Marathon boy Buddhia Singh -Is he a future Olympic prospect for India

Those of you who are following the story of the Orissa boy must be wondering what the hype all about is. To me just looks like some unscrupulous agents and the typical Indian middle men are trying to make short term money with the boy's ability to run long distances until he gets burnt out and leave him in the streets where he originally belonged to. To run 63 Km in 7 hours in hot and humid conditions from Puri to Bhubaneswar at the age of 4 is not a joke. It's another matter that when the boy was later examined he had hypertension and associated symptoms and was also under nourished. But this has been strongly refuted by his mentor cum coach who picked him for a meager 1000 Rs or so and claims that the boy is a running machine and is a future Olympic prospect. High time SAI steps in and takes over the boy to make him stronger and healthier before they start training him for the future and not expose him to the Media. May be the boy is a freak genius but needs to be nurtured properly for the long run ahead. But we need to spare a thought also for the poor coach who had that eye to pick him up from the streets and get him into the limelight
One Kadi joke on India's gold medal prospect - Last time when Anju Booby George as usual disappointed with some lesser ranking an SMS came in- 'ANJU bags gold with a bang- and then ended by saying she picked up gold from Thanga Maligai in T.Nagar'. So much so for our Indian Athletes who always flatter to deceive?

RK

Bharatnatyam and Cricket

I had been to a classical Bharatnatyam Arangetram concert yesterday of a child prodigy aged 11 years at Dubai and the talent on display was to say the least, Awesome. I was surprised that in spite of being in the Gulf where such oppurtuties to learn and display fine arts such as Bharatnatyam are rare, children like Indu have really learnt such a classical art the hard way for years and are striving to reach on par with their more illustrious counterparts from South India like Chennai who have the best of teachers and avenues to bring out their talents.

Though I have hardly sat through such dance performances in Chennai and Dubai (mainly due to my limited knowledge of the underlying nuances of this art) yesterday was an exception in spite of the irresistible urge to see the live telecast of the one day match being telecast on Ten Sports. Indu's movements were as artistic as that of the hand, eye coordination of a Virendar Shewag (not his feet, of course) her Thillana as majestic as that of a Brian Lara in full flow and her snake dance at the end was as athletic and graceful if not better than that of a Kaif/ Yuvraj running between the wickets. So much so for similarity between Bharatnatyam and Cricket and my familiarity with dance except the fact that while India lost Indu won the hearts of the 500+ audience who remained through the evening and applauded her magnificent performance for being a winner all the way! I am sure that this is the start of her new innings and she would break many records as she progresses in her dancing career with the same levels of enthusiasm, energy and commitment and of course aided by a gifted and talented coach like Lakshmi Venkatesh( another Greg Chappell??)

RK

TN +2 Results and the toppers

The TN state Board +2 results came promptly all over the net yesterday and needless to say that some of the websites were choked in the morning. Gone are the days when we during our result days used to burn the restless mid night oil and queue up in front of our respective schools on the'D'day waiting for that ultimate piece of paper to be stuck all over the notice boards and for the mark sheets to be distributed after 1 or 2 days. May be it's only a matter of time before we have the 'E" tests where the results are on line like the prometric tests as the students walk out of huge computer halls and the exam papers are auto scanned for evaluation and totaling and flashed across some huge monitors or giant outputs. The way technology is progressing may be this is a reality sooner than later with the conduct of entire examinations and results outsourced to some knowledge based companies with high technology skills with only a regulatory body in place to oversee the process

I was delighted to find that a boy Bharat Ram from Prince Matriculation, Nanganallur (perumaiya irukkadha-enga oor achhe) taking the first place with a whooping 1180/1200(it's only a matter of time as the years go by that somebody reaches 1200 mark!) and he fully credited the principal and the teachers of course along with his parents for the stupendous effort. Hats of to Prince School which has always maintained a high standard in spite of all the odds which Nanganallur faces due to poor infrastructure and the second rankers were from DAV where one of the guys mentioned that he was in State 2nd in 10th also and missed the first rank by a single mark. That's consistency of the highest order. Hats off to all the toppers and how ever the standards may be compared to the olden days to get to 98 or 99% overall is no mean feat!

RK

Karan Thapar at his best- Arjun Singh caught napping

As the reservation issue is taking a turn for the worse with protests spreading from medical to other domains, the Government is in a quandary as to how to perform a Houdini act and get out of this mess. In a hard hitting interview Karan ripped Arjun apart with some facts and figures and most of the Minister's answers to say the least were shocking and absurd and he didn't have a clue as to the current reservation levels in universities, current over all OBC population as per last statistics, how he would increase the general quota of seats etc. Good one to go through if you had missed the interview

http://www.ibnlive.com/news/decision-on-quota-is-final-the-chapter-is-closed/11063-4.html

There is also a youth forum for justice where the members collect signatures on this issue and forward to the President of India once it reaches the 100,000 mark. Not that these initiatives would make an impact on the President given the limited constitutional powers he enjoys but just some moral satisfaction for those who have the say that atleast they have taken part in an critical issue which can have a huge overall impact on the Indian Economy during the next few decades.

http://www.vyomworld.com/petition/


RK

The Singh's and the never ending controversies

It was V.P Singh who 2 decades ago who tried to show himself as the messiah of backward classes and came out with the Mandal committee recommendations which pushed the country backwards by at least 50 years . Then it was the famous Natwar Singh with the Volker report and now it's the turn of another Singh 'Arjun' to grab the limelight just to embarrass his own party men especially the PM's office with the proposed 49.5 % quota reservation in all education institutions across the country which has created a huge furore across the country. Reservation is a contentious issue and whether it's needed or not and for whom can be debated for years especially in a country like India with vast differences in the socio economic scenario and the never ending stream of political parties trying to exploit the weaker sections for their political gains.

Looks like the UPA Government must now beat a hasty retreat and try to bring in the legislations in a phased manner as and when the next elections comes around and Arjun Singh may be forced in to oblivion with a gubernatorial post in some North East state before he calls it a 'day'. Hope it happens sooner than later since such short sighted politicians can cause greater harm to the country's economic boom which is at an all time high.

There are some interesting links which analyze this issue in detail and few of them are must read especially the one by an anonymous senior executive from the IT industry who has beautifully analyzed the issue and exposed the politicians

http://inhome.rediff.com/money/2006/apr/26guest1.htm


http://www.rediff.com/money/2006/apr/28quota.htm

http://in.rediff.com/news/2006/may/19sb.htm


I personally feel that reservations are actually an in justice to the backward community by isolating them from the main stream and the only way to motivate and bring them back is to provide economic assistance for higher education, self employment, own houses, sports training facilities, fine arts, etc and make them feel proud of their contribution to the Country. Imagine the dreaded scnario one day that if this goes on, We would have the Indian cricket team or the Olympic hockey team with 49.5% reservations and the Sports Minister announcing that India would only play with such teams who also have a similar reservation policy. God save our great country from these politicians!

RK

Week end Sports Review

Justlin Gatlin of USA missed the World record as the fastest man on earth by .103 rd of a second thanks to the perennial rounding off adjustment error committed by the Doha IAAF officials where his timing of 9.767 seconds was rounded to 9.76 instead of 9.77 which is the current record of the Jamaican Asafa Powell. Sometimes Mathematics can be cruel not only to students but also to sportsmen as well and the rounding off devil played literally the spoilsport again at least for Gatlin!
For a change cricket has to take the back seat and the soccer World cup mania takes over in Germany for the next 7-8 weeks. Ronaldinho, Zideane, Beckham, Ronaldo, Henry all would be trying to make a mark in the tournament which may probably be the last for most of these veterans and we are in for a foot ball extravaganza of a life time. In the midst of all these stars our own Baichung Bhutia's comment that India can qualify for the WC in 10-12 years was a big joke since they are nowhere near International class and it may remain a dream at least for the best part of this century
The Tendulkar Jinx continues with confusing reports on his recovery and his participation in the Caribbean test series. Only he knows whether he is fit enough to get into the side. Dravid in the mean time along with the lucky Kaif aided by some abysmal fielding from the West Indies helped India to their first ODI victory of the series and the 17th successful chase on the trot. We can be proud of this record and is unlikely to be broken in the near future.

RK

The Priest order of the DMK Govt-Where to go??

One of the first few orders signed by the new TN Govt was to provide equal oppurtunity for all the castes in temples managed by HR &CE Dept as priests to fulfill the dreams of late Periyar. From viewpoint of unemployment it might be a good move. But whom does it affect directly?? No doubt the poor Brahmin priests of the various Hindu temples who know nothing but Vedas/pooja agamas and have spent the lifetimes as well as trained their future generations for this noble job which going by other industry standards is still poorly paid without any retirement benefits and they manage on the Prasad and the small houses/ meager piece of land allotted to them. The problem is they don't know anything else except the arachaka tradition and this ordinance seems to affect them the most as well as the 'poojaris' of some Sakthi temples.

I am sure a big hue and cry would have been raised if this order was also applicable to certain minority communities and sub sects and their places of worship, but they can never be touched and we would continue to take pride in calling ourselves a secular country. Though the Brahmin community is by any stretch of imagination always a minority both in numbers and in economic terms nobody cares or supports for them, they don't get any job reservations, still struggle for professional admissions in spite of getting 110%, even their own well off brethren don't care for them once they get into well paid white collar jobs in India or abroad(few exceptions are there) and neither do they have strong associations or representatives for their voice to be heard.

I am sure that the current generation of the arachaka youths given their native brilliance and instinct for survival would come out with something innovative to still keep them and this noble profession ticking.
RK

• Mother of all Elections
  
  It was a fight to finish all the way on 11th May when the TN election results were announced. Finally the veteran 81 year old leader Kalaingar prevailed over the iron lady and took the coveted chair for a record fifth time and in the process winning the lections personally for the 11th time since 1959. It was one of the closest elections in recent memory in terms of victory margins never before seen in TN History and some of them were nail biting finishes like T.Nagar, Mylapore and Harbour
  
  Here are some unusual interesting facts I gathered over the last few days
  
  First time I guess non DMK party won more than 3 seats in Chennai and that too 7 by AIADMK alliance, may be the Veeranam factor played a role and also a minority government taking office which is a first for TN
  There were nearly seventeen constituencies where the margins were less than 100, the lowest one being 14 and there were at least three instances where the victory margins was just 53
  at least another 30+ seats had less than 1000 as the victory margin and must have been heart breaking for the losers
  Captain Vijayakanth simply stole the show with 27 lakhs+votes and an 8.34% share. He is indeed the David amongst the heavyweight Goliaths like Kalaingar and Amma. I don't think even the great MGR had such spectacular results in his first election. At least in 60-70 seats his party got more votes than the victory margins and who knows if Amma had tied up with him she might be laughing her way to glory today again. Some times super ego in politics can lead the party no where and her reluctance to accommodate Captain is a classic example
  BJP was a cropper with less than 2 % votes and may be managed to retain deposits in 2-3 places max and so was Karthik's forward block which only started marching backwards the movement he was chosen as the leader. At least with AIADMK alliance they would have retained 1-2 seats like Udumalapet. They have failed to open their account in both Kerala and TN and time for them to do a serious introspection rather than making some meaningless statements like the one from Naidu as he only can.
  PMK fared no better garnering vote share of around 5.20 % much lesser as compared to earlier elections and lost even in their strongholds like Tinidvanam and Vridhachalam where the party was actually started getting trounced by the Captain himself. Just goes to show you can't run a party purely on caste lines and those days are finished
  The losers I guess were actors like Visu, Saratkumar, Radhika etc who made the last minute dash to the AMMA camp and were undone by MK's Doosra
  The perennial infighters in TN, the Congress won 35 seats which was a bonus to them by any stretch of imagination and since they are on outside support mode I am sure would start their tantrums and bargains as a tit for tat for what Kalaignar did when they came to power at Centre
  Hope the DMK Govt losts its full tenure to fulfill the long list of Freebies it has promised and I am sure the most worried man at this moment must be the new Finance Secretary of TN
  
  RK
  

My Chennai Visit

I was in Chennai for a week to attend the wedding of my niece to one of our blog friends from Singapore. Great occasion with more than 2000+ friends and relatives in attendance during those 2 days with some good ' heavy calorie kalyana sappadu' and a buffet to go with in the evening. Also did a favorite ’koothu dance' along with the groom's friends and relatives as part of the 'janavasam'. It was fun all the way with little bit of tennis ball cricket in between at the parking basement

Managed to have a sneak preview of the election battle on the streets live and on J and Sun. Seems to be too close to call with varied predictions and people crossing fences between the two parties on a regular basis. 6000 Km and 36 days and the iron lady looked fresh even on the last day concentrating solely on her achievements leaving the DMK bashing to Vaiko and Company. It was freebies all the way starting from rice, thali, gas, colour TV, Computer, 2 acres of land, cycles, etc, etc and the best was reserved by Kalaignar for the last day when he said what is left for him was now only to offer himself as 'free' for the people of Tamil Nadu. Why not the election commission stop all this rubbish free offers which might never see the light of the day like the restrictions they have imposed on so many other pre election activities.

Mahajan passed way after a grim battle for life and the country might have been deprived of one of the few outstanding young politicians who might have gone on to become the PM if he had not met with this terrible tragedy. Some times life is cruel to good people and Mahajan was no exception!

RK