T12:41:00.005+05:30

It has been awhile since we last heard about browser war. IE seemed content with a steady share coming as it did with Windows OS.

Google on the other hand promoted Firefox, which for many has been a delight, what with open source configuration that saw hundreds of nifty extensions that made browsing a pleasure.

Good things however seldom last long. In this case Firefox now has a new competition from its erstwhile backer, Google.

Chrome, Google’s own product, has debuted last week to much less fanfare than what it was when Gmail came into being.

Chrome takes on not only IE and Firefox, but also to lesser extent Apple’s Safari and Opera, the last 2 having several pockets of popularity.

I’ve made this small video below for my 2WebVideo site that highlights parts of Google's Chrome.

I’ve been using it since it debuted, and though there are some irritants like no separate search box – you need to type search terms in the address bar itself – and the search opening only in Google, I still like Chrome with many other innovative features.

Any new product launch means the company devotes its commensurate resources to maintain and innovate it. I therefore do not subscribe to the oft-repeated idea that Chrome is not necessarily an offspring Google wants to pursue vigorously.

Google doesn’t fail to surprise the people who have direct or indirect stakes in it. Its financial results after going public have consistently been wonders except perhaps the somewhat dull last quarter (Q2/08) figures.

To my mind there is no reason why Chrome won’t become yet another blockbuster from the search giant’s stable. Until then let the roving eyes pick up signals, subtle or pronounced, that tell tale(s) about the browser’s future.

The image at the top is inspired from this excellent creation.

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Kolkata’s another first

2008-09-09T19:23:00.006+05:30

If you keep aside the apparently suicidal trend to skirt industry to the state, Kolkata has many things ‘first’ to boast of.

I’m not saying the many developments during the Raj era that started in the city. In relatively modern times Kolkata has had the first underground metro in India.

To that somewhat worn-out feather will shortly add a fresh one…that of first under-river metro tunnel across river Hooghly joining Kolkata and Howrah.

Those are under the ground, not visible unless you enter the earth’s womb. What about the city’s skyline?

You’ll say, why, isn’t there the South City? Oh yeah, South City is big, bigger than many in Kolkata. But hopefully it will pale away compared to those in pipeline in the coming years.

It’ll not be a euphoric outburst to say that the city’s skyline will see some radical change in not-so-distant future. Let’s count some eggs that are likely to hatch.

The EM Bypass will host none less than 7 large hotels, among them are some renowned ones from across seven seas.

Moving to the north of the city, the Ideal Heights on APC Road will have 4, 19-24 storey highrises designed by Hafeez Contractor. And if you consider a swanky airport in the august list of buildings that define Kolkata’s skyline, expect the auspicious beginning of its making during puja.

However, the 250 meter office tower planned beside Tata Center will be the one to keep the city agape for a long time. Tell you what, this 54-storey edifice, though short of 60-storey Imperial Towers in Mumbai, will be the tallest in the country when complete.

The total height of 250m is equivalent to 83-storey structure, and who knows it may be a long while before this height is scaled by some other structure anywhere else in the country.

However, for all that matters, the year's architectural marvel surely belongs to the rotating skyscraper planned in Dubai.

Here is the picture above of artist’s impression of the Kolkata tower taken from the TT. In the inset is what it may look like in the evening.

Below is a schematic that compares the planned tower in the city with the world biggies like the Burj Dubai, the Petronas twins, and the Sears Tower.

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Uprooting smallness

2008-09-07T20:38:00.006+05:30

September 2008 will go down in the history of the nation as the month when India finally received waiver from the 45-nation strong Nuclear Suppliers Group for dealing and trading in nuclear fuel.

India’s admission to the ‘august’ group seems to have great portents that will gradually unfold as against the solution of more pronounced needs of nuclear fuel supply and the reactors to generate electricity.

Incidentally as the waiver came through after marathon sessions in Vienna, another important meeting to herald or not a monumental occasion has been ‘on’ at the Raj Bhavan in the city. It’s about Bengal unshackling the bondage of ‘smallness’.

Let me deal with the latter. It is important because if the Nano plant does happen, it does not automatically mean that Bengal’s industrial rejuvenation is just round the corner.

On the contrary there are many more hurdles that have to be crossed yet – the hurdles of smallness, of finding glory in smallness. I’ll narrate 3 incidents that have happened only recently to explain my point.

1
First the Sep 4 issue of Anandabazar Patrika with the results of an opinion poll that showed that 72% of Singur people want the plant at any cost.

If that sounds good, wait a minute. Consider the answers to 4 other queries in the same poll. They are alarming and indicative of the people’s mindset toward industry.

Here they are:

Q1: If Tata goes Birla will come. So what’s there to be afraid of?
43% agree to this.

Q2: Bengal has no future without industry.
57% don’t agree to this.

Q3: Agricultural land must be kept aside for the food needs of 7 generations to come.
53% agree.

Q4: We’ve survived all these years without industry. So why is there so din?
45% agree.

Needless to say the path to industrial glory in Bengal is highly tortuous. Remember Singur is quite close to Kolkata. So if a sizeable populace of Singur has doubts about industry, you can expect the picture in the rest of the state.

2
The state’s transport minister who doubles up as minister of sports and youth affairs – and in the process I feel is unable to do justice to any of the departments – recently in a lecture in a chamber of commerce supported the innumerable 3-wheeler autos.

He said one needs to compassionately consider that the auto drivers too have to feed themselves and their families.

Nothing wrong there, but unfortunately the autos are a law unto themselves. They use highly polluting adulterated fuel and they give a damn to traffic regulations.

Both are dangerous for any normal living, especially the pollution. But that means nothing to the powerful minister, immersed strictly as he is in reaping political dividends.

3
The third incident is ‘shocking’ and shows a malaise that has now become symptomatic of once-hailed high-thinking principled Bengalis.

ABP, Sep 3 reports an assistant school inspector in West Midnapore’s Ghatal was arrested for insisting on and accepting bribe for issuing a clearance certificate a school needed after it utilized government grants for improving the school facilities.

What’s new in this you may ask?

A routine affair indeed but for the fact that the school in question was Bhagabati Vidyalaya in the Birsingha village that was established by Pandit Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar and named after his mother. No prize for guessing why the news made to the paper.

If you ask me I’d say the inspector insisted on bribe because he knew he could never afford the goodies of modern life he so aspired for, and believed that asking for bribe – this is more ominous – was rather the norm than exception. Why hesitate then?

I think the common thread to the 3 incidents is people’s yearning for ‘smallness’. We have radically transformed from being simple-living-high-thinking to wanting-high-living-yet-committed-to-petty-thinking.

I’ve nothing against high living, but the Bengal of today is still strongly hesitant of coming out of the shell of mediocrity while being unable to refuse the lure of modern living.

Bengal's position is worse than say a distant virgin territory in a village elsewhere. There the people are simple and do not pose as 'great' thinkers to judge whether or not industries are needed.

To our ill-luck we 'know' too much, way too much that forces us to remain confined within the deep depth of narrowness.

The wind of change, so desperately required in Bengal, will need many more Nano plants to blow strongly. And that unfortunately is still a long, long way off.

P.S.
As I write this we’ve the news that the Singur problem is on the verge of solution after the Governor met the CM and the Trinamool Congress chief.

The Singur solution is the latest entrant in the list of memorable events in the week gone by. To the NSG waiver I’ll add Google completing 10 years as being the other two important events.

Will these repeat! [Image source]

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Singur’s blessings

2008-09-02T19:52:00.003+05:30

Yesterday was a ‘small’ high point in the ongoing agitation at Singur. Personalities from the world of art and culture like Aparna Sen, Saoli Mitra, and others paid a visit to the site and spoke to various people.

Late in the night there was a talk on the TV channel, Star Ananda, where Aparna and Saoli appeared.

According to them the disputed 400 acres are still barren – though surrounded with boundary wall – and so perhaps the Tatas could consider vacating that piece and locating the ancillary units across the Durgapur Expressway on the other side.

Should that happen, Aparna and Saoli argued, the 2 holdings on either side of the expressway could be joined with an underpass or an overhead flyover.

If indeed this could emerge as a solution to the impasse, I would stick out my neck and suggest that an underpass may be built because I believe it needs less amount of space. But then it must be sufficiently below the expressway to make room for large vehicles to pass under.

Whatever happens, two things stand out as easily noticeable.

One, a solution may be far off since the two sides harbor deep animosity toward one another – something that has happened as a result of several decades of strong-arm tactics by the left front.

Two, there is an unprecedented media coverage – note the debates on NDTV – ever since Ratan Tata’s statement that Tata Motors might consider pulling out of Singur if agitation persisted.

It is perhaps the case that the Tatas being renowned industrialists have sort of nudged the media to ‘take up’ their case. Whether true or not, the ringside view is it’s not all that bad for Bengal.

Being the industrial wasteland that it is for long, long time media coverage at the national and international level has been very few if any.

The ‘neglect’ is justified since Bengal’s story has been a constant denial of everything positive. So you can’t blame if sane people felt nothing would ‘happen’ here, that there was just no story worth spending time on.

Now, even as I feel a bit elated in seeing the media covering the event for an extended period, there is still my fear of clock turning ‘full circle’. But then there may be – just maybe – a silver lining in the distant horizon.

Which is that Bengal’s common people, fed with the limitations of smallness, may start thinking that being big is after all not bad…it’s rather unavoidable.

To that extent, if events prove so, the current Singur agitation will have done a large favor for this beleaguered state.

A beautiful underpass [image source]
Let Singur's solution be as beautiful..!

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The circle completes

2008-08-25T13:12:00.008+05:30

Those who grew in Kolkata during better part of 70s would remember the ricocheting sound of hundreds of voices marching on the streets chanting with clenched fists that kicked the air above.

These happened nearly daily, sometimes twice or thrice a day, as the voices chorused:

Markin sambrajyabad nipat jak
Tata Birla, dur hoto.

Roughly translated, that meant:

Down with American imperialism,
Tata Birla, go away.

Four decades later, the American ‘imperialism’ has changed very little even as the Tatas and the Birlas have had no reason to not prosper in the country. To their clan in fact, in the time gone by, join more illustrious names like the Ambanis, the Dhoots, and others.

Back then, the left parties with their growing numbers believed in what Gokhale once said, ‘What Bengal thinks today…India thinks tomorrow’. They wreaked havoc on the state.

In 1976 when the CPM-led left front came to power, they started implementing the practice of letting ‘thousands flowers bloom’.

The land reform saw big landowners’ properties distributed among millions of sharecroppers, each holding a small parcel just enough to eke out living. Some years down the line, those small parcels of lands found new claimants as each holder’s family expanded.

The land reform was not an act in isolation. In tandem with it started the drive to shoo away industries, medium and big, through dharnas, gheraos, and even downright threats.

The message was loud and clear:

Anything big is not welcome in Bengal unless your big is shared with us without even a murmur. It doesn't matter whether we contribute to your big. What matters is we have unequivocal share of your big. If you don't agree, take your big away.

As the state hurtled towards newer depths with each passing year, the ‘smallness’ took firmer roots and grew rapidly.

For proof look no further than the lakhs of autos clogging the streets, innumerable private buses from everywhere to everywhere, countless hawkers crowding every railway station, every artery, and of course millions of intermediaries and touts in all perceivable domains who ‘kichhu kore khachhe’.

In the process the state’s once prized industries flew, investments dried up, and following suit the talent too took the wings.

After a long, long time when the rulers ultimately are now seeking to arrest the downward slide, they find to their dismay that the word ‘big’ has long become an anathema for the people they so lovingly ruled for 3 decades.

‘Nothing big for us’, the ruled say, ‘we’re happy with what we have, dui mutho bhath aar matha gojar thain…that’s all we want.’

For good measure they add, ‘Don’t clamor for big. Big is dangerous.’

So, there we are. The people of Bengal are engulfed in a sea of smallness. The opposition’s attempt to stall the Singur car factory is an unmistakable sign of returning to the ominous roots of 70s. The circle of the state’s destiny thus completes.

There is no missing here the famous saying almost a century back by Rabindranath:

Sat koti sontanere he bongo janani
Rekhechho bangali kore manush koroni.

Today, on the occasion of yet another black spot getting etched on Bengal's tryst with destiny, one can easily say that the great Bengali renaissance in the late 19th century was rather an aberration, a blip, a chance happening, than the result of harboring tenacity, farsightedness, talent and worship to grow big.

The fate hangs...precariously [image source]

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Open your eyes

2008-08-21T22:38:00.002+05:30

How many wonders we see every day? Okay we see the wonder of the Nature – the Sun, the Moon, the Rain…

But what about human wonders! I’ll not repeat the feats of Bolt and Phelps in Beijing, we all know that.

Let me instead bring to you a fantastic video by the students of Furtwangen University in Germany. They have started a project called University LipDub.

It’s about what they do after studying, and they invite others around the world to present their after-study activities in the form of video. So far so good.

What makes the whole thing damn interesting is the excellent video they have made to start their initiative.

Here is what they have to say:

In the whole sequence, what some of you may not believe, there is no single cut! You can call it "plan sequence" or "single shot". To choose an action like this was one of the great demands we decided to face on this production. Although this needed a complex conception the result compensates the invested time. We hope other students will meet a similar challenge..

I’ve been seeing the video time and again – a stupendous effort I must say. What do you think?

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Electrifying..!

2008-08-21T21:34:00.005+05:30

One has been feeling the spectacular Bird’s Nest is what will remain etched in memory as the legacy of Beijing 2008. Then comes the opening ceremony of which there may be no parallel for a long time to come.

But there are more to come. The list of mind-defying performances may not be very long, but whatever there have been thus far leave our senses numbed.

Michael Phelps will be remembered for his record 8 golds in a single Olympics. Who knows how long it will be when this record is broken! But wait, we haven’t seen Usain Bolt then.

The 6 and a half footer athlete from Jamaica sets the stadium ablaze with his running in 100 and 200 meters, creating world records in both events, a first-time happening in the Olympics history.

Will Beijing Olympics be remembered for the stunning stadium or the gallant opening ceremony or China winning maximum golds – one doesn’t know!

But it will certainly carve out a sizable space in our collective memory for Phelps and Bolt for a long, long time to come. Here is my small tribute to the 2 greats.

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Michael Phelps

2008-08-15T19:09:00.002+05:30

Today is India’s 61st Independence Day, and despite the fomenting trouble in Jammu and Kashmir it feels great to see my country storming into the ‘men’s group’ of Asia’s football 2 days back after 24 years in wilderness.

But should feeling great have a nationalistic hue…especially when sitting in my worktable I can hear patriotic songs wafting in from distant loudspeakers?

If so then why must I suffer from bottled-up emotions each time my mind recalls watching Michael Phelps on the TV breaking one world record after another in Beijing?

The answer perhaps is Phelps is not an ordinary human being. The ease of his superhuman effort is telling on my limited power of imagination, leaving me groping for parallels that are so few.

Yet you may ask how great Phelps is?

To that my quick riposte is here, a Simon Barnes’ comment in The Times, London of which he is the chief sportswriter.

Phelps has established himself as one of the great names in sport. If you find that boring, you are recommended to abandon sport and seek something smaller, something that is more your size. I believe many television channels offer things called soap operas. Those who yawn when they look at one of the greatest athletes to draw breath will find them just the ticket. Meanwhile, I'll stick with greatness.

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