G.O.D

Rediff has an interesting article on the idiosyncrasies of India Inc. Here.

A similar article had come some time back that tracked that a significant chunk of the scientist community had belief in God. Here.

There has been a lot of heated discussion between the theory of natural selection and intelligent design and both of these theory don't have any proof. So for the time being they are only hypothesis. After all no body has seen God till now and neither has somebody lived through ages to see natural selection in action and vouch for it. Therefore it is fruitless to talk about whether god exists or not. The only question I would like to put across is, does having faith in a power beyond imagination have any repercussions on the conduct of human being in general and scientists & business men in particular?
To answer this question let me take two scientists who are equal in every respect except for their belief in god. One is religious (test) and the other is an atheist (control). Will one's career graph be better over the other? GOD will definitely not come and tell the secrets of nature in the ears of our religious guy. And since both of our gentlemen are scientists we can assume that the have equal scientific temperament. The only thing that I see might differ in the life of the two gentlemen is of having patience at work! (Research is definitely more about brains but is also about the level of persistence on can show in the face of obstacles.) Under the trying situation when years of your work have left you with nothing but written crap, the hope of some supernatural being seeing you will give the hope to persist. The hope to take the one extra step. As one of my professor used to say 'People just give in when they are at the door step of success!'

The same thing I believe goes with the businessmen. Optimism and persistence are the key to survival in any cut throat business. And it is belief that a businessman reposes in God that gives him the strength to get up every morning.
But just having faith in God and doing nothing else will not make you successful. If that had been the case India would have been the most prosperous nation given the bounty of hermits that we have. The optimism that comes to a spiritual person cannot compensate for hard work. It can only act as an adjuvant.

India Gyrating!

I normally don't watch Hindi movies. But have to watch them sometimes to give company to friends or too many people have suggested me. At my college, I had lots of movies at my disposal and limited time. By watching Hindi and English movies I have developed a liking for the Hollywood movies and a sort of disdain for Indian Film Industry(IFI). It seemed to me that all that IFI can dole out is meaningless crap that has little relation to the actual India that people live in. There is no shred of reality in the movie that the Indian audience can connect to. Only songs to fill in the sequence of drama by a few people who call themselves actors. The movies seem to be made for the NRIs who expect to see lush green/yellow mustard fields in the background with the actors lip-syncing in the front. Another segment of Indian movies seem to focused on groups who are in a sad state because of the BAN on Porn Industry in India. Therefore, the directors often attempt to make movies and try to test the line for the censor board.
But recently in the last 2 years a lot of new movies have come in which have given me hope that something is changing the mindset of people who are running the show. The movies that I have seen in the last 1.5-2 years seem to capture the mood of the current generation (at least myself!) and provide meaningful content instead of some song and dance sequence. I see a marked attempt by this new breed of directors to test new waters instead of sticking to the old formula of movie making. The best thing that I appreciate about movies is that every time I watch the same movie I get to see something new in the same frame, some thing that makes me think that how meticulous the people must have been who were responsible for it.
Take for example the latest movie I have developed an appreciation for "Khosla ka Ghosla". The movie doesn't have any big actors or people backing it, but it hovers around a concept that can happen with any middle class family. The first scene when Khurana comes in and talks to Khosla is a masterstroke of genius, and I am all for it. The scene where Omi comes in with his cane is some thing that looks very real. On seeing that movie, I started wondering how would I react if something like that happened to me. Now, how many movies can actually do that to me? make me think like that? I would definitely give 160 bucks for watching the movie.
The beauty of these new age movies is that the new thing not just shows in acting and plot but comes about in every facet of the movie. Today I was watching the Beedi song from Omkara. In the dance sequence one of the steps was taken from the way farmers cut paddy from the fields. Seeing that sequence I was just amazed and wondered how much thought must have gone to make that sequence.
Kudos to IFI and I want more of it.

Quis custodiet ipsoscustodes ?

Recently I have shifted my home to Gurgaon, a satellite city close to the capital. The place is nice and has some problems of absence of public transport system. When I arrived at Gurgaon, we stayed at a company guest house which is in sector 14. A place called Defence Colony is very close by. Myself with other new joinees would go for evening walks across the colony and marvel at the houses, estimating their values and calculating the number of years it would take to own such a house. (Of course the number of years was more than the average life expectancy at birth in India which is around 65 years and therefore beyond our reach). Looking at those houses I pondered over choice of career. Monetary benefits has been the sole guiding principle for my career choice and for this reason I had opted for a engineering. But now as I stood before those huge monuments of sucess I wondered whether the decision was right. I wondered where I went wrong. As far as I knew, the army officers are paid a pittiance, and that's why only three groups of people choose to join the army:

1. People who want to do something for their country.
2. People who have to maintain a family legacy.
3. People who have no where else to go.

Still I wondered where does all the money come from. There have been cases of ketchup colonel and coffin scam within the army, but with so many bunglows around I kept wondering where all the money comes from there. Then one day a friend of mine made the disclosure of the unaccounted wealth. The process of recruitment in the officer cadre is very strict but the soldiers are taken through recruitment drives conducted by the army. Also the criteria for recruitment in case of soldiers is not very clearly defined. Now, this loophole is used by our 'respectable' officers for minting money. Bringing in their discretion, they charge 1-2 lakh upwards for every soldier recruited.
On hearing his narration about the bravery and integrity levels in the army, my respect for the uniform has vanished in thin air. Whenever I cross those streets lined with sprawling bunglows, I remeber the question posed by Dan Brown in his novel Digital Fortress "Who will guard the guards?"

Am I a Coward??

I have been pondering on this question for so long, but answer does'nt seem to come. I guess sometime or the other everyone has to confront these questions. It's just that my time for this question came early. Bravery, I guess is reflected in the decisions that we take in our life time. Bravery may seem very close risk taking ability, but I guess there is a strong difference. Dictionary.com says that bravery is a show of courage were courage means "The state or quality of mind or spirit that enables one to face danger, fear, or vicissitudes with self-possession, confidence, and resolution." Brave are those people who take actions when danger is staring at their faces. On the other hand risk-taking is just a opportunistic (not necessarily unethical) mindset. The risk-takers, knowingly will never encounter danger. Mind you, both these qualities are not mutually exclusive.
But apart from the distinction made between bravery and risk-taking how can one quantify bravery? I guess it can be done only through looking at the decisions of the concerned person and the circumstances in which the decisions were made. But even decisions have a mixed background. Some decisions taken by us are totally impulsive in nature. Such decisions have to arrived at in split second time. And then there are decisions, which get a lot of time to think..... to ponder, to sleep over it. The second category of decisions obviously show your colour. But it also has reason mixed with it. So can we, use such decisions to quntify bravery? Or , we should use the parameter of impulsive decisions as our criteria? Implusive decisions have little or no reson attached with it.(where do u get the time to think in half a sec?) But in the same half sec, things like prejudice, taste etc. have a overbearing influence in one's decision making?
If anyone can figure out how you classify yourself as brave or coward please let me know? I would like to know myself. And I am totally ready to accept myself as a coward if I am so. And if I find myself to be brave I will happily award myself the bravery certificate by Dr. Greenfingers.

Welcome

Welcome!
Suswagatam!
So many different ways to convey the same feeling. But do they convey the same feeling? I don't think so. Most of the time people confuse themselves and their writings by refering to the thesauras in search of a better word or a replacement. But each word has its own individuality. Its own meaning. The feeling that each word evokes in the mind of the reader will always be different. The fact that two different words exist ('happy' and 'ecstatic') mean that they call for different (however close) feeling to come up in the mind of readers.
Welcome and Suswagatam are definately different.
Welcome to my blog!