Mumbai attacked again…

The city of Mumbai was taken at ransom by bunch of terrorists on November 26, 2008. They took scores of innocent lives by firing indiscriminately at Chatrapathi Shivaji Terminus (CST or VT), Metro cinema, Cama hospital and taking people hostage at the Oberoi, the Taj and Nariman house (They say for any Islamic terrorist killing a Jewish is a sure way to heaven – what a crap) . 

Till I publish this blog, the gun battles were on at Taj and Nariman house.

The terrorists took some well known 5 star hotels killing many unarmed innocent people and took many people hostage there. Most of front office staff of Taj has been killed by these terrorists and many of foreign nationals were also been targeted. 

Me and my wife (Amitha) were worried for our close friend Sunayana as she works with JW Marriot. Early morning around 2.00 am on 27th, news channels reported of possible attack on Marriot and nearby Ramada. We tried to call her, on cell phone and landline. As expected the lines were jammed. Scrapped thru orkut, and till late next day we had no response. Finally around 4 in the evening, we were relieved to have a scrap from Sunayana, who was stuck in Marriot but was safe. We both could speak to her today and got an idea of how serious was the situation out there. Most of South Mumbai was either closed or was under curfew. Almost all of front office staff at Taj was shot dead. They were also soft on particular community people and were only asking for British and US passport holders (Often our leaders say terrorism has no religion, they need to think again).

Things have been done at a very systematic way with highly professional accuracy and coordination. They were highly trained and have complete idea of city’s landscape and the hotel layout where they took number of people hostage. The way terrorists have targeted top cops and encounter specialists, it seems there was a clear help from local underworld (May be D company and its vendetta on Vijay Salaskar and Hemant Karkare).   

I share some of horrific pictures of  Mumbai after the attack.

The so called concept of terrorism, where unarmed innocent people are targets, is cowardly and must be dealt with harsh punishable measures. These bunch of B*******, who really do not have guts to take on our army, come and either place bombs or fire bullets and run away, should be killed in public (most of them were killed like dogs in Mumbai). One who tries to attack Indians should be taught a lesson of life not to commit such mistake again.  

Our heart goes with people whose closed ones are stuck up in stalemate or missing. Our deep condolences to one who have lost their lives and we salute those brave soldiers who laid their lives to protect us.

Some channels like TIMES NOW, NDTV and CNN-IBN were sensitive in covering the entire events. But there were some channels like 9X to whom the death of ATS chief was dramatic event. The narration was so hopeless and insensitive, we really felt as some idiot was on air and talking some bullsh** (One news reader from 9X used ‘over there’ almost 50 times in 10 min).   I think beyond thinking of TRPs they also need to think that they are Indians first.

Finally, we tend to forget the things soon, and as usual politicians start taking advantage and credit of the situation and play some vote bank politics.

May be next time when a software company is taken hostage or entire airport…

May be they blow up the train or some busy mall on a weekend. And again politicians start blaming some other country to hide their inability to protect us….

It’s time that people in government are made accountable and asked for the loss of so many innocent lives. 

India has been bleeding from centuries and we really don’t know how long this will continue. How many more innocent people have to lay their lives before we get up and strike back?

Immobile and Resting

 

Definition of an accident: It’s an unplanned even causing physical and financial damage.

Accidents are quite unpleasant as well. They leave lots of bad memories.

It happened last Thursday mid night, when I slipped and fell while parking my bike inside. My left shoulder bone got dislocated. (Again it got to its original position soon). I had to go through horrible pain for almost one hour. X ray showed clear dislocation. Docs were planning for local anesthesia to move the bone manually to the original location. But luckily (or accidentally again) it moved back to the original position. Thanks to Ams, who provided all the mental strength and Abhya, who dropped in at right time to help us.  And Ams had a lifetime adventure adventure on that night.

Doc advised to have a shoulder sling for 4 weeks and take rest.

No to bike riding during this period… No heavy work (That anyway I don’t do)…

Now, confined to house… Four weeks, have to sit with sling, I’m Immobile and Resting. (May be I needed one)

I now plan to finish half of Jack Welch book, finish some office work from home and simply rest. 

Listen to good music, watch good movies and surf internet.

Complete leisure?  (We used to say MCA)

Hope so.

Put PEOPLE first…

Some time back, I got a forward from one of my friends. It was about frequent job hopping. Why do people change jobs quite often? (This is very true with my case as well…)

Infosys mentor Narayan Murthy says People don’t work for the company, they work for their managers.

So true… though the company may be good, and has maintained strong principles and work ethics. But if the managers under whom we work are not good, then perhaps the company has started to reach a dead end.

I should put my own example here. When my manger in first company changed, we had great expectations from new manager. But it took us a very little time to make out that he is an autocratic leader. To share few examples/instances…. The manager called one of my colleagues prior to his marriage vacation and threatened him to report to duty right away else lose the job… In a similer fashion, he did the same with one more colleague … He used to speak to people as if it’s still British era… Treating his subordinates like slaves… 

Though he was good with our team, but who knows… Once we are done with our job, he may surely give same kind of treatment to us as well.  

 Most of the people left organization in a short time… Leaving it dry, without experienced folks.
I have met loads of such people in my career, who have been very arrogant and hopeless in every single term, whether it is related to work or basic behavioral issue with subordinates. Most of such managers are technically dumb too… They have climbed up the ladder simply because of some godfathers or by ‘bucketing’  superiors. (This is one more management technique, which is not taught in any of the management schools…)

But one thing which is very common in all these people is “They don’t survive on long run” …

Among the managers I have mentioned above, most of them have been thrown out of the organization or will be asked to leave soon…

 One common thing here in engineering service industry is Middle level management takes everyone for a ride in top management…

For success of any organization it’s important that it treats its employees (people) well… These simple gestures make them to develop a bonding and belongingness to the organization… Hence they treat their customers (implies organization’s customer) well.. It’s very important to connect between an employee’s goals to the organization’s vision…  Instead of simply concentrating on profit margin or gross margin…

Any organization’s strength are its people… Its work force… They are the real face… and it’s very important to put them first… Putting people first…

I leave here with link to Robin Sharma podcast about importance of putting people first…

http://www.esnips.com/doc/7b77403b-065d-47f7-980a-c815b6ae0ce1/PutPeopleFirst

“Help people to realize their dream, they gonna help you to get your goals… Link the paycheck to purpose…”

“Show gratitude to your employees…”

“Leadership is about consistency around the fundamentals…”

Have a great day…

Cheers…

Nothing fails like SUCCESS…

 

Whenever we felt like going for dinner outside over weekend, the nearest place is to some restaurant in and around West of Chord road or somewhere near Vijaynagar in Bangalore. The only logic is, it will be nearer for us to reach home and we can spend less time in commuting and quality time together.

 

 

Me and my wife went to a restaurant called Madura. The service around here was really horrible, worth sharing…

We needed to shout for a single request. Let it be a glass of warm water or ice cubes.. The food was not at its best, as it used to be…

 

 

The waiters attitude was as if people were having dinner for charity…

 

 

Every request was met with some or the other kind of arrogance…

 

 

Not only with us, but with all customers present there.. Always hurrying up for Main course…


Weekend dinner is supposed to be a relaxing time with family.. Lots of chats, laughter and fun.. Spending quality time with friends n family… But thanks to Madura and its polite service, they had spoiled almost every family’s evening out there..


Service was … Bad… Bad… Bad… WHY….?  

Now restaurant has Customers… Restaurant has got a Name around there … Restaurant is in profit…

And because they are doing so well, they’ve taken the lines out front for granted… and

 

Guess what? It’s the beginning of their end…

Nothing fails like SUCCESS…

“THE MORE SUCCESSFUL YOU AND YOUR ORGANISATION BECOME, THE MORE HUMBLE AND DEVOTED TO YOUR CUSTOMER YOU NEED TO BE..”

The more committed to efficiency and relentless improvement you need to be.. The faster you need to play. The more value you need to add… Because the moment you stop doing the very things that got you to the top of the mountain is the very moment you begin the slide down to the valley…

With due credits to My wife Amitha 
 Quotes courtesy Greatness Guide

Coincidence or something else…

 

 

Trin…. Trin…. Trin…. Trin….

 

Alarm bursts cracking that peaceful silence in the morning… (I’m quite sure there must be some souls who will surely curse me for that…)

 

God… Its 4.30 in the morning and it feels as if I slept some 10-15 min ago. But well it’s been 6 hours I slept and its time to get up…

Put on the geyser and have a small nap again… May be another 10 minutes or so…

It’s 4.45 and time to get into shower… Though standing under shower and getting my hair wet causes me sneezing, I am lazy enough to pour water in bucket and take bath…

 

5.30 is a pickup time for me… If I go on time, the cab fella makes me wait… For minimum of 10 minutes. So that makes 5.40 as default pick up time…

 

But sometimes if I get late and reach even by 5.35, he will be waiting there (its 200% true)… And with a sense of achievement he will comment (taunt is the right word) on me “Sir, I have been waiting since 10 min, thought of having tea in case u come early…”

  

It’s not only our cab fellow Manju, but in most of cases… Like when we want certain things happen in some way… They happen exactly opposite… I still don’t understand is it by meager coincidence or something else…

 

To share a few… 

  

I want to eat Puri in food court after a real long time… and guess what… That day there will be shortage of Puris…

 

I am supposed to pick up a close friend and his wife, who are coming first time to our home… and they are waiting near the land mark I told … Guess what… I AM NOT GETTING THE KEY OF KINETIC HONDA…. (What a heck… sorry Abhs… it really happened…)

 

I book two movie tickets in fame, just to make it a perfect evening on my birthday with Ams… We are going for a multiplex after a real long time. But, we get stuck in rain. Spoiling the entire evening… (Ams, I promise you wont curse rain next time….) 

 

I want to call a friend whom it’s been a really long time I have spoken to… And to my surprise he calls me on same day… just to tell “Look, I remember u and u don’t have simple courtesy to call me occasionally also …” (Sorry for everyone who are close to me.. Prashya, Babya, Goods, Bassu.. I really wanted to call… but again is it a mere coincidence or …?)

 

And many many more incidents I can recollect…

 

But again… Is it just a coincidence or it’s same happens same way with everyone… I really need to check out…

 

I will now try to exactly opposite to what I think and see… Let me observe and tell you if it happens the way I want it to happen…

 

8.30 am…. Time to catch with my colleagues for some chit chat about weekend that’s gone by at an ideal place… cafeteria…

 

Have a great week ahead…

 

 

Gandhi Smiles….

 

Gandhian techniques based on principles of M.K. Gandhi. These are derived from the inspiration, vision and life work of Gandhi. Gandhism also permeates into the realm of the individual human being, non-political and non-social.

 

Popular Gandhian techniques include Satyagraha, Ahimsa, swadeshi and fasting…. 

 

Speaking about globalization of Gandhism…

 

Gandhi’s deep commitment and disciplined belief in non-violent civil disobedience as a way to oppose tyranny, oppression and injustice has inspired many subsequent political figures, including Martin Luther King Jr. (and may be Obama in future, who also draws inspirations from King Jr.)  of the United States, Julius Nyerere of Tanzania, Nelson Mandela and Steve Biko of South Africa, Lech Wałęsa of Poland and Aung San Suu Kyi of Myanmar. By and large all have had success and leaders like Suu Kyi have fair amount of influence on the local government in Myanmar.

 

 

Films on Gandhi have been instrumental in spreading awareness about Gandhism.  

 

Oscar winning director Richard Attenborough’s dream project presented Gandhi to the world and to India on Silver screen.

 

Coming back to India…

 

Many movies have been made on Gandhi in India. But not many have had the appeal for the masses. Recently Lage Raho Munnabhai popularized the concept of Gandhism and introduced Gandhigiri to young Indian Generation. It inspired many to take the way of non violence to fight against the injustice.

 

Kudos to Rajkumar Hirani and Sanjay Dutt …

 

The concept of GRAM SWARAAJ has been adopted in unreleased or soon to be released Kannada movie ‘Gandhi Smiles’.  Directed by debutant Krish Joshi and deals with the above issue in a nice dramatized way. Without getting into details of the plot (which even I’m not fully aware of…), I felt the concept and the adaption of the subject is quite interesting.

 

Interacting with Mr. Krish Joshi was an interesting and memorable experience for me, as I got to know many things about film making. The amount of work and professional approach Mr. Joshi adopted is worth mentioning here. Also in the era when there are more commercial and stereotype movies in Kannada, Krish’s idea of making a different genre movie is appreciable apart from his sincerity for producer’s money.

 

Let’s wish ‘Gandhi Smiles’ good luck and it makes a mark in Kannada film industry. ….

 

Cheers

Dinesh

The Apple…

 

A-P-P-L-E….

 

A-P-P-L-E…. responsible for Adam and Eve to commit the first sin…

 

A-P-P-L-E…. inspired Isaac Newton to discover gravity…

 

A-P-P-L-E…. helped Robert Langdon to discover the location of Holy Grail in Da Vinci code…

 

One A-P-P-L-E…. per day keeps doctor away… (In case Hubby/Wife is a doc and Wife/hubby eats one A-P-P-L-E per day, then….)

 

There are so many things about A-P-P-L-E….

 

We too have had an important connection to it.

(WE – Dinnya, Sammya, Vinnya, Shailya, Sachya, Shivya n Shirya…)

 

Year 1996 to 2000… During which We studied engineering.

 

Classes used to start sharply at 8 am in the morning as per time table. But most of the times our lecturers get confused with the timings and arrive late. (With due respect sirs, lets accept this fact…) After all they too are human beings.

 

How to pass this time… 8.00 to 8.30 am … So best thing is, to sit under tree and seriously discuss about current affairs(Yes, U thought it right.. AFFAIRS) in college.

 

Many of our batch mates from Electronics and computer science used to ask us “Why do u guys sit under the trees, where as u have good locations like canteen?”

 

Answer: “Folks, we are waiting for the apple to fall on someone’s head here… ”

 

Some used to understand… some simply think these people are interested in watching chicks from their branches… May be that was also one of the reasons prompted them to ask us … Obviously some of THEIR people (Girls to be straight) might have got disturbed/irritated/offended with laud laughs or some  other thing. Anyways we never used to care about what others think at that point of time.

 

Apart our HOD, who used to pass by around same time… again an unpleasant look…

 

But never commented till we were out of college…

 

Finally our respected lecturer used to arrive… As fresh as he is just out of bed… “Good morning sir…”

One more unpleasant look. Thinking HOD might have noticed these USELESS fellows sitting here and got to know lecturer is late again.

 

Time to move into class… else we miss the ATTENDENCE… (Lecture is secondary and anyway who used to understand it… except few…)

 

Like this our day used to begin in the college… We waited for four years… One day the A-P-P-L-E will fall… and who knows someone may be inspired like Newton.

 

But NO…

 

Finally, non of us could become Newton as that A-P-P-L-E, which inspired Newton, did fail to inspire us.

 

Finally, why did A-P-P-L-E did not fall on any of us…? (Kind of RCA… Root Cause Analysis)

 

BECAUSE THERE WAS NO APPLE TREE IN THE CAMPUS

 

Have a Great day…

AN ABNORMAL MORNING….

A lovely wednesday morning…

Its 6.30 am and there is loads of fog all around. Slightly cold… Drop vehicles speeding away on road with their headlights on… Sipping hot tea with cold wind blowing makes it an unique experience… Empty roads on the way to  my office, which are usually very busy with dust and full of smoke… Pure ozone rich air, for which we may have to pay in future!!! 

No noise making Trucks and buses… Night shift cabs heading towards their respective destinations with sleepy fellas in … A beautiful morning in Bangalore…  Sun is all set to breach in and couple of hours later all will be as usual… I should say city comes back to normal which now seems ABNORMAL … 😉

Smiling security person in office reception… Still a small percentage of sleep in his eyes… But he never forgets to wish ” Good morning saab…” Again that broad smile… I wish him back, swipe my card mechanically and move towards my cubical…

Another day at office has begun… Time to check mails and get settled to the routine… Well, its 6.46 am and I got first forward of the day with my colleague promptly doing his KARMA by hitting that forward button without changing the signature…  but with a Lovely message

” IF A DROP OF WATER FALLS IN THE LAKE, IT HAS NO IDENTITY… BUT, IF IT FALLS INTO THE ROSE IT WILL SHINE… SO CHOOSE THE PLACE WHERE YOU WANT TO FALL…”

And yeah importantly… two more days for weekend… Isn’t that cool… ?

 HAVE A LOVELY DAY AHEAD… 🙂

ONE SHOULD LEARN TO HANDLE SUCCESS….

We were watching Fashion last weekend. Overall a good movie I felt, but slightly lengthy. A typical Madhur Bhandarkar stuff… Loads of reality on glam clad fashion world. Cool performance by most of the cast …

FASHION has it all… Glam, Sex, Drugs, Arrogance, Show off, so on and so forth…  MB talks mostly on various technical aspects of fashion industry as well… Like show stopper, Ramp, back stage stuff etc…  And yeah… there is something to learn…

 

   “ONE SHOULD LEARN TO HANDLE SUCCESS…”

 … Movie shows fall of a famous model (Kangna) and rise of another upcoming modeling aspirant from a small town (Priyanka)… The way Kangna fails to handle failure, Priyanka fails to handle success… And so, as expected her downfall begins… 

 

I recollect a dialogue from the movie Spiderman… When Ben Parker tells Spiderman (Peter Parker) …

 

  “WITH GREAT POWER, COMES GREAT RESPONSIBILITY…”

 

I should put in another way… the moment we have money, our attitude changes… Not everyone, but with most of people I have come across… The way one speaks changes… oh man, I have everything… A cool job, car, flat/house, wife/husbamd and everything that one should have…

 

MONEY GIVES THAT ULTIMATE SENSE OF POWER…

 

But I’m afraid its not real one… And in that process, we lose many other important connections of life… Relations…They say everything here in this world is temporary and the real thing is how many people come to attend our funeral…  PEOPLE are important … RELATIONS which last in tough times are important…

 

 

 

The week that was….

A lazy sunday morning. Getting up after 10 AM is become a habit, though I am planning for morning walk on weekends from years.. ;-)… Especially after listening Robin sharma’s ‘wake up early.. Life is short’ podcast…  But… well, I still have to make up my mind, first thing is should stop watching late night TV shows or surfing to get up early…

Watching India bowling with out Kumble in the last test in Nagpur… JUMBO.. Yeah, he is no more part of Indian team. After eventful 18 years to Indian and world cricket with 600 plus wickets in tests, he bid adieu. Best thing we see in Kumble is, he quit cricket at right time. I recollect a quote from my CPO Pallabh in my previous organisation Scandent Solutions (now its Cambridge solutions) that….

 “one should quit an organisation when he/she is at peak of his career and there is nothing else left out to achieve.  Because that hampers one’s growth has he/she has nothing else to achieve in the same organization.” 

 Correlating, perhaps Kumble has touched every stone he wanted to touch in Test and One day cricket… Let it be 6 for 12 in Hero cup at Eden Gardens, A century at Lords or 10 wicket haul at Kotla I think there is nothing left for Jumbo to achieve…

After all that he has given to the Indian Cricket, now its time for his family and friends…. Wishing him all the very best and have a great life ahead …

Apart.. Obama is the first non white President for US and all the world is going ga ga over his charisma… (Except Russia and Italian Prime Minister… Well, I dont want to elaborate on that Tanni issue…)  Well, one more rather funny incident is when Obama was addressing a rally soon after becoming President elect, our Pranoy Roy had tears in his eyes as he claimed on Live TV show.. Oh.. Com’on Mr. Roy.. We had bomb blasts in Jaipur, Ahemadabad or Even in Assam… U never claimed so.. But, now… And Phlzzzz… Dont compare Obama to Martin Luther king … As rightly said by Shashi Taroor in the same show,  Obama is the one who have been brought up in Post racial multi cultural America… and Martin Luther King was fighting to get human rights to slave workers from Africa in conservative racial US…

Anyways.. The discussions are endless… Got to see how he (Obama) faces recession.. and brings United States out of this big mess which is ofcourse created by them only.. One more hot topic to write … Sometime later… I would love to leave with a podcast by Robin Sharma… Have a great week ahead… 

http://www.esnips.com/doc/a6dc3aae-9c59-489f-8498-8a5f92b6036d/Life_Is_Short_Get_Up_Early

CheerssZZZ….. Dinesh…