Communists again

I don't know what it is between me and communists but somehow I always find something in the press that I find interesting about them. May be I just like them too much, Nah...

Here is an interesting piece of news. Basically a communist trade union leader M. K. Pandhe(who probably is instrumental in destroying economies of couple of states single handedly) thinks that if Samajavadi Party supports nuclear deal then it will lose the support of muslims.

Mulayam will have to think twice before supporting the deal as an overwhelming majority of Muslims are not in favour of the deal. Mulayam's support is much more among Muslim masses,

I fail to understand the point of Mr. Pandhe, after India announced the deal, even pakistan wanted it from US. If pakistan signs, will it not offend muslims. What muslims have got to do with the nuclear energy. I just don't get these communists.

Oil and protests

So every political party that can claim to be not in government is protesting the oil price hike. At times it is resulting in comedy. Here is an hilarious story.

chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan and his cabinet decided to go to work on bicycles in the afternoon.
But the CM's rally soon fizzled out with most ministers being either pushed by their bodyguards or giving up in favour of their official cars.

At 3.30pm, Chauhan and his ministers were on their way. The initial half kilometre was perfect. Soon water resources minister Anup Mishra could not keep up. More than 20kg overweight, he preferred being pushed on his bicycle by his bodyguards till the rally reached the road to Raj Bhavan , which is basically a steep climb. Here, most ministers gave up, including Mishra.

What can I say, Ha Ha..

Mystry of Oil in India

I don't understand much about oil business so I am not able to understand when different parties come up with different logic on why the price of petrol should be raised and why it should not be raised. After googling, here is some data that I found.

	Barrel	Gallons	Litres	Percentage of products	Cost per litre
Crude	1.00	44.60	168.83		30.80
Gasoline		19.40	73.44	43.50%	13.40
Diesel		7.80	29.53	17.49%	5.39
Heating Oil		2.70	10.22	6.05%	1.86
Heavy Fuel Oil		1.70	6.44	3.81%	1.17
Jet Fuel		4.10	15.52	9.19%	2.83
LPG		1.50	5.68	3.36%	1.04
Other Products		7.40	28.01	16.59%	5.11
Processing Gain		2.60	9.84	5.83%	1.80

So it seems every barrel (42 gallons) of crude produces different quantities of actual products like petrol and diesel. Now taking following numbers as indicative.

Barrel	42	Gallons
Gallon	3.78541178	Litre
USD	40	INR
Price	130	USD/Barrel

If one looks at numbers, for producing one liter of petrol, the raw material component only costs Rs. 13.40 at the current crude prices.

Now assuming that other components have only marginally increased and the primary factor in the increase of petrol is the price of crude, the current prices just don't make sense. Because the even if the price of crude has trebled, it is still capped at Rs. 13.40.

I am trying to get other data like the refining cost, marketing cost, taxes etc to make sense of Rs. 50+ of petrol price but the data is not very readily available.

If anybody has the data, give me and I will further do number crunching

Mother of all suck ups

So finally blogs outed the patent number 20080122796 filed by Apple which looks like a patent that encapsulates many things that are part of iPhone. The patent itself did not really surprise me, what really surprise me was the list of inventors that are part of this patent. The patent consisted of 20 inventors right upto steve jobs as the first inventor.

Now my mind thinks that this is just an example of of the biggest suck up in the history of patenting. Some (may be a couple of) engineer(s) invented something and then just to schmooze their boss, added his name and he added his bosses name and then it just traveled right up to CEO. It would be interesting to look at apple organization structure and see how are all these inventors arranged.

Or it could be just the places that I have worked and I could be completely wrong.

The third dimension

So this is really a story out of sci-fi story books. Almost unbelievable. When a wife went to file a complaint against her "in-laws", she realized that she has already divorced her husband 10 years back. Almost sounds like one of those movies where one can go back in time and change the present as one knows it. It would have been great if that was true, in reality it is again the corruption at work.

Virender Verma and Meena got the shock of their lives when a local court recently stated that the happily-together couple got a 'divorce' 10 years ago.

Married in 1989 and parents of two children, the two came to know about their separation on May 26. The couple accused Virender's advocate brother for forging their divorce documents.

Apparently all this happened because the wife filed the complain under domestic violence act so they just proved that this is not domestic violence because she was not even married anymore for last 10 years.

You can't help idiots

Many horrible things that happen in India are blamed on illiteracy prevailing. But sometime one feels that that these happen because some people are just idiots. See this news item. Here is a couple who is doing these bizarre things.

A British couple, who travelled to India for fertility treatment, abandoned their twin babies in the UK because they wanted a male child.

The mother aged 59 and father, 72, conceived in India with fertility treatment and dumped their twin babies in a British hospital after finding out they were girls.

Now somebody please tell me, what will you blame this on. To top it off they want to do it again.

The report said the husband also wanted to know how soon it would be before his wife was fit enough to fly out again for further IVF in the hope of getting a boy to continue the family name.

Why do they want to continue the family name that they themselves are actively working to destroy.

India's Oil Crisis

Every country in the world is facing oil crisis. In India is is particular severe because it is has become unnecessary political tool in the hands of communists. I think the problem can be solved and it is really not as severe as it has been made out to be. I did some calculation and I believe there is a small group of "poor" people that probably need to be subsidized while others are unnecessarily reaping the benefit of this subsidy.

Diesel is subsidized more than petrol in India while all the Mercedes and many other brands of luxury cars run on diesel. I think this needs to be stopped right away. Also anybody who can afford a luxury car or a luxury taxi needs to pay for real fuel charges and in case of luxury taxi services these charges need to be passed on to end customers.

So here is my plan. The fuel prices should be set at realistically market price levels and specific mechanisms should be designed to provide subsidy to needy sections. For example, farmers running tractors (not the guy using tractor to pull equipment on airport) can have a set quota of diesel that is subsidized on a daily basis. Similarly assuming that auto rickshaws may be used by poorer sections of society, direct subsidy can be given to these. This can be administered through automated systems like credit/debit cards.

Better still, everybody who wants discounted fuel should be asked to get a PAN card (this seems to be most systematic identification system that we seem to have today) irrespective of them filing returns. Once you use subsidized fuel, you should not be allowed to purchase a car. The logic being that if you can afford the car, you better afford the fuel.

If the so called middle class wants to vote the government out of power, so be it. They have to pay for what they use. Currently, just because this section is capable of making more noise, they are heard about many sections of society which are more needy. I did not hear so much noise even when thousands of farmers were committing sucides.

Karnataka Elections and role of BSP

So the election results for Karnataka assembly were kind of as predicted as well as surprising. BJP finally got almost a majority and they probably would peacefully run a government for next five years. But most of the analysts on TV were (without looking at the data) saying that congress lost because of BSP. So I thought that let me see if the data supports that fact. Here is a table of constituencies where congress's loss margin was less than the vote that BSP got. For simplicity I am assuming that if BSP was not the spoilsport and all the vote would have gone to congress they would have won. Here is the data

S No.	Constituency No	Constituency Name	Votes to Congress	Votes polled to BSP	Votes of Winner	Victory Margin
1	32	Indi	28885	7840	29456	571
2	35	Jevargi	46461	2266	46531	70
3	46	Aland	36689	14405	42473	5784
4	71	Dharwad	34694	1302	35417	723
5	78	Kumta	30772	1819	30792	20
6	81	Yellapur	36624	3278	39109	2485
7	98	Challakere	42302	3938	42591	289
8	109	Channagiri	38533	1372	39526	993
9	121	Kapu	44994	1109	45961	967
10	123	Sringeri	41396	4758	43646	2250
11	124	Mudigere	26084	11724	34579	8495
12	129	Tiptur	39168	8021	46034	6866
13	138	Madhugiri	51408	769	51971	563
14	153	Yeshvanthapura	56561	1331	57643	1082
15	206	Puttur	45180	2553	46605	1425

So there seems to be some merit to the logic that there is a significant number of seats that could have gone the congress way if all the vote that BSP got would have got transferred to congress. But this is only half the story. So I collected the same data for BJP and here are the results.

S No.	Constituency No	Constituency Name	Votes to BJP	Votes polled to BSP	Votes of Winner	Victory Margin
1	5	Kudachi	28715	1910	29481	766
2	18	Ramdurg	48862	1187	49246	384
3	26	Muddebihal	21662	14286	24065	2403
4	49	Bidar South	30783	21907	32054	1271
5	50	Bidar	20561	30627	33557	12996
6	53	Raichur Rural	29097	8499	34432	5335
7	75	Kalghatgi	38091	14992	49733	11642
8	78	Kumta	30201	1819	30792	591
9	103	Jagalur	35873	6482	38664	2791
10	205	Bantval	60309	1396	61560	1251
11	214	Nanjangud	42159	4513	42867	708
12	222	Kollegal	25586	25505	37384	11798
13	223	Chamarajanagar	39405	8866	42017	2612
14	224	Gundlupet	62621	7677	64824	2203

And the result and the damage is very similar, Now one can not really make a call on whom does BSP vote go to if the BSP was not contesting the election and I would think that it is more likely to get transferred in the ratio of the votes that were otherwise polled to each of the parties. A similar analysis for JDS also shows following

S No.	Constituency No	Constituency Name	Votes to BJP	Votes polled to BSP	Votes of Winner	Victory Margin
1	26	Muddebihal	14739	14286	24065	9326
2	53	Raichur Rural	32555	8499	34432	1877
3	112	Bhadravati	52770	2532	53257	487
4	127	Kadur	36000	4078	39411	3411
5	143	Chintamani	56857	1419	58103	1246
6	192	Krishnarajpet	45500	10218	48556	3056
7	210	Piriyapatna	37574	7814	38453	879
8	222	Kollegal	25286	25505	37384	12098

Another eight such constituencies. Now in each of these datasets the party in question (i.e. Congress, BJP, BSP) is not necessarily the second party, in some cases it may be third.

One thing is certain, BSP got significant percentage of votes in certain seats and definitely impacted the result of election but I would not really believe that it has impacted one party more than the other.

Banks and killing machine (again)

Back in 2007 I blogged about how banks have turned themselves into killing machines. It seems they have not really learnt. See here. This is what courts have to say.

We deem it appropriate to remind the banks and other financial institutions that we live in a civilised country and are governed by the rule of law," a bench comprising Justices Tarun Chatterjee and Dalveer Bhandari said.

Maybe they really need to be punished before they will learn, just the threats of punishment are not enough.

Manohar Dairy, Bhopal

After a gap of around 5 years I went back to Manohar Dairy restaurant in Bhopal. The place has been spruced up and the food quality is still as impeccable as before.

The restaurant is near Bhopal Railway station and I have always found North Indian snacks really good there. Things like Chole Bhature, Samosa, Alu Tikki etc. are really good. After reaching there after such a long time I realized that one does not really need a thousand rupees to have a decent meal.

त� सुबह सुबह म�� ��व� पर समा�ार द�� रहा ह�� �र ए� २४ ���� पर समा�ार प�श �रन� वाल� ��नल पर यह मु�्य समा�ार प�श ह�ता ह�

�मिष�� �र एश्वर्या ब�ल�वुड �� सबस� ह�� �पल बन �य� ह��।

�ब म�र� समझ म�� यह नह�� �त ह� �ि यह ��व� समा�ार वाल� �्या थर्माम��र ल� �र ��म रह� थ� �्या।

The dumb mainstream media again

So I am watching the television and one of the 24hrs news channel announces

Abhishek and aishwarya have become bollywood's hottest couple

No I don't understand who measured the temperature of this couple?

China mounts cyber attacks on Indian sites

So china is doing cyber attacks on Indian sites. Now a days almost every country is doing that. That seems to be part of their geo political strategy.

According to senior government officials, these attacks are not isolated incidents of something so generic or basic as "hacking" â?? they are far more sophisticated and complete â?? and there is a method behind the madness.

Publicly, senior government officials, when questioned, take refuge under the argument that "hacking" is a routine activity and happens from many areas around the world. But privately, they acknowledge that the cyber warfare threat from China is more real than from other countries.

The core of the assault is that the Chinese are constantly scanning and mapping Indiaâ??s official networks. This gives them a very good idea of not only the content but also of how to disable the networks or distract them during a conflict.

This, officials say, is Chinaâ??s way of gaining "an asymmetrical advantage" over a potential adversary.

Now It is very hard to stop hacking but it is not difficult to make sure that no damage is done and at the same time it is also not hard to mis-guide hackers into believing that they have been successful. I am sure there is enough skill within India to be able to do that. I only hope that government is leveraging every tool and resource at its option to achieve that.

Impossible is nothing

I think Sachin can rest easy, in India, Impossible is nothing. See this interesting news. Apparently under pressure from local don, police booked a 4 year old kid under Goonda Act.

The angry don, Gyanendra Yadav, decided to teach Chandrika a lesson and called the police to book Chandrika and his four-year-old son Mukesh. The cops, more than willing to oblige the don, charged the father-son duo under Section 110 of the CrPC of Anti-Goonda Act and even forwarded the file for notification to the additional city magistrate on April 24.

It was only after the boy appeared before a local court and the magistrate took note of his age that the record was set straight on Monday.

Well-versed in legalese, the cops still didn't relent. Since the don had ordered harassment for Chandrika, the police, instead of admitting mistake, tried to get a "rectified" application submitted with the ACM

May be Adidas should signup UP politicians as their brand ambassadors.

Mr. Bachchan has a blog

So finally Mr. Bachchan has a blog. The blog seems to be up for a while and if he is really blogging, it is really cool. But I believe that it may be an flunky of him writing for him.

He talks about his involvement in politics in his blog and why he got out of it.

For the Assembly Elections in that state I was sent to canvass for the party. An error of judgment forced my helicopter to land at the wrong destination. It belonged to the opposition. There was instant physical reaction and the pilot advised we make a hurried exit. As i sat back in the plane, a young student broke the cordon, ran up to me, thrust his fist through the glass window and handed me a piece of paper. It read - â??Mr Bachchan, I am a big fan of yours, but I am with the opposite party. Please leave this State, you are making life very difficult for me for I am torn between two desiresâ?.

Now, I would like to believe him in what he is saying if he was not behaving almost like a spokesman of Samajvadi Party. I think everybody remembers the advertisement that he featured in which was "sponsored" by SP.

Also his wife;s involvement and his active interest in his wife's political career suggests that he has not really moved away from politics, he has just taken a role akin to RSS while his family and friends are BJP.

Not that anything is really wrong with that. It is just portfolio management.

Luxury in the middle of nowhere

I finally took this trip to Kanha National Park and Tiger reserve. I avoided this for so long because I am one of those characters who wants everything to be really well planned before I embark on any adventure. I really can not bring myself to start any travel unless everything is planned to the last detail and everything is reserved in advance.

After doing the usual googling, I narrowed down on this resort called "The Baagh" which is in the village called Guduma near Kanha National Park. The resort is located around 5 kilometers from the mukki gate of the Kanha National Park.

I had not so high hopes from the resort since this was the first time I was visiting this place and I had not heard of the promoters but contrary to my hopes, this turned out to be a really luxurious and comfortable experience. Since we reached on the fringes of off-season, we were the only people in the resort and that helped.

The resort offers a right combination of luxury with remote location. The rooms are air conditioned but television is not provided, which I believe is a plus point. Nobody wants to go to a jungle and still watch TV. If one wants to watch TV, might as well stay in city.
Here is the website of the resort and one can find out what they offer in the resort.

We reached Jabalpur and from there we were picked up in an Toyota Innova which we had booked in Advance through one Capt Golchha from Shreya Travels. One could contact them on mobile no: +919823035666 directly on E-Mail. I just called him once and he confirmed me the pricing and availability of vehicles and everything was well organized and on time.

View Album

Get your own

We reached The Baagh around 12 noon and Mr. Vishnu Sinsinwar, who is the director of the company that runs these resorts was waiting for us right on the gate and welcomed us. We were checked in to a room within 2 minutes and everything was hassle free.

The package that we had bought included one jungle safari per day of the booking and safari was organized in a custom built Maruti Safari 4x4. Keeping in mind the fact that we were going into jungle and jungles do not have roads, the safaris were well conducted by Mr. Ramesh who accompanied us on all three days of our stay. He had very good knowledge of Jungle. Each day we drove approximately 50 kms in jungle lasting 4-6 hours for each trip.

View Album

Get your own

We did see rare most animals like Leopard and a pack of Wild Dogs apart from biggest success story of Kanha i.e. Barahsingha (बारहसि��ा). Unfortunately for us, we ran out of time before we could see a tiger, I am sure if we stayed may be one more day, we might have gotten lucky.

Hotels to avoid

On my way to Kanha Tiger Reserve, I ended up staying at this hotel called Narmada Jackson. It was listed at yatra.com as a welcome heritage hotel, so I chose it. After two, one night stays, I can safely say that this place is best avoided. Here are some of the issues that I found.

• The hotel charges for A/C rooms but the air-conditioning never really works.


• The hotel restaurants provide really un-edible food


• The hotel staff never knocks before entering the room, in one incident somebody opened the room at a time after midnight.


• They can't provide wake-up call service

May be because of the fact that Jabalpur does not have many hotels but I don't think this is a hotel that anybody should choose.

Themed Restaurant

If one visits the restaurant in The Forum mall called "Sahib Sindh Sultan, it is themed like a railway coach. Themed restaurants are always interesting concepts.

But while on my visits to Bhopal, I ended up in this restaurant called Shaan-e-Bhopal (शान-ए-भ�पाल). The restaurant was inaugurated on 17th March, 2007.

These guys have actually used a real train coach with regular seats replaced with nice comfortable seating for train.


The ambiance and decor of the restaurant was good. The food quality was worth the money but the service was pathetic. The fact that it is operated by MP Tourism seem to be in some way responsible for the really pathetic service that the restaurant.
Now if one is interested to visit a interesting restaurant with decent food at not so heavy price and can be patient with the really bad service, this one seems to be the place to visit.

Love hate relationship between BJP and PM

BJP and PM seems to have an strange love hate relationship. Yesterday, BJP jumped to the defense of PM.

Rubbing salt on Congress' wounds, the BJP on Wednesday alleged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been "insulted" because of the "make Rahul Gandhi Prime Minister" chant by a section of the ruling party leaders.

One would think that they would be really worried by the prime minister and insults being heaped on him. But it does seem that way really. In not so distant past the same party had this to say.

Manmohan has lost his mental balance, says BJP

And just before that, they had this to say.

Singh was the target of fresh salvos from Modi who at an election meeting in Bapunagar area here asked the crowd, "Do you recognise the Prime Minister?"

"I am talking about Manmohan Singh... He is our Prime Minister," he said in an apparent attempt to belittle Singh.

I am not sure what they are up to, but it is definitely entertaining.

���ल ब�्�न साहब �� �ुस्सा बहुत �ता ह�। �ब यहा� ह� ल��िय�। ��ल म�त्र� श्र� एम एस �िल न� ऐसा भ� �्या �ह दिया। �न�ा त� �तना ह� �हना था �ि �लम्पि� ए� �िला�िय�� स� स�ब�धित �य��न ह� �सलिय� �लम्पि� �� मशाल �� द�� म�� न�ता�� �र �मिन�ता�� �� शामिल नह�� ह� ना �ाहिय�।

मुझ� त� ल�ता ह� �ि श्र� ब�्�न �ा ब्लड प्र�शर बहुत �्यादा ह� �या ह� �सलिय� �न�� बहुत �्यादा �ुस्सा �ता ह�।

Morons and parenting

I always believed that people who are morons should decide for themselves and opt out of being parents. Today this belief has become more strong.

I am sitting in this really interesting restaurant called "Ada Hind Ki" on museum street and then a couple walks in with a 3 to 4 year old daughter and a maid servant who looked younger than 10 years old. This set of individual during the next one hour has helped me in strengthening my belief.

Parents who need another child to take care of their child do not need to be parent. This group exhibited that behavior. Even to extent that when the child has to visit toilet, the other child needs to be with them to take care of things.

As soon as the child is back, the "papa" shouts "light please" while I am thinking what the hell that means, the "papa" takes out a cigarette (an expensive one, in one of the gold boxes) and the waiter duty fully lights the cigarette. Now the dad is smoking next to the wife, child and the other child. I know lots of smokers believe that the medical industry is telling lies when it tells that cigarettes could kill but as a parent, I would ask why take chances. Even if you are willing to sacrifice yourself through smoking and other strangers through passive smoking, why be responsible for bringing cancer to the door steps of your own child, just in case this happens to be true.

I have nothing against smokers, many of them are my friends but still I found this behavior despicable. Even if one of my friends did that, I would make sure to point this out to them.

To add insult to injury, both the parents are drinking bacardy (or whatever the hell that was, I am not a drinking type so not sure) and I am sure that one of them was going to drive back all those people in the end.

Anyway, I quickly finished and got out so that I need not be sacrificed at the altar of cancer.

Pot calling the kettle black

Hindi film industry is well known for plagiarizing but this is clearly the case of pot calling kettle black. After Mr. Roshan "got inspired" from the tunes from Mr. Ram Sampath, he sued them in Mumbai High Court. The high court judge gave a judgment against Mr. Roshan. Now he is claiming that Mr. Ram Sampath schemed against him. He should have sued him earlier. That is a strange logic. Mr. Roshan copied stuff that was right fully Mr. Sampath's and then he is fully entitled to choose a time when he would be able to pressurize Mr. Roshan. I tell you sometimes I just can't believe these people.

हि�द� �िल्म व्यवसाय म�� ��र� त� बहुत ह� �म बात ह� पर रा��श र�शन साहब त� ��र� �र �पर स� स�ना��र� �� �हावत त� स� बनान� म�� ल�� हुए ह��। �भ� �न�� �िल्म �्र��्�� - ४ �� स���त �� ल��र �न�� मु�ब� ��्� न्यायलय न� द�ष� ठहराया त� �स पर �न�ा �वाब था �ि राम स�पत न� �न�� �साया ह�। �न�ा तर्� यह था �ि राम स�पत पहल� न्यायालय म�� �्य�� नह�� �य�। �नाब �ब �प न� ��र� �र� त� �प न�� नह�� स��ा �ि �प ��स स�त� ह��।

Interesting story

Very often one comes across really interesting happenings in this world. Here is such a story. Apparently one farmer was given a judgment to share all his property with his wife. He was just so pissed at the judgment that he took a very interesting route.

Instead, he bought a grinder and cut in two all his tools, including large items such as cattle scales, a harrow and a sowing machine.

"I still haven't decided how to split the cow," he told the newspaper. "She should just say what she wants -- the part with the horns or the part with the tail."

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Idiot of the year award goes to...

Here is a guy, just because he has reached UK, he thinks he is better than everybody. I had heard some people thinking that people in western countries are better than people in eastern countries, but this guy takes the cake. He thinks even animals/fish are better in UK than in other countries.

The wiki page on the award mentioned in this news item also says that the standards of this award have become very lax which is very clear from the fact that they have started giving it to morons.

Here is another interesting item on the troubles with the publication that doles out the awards. To quote

For the last three years, however, something has happened each year to cause the Red Guide itself to appear to be losing its grip. So far, the thick skin of Michelin is doing an impressive job of protecting the brand.

The first two years of the Red Guide's troubles began through no direct fault of its own. On February 24, 2003, amid rumors that he might be losing his Michelin three-star rating (a loss that often leads to a quick demotion to culinary has-been status), famous French chef Bernard Loiseau committed suicide.

Some of the biggest French chefs immediately pinned the blame on a too-influential Michelin. Cooler heads eventually prevailed, and it was decided that Loiseau had his fingers in many pies, some of which were turning sour prior to the Michelin rumors.

The troubles continued last year when a Red Guide inspectors, Pascal Rémy, published a tell-all book, L'Inspecteur se met à Table (The Inspector Sits at the Table or The Inspector Spills the Beans), alleging that Michelin plays favorites with chefs, doesn't visit reviewed restaurants as much as it lets on, and is generally less on the up and up with its readers than might be thought.

Michelin promptly denied what its inspector had to say, going as far as to take out newspaper ads pleading innocence. After 16 years of service and one tell-all book, Rémy was promptly canned; he lost the court case, where he pleaded unfair dismissal (remember, we are in France).

This year's Red Guide troubles, however, seem to prove some of the inspector's allegations correct, and this time, the wounds are self-inflicted.

Just before the Red Guide's 2005 home opener in France on 2 March, Michelin got caught trying to pull a fast one in Belgium. It very favorably "reviewed" L'Ostend Queen restaurant for the Benelux guide, which came out 26 January. Trouble was, the restaurant hadn't yet opened for business. The Brussels daily, Le Soir, promptly caught Michelin with its bib down.

Actually this Michelin guide guys tried to pull similar trick on restaurants in Japan but the treatment that they got there was really something that Indian media and chefs should follow.

It found much to like, even love, and showered the cityâ??s restaurants with more of its coveted stars than those in New York and Paris combined.

Michelin, based in France, made the splash it had hoped for, and has sold more than 290,000 copies of its familiar red-colored guides since November.

Many prominent figures of the Tokyo food world, however, are saying to Michelin, in effect, thanks for all the attention (which we deserve), but you still do not know us or our cuisine.

Food critics, magazines and even the governor of Tokyo have questioned the guideâ??s choice of restaurants and ratings. A handful of chefs proudly proclaimed that they had turned down chances to be listed. One, Toshiya Kadowaki, said his nouveau Japonais dishes, including a French-inspired rice with truffles, did not need a Gallic seal of approval.

â??Japanese food was created here, and only Japanese know it,â? Mr. Kadowaki said in an interview. â??How can a bunch of foreigners show up and tell us what is good or bad?â?

The mixed welcome reflects the challenges Michelin faces as the guide and its star-based ranking system enter a gastronomical milieu as far removed from Paris as teriyaki is from tête de veau.

I don't think Mr. Atul Kochhar should open his restaurants in India. We don't want him. People in India whom want him will go to UK and eat the "fresh" fish that he gets there. Meanwhile, we are happy with not so "fresh" whatever we get here.

CPI-M issues fresh threat to UPA government

What can I say, some people never learn.

India's software crisis

As many of you might have figured out I work in what is called "India's Software Industry". I am based in India. I have always wondered "Is India's Software Industry akin to sweatshops in rest of the Asia for other Industries".

I believe that to be the case and hence I am not really very optimistic about future of India's software industry. It is not going to die one fine morning but very soon it will start looking more and more like "Medical Transcription" industry. The reason it is so fixated with US markets is because it never did anything to develop technical skills. Tell me one company which is developing cutting edge technology. What IT industry is investing is in things like "finishing schools" so that they can hire cheaper labor from class B and C towns and still maintain the wage arbitrage advantage.

I have two issues with that approach, first the belief that talent from class B and class C towns needs finishing and second wage arbitrage can sustain anything. If the whole advantage that you are bringing to the table is pricing, somebody else will do it cheaper, or god will step in and dollar will weaken.

Today I got a call from one of the placement consultants. Here is how the interaction went.

Caller: Hello, I am calling from "ABCD consulting" and are you interested in a change

Me: It would depend what the change would be

Caller: They why did you post your resume on monster

Me: So that I can find out what are the possible changes

Caller: I have an opening with a large American MNC for Senior Software Development Architect.

Me: I don't think I would be interested in anything like that

Caller: Why, you don't like development and stuff

Me: No, I like development and stuff but I am not interested in that opportunity

Caller: Then why are you not interested

Me: See, I have close to 18 years of professional experience, if you were calling a manager with that kind of experience then you would offer him a director or a general manager kind of position

Caller: Yes, that's true

Me: Then just because I am interested in development and stuff, why do want me to be a variant of Architect which in Indian industry is characterized as a role with 5 years to 25 years of experience. If a job description is that broad, I am sure there is nothing for me there

Caller: No but managers are different, they need to manage.

At this point I said thanks you and moved on with my life. But the fact is that I have seen that being repeated time and again in Indian software industry, it is an industry which is controlled by people who have moved away from core technology and are doing "people management". Not that anything is wrong with that, but these people are smart enough to get involved in critical project but only pick up pieces that are not really technically challenging That way they leverage on their competence of being a manager and that is a good thing. I only think that it is not sustainable as a software industry.

What further made me believe on this was another telephonic interview that I had with program manager of a large database manufacturer.

Caller: We need somebody who can put together end to end systems

Me: I have had experiences in putting together large end to end systems costing multi-million to billion dollars

Caller: So can you tell me how to use Log4J

Me: I can tell you, but can you explain to me how do you people use Log4J in putting together large end to end systems

Caller: We use it a lot, ok, never mind

Caller: Do you have any more questions

Me: No

So here is my rant about why I don't think Indian software industry has a bright future. I hope I am wrong.

CPM warns again

I know it is getting boring but what to do. I thought I would let rest of the world know that CPM has warned UPA again.

Most bizzare chain mail

I keep on getting my share of chain mails. But this one was strangest. I never understood why people after writing such strange mails want others to forward these further on.

This is one of the best explanations of why God allows pain and suffering that I have seen...
A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and his beard trimmed.
As the barber began to work, they began to have a good conversation.
They talked about so many things and various subjects.
When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said:
"I don't believe that God exists.."
"Why do you say that?" asked the customer. "Well, you just have to go out in the street to realize that God doesn't exist.
Tell me, if God exists, would there be so many sick people?
Would there be abandoned children?
If God existed, there would be neither suffering nor pain.
I can't imagine a loving God who would allow all of these things."
The customer thought for a moment, but didn't respond because he didn't want to start an argument.
The barber finished his job and the customer left the shop. Just after he left the barbershop, he saw a man in the street with long, stringy, dirty hair and an untrimmed beard.
He looked dirty and unkempt. The customer turned back and entered the barber shop again and he said to the barber:
"You know what? Barbers do not exist."
"How can you say that?" asked the surprised barber.
"I am here, and I am a barber. And I just worked on you!"
"No!" the customer exclaimed. "Barbers don't exist because
if they did, there would be no people with dirty long hair and untrimmed beards, like that man outside."
"Ah, but barbers DO exist! That's what happens when people do not come to me."
"Exactly!" affirmed the customer. "That's the point! God, too, DOES exist!
That's what happens when people do not go to Him and don't look to Him for help.
That's why there's so much pain and suffering in the world." If you think God exists, send this to other people---
If you think God does not exist, delete it!
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO OTHERS

Now I don't really have an opinion on existence of god, but I did not forward it and in these times of google mails, you really don't delete a mail. Going a step further I actually blogged about it. Shouldn't I get some money!

UPA and CP(I/M)

Back in September of 2007, I wrote this post about CP(I/M) always threatening to withdraw the support to UPA government. It seems they are at it again. I would say, just do it already. How long do they think they can fool everybody.

ए� �र भारत�य �्रि��� �िला�� पर �ुर्माना ल�ा दिया �या। �ब �पन� समझ म�� नह�� �ता ह� �ि �्रि��� �� म�� र��्र� �नाब �� �्या ह� �या ह�। �ब म�� म�� �शा�त शर्मा न� सिम��्स �� ��� �िया था त� सबन� ��व� पर द��ा था �ि �नाब सिम��्स भ� �तन� ह� (म�र� हिसाब स� त� �स स� भ� �्यादा) ब� ब� �र रह� थ, �ितन� �ि �शा�त �र रहा था।

यह त� वह� बात ह� �य� �ि �प�� �ाल� त� �ाल� ह� हमार� �ाल� त� ��ल �ा भा� ह�।

�न सब�� त� पि�ा� ह�न� �ाहिय�, पर �्या �र��, हमार� त� ��� सुनता ह� नह��।

The dumb main stream media again

See this news item. Here is what the article claims.

Gourav Bhattacharya of Mumbai knows how to bell the CAT. He - like only 10-odd other management aspirants all over India - has scored a 100 percentile in the entrance examination to the Indian Institutes of Management.

I am not an expert in calculating percentiles, but I know couple of things for sure. When scores are represented as percentiles, there would be always one person who gets the top percentile.

I am not even sure that anybody can get 100 percentile. As per the percentile rank definition from wikipedia

The percentile rank of a score is the percentage of scores in its frequency distribution which are lower. For example, a test score which is greater than 90% of the scores of people taking the test is said to be at the 90th percentile.

As per above definition, one can not get 100 percentile because that would mean that your score is greater than the score of 100% of the people taking test, that would be impossible because you are also part of 100%.

The dumb main stream media

Here is another stupid media headline. Here is what the headline says.

SACHIN SCORES ON THE FIELD, YUVI OFF ITâ??WITH DEEPIKA

This is supposed to be the largest mainstream daily for English news in India. I think we really need a new news paper.

Mega crowd in Mall

Here is the photo that I took on 25th of December, 2007, in Forum Mall in Bangalore. It was so crowded that one could not walk.

Corruption crashes China's anti-graft website

After a long time a news that is almost funny. This could have happened anywhere but the fact that this happens is itself funny.

The website of the National Bureau of Corruption Prevention, which was set up to collect information on corrupt activities, was so popular it crashed on Tuesday, just one day after it was launched.

What the new item does not mention that the fact that a government website crashed itself points to some corruption in itself. The news item claims that the website received more than 20 pages of comments. I would say that on internet 20 pages in not really that large. Anyway life goes on..

Shelfari and Yaari social networking sites

Recently some of my friends mentioned that they got invites from me in two of these social networking sites. It sounded strange since I never sent invites to those people. Now my fears have come true. Both these sites are misusing information that one provides to these sites. See following links.

• http://www.librarything.com/thingology/2007/11/shelfari-spam-basically-social.php


• http://www.observer.com/2007/caught-shelfari-s-sticky-web-no-more-friends-please

King of spain, chavez and hit ring tone

A ringtone based on the incident of King of Spain telling Venezuelan president chavez to shut up has become hit and earned approximately USD 2m.

Finally

India won, for once we snatched victory from jaws of defeat. I thought bhajji had almost gifted the match to Pakistan. Anyway, all is well that ends well. Congratulations to all India team supporters, to other who don't like us winning, go to hell.

T20 cricket finals

I decided to give a miss to the T20 finals. May be I will go an watch the second innings. Just now checked on rediff.com, Yuvaraj has just departed at 14 off 19 balls. I think irrespective of what happens to the match, this is good for the team in long run, otherwise the good old dad of Yuvi would have really gone berserk.

Ulta Pulta Alliance

Today again I heard this news item that CPI warns the UPA, so I thought there is too much warning going on now-a-days. Just to validate my doubt, I did google search for "CPI warn UPA". See the results for yourself. All these news items are not necessarily from the same day. So I don't know about UPA's common minimum program, their common minimum program seems to have become to warn the UPA

CPI warns UPA govt

Karat warns UPA govt over nuclear deal- Hindustan Times

Left warns UPA against ties with US @ NewKerala.Com News Channel

Left warns UPA against ties with US - Yahoo! India News

Left warns UPA against ties with US - India

India eNews - Left warns UPA against ties with US

Nuke deal: Angry Left warns UPA govt-India-The Times of India

Ram Sethu

There seems to be a whole lot politics going around the Ram Sethu. I am not sure if it was made by vanar sena or somebody else. But I think the fact that we want to clean-it up is bizzare.

Even Archeological Survey of India which filed the affidavit that resulted in the political mess, agrees to following.

The Rameshwaram island evolved approximately 1,25,000 years Before Present.

The Dhanushkodi sand pit appears to be a feature of coastal processes and shoreline emergence and its orientation appears to be along the dissipation of wave energy patters of Palk Bay and Gulf of Manor.

Now my point is that keeping aside the fact of it being built during the time of Rama or not, this is a extremely old structure/formation. That fact itself should be used to not-destroy it but rather develop it as some kind of tourism attraction. If you really see, Grand Canyon is just a large hole in ground but they do not go around filling it.

I think the whole direction of debate it misplaced. Irrespective of the fact, who build it, something that is so old should not be allowed to be destroyed by some people who are hell bent on doing it because of ego.

Really bad food quality

Due to circumstances beyond my control, I had to eat in my office cafeteria after a gap of 2 years. I thought that in last two years the food quality would have at least improved little bit. But my hopes were shattered. See for yourself.

Mclaren and F1

As if F1 racing was not interesting enough, now it has additional angles of espionage and deceit. So Mclaren have been stripped of their constructor points but most confounding angle to the judgment is following statement.

However, due to the exceptional circumstances in which the FIA gave the team's drivers an immunity in return for providing evidence, there is no penalty in regards to drivers' points

Anyway, these seem to be interesting times that we live in, if you are a F1 fan.

Today's morning commute

[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=lm1kPwGg8ac]

Yesterday night it rained all night. So morning commute was full of detours and water logged roads. See for yourself.

How does a Tech MNC catch mice

The first surprise is that the MNC has its facility completely infested with MICE. The second surprise is that they seem to be using a home built mouse-trap. I would think they would be using some high-tech solution to get rid of mice.

Bizzare traffic in Bangalore

You can never guess the direction of traffic.

Mother of all traffic jams

I generally try to get to office very early in the morning to avoid traffic jams. But it seems the big bad world has figured out my plan. See this traffic jam at 7AM.

Is organized retail really good thing?

I don't think so. See the really bad quality of potatoes in Big Bazaar on old madras road in Bangalore. If you can't really get decent potatoes, then who needs shopping experience.

Forum mall launches free Wi-Fi

Forum mall in Bangalore (Bengaluru), India has launched free Wi-Fi. I tried to access it with my N95, it did not work. May be I need some setup.

My neighbour's door

I came out of my house and saw this really beautiful flower setting at the door of my neighbor. Looks pretty.

Coffee in south india

I am not a coffee drinker. But if I am in a South Indian restaurant, I prefer coffee to tea because I have always found the quality of coffee to be better than the quality of team. Another thing that has always fascinated me is the way coffee is served in any South Indian restaurant. See the picture. It was taken in restaurant called South Indies, Indiranagar, Bangalore. The tumbler and the bowl. What is really fascinating that you get this combination in different sizes but the volume of coffee in the tumbler is always exactly same as the volume of coffee in bowl. So if you get coffee served in this combination and you can fearlessly pour whole coffee from tumbler into the bowl. It won't spill.

Deserted forum mall

Here is the forum mall in Bangalore at 11:50 PM on a Sunday. You won't find space to walk at any other time.

Communists and their self-proclaimed national interest

The communists and their drama is on again. They show up on TV and claim to be only people interested in national interest when in the past their behavior has suggested time and again that they should not even try. Except in WB and Kerala, nobody falls for their theatrics. See this story. To quote a para from the story.

It is not without significance that the vigorous campaign of the leftist parties -- particularly of the CPI-M -- against the recently concluded Indo-US agreement on civil nuclear co-operation and against the growing strategic interactions between India and the US in particular has coincided with the beginning of the Chinese campaign against the so-called quadrilateral strategic interaction involving India, Japan, the US and Australia and the naval exercise with the additional involvement of the Singapore navy.

The leftists' campaign against India's relations with the US reflects more China's concerns and interests than those of India. I have never been excited over the Indo-US agreement on civil nuclear co-operation. Nor do I share Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh's [Images] enthusiasm for US President George Bush [Images] and the Indo-US agreement. I am inclined to feel that what we are seeing now is a one-night stand between Dr Singh and Mr Bush. Like most one-night stands, the happy thoughts thereafter will become an embarrassment in course of time.

At the same time here is another story in a newspaper. To quote a para from that story.

China and its â??all-weatherâ?? ally Pakistan are discussing an agreement similar to the one India has reached with the US on the civilian nuclear cooperation to maintain the regional security balance, sources said.

Now, somebody needs to explain to me, how does civilian nuclear cooperation results in regional security imbalance. Civilian nuclear cooperation is supposed to be about energy needs of a country and should have nothing to do with regional security imbalance. That point aside, communists seem to have no issues with that. Till the time it is "India" that gets shafted, communists are happy.

Here is another story. To quote from the story.

The fuel shortage situation has started telling on the performance of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL). Currently operating nuclear power stations with a capacity of around 4,000 MWe, it has been forced to slash power production levels.

The overall plant load factor (PLF) has come down from a high of 80-90 per cent to around 60 per cent in some three years â?? a drop of 30 per cent when thereâ??s power shortage in the country.

â?¢ NPCIL Chairman-cum-Managing Director S K Jain says the fuel shortage-led fall in PLF has already resulted in a loss of Rs 800 crore potential revenue.

So, to summarize, India needs fuel for its existing power reactors leave alone for the new ones that need to be built. India does not have this fuel available within. I know there are people with swadeshi angle who would want us to build everything inhouse but the fact is after 60 years of independence and 40 years of first nuclear test, we still produce abysmal amount of nuclear power and that too is dwindling. There a country who is willing to provide us this fuel which will let us generate more power but we believe because they are willing to give that power there must be something wrong either with them or with us.

I think we have enough diplomats and lawyers who can read the text of any treaty and figure out where it has that small print that is making us worried. I have not seen anything from anybody (except the fear psychosis created by communists) that would suggest that the deal is really bad for us. I have hear arguments that it is good for us or probably we don't gain much.

I think we should have confidence in being able to handle ourselves with determination if in future something new props up, but to mortgage our present because we don't believe in ourselves and our governments to be able to handle ourselves better in future is stupidity.

And by the way, these communists needs to be kicked out. Please, friends in Kerala and WB, kick them out.

Pressure on children

Here is a notice that I saw in one of the apartment complex notice boards. Unless there are really good reasons, this sounds like too much pressure on a three year old. Having tuitions?

Decline of a restaurant

There used to be this great eating place called Ramana's on Cunningham road on Bangalore. I always liked it very much and quality and taste of food there used to phenomenal.

I used to visit them regularly and then for last six months or so I did not get a chance to go to that part of town. Yesterday I again visited them and to my dismay, the quality of food was really poor to average. It was really sad to see another good restaurant go down the path of so many other in Bangalore.

I don't understand why that happens, every restaurant eventually degenerates itself into a shanthi sagar. May be it is the oft-repeated business model of every software company trying to degenerate itself into an sweat shop.

Anyway, one less place to choose from if you just want good food and nothing fancy.