What if you had only 100 days to live and knew death was coming

I came across an interesting piece in SIFY on the subject which is quiet fascinating and recounts moving stories of people with terminal illnesses enjoying their life to the fullest during the last few days and re discovering the art of living.

There is mention of one book from the the publishing giant McGraw-Hill 'Chasing Daylight, a touching memoir of KPMG CEO Eugene O’Kelly, completed in the roughly 100 days between his diagnosis of brain cancer and his death in September 2005. Some of the interesting portions of the book are reproduced here:

In his book, O’Kelly wrote, “I was blessed. I was told I had three months to live.” That statement, says his wife, Corrine, accurately reflects his attitude and their experience during those final months of his life. “I feel like my situation was the best that it could possibly be. We knew the end was coming. He had no pain and took the responsibility to make the transition as smooth as possible for everybody around him.” O’Kelly took advantage of the time to find closure in his life and relationships and to spend what he referred to as “perfect moments” with his family. He enjoyed these final days in a way he enjoyed no others. “He would wake up every day and be excited, something he rarely did throughout his life,” Corrine says. O’Kelly also used his final months to create a legacy, his book. “He wanted to leave a message for the world, which is that you do not need to fear death,” his widow says. But his primary reason for writing the book was to tell his younger daughter “it wasn’t how long you lived, but what you do with your life that’s most important,” she says.

Jan Stanton, founder of Celebrate Your Life Foundation, a non-profit that grants last wishes to adults dying from cancer after she herself was a survivor of the dreaded disease has this excellent piece of advice to offer even for those normal human beings who are not blessed enough to know that they would die within 'N' number of days or months

Don’t wait. I love granting wishes to people who are terminal, but they only get one. So many of us wish, ‘I should have done this, or I wish I could have done that.’ ” Stanton wishes everyone would check off their own list, one wish at a time. “I think in doing so,” she says, “you become a richer person, whatever the future holds.”

RK

Justice delayed, but not denied

It's a landmark judgment in the annals of the Indian judiciary. After 10 years of intense legal battle, Santosh Singh the main accused in the Priyadarshini Matoo rape and murder case was finally sentenced to death by the Delhi High Court for the heinous crime based on circumstantial evidence. The court also took the earlier sessions court to task for dismissing the case and acquitting the accused for lack of evidence when the judge himself knew that in all probability Santosh, that too a budding Law student and a son of a leading Delhi police officer had committed the murder. It was a moral victory for the ailing father of Priyarshini after almost 10 years though he had lost his precious young daughter who was also a brilliant law student

The landmark judgment opens up a new chapter and would be a precedent for many such earlier crimes like the Jessica Lall case which has also been re opened. Let's hope that this case would change for ever the age old adage 'Justice Delayed is Justice Denied' to 'Guilty would inevitably be punished even if delayed'

Truly a great day for the Indian Judiciary!

RK

Indian Team's misery continues

The ghost of major one day tournament losses continues to haunt the Indian cricket team. One more loss in the ICC champions trophy failing to qualify for the next stage even in their home turf pitches is hard to explain as they were outplayed by both WI and Australia and almost converted a definite victory to an impossible defeat against England before scrapping through. What's wrong with the team going by the interesting report card provided by the Cricinfo analysts in this article

Pathan seems to be confused whether he is a batsmen playing also as a bowler or the other way around. High time he is advised that he is playing more as a bowler who can also swing the bat and he needs to take wickets at an average of around 4-4.5 per over. Most of the top order including Sachin especially against Aussies have had a poor run and Shewag is a match winner once may be now in 15 matches and in the balance 14 is an also ran participant. The bowling seems to be better with the likes of Sree Santh and Zaheer still in reserves and it's the batting which has let the team down in most of the major tournaments. Greg's experiments though a welcome change from the earlier monotonous routine do not seem to be providing the much awaited results and may be if the trend continues in SA and in the WC in WI he might be asked to pack up his bags back to the land of Kangaroos to start experimenting with his own team

Team India seems to be in dire straits and badly needs some new faces especially an all rounder since we have not had a genuine all rounder after the great Kapil and Vengsarkar's comments that the reserve cup board is barren adds fuel to fire!

RK

India Inc's march continues

The truimphant take over saga of India Inc continues with yet another take over this time by Tata Steel with the proposed acquisition of Corus Steel, the Anglo-Dutch giant for almost USD 8 billion. Who would have thought of this scenario when in 1991 the country had almost become bankrupt with less than 1 Billion USD in foreign reserves or the crisis during late 90's when the NRI's came to the rescue through the SBI redemption bonds. The wheel has turned a full cycle and today the Indian companies are going for the kill acquiring large overseas giants with relative ease thanks to the overall financial rating of the country with the institutional investors as well as lending bodies like World Bank and IMF. The proposed acquisition’s combined out put would create one of the world’s largest steel conglomerates across Asia and Europe and needless to say would put the Indian style of corporate governance and leadership under global limelight.

As one of my fellow blogs had mentioned earlier it's only matter of time before the country starts getting the overseas immigrants aspiring for an Indian degree or a job and go through the process of passing TOHFL or TOTFL( Test of Hindi or Tamil as a Foreign language) or an IIV (Indian immigrant visa) quota system for skilled professionals. No jokes and it might be a reality sooner than later!

RK

AMMA and Captain- Slanging match

After some lull it's happening again in TN. This time it's Amma vs. the Captain. Her comments that Captain ( without naming him specifically but with enough clues) is a alcoholic who is drunk invariably every day and his promises to bring back MGR regime is more of a typical blabbering by a 'kudimagan' has already created a huge controversy and protests from Vijayakanth and his DMDK party. 'Captain' after giving a rebuttal has promptly asked his cadres to ignore the rabbit and concentrate on the elephant.

She could not have chosen a more inappropriate time. She had been routed in the local elections though she might proclaim them as rigged and her popularity graph was going down by the day. Instead of trying to bridge fences with Captain who had secured almost same percentage as that of her ally MDMK and consolidate the vote bank she chose to attack him for no rhyme or reason and that too on the personal front as though MGR's legacy was the sole right of her party. Even in the earlier assembly polls she could have easily won the election in tie up with Captain since in most of the place the difference of losses to DMK and allies was more or less the votes secured by DMDK. This is the area where her mentor late MGR stood out. He knew exactly whom to tie up with whether they were small or big parties to avoid split up of common votes and was master of electoral strategies and tie ups.

Jaya seems to be getting into a deeper hole by unnecessarily picking up cudgels with smaller opponents as the need of the hour was to consolidate and wait for the right time to strike when the intense family politics of the DMK would cause the inevitable split to happen. She can learn a lesson or two from 'Kalignar' who went in to the assembly polls knowing fully well that even if he won it was a minority DMK Govt in power which was a better option than being in opposition for another 5 years.

RK

Sad end for a Great Actress

Actress Srividya died all alone in a Kerala hospital after fighting cancer for the last 2 years or so with no kith and kin around during her final moments. She was an actress par excellence with a beautiful pair of eyes which could convey 1000 dialogues without ever uttering a sentence and was charming and vivacious in those days. Her films with KB were beautiful and' Sollatthan Ninaikeren and ' Apoorva Raganagal' being my picks of them all. Who can forget that song ' ezhu swarangalukkul' and even later in her career she had good roles in movies like Punnagai Mannan and of course in many Malayalam movies and mega serials later on.

Her personal life was how ever a disaster especially after fighting with her mother MLV, got into a financial mess with her divorced husband and took spiritual solace from Shri Sai baba and Shri Amritananda Mayi. At least some serial producer from Kerala who was moved by her desperate state helped her out with some mega serials which allowed her to pay for medical expenses and fighta losing battle till the end came last week. At least the Kerala Government gave her a decent funeral though except very few, most of the Tamil Industry had no time for a forgotten actress and were busy with the new movie releases. Many knew her as a Kalaskshetra Danseuse but very few people knew that she had great singing abilities also but mostly sang only for private audience for some reason known only to her.

May her soul rest in peace!

RK

New Diwali Releases- Which of them will click at the box office??

Tamil movie is perhaps at an all time high thanks to the resounding success of Chandramukhi and the series of hits like Anniyan, Imsai Arasan, vettaiyadu and Em Magan to name a few. The new DMK Govt has also provided lots of tax relief’s and no wonder that the Tamil stars made a beeline to the star studded function to honor Dr. Kalaignar though it's bit of mystery as to how the 83 year old veteran spent 7 hours to witness the 'kollywood kuthattam' when the reason given was that he was not health wise fit enough to visit the chikun gunya patients or to go over to Delhi for an important CM's conference during the earlier weeks. It's another story that the same stars sung in heavenly praise of AMMA not long ago with a similar function when she was at the chair and Kalingar being the old wily fox that he is brought out this point in a very sarcastic way in his closing speech.

A quick summary of movies coming up from the big banners for Diwali:

'Vattaram' by Director turned producer Saran with Arya in the lead is much talked about of all the new releases and is bound to attract the youth given its commercial value and Bharatwaj's music

'Varalaru' (God father) featuring Ajit in a dual role with Asin and directed by KS Ravi might give Ajit the much needed break after some failures though Tirupathi fared better at the box office. Story line seems to be nothing new to boast

'Vallavan' the Chimpu movie where he directs as well as performs in a dual or triple role with Sandhya and Reema Sen seems to have lot action packed. The songs of Yuvan seem to be catchy with ' loosu peene' already a big hit . Looks like Chimpu is finally making progress after he came out of his Dad TR's clutches and the never ending dialogue punch lines

'E' (d0n't think it's an English thriller-is the first name of slum hero Eashwar) is supposed to be a movie on bio medical technology and related social issues and looks like the producer RBC's son Jeeva is growing leaps and bounds with every movie. This movie also starring Nayanthara and Asish Vidyarthi is directed by Jananathan who was the director of the national award winning movie 'Iyarkai'

Thalai Magan's hero Sarat Kumar for the first time also wields the mega phone for his Wife Radan Media's production and he badly needs a break as otherwise with the growth of young heroes like Jeyam Ravi, Jeeva etc he also might also be forced into the small screen sooner than later

In spite of his hectic schedule Captain has found time for' Dharmapuri' though I don't expect anything new except some oft repeated story where as a Govt officer or in uniform he will save the country against all odds and in the process shoot thousands of anti national elements single handedly or as a village youth (he looks too old though for these roles) he will fight the village bigwigs and politicians till justice prevails

Director Venkatesh comes out with yet another movie'Vathiyar' targeted at B&C centers and going by the storyline for Arjun it may be a make or break film though he looks different with his new flowing hair style


Vattram and Varalaru are my picks which might go the distance where as the others might bite the dust or fade out in 2-3 weeks. I was eagerly awaiting KB's 'POI' which for some reason has not been released for Diwali.

RK

It's Diwali time -Films, sweets and crackers galore

Well it's that time of the year when the customary question ' Ganga snanam accha' is the first greeting in the wee hours of the Diwali morning and the day's schedule is a welcome change with the TV progs, crackers, new dresses, sweets, savories etc. This is one festival where the scale of celebrations still seems to be keeping pace with the change of times.

When I was in my native place the morning used to start as early as 3 am with bit of lee way for the smaller kids up to 4 am max followed by the small nalangu, compulsory hot oil bath while we were half asleep, namaskarams to the oldies with the individual dresses being distributed and worn instantly. I still remember my grand mother non-chalantly throwing out an electric Sara vedi as the perfect sampradaya starter to be f0llowed by the fist bout of cracker bursting. There was a little competition as to which house would start the big cracker sound with either a 1000 wala or a kuruvi vedi and all the kids had to be rationed with their own quota of crackers with a small 'oothuvathi' which became bigger in size in the later years as we graduated to bigger crackers from mathappu and busvanam stuff. The king of the crackers of course used to be the atom bomb which was a precious commodity and was given only to the veterans closely followed by Laksmi, Vishnu, Elephant, Kuruvi, bomb rockets and the train on a small twain rope was the attraction of the evening. The guys who had the maximum paper waste accumulated in front of the house were supposed to be the biggest spenders and the result used to be out only by next day and such guys would walk up and down the street with a raised shirt collar and a villainy smile at the others

There were also the interesting pieces like the 'marunthu' which had a great taste when taken with the coffee and the murukkus and sweets used to pile up as the day progressed with almost every body in town visiting my grandmother to get her blessings since she was the biggest of them all after we moved to Chennai. On one Diwali count in a small one bed room housing flat in Royapettah if I was right the visiting headcount reached triple figures by the end of the Diwali day but my mother used to ensure with a smile that all of them had coffee and sweets whether they wanted or not thanks to my grandmother's legendary hospitality . Only DD was around and they used to screen a movie on the Diwali evening or the nearest week end and there was a huge suspense waiting for that week's Ediroli programme from the anchors Kannan and Sampathkumar as to when they would announce the movie name

In Gulf most of the time the Diwali day is a working day but our guys manage to take a day off and after the customary phone calls back home before 7am when the full rate starts they settle down to the TV programmes of Sun and Jaya with a little bit of local sweets and savories. In the evenings with great difficulty the children try to find a secret place to burst the small crackers(actually they are apology of crackers compared to back home) procured with great difficulty from nearby supermarkets and they have to invariably disburse the moment the local police vans turn up. For the elite it's more of a social gathering with few drinks at the Indian club showing of the jewellery and textiles purchased for the occasion to one another.

Feel sad for the Gulf kids. They miss the real festival mood back home especially during times like Diwali

Happy Diwali to all of U and hope U have atleast 'Snanam' even if the Ganga is not to be found!

RK

Hats off to Pakistani Cricket Board

May be the recent turmoils in Pak Cricket must have taken them to an all time low and the doping scandal was another nail in the coffin, but we should congratulate the Board for being upright and coming out with results before a crucial match and that too in the glare of the entire world cricket media. There are many who question this motive also saying that anyway the ICC random test would have brought out the same results or it was the outcome of the factional fighting between Sharyar Khan and Shoaib

However it calls for guts and some real transparency to come out with the test results especially the timing and also take immediate action to get the players back home and by doing this brave act Pakistani Cricket seems to have set a precedent as for as doping is concerned in cricket. For a change they were the underdogs cheered on by the huge Jaipur crowd in the match vs. the fancied Lankans and surprisingly they won the match against all odds and who knows this may be the turning point and the only consolation for Pakistan is that things can't get worse from here!

RK

High Rate of accidents in Dubai -Let's all think

Traffic chaos, accidents, paid parking and diversions is the hottest topic today debated by almost every citizen of Dubai and no discussion starts or ends up without mention of traffic and in the bargain is also a convenient excuse for late arrivals or even failure to attend sales calls or meetings on the business front. But apart from all the factors some of which is beyond our control like Metro project, diversions, growing number of vehicles, rising cost of living pushing more and more residents to Northern Emirates, etc there are some important reasons which most of us tend to conveniently forget and that's lack of ethical driving standards, self discipline, courtesy to fellow drivers and above all Patience.

Dubai is witnessing around 157 traffic violations every hour and more than a million in the past 10 months alone and that's phenomenal by any stretch of imagination for such a small city. Most of them are related to lane violations, crossing red signal and blocking traffic and the number of fatalities is also quiet high and last 3 days alone there were five or six of them. So we all have a part to play in doing a little bit to improve the situation and that can come about by way of lane and parking discipline and respecting that time is precious for all the motorists on the road and is just not the prerogative of few. Many drivers commit blatant violations under the pretext of smart driving and unless we have self discipline and learn to respect the rights of other motorists no amount of new bridges and roads would solve the problem in the near future

RK

Time for local polls in TN- Political games as usual

Looks like going by the press and media reports the Chennai Corporation polls have again witnessed one of the most violent local polls ever with booth capturing, rigging, impersonation incidents hitting an all time high. Both the Dravidian parties are throwing mud at each other and ' AMMA' is already in the process of appealing to the High Court to declare the elections as null and void. Some of the scenes I saw in TV in front of polling booths in Chennai would even put stunt masters like Super Subbarayan and Pepsi Vijyan to shame and would have been an ideal shoot for a kollywood crime thriller. It's sad and a national shame that such incidents can happen right in front of helpless police officials and polling officers and goes to prove how much of money and power must be at stake even to win even small wards and councils within the corporation.

The difference between the assembly and local polls is while the former comes under control of the National Election commission which today is a much feared body thanks to one 'TN Seshan' the latter is under the purview of the State Government and so naturally the ruling party is bound to flex it's muscles since the stakes are high. As the Late Kamarajar had said once both the parties come from the same' kuttai' and to expect anything ethical or 'Gandhigiri turn around' in their approach is an unlikely dream which would never happen unless TN voters can find a credible alternative to these parties.

RK

Week of International awards- Unlikely winners

The Nobel awards are coming in every day as usual at this time of the year and one of the biggest surprises has been the peace prize which has been awarded to Grameen Bank of Bangladesh and its founder Yunus. For those who might not know Yunus he has been virtually the father of rural revolution in Bangladesh and his Grameen Bank today is a role model for the rural poor being followed by many poor and developing nations especially in Asia. For a country which has been plagued by natural disasters, political instability, corruption and one of the lowest per capita incomes in the world Grameen Bank has been a revelation with its innovative lending approach in providing a helping hand even to the poorest of the poor with no middlemen whatsoever. Perhaps a silver lining in one of the poorest economies of the world, especially since the award goes to prove that when sincere attempts are made to improve the economy peace, harmony, friendship and goodwill can be a big value add to such nations

The other one was the Nobel Prize for Economy which went to another dark horse Edmund Phelps who is a professor of Columbia University. His macro level theories which unraveled the mystery of short term and long term impacts of the link between unemployment and inflation is virtually the text book for many of the world's monetary agencies and Governments to adjust their federal interest rates. He did go one step further than the Newzeland Economist Phillips curve theory on inflation and unemployment and came to the conclusion that inflation does not necessarily depend on unemployment rates and is also dictated by consumer expectations of price increase or decrease

Last but not the last was our own Anita Desai an Indo-US citizen who won the prestigious Booker prize for her novel 'Inheritance of loss' which narrates how a retiring old judge copes suddenly with the return of his orphaned grand daughter. Incidentally her mother who is also a novelist had failed three times after being short listed for the award during earlier years but the daughter was lucky just in her second novel which was completed after 7 years of intense hard work and struggle to find the right publisher. Hard work and determination still pays!

RK

100th birthday of of RK Narayan and his memorable short stories

Who can forget the great characters of Swami, Krishna, Chandran, Ramani and Savitri or the humble Sastri, Gaffur, the Taxi driver as well as the minor characters created by RKN or immortal places like Market Road, the snuff stalls, toothpaste vendor shop, Regal Hair Cutting Saloon, the river (Sarayu) and the Railway station. Those days the only attraction for me in DD apart from Cricket was the Malgudi Days serial (those days there were no non sense mega serials) brought to life thanks to the cartoons of his legendary real life brother RK Lakshman and directed by the popular Kannada actor and director Shankar Nag. I still remember his only villain character 'Vasu' who figured in the 'Man- Eater of Malgudi' and was a super hit loved by children and adults.

Some of the his short stories were almost textbook illustrations of how to write a memorable short story in five hundred words or less with a beautiful unexpected twist at the end and he had mastered the art of ending the story when we expected them to continue for another 1-2 pages. For him human life and the surrounding community was to be seen as close to reality as possible and he did not believe in cinematic exaggerations or even a bit of violence, obscenity, sex or crime unlike the modern day fiction and short story world.

I am sure that Malgudi will continue to fascinate the future generations even for centuries long after some of the writers of this generation would have lost their audience and RKN would live in the hearts of his countless fans for ever. It's a pity that his house in Mysore has not been declared as a National Museum of books with all his memorable short stories, travelogues and memoirs and continues to be rented out like any other normal house where as if he had been born in Europe or US he would have gone on to win may be even a even a Nobel prize and the place where he lived would have become a National Heritage site.

Anyway the enchanting literary world of R.K. Narayan lives on!

RK

Say NO to Eve Teasing and sexual harrasement in public places

Jasmeen Patheja, a 26 year old photographer from Bangalore along with some common friends has taken an innovative approach to counter the eve teasing menace. She has started a blog website which is now quiet popular.

Since setting up Blank Noise project about three years ago, Patheja has organized "night actions" in four other cities, inviting women through her blog to meet at a designated place at night and then set out on a walk. Along the route, they spray messages on the road that describe the abuse that many young Indian women encounter daily in the hope that they will be read the next morning by pedestrians and create an awareness. The site seems to be quiet popular and the night walk at Delhi by the girls as well as sitting there right up on the street railings in Bangalore to counter the men folk who used to be there all the time making lewd comments at the women passing by have drawn lot of attention.

In a country which reports a rape incidence every 29 minutes and 30,000 official and unofficial complaints of sexual harassment in some form or other every year, these sort of public awareness mediums may be of very little use unless backed up by strong crime legislation as well as the commitment to crack the whip on the offenders using these laws

RK

India loses out yet again - This time in the UN leadership race

Though the Indian nominee Shashi Tharoor was a late entrant to the UN leadership battle he did put up a gallant fight before losing to the South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki Moon whose final election is now a formality. Shashi was considered close the existing incumbent Kofi Annan who was not really a friend of US and in the ultimate analysis the five UN permanent members including US finally decided to cast their vote for the South Korean which was what mattered at the end. So all the talk of India becoming close to US as well as a possible inclusion as a permanent security council member were laid to rest at least for the time being with this result and it's yet another political fiasco for the world's largest Democracy and the UPA Government. In this process we alienated even small neighbors like Afghanistan and Sri Lanka who put up their own nominees even though with little bit of diplomacy we would have got the entire South Asian bloc supporting our candidature

Interestingly Shashi's website has lot of interesting articles and his views on Hinduism and religious tolerance definitely is worth reading

RK

A Different perspective of a seemingly booming Indian Economy

Wherever you open papers or talk to people back home every body is bullish about the 8% growth rate, pouring Foreign exchange revenue, the recent Indo-US civil nuclear deal, booming BPO business, performance of the stock market etc, etc. Hence when somebody comes up with a different perspective especially on the political front and how as a country we are losing our traditional values moving more and more towards Western ways especially US then it's worth reading. Kuldip Nayar's article in this context in Gulf News is one to be read.

He laments on the lack of ethical values in the Indian system and how we are slowly but steadily becoming addicted to the US brand of arrogant economy with no tolerance for criticisms while the country's poor continue to remain with only one square meal a day in spite of all the big talk about globalization.

RK

Pakistan Cricket- an example of musical chair game played to perfection

If any of the aspiring children of our times wants to master the art of musical chair game they need not look beyond Pak Cricket. Change seems to have become a way of life rather than an exception for Pakistani Cricket and what's happening is truly bewildering stuff worth a celluloid bollywood script. Let's look at some of those changes till this minute.

Zaheer Abbas sacked as team manager

Inzy banned for four one day matches by ICC referee for the Oval fiasco

Younis Khan appointed captain only for the champion’s trophy

Mustaq Ahamad appointed assistant bowling coach

Younis khan walks out of captaincy saying he does not want to be a dummy captain

Mohammed Yousuf appointed captain and Razzaq his deputy

Sharyar Khan sacked as Pak Cricket board chairman

Dr. Naseem Ashraf(?) appointed as chairman in his place

Bob Woolmer says that new chairman is happy with Yousuf as captain and no changes expectedImmediately

New chief announces reinstatement of Younis Khan as Captain and Yousuf demoted as vice captain

Mustaq Ahamed is sacked as assistant bowling coach

I can hear somebody saying STOP! Head is reeling. Can you imagine the state of mind of the players and their morale which is already shattered after the Oval fiasco with all these mindless changes? Sad that a great bunch of cricketers are now being forced in to such an un certain future when they have all the potential to win the ICC trophy as well as being a serious contender for the world cup in 5 months. I have always felt that Younis Khan with all that fierce motivation and exuberance around him was a much better captain than Inzy, however great a player Inzy has been and if Younis is allowed to continue till world cup in spite of all these mess he may still motivate the team to much greater heights.

Let me finish fast since by the time I close the changes would become old news and further changes might have taken place in Pak Cricket!

RK

Lalu in limelight-For the 'right reasons' for a change

You can call of his 15 years in Bihar a jungle Raj, his methods of Governance a corporate tragedy, can be labelled as the most ridiculed Indian Politician aboard and as the victim of countless Lalu jokes . But the man has made a remarkable transformation of Indian Railways in the last 2 years since he took over so much so that he gave a lecture recently at IIM (A) on how he managed the turnaround. Some of the figures are staggering

a) Indian Railways, one of the largest networks in the world was reeling under losses till 2001 and was close to bankruptcy
b) Track record of on time departures and arrivals was pathetic and was abused by public from all forms of life and the accident rates were high
c) Every railway budget till 2003 saw an increase in second class and AC fares and the common man was finding it extremely difficult to bridge the gap

However in the last 2 years things have turned around as Railways are back in black and they even have a cash surplus

Cargo volumes have gone up by 3 times and that line of business is quiet profitable

For a change in some sectors fares have come down and the numbers of routes have increased by almost 30 % in the lat 2 years with majority of broad gauge projects completed on or ahead of time.

We have now a three tier AC train called 'Gharib Rath' which is 30 % cheaper than the convention AC fares which has been achieved by increasing space up to 85 berths from 64 by changing the design of the compartments

On time arrival rates have substantially gone up and the motivation of railway employees seems to be an all time high and the actual number of accidents has also come down as a %

He is not educated from any of the top Management universities of the world, may be not even passed the secondary education levels and neither does he possess any of the basic qualities of excellence preached by the management schools for strategy , leadership or innovation. However he has delivered the results for an organization which is one of the most complex public utility services in the world and nobody even in their wildest dreams would have expected him to do so give his past track record. Hats of to Lalu and this for a change is a pleasant surprise unlike the Lalu we are used to!

Let's give the Devil its due as they say
RK

Trust with a noble cause

Some of us would remember Mahesh Mahadevan a Tamil film music director and an alumni of XLRI who died after a prolonged battle with cancer at the age of 47 in 2002. He was also a close friend of Kamal and was the music director of 'Nammavar' which won a National award. Mahesh had desired in his final will that some of his friends need to do something for existing cancer patients in terms of motivation especially children as well as spread awareness about early detection and prevention of the deadly disease. Some his noble friends true to his will have started the Mahesh Memorial Trust which based on the Gandhian philosophy of creation of trust wealth for charitable and social causes has been doing a great job for helping the cancer patients and is also in the process of building a separate pediatric cancer ward in the Chennai Cancer Institute.
ARR helped the trust by performing a live music show in Chennai and Ajay Devgan and Kajol thanks to ace director Mani Ratnam who is also a trustee collected Rs. one crore for the trust by participating in the Kaun Bangea quiz some time back. The man behind the trust is P. Jayendra, a famous ad film maker with whom Mahesh had worked for more than a decade in his company called Real Image. Those who want to help the trust in whatverever way they want can get in touch through the following link

http://www.real-image.com/livebeyondcancer/contact.htm

This is a classic case of friends coming together in pursuit of a noble cause to achieve what their dear departed friend had aspired and goes to show literally that

'Where there is a will there is a way'

RK

Saraswati Pooja and Vijaya Dasami Holidays-Time to rejoice

Its holiday and Pooja time back home with a series of holidays and schools, colleges and offices are having a gala time though the intensity of the celeberations have gone down. Just thought of recapping my experiences of this Pooja season.

During school days the week preceding Saraswati Pooja was beehive of activity with small individual contributions for the Pooja and pori kadalai with little bit of jaggery was all we used to carry home after a common Pooja in the central hall. But it was exciting to know that there would be no studies the next day and all the books whether used or not were carefully decorated with sandal/ kunkum and confined to the laps of the Goddess for 24 hours or so. But only problem was some parents used to ensure that even stuff like Radio , cycle, mopeds etc were all part of the Pooja and that would mean not touching them till the next day Pooja. To bring them back to action another puja was performed on Dashami day and after formal 30 minute lip service of touching all the books under the pretext of reading they were happily confined to those wooden shelves. For me not having to read was the only attraction of the Saraswati Pooja since there were no TV channels and cinema programmes for the day those days and going to movies was also banned since it would have spoiled the sanctity of the pooja mood and upset Goddess Saraswati and we were threatened that we would never ever get good marks again.

However once I started work and became part of the entertainment club of Best and Crompton the last week before Pooja was no work and complete 'OB' as they call it under the pretext of Pooja preparations. All the monthly contributions net of Pooja expenses used to be converted into some Tiffin boxes or large stainless steel vessels with some well to do factories giving away larger 'andas and gundas' along with of course the inevitable pori kadalai. The late wonderful 'Sunda' of the famous SV Sekhar drama troupe was the default Poojari cum Sastrigal. When I moved to Crompton Greaves the whole office used to come to standstill on the day before the holidays with the petty cashier closing his cabin with a huge smile on his face hours much ahead of the Pooja since he was supposed to decorate the cash box and the President of the unit used to open up the petty cash book and write 'labham' on the first page like a typical' Sate kadai' being a North Indian Company. But the best part was the large pumpkins thrown to the entrance after the Pooja by the shops all over the place in the night after cleaning up their premises and invariably some vehicles were victims of the slippery surface next day thanks to those pumpkins.

Once into Gulf everything became history since there were no holidays and the only way you came to know that the Pooja was on back home was by seeing special programme announcements of Sun and Jaya full of cinema related stuff with just a caption of a Saraswati photo shown as a curtain raiser.. Some times on these days we really regret missing all that fun but as usual life is quickly back to monotonous routine the next day and we carry on!

RK