An Electric shock to the Environ-Mentals!

I was washing my hands full of mud after settling a life in a pot in my small little garden, which brings me to the biggest conundrum when it comes to saving the environment.  Once you are done with your deed and you wash your hands, how do you wipe them dry? With a disposable paper towel? It is most effective and convenient , especially if it is made of recycled paper. But perhaps an entire forest was razed to make all that paper. A fancy hotel places a tray full of cloth towels. Which seems eco friendly. Use, wash and Re-use. But can you imagine the amount of cloth towels that get to put away for a wash after a single wipe within 24 hours in such place? And you think the energy consumed in getting them laundered involves butterflies and dew drops?

The only method that involves no deforestation and no landfills is a blow dryer. Most give out a gentle whiff of air that’s only good at drying out your last molecule of patience. But there effective ones that dry your hands real quick. The power for these powerful dryers doesn’t come from that tiny solar panel placed on the roof many years ago on World Environment Day. It comes from smoke spewing power stations. Speaking of smoke spewing, India is aiming for all electric car fleet by 2030, which means petrol and diesel would be tanked. Not because fossil fuels will end. But because of “conscious decision” by Ministry of Power and Renewable energy to eliminate everything that will make our air, water and planets dirtier.

In the good old days, when naturally aspirated engines used to work on streets, which were until about April 2014, there was only one thing that annoyed me. The look on people’s faces when I used to fish out my five year old dumbphone. I loved my dumbphone. It had GPS navigation with simple browser, I could browse, access multiple email accounts, send and receive emails with attachments. More importantly, it had two-three day battery life. Besides it used to fit in pockets, nooks and crannies. But then, Google stopped support for Gmail on Java based phones- dumbphones for you and me.

Thanks to planned obsolescence, I finally gave into a smartphone. It had 1 Gigs of RAM and 8 Gigs of memory. But before I get to know its full features the device was already outdated. If I had to replace any part it either cost me the price of new phone or it wasn’t available because my phone is too ancient.

Which is when it struck me. Motown isn’t the best of health. But Silicon valley is thriving. A car, if maintained well, lasts ten years. A flagship smartphone lasts three years before you start complaining about lack of storage, lack of battery and how apps don’t open as fast as they used to.

Sure a car is several times more expensive than a phone. But when you buy a communication device, whether for 10k or 80k, it’s ridiculous that it can’t provide three years of hassle free service. This, when cars in the developed world, with infrastructure that’s easier on wear and tear, can clock in seven figures on their odo and keep running. It may seem cars will continue being that- work horses that keep running if you provide fuel and service.

But I am not so sure. You see Silicon Valley is already at the forefront of the automobile revolution that’s taking place as you are reading this. Fully electric cars, driverless cars, cars which communicate with other cars. We have gone much beyond electric cars now. But electric cars have the same problems as phones. Battery packs. They take time to charge and over months their ability to hold a charge diminishes. Cars are going to be about software. If your manufacturer or a Google abandons operating system and security updates for the connected cars older than a couple of years, you wouldn’t be as eager to look up new cars on Amazon.

The automobile is polluting, crude slow and relies on century old tech. Agreed. But the automobile is the only consumer durable product, that’s hardy; tough can take beating and last a decade and never become obsolete unless you drive it off a cliff. You see the problem with our lot is we always take the pitchforks and sickles to the evil that’s in front of our eyes. But are blissfully ignorant of the evils we don’t see.

The super sleek, super light smartphone on which you might be reading, emits 2,25,000g of carbon in its manufacturing process. That’s as much as a Porche 911 emits over 1000km. And this is obviously not your first laptop or smartphone. Do consider what happens to the gadgets we discard. And what can possibly happen when these cars turn into mere electric gadgets! The electric cars we would see may not pollute, but the contribution to environment in the manufacturing, maintenance and disposal won’t be much clearer  than the point which I am trying to make.

A study by the Central Pollution control Board and the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute reveals that the percentage contribution of particulate matter in the air by petrol cars is 0.06 percent and diesel cars is 1.17 percent. And would you want to know the star contributors in this list? Bakeries- 5.8% , Paved road dust – 11.8% , Unpaved road dust- 17.76%, Construction- 8% , Garbage dump burning – 10.84%, and right at the top , Powerplants-20.99%

Pollution and its pitfalls are true. But if we are going to comprehensively target only objects with tailpipes – much less diesel engines above 2000cc as the sole reason for bad air and diseases, then let that be some sort of personal satisfaction. Because that’s doing nothing to eradicate pollution.

I do feel like taking a naturally aspirated inline six cylinder petrol Porche  and howling and burning some rubber and doing a orchestra in front of the premises of the  Ministry of State for Power and Renewable energy to make them understand the seriousness. But this blog is all I have…

Maybe I will start with a “conscious decision” to save environment by walking out of the washroom with dripping hands.

The Round Up... Of Applause?

Unaware of the fact that he was around me, while I was searching for him for one whole revolution, I stretched my back.

Meet the person of the year 2016: The quintessential Indian hypocrite.

You would have met him everywhere. In queues outside ATMs, banks and multiplexes, chanting slogans, waging WhatsApp jihad, supporting boycott calls on Twitter, railing against his own countrymen and bleeding from his desktop for soldiers on the border.

His principle: Preach in public exactly the opposite of what you practise in private.

His dharma: Hate in others what you want to hide about yourself.

The year belonged to him. He screamed, shouted, outraged, pointed one finger at others, forgetting the direction of the other four. But as Ralph Waldo Emerson said: "What you do speaks so loud that I cannot hear what you say."

India has always been an amusing bundle of contradictions, a lexicon of oxymorons. We worship at the altar of female goddesses, but have a skewed sex ratio. We boast of sanskars and lofty ideals but practice casteism, demand dowry and have a maniacal obsession with male children.

We are the land of Kamasutra, Khajuraho and have the highest growth rate of population, but we also have Pahlaj Nihalani who fears moral regression of the vulnerable masses if James Bond kisses for half-a-minute on the screen. We are a country that sings bhajans of Meera and Kabir but ends up revering Radhey and Asaram as 'Maa' and 'Bapu'.

We are a country, which, in true Oscar Wilde fashion, is so clever that it doesn't mean a single word it says.

But, sometimes a country's polity and society combine to create circumstances and debates that expose our deeper contradictions, expose bigger hypocrisies. And gave us many shades of the quintessential Indian hypocrite.

This year we had the kaala dhan warrior. He rejoiced when Prime Minister Narendra Modi outlawed notes of higher denomination. In a delirium of patriotism, moral propriety and schadenfreude, he announced the end of black money and the corrupt — everyone apart from, of course, himself.

But, by next morning the kaala dhan warrior rushed to launder unaccounted cash, adjust accounts, put every bit of outlawed currency into bank accounts, announcing at the end of the day, "Yaar, apna to adjust ho gaya."

He called it a surgical strike on the corrupt, rich and powerful and then bathed in the flowing Ganga of connivance and corruption with co-hypocrites — the broker, the banker, holder of Jan Dhan accounts, presumably the people hit most by kaala dhan.

Nothing captured the prevailing hypocrisy more than the constant changes in deposit and withdrawal rules to counter his propensity to circumvent laws that were hailed in public — Bharat Mata ki Jai — and violated in private.

We had the holier-than-thou fanatic. By day he slammed fanatics of ''that religion" for not allowing a cricketer's wife to wear a gown. He mocked the utter lack of freedom in that religion, the tyranny of those opposing their religious and moral codes on others. By night he railed at a celebrity couple's choice of name for their newborn, opposed a woman's freedom to choose her husband, a person's choice of food, a producer's choice of the actor he wanted to cast in his film.

His ideological rival, behaved in an identical fashion. He defended a mother's right to call her son Taimur, but not a woman's right to protest Triple Talaq or wear a gown, proving hypocrites of the world have just one religion — hate.

We had the pious gau bhakt. He declared cow as his mother, advocated lynching of men for eating beef, skinning carcasses, but blithely went past bovines looking for food in heaps of garbage lying on roads of 'Swachh Bharat', ignored hundreds dying in cow shelters.

He was the bleeding heart patriot who blasted others for complaining of hardships when soldiers were dying on the border but encouraged his children to look for the best overseas job, leaving the vacancies in the Army for the neighbour's son to fill. He shed Twitter tears when soldiers died in natural disasters in Siachen but laughed when people died in queues outside banks due to a man-made disaster or at Jantar Mantar while demanding one-rank-one pension.

He was the angry desh bhakt who danced to Rahat Fateh Ali Khan's songs, sang out aloud Honey Singh's "g@#*d mein dam hai to band karwa lo'' at parties but protested Ghulam Ali's ghazal concerts. He gloated when Indian beat Pakistan in hockey but felt outraged at the thought of cricketers and kabaddi players taking on their cross-border rivals. He lamented when one state government spent a few hundred crores on ad campaigns but puffed his chest in pride when another government announced it would put Rs 3,600 crore in the Arabian Sea to showcase a warrior in a state with high rates of farmer suicides and history of droughts.

Finally, he was the social media jihadist who advocated bans on apps of online retailers endorsed by Aamir Khan but rushed to its stores every time a sale was announced. He was the Twitter activist who sought a ban on Chinese items but queued up for flash sales of mobiles made in China, paid for them through Paytm. He was the intolerant troll who wanted films to be boycotted, actors to be punished but bought tickets first-day-first-show, tamely surrendering crores in the dangal of box office, putting his money where the mouth wasn't.

No, 2016, didn't belong to Narendra Modi, Arvind Kejriwal, Rahul Gandhi, Urjit Patel, Aamir Khan or Salman Khan. It belonged to the quintessential hypocrite who amused and entertained us throughout the year, proving right Somerset Maugham who famously said, "It cannot, like adultery or gluttony, be practiced at spare moments; it is a whole-time job."

Congratulations, all of us gave it one full year.

*pats on the back*

Are you kidding me?

The first job I did when got off from the station, I went to this person whom I didn’t really feel like visiting to -  The Barber. The last thing I remember, I was sneaking inside my own house at late night, my grandfather was beating the hell out of me, thinking me as a sort goon or thug or something, until I handed him over his glasses.

Anyways, so I went to this phony saloon, as this No Shave November was also over, for over the fifth time. After taking half measures, I walked out of this fancy shop as a ninth grader, oil on my head, powder on my body, with almost no hair above my neck. Holy cow! I was feeling like a goddamn kid!

I thought now I could not go back in public or hang out with buddyroos or travel in local trains or anything, as these transgender guys would flock around me and say “aye chikne” and pull my cheeks and all. I jumped inside a nearest OLA (no I won’t be getting brand integration money and shit) , so this car was really crumby, I didn’t care much. I was too depressed to care anymore. The person who was going to be my chauffer was an old guy. He was even more depressing than the cab was. Before getting in he asked me if I had any change or debit card or something. Ya know this goddamn demonetization circus and all. This stupid sonuvabitch seemed to be  silent but intelligent as he had magazines and stuff in his damn car. That made me sick.

I initiated some talk with this conceited old man so at least I wont feel nauseated. “What a pain in the ass this Modi government has become. Like suppose Rahul Gandhi was our leader, the life would be peaceful as hell”

He looked at me through the mirror in a peculiar way, “What do you mean?”

“Like he cares about the country and people and stuff so he wont do something like demonetizing for the heck of corruption or something. Also he is sort of wise guy, so he would enjoy his term and keep things like they are and people will also be having merry time doing corruption and inflating the market.

If not him this old woman Jayalalitha was also quiet good. I mean she was pretty intelligent. Served for about six terms as a chief minister doing nothing but slamming her own public for derogatory statements which criticized her government for water scarcity or not fulfilling poll promises and all. She even gave a leading search engine a notice of defamation for posting that her health condition was not good while serving her last days in hospital. Dang! Must say she was one hell of a cool old woman.”

“How old are you kid?”, he interrupted me.

“Sixteen, dawg!”, I gave him a believable answer like my face-lift my language-shift and all, I was sort of smooth to be one those cool kids.

“You know, we are in very good hands now. This is a short term trouble for a long term benefit.”  Boy, he sounded as serious as a batman and was looking at me like I was a madman.

But I had to keep talking so I won’t puke on his head, ”You gotta be kidding, like there’s this hero Arvind Kejriwal who is more capable national leader. An IITian, an IRS officer and what not. He is quite brilliant like when Delhi’s current air quality index is marked at 265 he is implementing this genius idea of odd-even rule. Simply clever. Whilst other stupid cities of Europe when detected their air quality index of 54, they panicked and made all public transport free and doubled their funds to tackle air pollution and what not. What a waste.

He is the best, hands down. From taking potshots at Prime Minister to posting videos on YouTube to tell the world  Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah were conspiring to murder him, so they could stay in power. Most Indians would loathe to hear and ponder over what the Delhi chief minister broadcasted on the internet against his country's PM but Kejriwal as usual is playing both victim and hero. Victim because, he claims to be constantly on the receiving end of a conspiracy unleashed through the Income Tax, Delhi Police and CBI and hero, because he and only he has the guts to fight a tyrannical Modi regime at the Centre. He presents himself to be the only hope of the people and thus Modi wants to eliminate him and his party leaders. Masterstroke! He is the Donald Trump with a graduate degree from each college of Ivy League.

I guess we need more leaders like them to end the first world problems as soon as possible.”

I heard the tires screeching, I guess the driver drove as fast as he could to my destination. Ah! It seemed at least somebody was getting rid of their problem.

While getting down to ease his troubled mind I asked him to read my last post in which I was talking about waking up and getting serious and stuff. Upon reading, he jumped on his toes and exclaimed boisterously, ”Are you trying to kid me, bud?” He showed me this recent article by Stephen Hawking.

The article was so dope, it baked me. I smirked saying  thank you and bidding goodbye to him. He shouted from a distance, “Sir , How do you think we can clean this mess of unscrupulous leaders?”

I laughed, “I don’t know, may be ‘BARBAR’ them.”

Are you awake enough?

A pleasant evening. It was a holiday so had decided to chill out, which I do pretty much my entire semester. Being an audiophile I was testing my brand new headphones streaming brand old songs and singing aloud the crapella version of it, “Like my father’s come to pass, seven years has gone so fast, wake me up when September” just right then a flying saucer like object hit my head. I turned at my mom and said, “let me at least put ‘end’ to the song and why are you throwing dishes on me, dad is sitting right there.” Upon that reply another dish came flying towards me.

Well it is quite obvious to get hit when you are not at all serious about your life and shamelessly singing loudly like a frog infront of an elder who has appointed you to do some work.It is also agreeable ,that being a ‘young-can-do-it-all-grownup’ you are not supposed to laze around especially infront of your parents and especially -especially when you are an engineer! Pretty much everything changes after that “e”-word transits your life to “f”-word. From plumber to mechanic, from fixing that neighbor’s computer to buying and negotiating the tomatoes with vegetable vendor, ” 20Rs ka kidhar bhaiyya, 15 ka rate shuru h” all because you are running low on your pocket money. In a similar fashion, I had got the work-some-save-some-earn-some opportunity.

Old newspapers were to be scrapped. I thudded inside the balcony where they were piling up. Residing on the top floor of the high-rise building, I enjoyed an open view of trees, mountains, lakes and nice abstract art of pigeon shit. I started alienating the by-mistakenly-thrown-notes of the paper where I thought I would pass but I dint. Assorting the papers, thinking how much money I would make out of them, I smirked, when I came across the news of UPA government slamming NDA government for the Union Budget, probably the first person to be profitable because of the Union Budget*literally*

I jolted as I read the word Union Budget; indeed to the economists, business analysts this word meant a huge deal but to me it was a quick time-shift. I mean January lasted for about 3 minutes for me and I am pretty sure I just entirely skipped February. Impetuously I flipped the stack of newspaper and decided to time travel. Swimming my way up in the ocean of stories I surfaced up with some disturbing things which can drown the whole world.

“One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors” -Plato

Surprisingly two-thousand four hundred and sixteen years later his quote is still trending when I see Donald Trump leading in the presidential elections of the most powerful country in the world. Series of memes and ‘funny Trump’ moments may have surfaced the internet but we have ignored the fact that he has already won three states and is leading the most Super Tuesday states, which is a big deal. Since 1988 every candidate who has won the most states on Super Tuesday went on to become their party’s nominee. So at this point Donald Trump is America’s back mole, it may have seemed harmless a year ago but now that he has gotten frighteningly big, so big that even the secret services are being employed to stop Donald Trump. The reason why he is getting plethora of votes, what his supporters had to say,” I think he is a credible businessman, if he runs the country like he runs the organization I think we will be in good shape.” This sounds felicitous for a moment because of the rich and successful status he has. But because he is rich therefore he knows politics has the same internal logic as I am a vegetarian therefore I know karate. He is currently observed loaning $18million to fund his own campaign. Why would he do that if he is significantly rich and has earned more money than most of us will make in a lifetime? Because the fact is not only did he get multi-million dollars inheritance from his father but he has also lost a huge amount. His own daughter described the state of his finances in one interview,” My father and I were walking down the fifth avenue and there is a homeless person sitting right outside of Trump Towers and I remember my father pointing to him and say that the guy has eight billion dollars more than me.” Explaining how indebted he was.  Whatever we think about Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz at least they know where they stand but Trump’s opinion has been wildly inconsistent. When asked about what he had to defeat ISIS, he simply replied without any hesitation,” We need to take out their families and basically kill all Muslims.” This was the front runner of Republican nomination advocating a war crime, and he might say he was joking or changed his mind but when this racist, unstable, hysterical, himbo will sworn in as President on that day his opinions are going to matter, to US, to us.

And just when we pray that sufferings of America should end; enters North Korea- “Attention, United States of America. This is your final warning before we destroy you completely.”  Kaboom. The not-so Democratic People’s Republic of Korea hash North Korea is one of the most fascinating countries in the world. They live by this weird sort of ideology called “juche” which is the bizarre sort of Marxist-Leninist-Socialist hybrid. North Korea is like that lonely, slightly sociopathic guy at a party who sits in a corner and doesn’t talk to anyone- “hey bro, you enjoying the party? We are doing shots” “Yeah, so am I. Just fired missiles at your house.”  Where South Korea is famous for Gangnam style, North Korea is getting famous for its Bombnam style. Things started getting really serious, when their Supreme leader Kim Jong Un declared that they have been testing hydrogen bomb. The guy is as wacky as his name, known for holding the title of ‘World’s most cruel dictator’; this no DC no Marvel very real supervillain destroys whatever comes his way. It is genuinely worrying that a guy like Kim Jong Un who has no military training is in charge of one of the largest military and nuclear forces in the world. And with that he has a fanatic reputation for shooting people. He had his defence minister executed and shot. Not with a pistol or an AK-47 like normal psychopaths but with an anti-aircraft gun- a weapon designed to attack aircrafts. So he must have shot him because of some serious crime, right? Like treason? corruption?  Spying? Nah.nah.nah. He had him shot because he allegedly fell asleep in Kim Jong Un’s  presence!

It is really scary how much power this guy has an access to. Here is some perspective. North Korea is just over 120,000sq.km in size. That is just slightly smaller than Tamil Nadu. Despite that it is among the top 5 biggest Nuclear powers in the world. They have military strength of close to a 1.5 million soldiers where each knows 1.5 million combat moves. For lot of us Kim Jong Un is just some fat dude we see in newspaper. But he and North Korea are capable of doing some serious damage, which could possibly trigger the next world war.

And we may have diffused one bomb named Rahul Gandhi, there are still many explosives like Tejashwi Yadav- deputy chief minister of Bihar, Kanhaiya Kumar-JNU President, waiting to do a damage. And this should come as a warning to all of us. One half of the human race is at war with the other, which is worse than an attack of flying saucer like objects(U.F.Os) on human beings. This is the time to get serious about your, mine and everyone's life. This is the time to WAKE UP, because the world can end before the September ends. GOOD MORNING!

Nothing is Perfect?

What is more perfect than a beautiful Sunday morning? I stretched myself in the direction of the Sun just shining its warm golden light. The entire meadow was glowing under its morning warmth and the dew was still plainly visible on the blades of grass nearby. No,the birds chirping, cool breeze invigorating me, the Sun rising from behind the mountains or rooster’s cock-a ‘doodle doo didn’t happen, though I could hear some frogs croaking.

I was taking a stroll in the Central Park; the sprinklers set up were spray painting the brown surface into lush green using those colorless droplets.  I was still thinking about the movie I watched yesterday night- A Brilliant Young Mind. (Relax, no spoilers ahead) The story revolves around a teenage kid who is a math prodigy, with an extreme obsession of prime numbers.

Prime numbers are very rare, yet they are not useful in any manner. They don’t divide, they don’t factorize, they just sit there and keep on growing in the garden of the Number System. They are like weeds, the more you will explore your garden, the more you will see them popping out; you can’t get rid of them.

Mother Nature is a complex web of life and the lifeless. The very state of being so perfect is the reason for life and also death. Mathematics on the other hand is man-made, to understand nature and beyond. Mathematics is the language of nature. Now, there is a debate over whether mathematics was invented or discovered, but hey who cares? Either way it is still perfect.

Everyday there are new discoveries that are made in nature and in Mathematics as well. We are just getting more aware of the truth, which exists independently of our acknowledgment.

Maths is founded on simple yet powerful elements-numbers. Numbers, just like the elements of nature, share a complex relationship with every other element in that set.

The relationship is universally valid. The equation, (a+b)² =a² + b²+ 2ab, stands true on Earth, on Jupiter and even if the Sun goes down. Because, math doesn’t exist in physical dimension, it entirely exists in human mind. Maths and human beings are co-dependent to aid each other’s growth.

When we get to the bottom of it, we see that Maths is an abstract representation of nature- element to element, shape to shape and relation to relation. This fundamental reason suggests that Maths is no different from nature. Hence any real world problem can be solved in maths and any maths solution is effective in real world. If you think this statement doesn’t hold true in love and war, think again!

Mathematicians have claimed the formula of love. No, no, its not “Candlelit dinner+ roses + kissing=Love”. It is an actual mathematical equation. Even there is an algorithm discovered for stable marriages. Do you imagine how peaceful the lives of the humans would be! During World War II, English mathematician, Alan Turing cracked the enigma code to help them win against the Germans! This is the power of Mathematics.

It is not necessary that one should be a maths-wiz to love mathematics. Anyone can love it; no matter if you are commerce student or a medical student or an engineering student who has failed five times in Maths-1 subject. The reason why 80% of the students hate maths is the kind of approach they got to it.

What is the largest number our mind can conceive? What is the size of universe? Well the answer to both questions is one and the same. The answer is not infinity, it is Zero. Yes! The size of universe is zero and so is the largest number! Let me explain, for every positive number there exists a negative number in maths. For every matter there exists anti-matter in nature. This is the big picture. Therefore when you put everything together, the size of universe is zero. Zero is thus, simultaneously everything as well as nothing. That’s why its called whole number. You add or remove it still remains whole.  

This is how we should approach Maths from ground zero. Then only we would realize the beauty of the concept of Mathematics. Its groundbreaking revelations can change the human thought process once and for all!

The next time you hear anyone say,” What is more PERFECT than a beautiful Sunday morning?”  I guess then you already know the answer!

You cannot change the world overnight?

“The world is an evil place.

Because of their cruelty

I am a miserable person,

And it’s very foolish to assume that

It’s all in my mind

We everyone

Lies,

About the truth

The world

Decides

Who

I am

And I want to live this way where,

Sadness

Kills

Happiness

I believe that,

The surroundings are controlling me

And I will never ever think that

The world is a beautiful place. “

I thought to myself as I stared out of the window into the dreary scene. The clouds looked like airy anvils drifting under the gleaming disc of the Sun. Faint splattering sounds came from outside, hissing as lightning struck the sky. I could see the curtain of rain on the other side of the window.

My mind was behaving like a dragon, flying horizons in few seconds, breathing fire and burning down the few remains of optimism.

I don’t think, I am the only one whose thoughts races towards darkness, hatred or pessimism when he/she is a victim of heart-break or solitude or pain. There are circumstances which forces us to take some decisions, maybe right maybe wrong. I think these decisions which we make solely depend on how we perceive those circumstances, how we see the things.

I am not giving any dose of wisdom, I am just telling to turn on your indicators and change the direction of your thinking, and you will eventually experience serendipity.

Even this dude, Shakespeare once quoted,” There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so”

This tells that the philosophical stuff which I am talking about now is being known since early 15^th century. So, why people are still becoming supreme judges of their life and sentencing themselves to misery? Why people start relating the lyrics to themselves whenever they listen to sad songs? Why there is ephemeral happiness? Why the world is so evil? Why Why Why?

My mind was whirling with the storm of thoughts. Just then, the pleasant, dewy petrichor of the post-rain caught my attention. I could see the iridescent sky.  The sky was getting cleared up and so were my thoughts. I realised how oblivious I was all these years of my life. If only I could have reversed my perspective from the beginning, I would certainly have changed my last twenty-years!

(Now read the first TWENTY lines from Bottom to Top)

Death destroys You?

I frowned as my mobile screen flashed ‘Game over’,  I  needed just one extra life to complete my game. Noticing at my sullen look, my friends snatched my mobile and advised me to get some fresh air and enjoy the surroundings.

We were strolling along the pavement of the liveliest street in the city-Marine Drive. It was a Saturday night, around midnight but still the noise of cars and taxis hooting, or of scooters  flying past was deafening. We sat down on a bench trying to figure out what to do next.

I was observing the scene of number of vehicles zooming past or crawling along when caught at traffic lights. In the hustle & bustle ,I saw an unusual, majestic vehicle approaching in the picture. Noticing it further , I gasped,” It’s a Vintage! Rolls-Royce Vintage!” That was a real blast from the past. The world around me suddenly came to a halt.

Let’s put few seconds back on the clock; Since early 1900s production of this car has been stopped along with other Fords and Fiats which were ubiquitous at that time. But instead of being completely wiped out and getting buried in timeline, this distinctive, peerless, exotic piece of metal lived. Maybe because it had some unique, uncommon character in it.

Like this uncommon man, R.K. Laxman, famous for his acerbic cartoons lampooning political figures. R.K. Laxman epitomized the true way to express satire- inclusive, unoffensive, bold, realistic and simplistic.His work spanning over six decades,put his best foot forward. He chronicled the fortunes and mannerisms of India in a witty ,sarcastic way.

Stepping outside the boundaries, Michele Ferrero was the richest and most popular man in Italy.He was the owner of global chocalate empire. The Chocolate Man created happiness also known as Nutella and Ferrero Rocher.  His hardwork, determination and innovation kept the chocolate-hungry- world alive and happy.

Parallely my ardour towards cars, make me think about this prominent Hollywood actor Paul Walker. Paul Walker was an American actor, who came into fame in movies like Varsity Blues, and became well known for his starring in Fast and Furious series. Though not much he have contributed selectively and significantly to the film industry,leaving behind many die hard fans.

He may have died now, but he is still remembered by his astounding movies. His co-star Vin Diesel named his baby Pauline, after Paul Walker and claims tha he still feels his presence today. Everytime I unwrap Ferrero Rocher, I thank that legend Michele Ferrero. Some of the R.K. Laxman’s cartoons out of 1960s and 1970s would be alive and meaningful if produced today without date. They were timeless. Though these people are dead now, they would still be alive in our memories.

Which brings me back to this Rolls Royce vintage which was charging out of the picture as the signal turned green. Though its technology have died a century before, it still creates lasting impressions on thousands of minds.

It's not about just coming on this road called “Life” and passing by; Its about coming here, leaving your mark as you pass , its about adding that extra life to your life .This is your last chance to make sure you live after you die. The GAME IS ON!

Time heals everything?

I woke up to my mom’s voice; she was shouting her lungs out with my name and lecturing me about importance of time. Not heeding to her I checked, the hour hand was already past 11. Accusing myself for this morning ‘pravachan’  ,I gathered myself up. It was just another weekend of summer, the sun was passionately shining bright, radiating happiness and illuminating people’s lives.

Shuffling through the newspapers, I came across the boldly printed headlines about Subrata Roy. There was an adjacent report on former PM Dr. Manmohan Singh. It seemed both of them were in hot water. Just then a gust of wind blew my newspaper, trying to gimmick the outside atmosphere was getting gloomy, the sky was slowly getting overcasted.

I sat down in a chair baffled and obscure about what was going on. Now assembling the boogies of the train of my thoughts, I contemplated  for a while…

Now let’s see, Subrata Roy is a noble person, in my perspective. But some people or investors to be precise won’t feel the same way about him. It is said that he have allegedly failed to repay billions of dollars to the investors after bonds Sahara sold to them turned out to be illegal. Now who would have seen that coming? Especially the man who was amongst the most powerful people in India. The founder and chairman of the largest private sector employer in India with more than one million employees and agents, with net worth of 680 billion rupees is struggling to repay the debts.The tycoon who was often photographed in the company of world leaders, Indian politicians and business moguls is spending time in solitude in Tihar jail.

 Let’s consider Manmohan Singh. He is well known for the performance he delivered as ‘the muted prime minister’. I would give the credits to the ‘puppet-master’ Sonia Gandhi for his performance or rather say coercion! Recently CBI has summoned him in court for coal scam.

Genuinely speaking Manmohan Singh is a very brilliant person. He has got outstanding academic record for standing throughout first in his class. He has won scholarship to go to Cambridge university and then succeeded to get pHD from Oxford university.He devoted his time religiously for the welfare of Indian society. Being most talented economist he was roped in by scavengers like Congressmen, who wounded him with their ghastly jaws , making him writhe in coal dust.

Now , I am a car enthusiast and have reverence for Jeremy Clarkson, who is doing turns in international news for getting suspended by BBC for fracas on the sets of Topgear. For those who are not aware of him much, Jeremy is an English broadcaster, journalist and writer who specializes in motoring especially for BBC. He is a recognized public personality, with 4.7 million followers on tweeter. Jeremy lures away his audience by his opionated but humorous tongue in cheek writing and presenting style. What does he get for making people happy and entertain them? A suspension letter of his career?

Well, scrutinizing all these three public figures they have something in common, they all are amongst the most powerful and influential people, who have served human society. For that now they have been over-casted by dark clouds.

Just then a lightening flashed spookily, thunders were already doing orchestra in the skies. The clouds bursted with bomb like water droplets. The “things” , only sunny and bright some minutes ago, were now dark and shadowed ; time takes toll on everything.

Now I comprehend why my mom was yelling to me about importance of time… it has power to change or rather say destroy anything, ANYTHING!