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2006-08-10T19:59:00.000-07:00

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The scandal in Serie A

2006-07-15T00:50:00.000-07:00

The verdict is out! The four clubs which were implicated in the match-fixing scandal have all been meted out harsh punishments.

Juventus have been relegated to Serie B. The Bianconeri have been stripped of their league titles of this season and the last. They will start Serie B with minus 30 points. The Italian Serie B has 22 teams, which play 42 games across the season. Only the top three teams win promotion to the Serie A. This year, Atalanta (81), Catania (78) and Torino (76) have been promoted to the Serie A. If the trend were to continue in the coming season, the old lady of Turin will have to secure at least 110 points to be assured of getting back to the top flight. 110 points out of 126? Simple. Win 35 games. Draw 5. Keep praying! Juve are out of the Champions League for the next two seasons, at least! How are they going to manage this if there is going to be a player clear-out?

AC Milan is the only club of the four that has not been relegated. However, the Rossoneri will start with a 15-point penalty. They have been booted out of the coming season's Champions League. And this penalty might mean that it will be a tough fight for them to get there next season too. However, if they perform just as well as the did in the last season, their chances are bright. Milan ended with 88 points, to fourth-placed Fiorentina's 74. In Italy, the top two teams get a direct entry, and the next two will have to play a qualifying round. The advantage they have enjoyed this season is just as much as the penalty. In any case, Milan will play in the UEFA Cup, though it is not as money-spinning as the Champions League. Have we seen the last of the impeccable Paolo Maldini in Europe's biggest club competition?

Fiorentina and Lazio have also been relegated. Further they been handed out 12- and 7-point deductions respectively.

Those two moments

2006-07-10T06:55:00.000-07:00

The World Cup is over. Life returns to normalcy; the Italians return home to a glorious welcome; men return to work, and TV remotes to women. Comparing one tournament to another doesn't really take us anywhere. The World Cup is a self-contained event, and to derive pleasure from it, it is better to look at it in isolation, and enjoy the great moments that it has produced. New heroes, new villains, new records...

There were two important moments in this World Cup, two "points of inflection", to derive a term from mathematics. One was noticeable, the other, I assume. And both these moments happened in the second round. The first was Franck Ribery's brilliant run past Iker Casillas to score France's equalizer. This came after David Villa had struck a penalty to put the Spaniards in front. France was in poor form till then, and had barely managed to scrape through to the knock-out phase. That goal galvanised the Gauls, and it took them all the way to Berlin.

The other important moment was dubious penalty decision that went in favour of the Italians against Guus Hiddink's Australia. The Azzuri, who generally find themselves at the wrong end of such decisions, grabbed this lifeline with both hands. Totti stepped in to convert, and Italy hasn't looked back since that moment.

It was a moment of truth for the Italians. Faced with an uncertain future back home, tagged as under-achievers, and with very little self-belief, this team could have faltered at the very first hurdle. Yet, like a batsman who knows that he is in for a big hundred when a close lbw decision is not given or a straightforward catch is grassed at the outset, this Italian side surmounted every single test from then on to keep their date with Dame Fortune.

Winners, losers et al

Zidane was awarded the Golden Ball. I would have thought Cannavaro was the more impressive of the two. This decision also outlines the general inequity in the game. That those who play in attacking positions are in the money and in the spotlight always. I can't remember any defender winning the FIFA World Footballer of the Year award. Paolo Maldini came second sometime in the mid-90s.

Ivory Coast were the most unlucky of all the sides that bowed out after the first round. They played such excellent football that had they been placed in any other group, they would have progressed to the knock-out phase. Ghana played exciting football, beating the Czechs against all odds, but were unlucky to walk right into Brazil.

The match of the tournament was Germany v/s Italy. It was worthy of a final. The final itself was quite competitive.

Italy walked away with the trophy, deserved winners. But the real winners are the people of Germany, who have, by all accounts, made this World Cup "a time to make friends". Thank you, Deutschland!

Lessons from Lineker

2006-07-09T19:46:00.000-07:00

One of my favourite footballers is Gary Lineker. I don't remember watching him much; I was 3 when he won the Golden Boot in Mexico 1986. And my memories of him from Italia '90 are also vague.

Lineker, who presents football games on TV these days, has many claims to fame. He belongs to a select group of footballers who have scored 10 or more goals in World Cup finals. He captained the English side for two years, won the Copa del Ray and the Cup Winners' Cup playing for Barcelona, and is also England's second highest scorer in international games.

But the one record that sets this favourite son of Leicester apart from other great players is this: he has never received a yellow card in his entire playing career (and no red cards either). Not a single booking in such an illustrious career. This record he shares with very few others (Wikipedia names only 3 others), and he is the only practitioner of the modern game to hold this distinction.

That is not say that footballers should take to the game with the sole intent of being labeled "Mr. Nice Guy". Not being booked at all, or being booked sparingly during a top-flight career spanning a decade or two speaks highly of the discipline which these footballers bring to the field.

One can easily turn Machiavellian and retort that it is only what is achieved on the field that counts, and not how. Future generations might remember Lineker the Golden Boot winner, while relegating his disciplinary record to a piece of trivia. But nothing can erase the fact that Lineker, while being just as competitive as anybody else, also brought a humane touch to football. Indeed, we call football the beautiful game. We talk of "joga bonito"; we give our competitions taglines such as "a time to make friends". Why? To headbutt opponents?

Should Zinedine Zidane's act of crashing into Marco Materazzi disturb the pedestal he was standing upon? That is something for posterity to decide. My guess is that we will remember him as one of football's all-time greats, but (just like we have done for his fellow countryman Eric Cantona) we will also reserve a footnote for his disgraceful, even shameful exit from the final.

A better stage could not have been presented to the Frenchman. Had France won, he would have held aloft the same trophy he helped win eight years ago. Even as a losing finalist, he could have held his head high, could have heard a few words of consolation from the great Franz Beckenbauer, and could have thanked the whole world for cheering him on.

But that head, that famous shaven head, that struck twice in St Denis in 1998, it only struck a poor (provocative?) Italian defender, and has been missing from public view ever since. Before the final began, a friend has set his IM status message to "employez la guillotine". It is sad that the guillotine fell on -- rather, was self-inflicted upon by -- France's favourite son. Monsieur Zidane, surely you could have had a better farewell!

They say that it only takes a moment of madness to bring down years of hard work. In Zidane's case, "bring down" might be an exaggeration, but no one can gainsay that his reputation has not been dented. Zidane lost not just his head, not just the World Cup, but also his status as an ambassador for the game.

Meanwhile, Gary Winston Lineker watches on...

... glorious night!

2006-07-09T17:57:00.000-07:00

P.S.: Finally, it had to be someone from Sicily who finished the French off! Thank you, Grosso! Viva Italia!

This is the night...

2006-07-09T03:15:00.000-07:00

In less than 8 hours from now, the final of the FIFA World Cup 2006 would have kicked off. France and Italy will clash to take the top honours in this most prestigious of competitions. An estimated audience of over one billion will watch the game live on TV. This is in addition to the many thousands who would throng town squares across the world.

France and Italy were both unfancied at the start of the World Cup. Whereas punters' favourties like Brazil, Argentina and England were knocked out at the last-eight stage, hosts Germany were beaten by Italy in a tense semifinal -- a clash worthy of the final itself.

Thw two finalists both play the 4-5-1 system. However, the styles are quite different. Italy, surprisingly, play the more attacking type of football. With full-backs who can be effective in the wings, and with Totti, a natural striker, who plays in the midfield, and Pirlo who can send searching balls upfield, and Gattuso who will throw himself around to win balls, this is a team that, unlike previous Italian squads, spells aggression.

France can attack at will, however, they cannot wish away the fact that they are the oldest team in this World Cup finals. Can Zidane last the whole 90 minutes? Can Thuram push himself to add protection to Barthez's goal? We shall know before the night is over.

Many feel that the game might not have many goals, as both teams would not hesitate to retreat into their shells at will. The goalkeepers have an important role to play. Gianluigi Buffon is arguably the best shot-stopper in the game. Barthez can be good on his day, and messy at other times, so Domenech would be looking up to the stars to lend help to the man with a shaven pate. However, Buffon will have to face Henry, one of the best forwards in the world. If Henry gets into his touch, this would be a great contest between striker and goalie. Barthez can be pull off some really good acrobatic saves, and the Italians would not find him a pushover. Toni, Gilardino, Del Piero, and Inzaghi will have to work their way to glory.

Both sets of defenders are excellent. The Italians would have felt sore at missing their star defender, Alessandro Nesta, but Materazzi who stepped in for the Milan centre-back has been just as effective. The Italians would want to exploit Abidal, as did the Portuguese with great success.

Zidane v/s Gattuso could be battle to watch. If Gattuso, a midfielder in the mould of Roy Keane, can terrify the French midfield as he has done to the other teams in the competition, the World Cup should be well on its way to Rome. Zidane would be wary of this threat, and this master craftsman could show his artistry to outwit him. The other interesting battle would be between Totti and Pirlo, and Makelele and Vieira. The Italians should ideally mark Malouda and Ribery as weak-links in the Blues' midfield.

In all, this should be a game which will shower victory on which coach -- Lippi or Domenech -- gets the tactics right.

Some stats

Juventus FC, now in the centre of the betting and match-fixing scandal in Italy, has the largest number of players in the final. Buffon, Cannavaro, Zambrotta, Camoranesi, Del Piero, Vieira, Thuram and Trezeguet are all part of the first team at the Old Lady of Turin. Besides, Zidane and Henry have also played for the North Italian club. AC Milan and Lyon are also well-represented.

Italy have won with ease alternate games. They won against Ghana, Czech Republic and Ukraine with a two-goal margin or better. Games 2, 4 and 6 were not as easy. The USA fought and won a point; Australia were done in by a poor refereeing mistake; and the Germans weren't conquered until late into extra time. Tonight, Italy play their seventh game.

France have won their last two games with a one-goal margin, and both these goals came from set pieces. Incidentally, Zidane has scored or set up the last three goals for the French.

The verdict

Does the French team possess the staying power? Especially after such tough, exerting games against Brazil and Portugal. I think not. There could be very few goals tonight. And I'm betting on the Azzuri to win it. Maybe on penalties, who knows?

The game should be a treat for the neutral football fan. But hey, there is nothing as a neutral football fan. And if you are undecided yet, back the Italians. They DESERVE to win this!

The Battle Cry

2006-07-08T04:08:00.000-07:00

I was discussing with a friend about how powerful movies can influence viewer thinking. The Godfather came up as one of the prime examples. It brought gangster-ism into popular culture. Books have been written about it, a slew of fantastic movies on similar lines sprang up in a short period. It made "mafia" a household term.

The word mafia is quite interesting. Many contend that it didn't exist in Italian until the 1850s. The Wikipedia article suggests the word should have been derived from the Sicilian adjective "mafioso" or "mafiusi", which has its origins in Arabic, the connotation being "a bully, arrogant but also fearless, enterprising, and proud". The word came to be associated with the secret criminal organization / society in the 1863 play about criminal gangs in the Palermo prison, I mafiusi di la Vicaria (The Beautiful People of Vicaria). The first official occurrence of the word was in 1865, in a report by a prosecutor, a certain Gualtiero

Opinion, however, is divided on whether tha above captures the real origin of the word. For example, some claim that mafia is a corruption of the Italian for "my family" -- mia familia. This is a plausible case of apocope, where some sounds in a term get lost in time, thus producing a new word. Mia familia explains in part the nature of the organization's structure.

Others give a different twist to it. They suggest that in olden days, when Sicily was under the grip of the French, a soldier dishonoured a young girl. In order to rouse the men of Sicily against the French, the girl's mother ran along the streets shouting "ma fia" (my daughter). Those who proffer this explanation give it a historical twist by linking it to the 1282 uprising of the Sicilians against the French.

Some others give another origin, and this has also to do with the French. As the Sicilians considered the French their mortal enemies, they formed a criminal organization, and named it "Morte Alla Francia Italia Anela", which means "Death to France, is Italy's cry". In time, the organization was referred to by the acronym, and hence MAFIA. This explanation makes the origin sound quite intelligent, but not really spontaneous. It is possible, of course, but I'm doubtful of its veracity.

Centuries ago, the Sicilians rose against the French. Given the odds, they may not have been successful, but they fought with their lives on the line. They had only one intention -- to defeat France.

Tomorrow, Cannavaro's men will take to the field against the French. This is a different battleground, but the stakes are just as high in this the Battle of Berlin. As in the case of the mafiosi, it is honour which is on the line. May the cry which emanated from the hills of Sicily in those hours of desperation feed the Azzuri with the strength to defeat their once-mortal-enemies. God bless. Arrivederci.

Forza Italia!

2006-07-04T19:35:00.000-07:00

Yes! Yes! Yes! The Azzuri are in the final after another 12-year wait!

I was predicting a 3-1 victory for the Italians. It ended 2-0. My prediction defied logic; however I'm not claiming that I got the result (and the goal difference) right. I rooted for an Italian victory, simply because they are my favourite team. As they have been since 1990!

The main reason was that this Italian side was unlike any Italian side since the one which set Italia '90 on fire, Salvatore Schillaci being the prima donna then. Since then, the Azzuri started losing their sheen, a World Cup final defeat to Brazil on penalties, a quarterfinal exit in 1998 (again on penalties) against France, another defeat to France in the Euro 2000 final (France came from behind to pull off a dramatic win in extra time) and a similar yet more ignominious defeat to Guus Hiddink's South Korea in the second round in 2002.

A squad which boasted of some of the best strikers in the world -- Alessandro del Piero, Christian Vieri, Roberto Baggio, to name a few -- resorted to playing the familiar "Let's settle for 1-0" game. Yes, defence has always been their strength, what with giants like Maldini, Nesta, Cannavaro, Baresi and a host of defenders of the who's who kind playing in front of excellent goalies like Pagliuca, Perruzzi and Buffon. And there were excellent midfielders too. And yet Italy had to do without any major trophy.

Cut to 2006. And there is a huge scandal facing Italian football. Clubs are threatened with a year's suspension. The Azzuri have a decent squad, and on an excellent run too. But no one takes them seriously. Weren't there some who expressed doubts if Italy could at all get to the next round?

The Times captures the scenario perfectly, in an article by one of their football correspondents. The scandal back home and the uncertainty about their future has created a kind of "ghetto mentality" in Marcello Lippi's men. The correspondent points to the celebrations on the bench every time Italy scores a goal. This mentality has pushed the players to go every possible step, chase every ball and outrun every opponent. After all, what good is any steel if it doesn't pass the test of fire?

True, the draw against the Americans raised questions. And the game against Australia... everyone will keep talking about it, more vehemently if the Italians win their next encounter in Berlin, this Sunday. But let us not take anything away from them. This World Cup has given undue attention to Ronaldo, Ballack and the sorry English side. The unsung heroes are Cannavaro, Pirlo, Gattuso, Matterazzi and company. They deserve not to lose.

One of Portugal or France will stand in the way of the Italians on Sunday. As for tonight's game, I think Portugal will nick it. Surely the man of the tournament thus far is Luis Felipe Scolari. And with the return of Deco, who will orchestrate the Portuguese midfield, and also given their attacking, physical and racy playing style, the Iberians have the edge. And this comes from a Francophile!

GoPagal tag

2006-07-03T19:02:00.000-07:00

Vatsan has tagged me, and this time, you, I and everyone else stand to gain a free air ticket. Just answer a simple question, tag four others and submit it on Pagalguy, and voila, your free air ticket is flying your way. The question is:

Q) On which GoAir Sector would you like to win a free air ticket?
A) Chennai - Delhi (cos it's the longest, right?)

The rules state that I must copy the entire junk they have put up, but since I'm not winning anything, why care? Go ahead, why say "No" to linklove?

I tag Vinayak, Sekhar, Aparna and Thennavan.

Male-storm and mayhem

2006-07-02T09:23:00.000-07:00

One of most shocking news items that the media has been hyping up this past week has been the Sabarimala episode, where it has lately been "discovered" that a woman entered the sanctum sanctorum, thus causing a loss of divinity in Lord Ayyappa's most sacred abode. I'm jotting down some observations on this.

1. The Kannada actress who has confessed that she touched the idol of the deity claims to have been pushed in by the crowd. I find this not credible. I have been to Sabarimala a few times. The innermost prakaaram has a very small entrance, not very high. Even the pujaris enter with caution. Second, there is a gap of at least 20 feet where the crowd -- the first-est row -- is cut off. Such a statement would have had takers if this had happened in say, Tirupati, where the prakaaram is cut off only by a human chain, and there is no entry door.

2. I fail to understand the "loss of divinity" angle. Who is man to define limits to the power of God? The same Mr. Panikkar drew much ire in Tamil Nadu when it was rumoured that he suggested that the idol of Lord Muruga at Palani be removed and a replica made of some other material be installed instead. The act was done, only to be reverted very soon. Playing foul with God?

3. The Government in Kerala stokes religious tensions from time to time by appointing women in administrative positions in Sabarimala. Why would anyone want to do so given that it can be unpalatable for many? Why not appoint men, at least in such positions?

4. The media has been hyping up the whole thing, and has given a most unwarranted feminist twist to the story. Sagarika Ghose asked on CNN-IBN, "Should faith be restricted to men alone?" Ms Ghose needs to undergo a course which teaches respect for traditions. I do not intend to begin another flame-war, but do men ever repent, "Oh, what treachery! Can we not bear babies too?" Yes, Ma'm, everyone is equal in the eyes of God, but let us also learn to realise that if a tradition has been put in place, it exists for some reason. Of course, Indian society has done with away quite a few "evil" practices, sati, for example. The customs and practices surrounding faith are better left alone. Especially in a state like Kerala where such customs are followed rather fanatically.

5. One of the guests on the same CNN-IBN show radiated ignorance by claiming that the reason women were not allowed in Sabarimala was that they cannot make the arduous journey. Pray tell me, how is a woman of 60 better placed than a 25-year old to handle the ardour?

6. Another angle thrown in by some self-confessed experts is that Sabarimala was a Buddhist monastery, which was later converted into a Hindu shrine, hence the restriction for women. These armchair theorists hold the same view about every single Hindu holy shrine. The Wikipedia article on Tirumala (Tirupati) states:

While some scholars accept the antiquity of the shrine they believe that the image of Venkateswara was not originally that of Vishnu but of a Buddhist deity, perhaps bodhisattva avalokiteswara. The region of Andhra in which Tirupati is located in was already known for the existence of ancient Buddhist sites of the Satavahana era, namely Nagarjunakonda and Amravati, thus scholars suggest that the ancient site of Tirupati was probably a Buddhist site prior to its transformation into a Hindu one after Buddhism saw its decline in the face of Guptan Hindu Rennaissance. Even up to the time of Ramanuja, the famous Vaishnava scholar of the 12th century, the identity of the deity was still disputed until Ramanuja confirmed it to be Vishnu.

There are also some who hold the view that Mecca is a Hindu shrine, which I find to be equally ridiculous. The study of history with the sole aim of disturbing social harmony is detestable.

It is the hobby of some to breathe new life into controversies surrounding religion and faith. They do not understand (or they understand it too well) that religion whips up people's emotions. And the newsmen simple love it, they have a field day!

I'm reminded of the following lines from Leon Uris' Exodus:

Ari Ben Canaan put the Bible down. "The gentleman of Whitehall had better study their claims further. I say the same thing to the Foreign Minister that a great man said to another oppressor three thousand years ago -- LET MY PEOPLE GO."

Leave my faith alone!

No more samba

2006-07-01T14:33:00.000-07:00

Thierry Henry and France proved too hot for Brazil, as les Bleus put an end the samba magic out of the World Cup. To be honest, there was no magic on show anywhere, so the first really good team Brazil met proved to be their nemesis.

For those of us who (defying all logic) predicted that the Brazilians would walk away with the World Cup, there is still some hope. Deco was born in Brazil. Luis Felipe Scolari is a Brazilian. So, we might still end up having a couple of Brazilians keeping up their date with glory!

Radio commentary

The only quarterfinal match I got to watch on TV was the clash between Italy and Ukraine. The other games I missed, being away from home. However when on the road, I discovered that FM Rainbow offers live commentary of the football matches. They pick up live feeds from BBC Radio Five Sport. The commentary is of the first order, almost like you are able to visualise the action. Despite the fact that they sounded partisan during the England-Portugal game, I recommend it. It is definitely a few notches better than the commentary on ESPNStar.

Time - the great leveler

2006-06-30T11:16:00.000-07:00

Two weeks ago, Esteban Cambiasso was the toast of the world, finishing the most perfect goal to be scored in this World Cup finals. Today, the Argentinian walks back, a lone man, holding his head in his hands, hating himself for missing a penalty.

What a great change two weeks can bring!

P.S.: And think of Roberto Ayala too. The defender scored what could have been the winning goal for Argentina, only to miss a penalty just about an hour later. And ponder about Germany too, dear reader. They played so poorly for most of the game, yet they are through!

Is Brazil divided?

2006-06-27T10:40:00.000-07:00

Brazil have beaten Ghana 3-0 to progress to the quarter-finals of the World Cup. It could have been much worse for the Africans, though, truth be told, they played rather well for the most part. The one thing that didn't work for Ghana was their offside trap; all three goals stolen by Brazil were due to some deft line play by their scorers. Ghana did look like scoring, and they did get some good shots on goal, but they lacked two things -- finishing and width. They played very narrow, and really that is not the way to play Brazil if you want to score goals.

I noticed something midway through the game, and as the game progressed, I find me telling myself that I could be right. Of course, I could be wrong. It could be this devil's workshop working overtime, but as of now I cannot convince myself that I am wrong.

Most of the Brazilian players do not pass the ball to Ronaldinho, unless it is absolutely necessary. Like, if he is the only player around to receive a pass, he gets the ball. Else he is overlooked for someone else, although the World Footballer of the Year might be in a better, more attacking position. I'm not referring exclusively to the incident when Cafu tried a shot on goal, when he could have passed it Ronaldinho for a simple tap-in. There is a whole gamut of incidents.

Ronaldo and Ronaldinho do not embrace each other, even if it is the latter who sets up balls for his older teammate. However when Adriano pulled off a goal, Ronaldinho and he were in a prolonged embrace, though Ronaldinho neither set up the goal, nor was he even in the frame when Adriano converted. In earlier games, one could have observed Ronaldinho not passing the ball freely to Ronaldo. It could have been a case of him not trusting the poaching skills of other, but in any case, do note that point, Your Honour. When Cafu decided to go for glory in front of goal, Ronaldinho displayed a rare gesture that spoke of his frustration and disappointment. Were there more (untold) emotions / frictions behind it?

As I said earlier, I could be wrong. However, if you do get to watch a replay of this game, notice how many times the ball is passed to Ronaldinho and how many times it is passed to his teammates who are not in a better position than he is in.

There are some ways to explain this, rather than to point out at a divided dressing room. In Brazil's midfield, there is only one player who has the pace to match the smiling assassin - Kaka. Ronaldo, for all of his three goals, isn't the kind that will run his heart out to be at the end of delightful crosses. Something like the Tendulkar-Ganguly combination when it comes to running between the wickets, the former being a perfectionist, and the latter sluggish.

Secondly, Ronaldinho's favoured position is the left side of midfield -- like the President of Brazil, he is left-of-center! In Barcelona, it is Giovanni van Bronckhorst who plays behind him -- a workhorse-type passer. For Brazil, Roberto Carlos plays at left-back, a crosser, who plays balls into the box rather than forward, into wider attacking positions. Thus Ronaldinho the midfielder doesn't get enough balls to feed into the forward areas. Naturally, to accommodate Carlos, he has to move into a more central area, which is quite crowded because Kaka, Ze Roberto and Emerson are all there already. In contrast, we can observe how unobstructed Cafu's movement is. He can move into wider positions and cross, or cut into the box and play short passes. This in part explains why Brazil haven't got many goals from the left, because Ronaldinho has to make allowances for the playing style of his teammates. Which restricts his influence on the game, and adds to his frustration.

I'm thinking how much more effective Brazil's attack can be if they played the Barca-style 4-3-3 with a narrow midfield and strikers from out wide. Since Cafu and Carlos are excellent wingers, they can synergise with their attacking wide midfielders (say Robinho on the right and Ronaldinho on the left). But for that, they need to play as one single unit. Which is what I am questioning. Are they playing as one team?

As of now, Brazil are through. They can think about setting things right as they wait for Spain or France to join them in the next round. I'm backing Spain; but why do I have this nervy feeling about les Bleus just pipping their southern neighbours?

Two advertisements

2006-06-26T21:47:00.000-07:00

The World Cup broadcasts come with their own share of advertisements -- a small set which gets repeated over and over again. Minus the longer Airtel ad, nothing is worth a mention...

... except for the HDFC Standard Life Insurance advertisement, which should rank as among the most insensitive ever to appear on Indian television. You couldn't have missed this one. An old man isst about to get down from the train, and his son proffers his hand in aid. The old man frowns at his son, and alights on his own.

We are to assume that this depicts the old man's self-respect and self-reliance. Which is fine. But isn't there a better way to depict this? Should it be done in such a cheap and demeaning way? What of family values? A son wants to help his father alight from a train -- how can it affect the old man's self-respect? It is a simple act of caring for elders, a value ingrained into Indian society (and any society, in general).

The ad seems to mock at this value. It tells us, "No self-respecting father will ever take his son's help to get down from a train." What utter nonsense!

Express yourself

The ads for Airtel Prepaid which extol the advantages of instalments are pathetic. One shows a peon advising a guy loaded with work to sift through one file at a time. Another depicts a stranger informing a guy to gift a costly necklace to his girlfriend pearl by pearl.

In contrast, the longer Airtel ad is splendidly done. All of Airtel's ads (the sensible ones) have a single theme -- "the power of human expression". And this ad shows it better than any other.

It starts with a shot of the Quit India Movement: "Two words can bring down an empire". Then it cuts to Martin Luther King Jr's famous "I have a dream speech". Caption: "One dream can change the world." The next frame shows David Shepherd giving Tendulkar out, followed by the obvious caption: "One raised finger can break a billion hearts." This is followed by an image of Winston Churchill addressing a huge gathering during the War. The caption continues from the previous image "... and two can win a war!"

The images that follow are of the Dalai Lama ("a whisper can inspire hope"), Mother Teresa ("one touch can instill faith"), Lata Mangeshkar ("some voices can move a nation"), Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan ("yet some others can dissolve boundaries"), the demolition of the Berlin Wall ("one act of defiance can spark a revolution") and finally, a army of people holding candles ("one hundred thousand candles can end a war"). The AR Rahman-composed Airtel tune is sounded like an anthem, as the words "That is the power of human expression" appear.

Whereas some might question the ethics behind the use of emotionally-charged images to convey a business theme, one cannot deny that the ad is a masterpiece in its ability to communicate a simple idea in a simple manner -- black-and-white images, no sound effects, and no cavalier themes. This ad is a treat!

The "weird" meme

2006-06-25T05:32:00.000-07:00

Tagged by Vinayak. Here are 6 weird things about me:

1. I listen to one song at a time, in the repeat mode. If I like it, I'll listen it all day long, for weeks. I consider Johann Pachelbel's Canon to be among the finest pieces of music ever composed. I should have listened to James Galway's rendition of it a few thousand times till date -- arguably the most number of times for someone who is neither a student nor a practitioner of the flute.

2. I can manage with about four hours of sleep daily. And without solid food for two days on the trot. Seriously!

3. I failed my first test for a driving license -- on a TVS Champ!

4. Whenever I read a book, I tend to resonate with one particular character -- and it is generally NOT the main character. Like in The Hound of the Baskervilles, I found Mr. Frankland the most like me, for Doyle describes him thus: "He fights for the mere pleasure of fighting and is equally ready to take up either side of a question..."

5. The last Hindi movie I watched was Parineeta. Before that, I don't remember watching any Hindi movie, not in the ten years before that at least. In fact, I have watched more French than Hindi movies.

6. I enjoy wordplays, and I attempt them ad nauseum. While speaking in the Youth Parliament when in college, as a member of the Opposition, I closed the debate on a bill seeking reservation for women in Parliament thus: "The Government seeks to give women a fair representation in the legislating bodies. But, Mr. Speaker, I think it would be fairer if the fairer sex fare well in a fair competition."

Despite (3), my driving record is quite impeccable. And given my recently-acquired tag as a male chauvinist, I think (6) is a bold confession to make, what say?

I hereby tag Vatsan, KG, Praveen, Vijay R and Anu.

Indian football

2006-06-22T23:24:00.000-07:00

Sportolysis hardly needs an introduction. One of India's best sports blogs, it covers a wide spectrum of sports and sport-related issues. For a single-person effort, it is surprisingly regular and consistently good.

As part of the Visitors series, Pratyush has invited me to write for Sportolysis -- a piece on the state of Indian football. Please to read, dear reader, and share your opinions / insights on the same.

In praise of normal woman

2006-06-21T11:58:00.000-07:00

[This is a long post, I warn you. It is a faithful reproduction of an essay by J.B. Priestley. If you are a feminist or a women's lib type, you may stop reading right here. ]

A large number of men, for the most part elderly men, are secretly terrified by the new type of woman, the emancipated woman, who has put down her fancy-work, left home, received a man's education, taken a man's position in the world, and partly adopted masculine habits. The protests, the sneers and growls of such men are fed by this secret terror. The very sight of one of these young women, so determined, business-like, efficient, makes them shake in their shoes; for they know that the game is up, that no longer will they be able to swagger and boast of their professional capacity before an admiring female chorus; the women have penetrated behind the scenes in the theatre of man's business and have noted the fraility of the players. Now, like these fellows, I have protested, have even ventured a little sneer at times, but I flatter myself that it has been for a very different reason. To speak frankly and without boastfulness, this new type of woman does not terrify me in the least. On the contrary, she puts me at my ease; she is so like myself. The only difference is, she does not do it so well as I do. Moreover, she has lost something very valuable, to wit, feminine reserve, dignity, grace, without which she will never be able to check my raging conceit, my swelling vanity, never be able to put me in my place as her gentler sisters can with only a faint smile or a slight gesture. That is why I protest against her, for if her kind multiply, we shall live in an entirely man-made world, and we men will strut and swagger unchecked, to the peril of our souls.

It is the other and older type of woman, who with her fancy-work and fancy puddings, her slight knowledge of Italian and painting in water-colours, that terrifies me. It is the frail silvery old ladies with fine manner and much knowledge of the world, who can put me in my place. And, like all men, I ought to be put in my place every now and again, or I should become insufferable. That is why the intellectual young men who figure as heroes in our novels of Chelsea life are so insufferable; they spend all their time among advanced women (who have gone into the world in pursuit of a career -- as the phrase goes) and so are suffered to go their ways unchecked; whereas any ordinary woman would quickly send such fellows very briskly about their business, for all their talk would not hide from her quick feminine glance their hundred-and-one little meannesses. For in addition to some qualities already mentioned, the ordinary woman usually possesses something that her more 'advanced' sister plainly lacks, and that is commonsense; and a measure of feminine commonsense is fatal to pretentious and designing males. It usually seeks expression in a curious sort of cool yet sparkling irony, essentially feminine, which will prick the inflated balloons of masculine conceit in a trice. Nothing could be better for the purpose. Every man, if he will but speak the truth, will admit that his grand egoistical self has suffered more discomfort from this very feminine verbal weapon than from all the other more boisterous devices of his fellow men put together. As for the free-and-easy banter of the mannish women, their pontifical airs, their pedantry, their shrill sarcasms, they are simply ineffectual, a mere play of shadows, compared with this older method of feminine attack and defence, the method of polite smiling irony.

Jane Austen, of course, used it to our admiration, and, if we are men, occasionally to our discomfort. There is a fine squib in G.K. Chesterton's brilliant firework display, The Victorian Age in Literature, which can be aptly exploded here. 'Jane Austen,' he says, 'was born before those bonds which (we are told) protected woman from truth were burst by the Brontës or elaborately untied by George Eliot. Yet the fact remains that Jane Austen knew much more about men than either of them. Jane Austen may been protected from truth: but it was precious little of truth that was protected from her. When Darcy, in finally confessing his faults, says, "I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice though not in theory," he gets nearer to a complete confession of the intelligent male than ever was hinted by Byronic lapses of the Brontës' heroes or the elaborate exclupations of George Eliot's. Any man wishing to preserve his own unbounded conceit of himself would rather face ten women like George Eliot or George Sand than one like Jane Austen, a delicate and fastidious little spinster who spent her life in a secluded village. But for company and for the good of my sould give me Jane Austen and all such cool feminine intelligences that know too much to flatter my sex by imitating it.

The woman who lives a normal life is able to check the swelling conceit and egotism of her menfolk simply because her outlook is so different. It is more personal and yet more impersonal. Her interests are at once narrower and wider than those of men. She is primarly concerned with very little things, the minutiae of talk and behaviour for example, on the one hand, and with very big ones, the colossal elementary facts of life, such as birth, mating, and death on the other. The first are personal and particular; whereas the second, those enormous facts about life which woman is never allowed to lose sight of, are, of course, universal, meaning just as much in the Fiji Islands as they do here. And both ranges of interest make her what only fools deny her to be, namely, essentially practical; her eye is steadily fixed on the concrete thing, and she mistrusts that chasing of the wild goose which is one of the chief pastimes and delights of man, She is concerned with persons, solid unmistakable individuals, and judges ideas according to their capacity for making persons happy. Her peculiar and intense devotion and loyalty are meant for persons, for the family and not for the world, and when, by some accident, there is a temporary dislocation, a change in the objects of this devotion of hers, the result is rather pathetic and, I think, not entirely harmless. Thus, at the present time, there is more than one woman who goes out to business and gives to the trade, say, of money-lending that intense devotion and loyalty of hers which Nature meant her to give to human beings, a man and helpless little children -- a very unfortunate displacement.

Now somewhere between these two extremes, the minutiae and the colossal universal facts, come man's interests, all the philosophies, arts, sciences, political systems, dreams, fantasies, abstractions, and what Stevenson called 'logical Aunt Sallies'. These are the things that men take seriously, and these are the things that woman (I do not mean Miss So-and-So or Mrs. What's-her-Name, but Woman) does not take seriously -- not, that is, in the last resort. From this comes, what Stevenson again called, woman's 'motherly, superior tenderness to man's vanity and self-importance'. But the fact that is 'superior' tends in any healthy man o check that vanity and self-importance. He takes his interests for once into an atmosphere in which they are regarded as the ingenious play of a great child; his values are for once not merely questioned but quietly set aside and a new scale erected in their place; his monstrous egoism receives a shrewd blow and, if he is not a megalomaniac, he finds himself swallowing an unfamiliar dose of humility. If a man is hurt he can run to his womenfolk for comfort and sympathy and he will not ask in vain, but he is only doing what his child who burnt itself playing about the hearth did a few minutes before, and what comfort he receives he has to accept on the same terms. If he is not a Sir Willoughby Patterne, the experience will do him good. Many a time when I have been brimming over with self-importance because some little affair of mine, which I imagined was as significant to all the world as it was to me, has prospered, I have encountered some quiet-spoken, almost timid lady, whose faint but perceptible contempt for the whole world of ideas I was living in suddenly brought me down to the ground again and gave me a right sense of proportion once more. Most men (with the exception of the Patternes) who are whole-heartedly devoted to this art of that science, who are ambitious in their profession or their politics, must have remarked this queenly indifference, this unspoken but obvious contempt for their great concerns, and benefited by it. This tolerant and tender smile keeps us in order when al the shouts and groans and menacing gestures of our fellow men are of no avail. It puts us in our place, among the largest and noisiest of children. Once all women have left their citadel and descended, with shrill cries, into the battlefield, as some are doing now, then man's conceit will flourish unchecked for ever. He will become the Superman; a sight for the gods, rolling in inextinguishable laughter.

[If you want to flame someone, it has to be Mr. Priestley. But since he is in deep sleep now, I can step in for him!]

Where to draw the line?

2006-06-20T22:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Slashdot linked to an interesting article about a teenager and her mother suing MySpace.com, a social networking site for $30 million.The complaint: that the website had failed to protect her (the teenager) from a sexual predator who molested her on their first date.

More than the article itself, the comments which follow it provide an insight into the general thinking on this issue -- that the lawsuit is downright ridiculous. The lawyers representing the girl, who is a minor, argue that "the Web site does not require users to verify their age" and that "the security measures aimed at preventing strangers from contacting users younger than 16 utterly ineffective."

The question to be asked here is how much security can a social networking site provide to its users. Especially to the foolhardy, irredeemable ones (like this girl)? Driving license verification? Credit card verification?

Where is the personal control here? The site didn't fool the girl into believing the guy. If MySpace.com's raison d'etre was to aid the molestation of this girl, then the lawyers have a case. Rather, we are told that the two communicated via emails and over phone as well. Doesn't that make it consensual? How can the mother, who now has the guts to sue the site, have any claim at all, as she failed to regulate / monitor her daughter's internet usage?

As someone pointed out, if the guy and the girl communicated over phone, why not sue the phone company?

Just like the phone, the Internet (in this case) is just an enabler. This incident could have been avoided at many levels -- the girl could have been more cautious, the mother could have regulated her daughter, a freer offline dialogue at home.

They say that a bad workman blames his tools. Here too, it is the same. Instead of owning up for their mistakes, people are simply passing the buck.

Marriage musings

2006-06-19T04:58:00.000-07:00

Last week, one of my cousins (so close that I consider him as an elder brother) got married. His was probably the first marriage in the family which I could observe from close quarters. There are many who say that cinema and sport best reflect the culture of a people. I pity them, for I'm sure they have not witnessed a South Indian marriage. A few observations:

1. Everyone who comes to the marriage tend to ask the boys next in line, "So, you are next, right?" Some say it for fun, some are pretty serious. I tried different answers: "Oh no, I'm still young", "Not really, I'm planning to study further", "Well, I'll ask the groom for an opinion. If he says 'Don't risk it', I'd stay on my guard."

Relatives are tired of such answers - after all, they keep doing this to every boy in every marriage they attend. And everyone says the same thing. So, I had to invent an answer: "You're correct, I'm next in line. Maybe as soon as next year. There is this beautiful Muslim girl I'm going out with..." Ghastly silence follows.

2. The one aspect of a marriage that has to be impeccable is not the bridal make-up. Nor is it the groom's hairstyle. It is the food which take centre-stage. I've been to many functions where the food has turned off many a gourmand. However, in this case, the food was top-draw, in terms of quality and taste both -- good enough to satisfy innumerable tough-to-please palates.

3. Marriages can be much more fun if you stop staring at the girls, and start attending to long-lost relatives / friends instead. These are among the few occasions where you get to meet that periappa or this athai or the once-neighbour whom you've only heard talked about in conversations. They crave for someone to talk to them, to accost them for a few minutes, to inquire about their health or the progress of their grand-daughter in kindergarten. A few minutes spent with them warms their hearts, and leaves you with the feeling of having "made their day". A smile to welcome them, or a shake of the hands when they leave wins accolades. A namaskar is a Parthian shot.

4. One of the problems with relatives though is to identify them correctly. If you can't, it is safe to say so. I try a sheepish smile despite knowing well it doesn't look nice. My mom would also do her best to compound my troubles. She would drag me to someone and say, "They wanted to meet you. Don't you identify / know them?" For God's sake, no! Sheepish times again.

5. The marriage is great fun for everyone, except the bride and the groom (indicative of the future?). Standing in front of a camera and doing nothing is worse than a sentence. I cannot imagine how the newlyweds have the patience to greet every guest and pose with them for a snap. A few hundred snaps in a single day! God bless...

6. Card games are universal favourites. What better way to spend a nice evening with a bunch of kids and a deck of cards. But don't ever teach the kids, "Bluff". You would live to repent it. Kids are such experts.

7. Nalangu can be great fun, but in order to be awake to attend it, you shouldn't be playing "Bluff" with kids the previous night!

Le problème

2006-06-18T02:16:00.000-07:00

Alan has listed the French equivalents of some common footballing terms. The one term he seems to have missed is le problème - the problem with French football.

World Cup winners in 1998. European Champions in 2000. Knocked out of the first round in the 2002 World Cup! Toothless in Euro 2004. And a tame draw against the Swiss in the first game, a few days ago. What is the problem with the French side?

The French look depleted. Most of the players of that inspiring midfield that trampled over opponents at the turn of the century are either missing or are past their prime. Zidane, for example, is hardly the player we used to regard with awe and admiration. So is Vieira, who seems to have taken to the Italian value of efficieny rather than pace, creativity and slick passing which marked his Gunner days. Trezeguet... the lesser said, the better.

They do have some quick and effective players though. Wiltord and Malouda who play for French Champions, Olympique Lyonnais, are fleet-footed. But their main man is Thierry Henry. France now see Henry like what India used to see Tendulkar as in the 90s. If France go on to win the World Cup, you can be certain that Henry will be one of the contenders for the Golden Boot.

Maybe I'll be accused of being radical or stupid or both... but can France afford to drop Henry? The reason behind this suggestion is that the Henry we know and we see all around the year plays at the head of a very young Arsenal midfield. There is Fabregas, Hleb, Reyes and even Pires (whose pace hides the fact that he is on the wrong side of 30). The Henry who plays for Arsenal relies on them to provide him with excellent through-balls, to play one-twos with him and bomb the opposition with the swiftness of their attack.

Sadly, Raymond Domenech cannot provide him with what Arsene Wenger does. Domenech gives Henry a big-name player called Zizou. He can give him a sluggish Trezeguet. At the head of such a midfield, Henry will get limited service. He cannot play a ball from wide position and expect the quick feet of van Persie to tap it in. It was on view during the Swtizerland game. Domenech cannot create an El Dorado for Henry. Despite his credentials as one of the top strikers in the world, he cannot produce goals unless he is fed amply.

Given this situation, Domenech can (and I'm sure he won't; no one expects him to, not even I) ask some other striker, someone who can tolerate a depleted midfield, who can be slow enough to strangle the French advance, to train instead of Henry. Thierry Henry is a great player. But it is not his burden to win the World Cup for his country -- surely not with this team. Let us relieve him of such a strain.

Tarot gazing

2006-06-17T01:07:00.000-07:00

Headlines Today should immediately be conferred with India's silliest news channel award. While every other news channel is analysing Argentina's rout of Serbia & Montenegro, and van Persie's wonderstrike against Ivory Coast, HT sent one of its reporters to spend time with a tarot expert.

The tarot woman was so much fun.

Reporter: "What does the World Cup hold for Thierry Henry?"

Tarot Reader: "Please pick a card... As we can see from the card, Henry is very talented. France is a good team. Both of them should be doing well, much better than their current showing. The tarot points to the fact that they will go a long way."

(I wonder how people manage to joke without actually laughing.)

Reporter: "What about Ronaldo? Everyone's been saying he is uninterested, clumsy and fat" (unmindful of the size of the tarot reader!)

Tarot Reader: "Please pick a card... Ronaldo is blessed with a lot of intelligence. He should be doing better. The card shows it. It says 'beyond greed', so he can shatter every record."

Reporter: "What about Tomas Rosicky?"

Tarot Reader: "The card says he seems bogged down, tired. He should go back to nature. Try yoga, meditation. Maybe he will shine in another World Cup. Not this one."

Reporter: "Will Wayne Rooney save England?"

Tarot Reader: "The card says, in 9-10 days, Rooney will be able to take England to greater heights. Not immediately, but in a few days' time."

Reporter: "Lionel Messi, the young Maradona, is touted as the next best thing..."

Tarot Reader: "The card says it can only get better for Messi."

Fifteen solid minutes of fun came to an end thus. I don't understand how tarot cards work. At least, those who read horoscopes have something to base their predictions upon. But tarot cards? Suppose I asked this lady, "How will I fare in the World Cup?", and I picked the same card which was picked up for Messi? Does that mean I, Vijay, am going to score in the next game against Netherlands?

With regard to sporting competitions, always take such predictions with a jar of salt. Didn't some popular astrologers predict that New Zealand will face the West Indies in the 2003 Cricket World Cup Final?

And in any case, Ronaldinho won't pull off a magic strike just because I picked a card. It simply doesn't happen that way.

Oh my! Argentinaaaaa

2006-06-16T23:39:00.000-07:00

Take a look at this wonderful goal. Esteban Cambiasso scores at the end of a 24-pass move. Truly a treat for any football fan.

Brazil, here we come!

Ronaldo or Crouch?

2006-06-15T11:53:00.000-07:00

I have nothing against fat men. I belong to that tribe anyway. But Ronaldo... what was he doing on the pitch that night? A sordid display that had disinterest written all over it. Carlos Alberto Parreira might be committing a grave mistake playing him in front of top-draw playmakers like Ronaldinho and Kaka. He simply doesn't deserve that kind of service.

Ronaldo might have had to face even more criticism, but he should be thankful to Peter Crouch for diverting some away from him. These were some comments from the England - Trinidad & Tobago game... Crouch is played an excellent ball, it comes right to his scoring foot, at just the right height, an easy tap-in for anyone at that level. Crouch sends it wide, almost 70 degrees away from goal. The commentator remarks: "... an excellent ball played to Crouch. Peter Crouch! Goodness me, he almost sent it for a throw-in!"

On another occassion, the 6ft 7in Liverpool striker misses an easy header. Comment: "Must say, the ball hit Peter Crouch, rather than Crouch hitting the ball!"

Crouch seems like a person being played by Eriksson because he is short of players, or because Crouch is a tall man. Yes, of course he scored. But if you get David Beckham to play such wonderful, measured crosses a hundred times during the game, surely anyone can convert one of those.

It's not just Crouch, the whole English team looks off-colour. The only player who seemed comfortable in an England shirt during the T&T game was Aaron Lennon. Wayne, save these folks!

Mark, his name

2006-06-14T10:12:00.000-07:00

Last week, I was speaking to a neighbour who had come home for vacation from the USA. The conversation beat upon the normal lines, and moved (predictably) to the battle for Washington 2008.

From whatever little gyan we get from our local media, we might be led to believe that Senator Hilary Rodham Clinton would be the undisputed Democrat nominee. And that to take her on, the Republicans would field Condoleezza Rice (despite her opting to play club football). My neighbour revealed that Senator Clinton, though a probable candidate, isn't by any means the automatic choice. One of the strong contenders from the Democrats is Mark Warner.

Mark R. Warner stepped down as Governor of Virginia in January 2006, after four years at the helm, in which time, he turned around Virginia's fiscal position -- from a $6 billion deficit to a $544 million surplus! He is considered as one of the most popular governors of Virginia (with an approval rating of 74%, the highest ever recorded), and was named in Time's Top 5 Governors last year.

A Southern Democrat (like Bill Clinton), Warner is considered a strong contender "because of his wide appeal to independents and moderate Republicans, and his high popularity in a relatively Republican state." (Wikipedia).

He can also take heart from the fact that history is on his side -- every Democratic President since Lyndon B. Johnson has been from the South.

Johnny Johnny, No Papa

2006-06-14T01:54:00.000-07:00

What's wrong with the BJP, I wonder. Why are they wasting their energies on such arbit issues? First it was the ban on Fanaa in Gujarat. Now, the Madhya Pradesh Government has decided that nursery children won't learn "Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star", "Ba ba Black Sheep" and "Johnny Johnny, Yes Papa" from now on.

The reason given is ridiculous.

The state claims that these rhymes smack of feudal mindsets and that's why they are being replaced by poems that are inspired by nationalism.

Says state education minister, Narottam Mishra, "We have removed some poems from the school syllabus. The decision was taken as our committee feels nationalist poems need to be taught to school kids."

Next up... Google Spreadsheet

2006-06-06T06:28:00.000-07:00

Stop reading for a moment, and click here to sign up for a trial of Google Spreadsheet.

An online spreadsheeting program that will let you do spreadsheets from anywhere, upload existing sheets, collaborate and allow others to edit your sheets online! You know what these guys are targeting, right?

Check out this online tour of Google Spreadsheet.

Let's go on strike, comrade!

2006-06-05T20:36:00.000-07:00

The Petroleum Minister has finally increased fuel prices - petrol will be dearer by 4 rupees and diesel by 2. That is in fact lesser than what was expected, and therefore is heartening.

You can predict what the Communist parties will now do. They have called for a strike on June 13. They will protest for a couple of days; some Left leaders will meet with the Prime Minister and the Union Cabinet, and then the prices will be reduced by 4 paise and 2 paise respectively. The Left will claim a victory for the people and all protests will be called off.

It is worth pondering what the Left wants to and has actually achieved by being in power for the past two years. Of course, they are not in power technically; but that doesn't stop them from arm-twisting the Government from time to time. Yet, when was it that these folks succesfully stalled a price hike? Their actions make everyone more doubtful. It is almost like a set plan: "Protest. Meet. Call-off. Claim victory."

Bad economics - that's what these people preach and practise. And they win brownie points everytime. Has the Left ever dared to withdraw support to the Government? Ask them this, and the response will be, "Oh, the country will then be under the control of communal forces!"

In conclusion, one has to salute that exalted mind which once quipped, "If the Left has a future in India, India has no future left!"

Jaffer scores 200

2006-06-05T11:14:00.000-07:00

Wasim Jaffer has just battled his way to his maiden double hundred, against the West Indies in Antigua. In doing so, he has joined a select band of Indian test cricketers - the 200-club is indeed elite.

What he has also done is to walk into the media's glare as another hero who will now be mercilessly targeted every time he fails to impress.

Good luck, Wasim!

The irony

2006-06-05T06:43:00.000-07:00

Practitioners of the medical profession are supposed to take an oath - the Hippocratic Oath - so named because it is believed to have been written by Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine according to the Greeks. It begins thus:

I swear by Apollo the physician, by Æsculapius, Hygeia, and Panacea, and I take to witness all the gods, all the goddesses, to keep according to my ability and my judgement, the following Oath.

Going by the current debate on all the English news channels, one can spot an irony. It has now been concluded by these channels that the Apollo report was doctored (wow, an unintentional wordplay, really!).

I wonder what would have happened had this report been considered as true. In court, Rahul Mahajan's lawyers would have said:

Your Honour, my client is not guilty; I swear by Apollo!

And had the doctors who prepared the report been asked to testify in court, what would that have been called? The hypocritic oath?

How to get more traffic

2006-06-03T19:51:00.000-07:00

Marketing guru Seth Godin has a huge list of ways to get more traffic for your blog. Many of the tips are obvious:

#8 Announce news
#15 Be sycophantic. Share linklove and expect some back.
#38 Write about blogging.
#39 Digest the good ideas of other people, all day, every day.
#46 Edit yourself. Ruthlessly.
#48 Be patient.
#50 Ping technorati. Or have someone smarter than me tell you how to do it automatically.

Some are controversial:

#10 Encourage your readers to help you manipulate the technorati top blog list.
#14 Be snarky. Write nearly libelous things about fellow bloggers, daring them to respond (with links back to you) on their blog.
#21 Use photos. Salacious ones are best.

And some are contradictory:

#2 Be topical... write posts that need to be read right now.
#5 Be timeless... write posts that will be readable in a year.
#9 Write short, pithy posts.
#12 Write long, definitive posts.
#11 Don't write about your cat, your boyfriend or your kids.
#13 Write about your kids.

But in all, it is a funny, interesting read. You better read it, because it isn't a nice idea to mess up with the gurus!

All for a movie!

2006-06-03T09:32:00.000-07:00

This week, a movie festival was organised at my company. Originally, 2 Tamil movies, 2 Hindi movies and an English movie were planned to be screened. Because of some unforeseen circumstances, one of the promised Tamil movies could not be screened. And this happened to Chandramukhi - the Rajnikanth starrer, the most successful Tamil movie ever.

The Tamil brain has suspicion and conspiracy hardwired into it -- someone suggested that the movie was not screened because the earlier Tamil movie was not well-accepted by the non-Tamil audience. Wow, what a way to trigger the Northie v/s Southie debate!

The subsequent debate which raged on in the bulletin board had all the elements of the usual slanging match. Funny as it might to a sane individual, it also brought out the differences hidden in the deepest corners of many hearts. Some suggested that a conspiracy was being hatched against Tamil movies; some others criticised non-Tamils for not being receptive enough; to which the response was the usual rant -- that Hindi was India's national language, and that everyone must learn to appreciate Hindi movies. An additional spin was given to this -- those who do not know Hindi are a national shame! Ouch!

And the root cause -- the distributor who had promised the Chandramukhi movie reel could not provide it. Goodness me!

Why would someone be so passionate about something as trivial as a movie screening? My Tamil friends, you could have accepted the inability of the organisers to screen a particular movie. And my non-Tamil friends, you could have chosen to act "as the Romans do". After all, you are aware that Tamils feel strongly about their culture. More importantly, our popular culture is not dictated by what happens in the Hindi heartland, but is pretty indigenous. It isn't such a bad thing to partake in our way of life, or is it? At least for a couple of hours?

This argument about Hindi being our national language reminds me of an interesting scene from Cho Ramaswamy's classic Mohammed bin Tughlaq. The Council of Ministers are in a meeting and the problem being discussed is which language should be ascribed the status of India's national language. The usual debate rages on, and it turns into chaos. Tughlaq, the Prime Minister, intervenes and declares, "From this day, I declare Persian as India's national language!" Everyone looks puzzled. Tughlaq explains, "Yes, Persian will be our national language. It is a language alien to India. The Hindi speakers do not know it. Nor do the Tamils, nor the Bengalis, no one... So, if Persian is elevated to this status, there will not be any quarrels. Everyone has to learn a new language, and no one will dare complain of favoritism!"

Kalaignar turns 83

2006-06-02T21:47:00.000-07:00

You may not agree with him; you may not like his views on many issues; you may not vote for him. But that doesn't take anything away from Kalaignar M. Karunanidhi, who turns 83 today.

This man, who started his journey in the small village of Thirukkuvalai in 1924, is still relentless. Just think of what those eyes would have beheld all these years - it's staggering!

Very few contemporary figures can rival him in his status as a Tamil icon. I salute you, Sir!

The Flying Spaghetti Monster

2006-06-01T19:36:00.000-07:00

Till yesterday, error messages in Technorati used to be, "We're sorry. There is a huge server load. Try later." Suddenly, they have decided to become cool.

The Flying Spaghetti Monster has arrived and we have all been taken to planet Zeus 94 to kneel before Zod. All this is a little much for us to handle at the moment so come back later please. And leave a quarter in the collection tray on your way out.

That sounds better than "No donuts for you", doesn't it?

Desipundit gets a makeover

2006-05-31T23:00:00.000-07:00

Yeah, and the new design looks really good and professional. The site has a lot more colour and is really lively -- very desi. Check out the new design. I'm sure you'll love it!

No Vinci Code!

2006-05-31T22:12:00.000-07:00

This is absolutely ridiculous. The Tamil Nadu State Government has decided to suspend the release of The da Vinci Code in the state; this despite the Central Government clearing the movie for release.

According to a press release:

The screening of the movie might hurt the religious feelings and sentiments of the Christian community and lead to demonstrations and disturb peace and tranquillity within the State...

One year on...

2006-05-31T03:02:00.000-07:00

To start a blog is easy; but to maintain one is among the toughest things...

... thus started a mediocre blog. A year and 200 posts later, it still remains that way - more importantly, it remains!

Today is my first blogiversary.

Thanks everyone for tolerating my rants; thanks especially to those who drop in regularly in the hope of finding out "Has this person written something useful at least this time?"

Bring in the experts

2006-05-30T21:14:00.000-07:00

One of the major problems in India's downfall in the recently concluded one-day series against the West Indies is the absence of a solid opening pair.

Sehwag has been very tentative for a long time now. A couple of boundaries and then he holes out. Gautam Gambhir's inconsistency led to his being dropped from the side. A clueless Dravid had to push himself up the order. Though Dravid has done well as an opener, it is not his position. We need him at number 4 or 5, where he can steady an innings and launch after the 40-over mark. This has been felt badly by the team, because in this series, we had good starts, but blew it away after 35 overs.

The immediate requirement for the Indian cricket team is a good opener, someone who can hang in there. It is a specialised slot, and it requires a specialist. Gambhir would have been ideal, but he throws his bat around as much as Sehwag does, and that serves no purpose. We need someone who can keep a low profile, play second fiddle to Sehwag and weather the storm. If we are looking to win the next World Cup, we need an opening batsman who tackle these unfriendly, unforgiving Caribbean pitches.

A request to you, Mr. Chappell: let's develop an expert opener!

Videos from Sivaji

2006-05-30T04:17:00.000-07:00

Last week, it was the photos which did the rounds. Now, a few videos from the shooting of Rajnikanth's latest movie, Sivaji: The Boss, are out. Someone's shot a few videos, which show thalaivar and some other dancers practising before a shoot, in Bilbao, Spain.

There were a few who felt that the photos could have been leaked by someone on the sets. I have a feeling this has been done intentionally by the production team to whip up anticipation amongst the public.

This video shows the superstar trying out a step.

Here are links to two other videos on YouTube: Rajni practising a step, a group of dancers rehearsing.

Want to make friendship?

2006-05-29T19:42:00.000-07:00

In online chatrooms, girls are always at a premium. Sensing this, many boys / men impersonate as girls and have great fun at the expense of some poor unfortunate soul. If you haven't tried it before, I urge you to do -- it is such a joy. Of course, Orkut has changed all that, but still that one amazing phrase lives on.

Those who chat with girls have only three questions to ask: "a/s/l?", "pic?" and "do you want to make friendship with me?" In Orkut, this last question goes into scrapbooks.

Online friendships are strange, but fun. I'm sure most of us have tried our hand at it, at least in curiosity. However, the one downside of it is the durability of such a friendship.

In case you are interested in acquiring a new friend, I suggest you try this new website -- Fo.rtuito.us -- it is quite interesting. Once you sign up with Fo.rtuito.us, you are assigned a friend at random. All you know about him / her is the sign-in ID and a picture uploaded by him / her. That's all. You can exchange messages with this person via the website over the ensuing four-day period. If you hit off with this assigned friend, you get to add that person. In any case, you will be assigned a new friend in four days.

I tried it; at least, the first time you do it, it is kinda interesting. After that... well, try it if you are really vetti.

Does Trisha have a male voice?

2006-05-28T09:42:00.000-07:00

While returning home from work a couple of days ago, I had to endure one of the worst Tamil film songs I have listened to in a long time. I had not listened to it before, so I couldn't arrive at the movie without googling. And you wouldn't disagree with me on the point that Olli Olli Iduppe Ottiyaanam Edhukku from Vijay's latest super-duper flop Aadhi is among the worst songs ever to (dis)grace Tamil film music.

Let's leave out the lyrics, of which the lesser said the better. But what prompted Vidyasagar to ask Anuradha Sriram to sing in a male voice, I cannot understand. Probably it is some situation in the movie where the heroine has lost a bet with someone and has to sing a particularly poor song in a particularly stupid voice.

This is not the first time that Trisha features in a song where the female lead sings in a male voice. I can recall that the equally poor Thiruppaachi had such a song too. Now, we all know that music directors pick playback singers to suit the actor and the situation. Other things remaining the same, I really really wonder what Trisha's real voice sounds like...

Pudhupettai: powerful, ruthless, spectacular

2006-05-27T03:49:00.000-07:00

When was it last you saw a gangster movie in Tamil? Pattiyal, you say? That was about contract killers. I'm asking you about a gansta' movie. When was it last that you saw a movie which reached out from the screen and hit you hard in the face?

Want to savour both those experiences in a bit over three hours? Go watch Selvaraghavan's Pudhupettai (whichever way you want to spell it: Pudupettai, Puthupettai, புதுப்பேட்டை)

The movie is about an adolescent who is driven to the world of crime because of circumstances, and his rise and rise in the underworld. It shows us that promising Dhanush who went AWOL since Kaadhal Konden. Kudos to him for choosing to get back to his brother for that badly-needed hit, and more kudos to Selvaraghavan for extracting the very best out of his brother.

With his physique, Dhanush might not convince us as the perfect gangster, but his acting -- boy, he's simply poured his heart into this movie. He has put in such a riveting performance that the jury for the State Awards can tell themselves they won't see a better acting performance this year.

The movie depicts reality in all its gory glory. It's long, mind you, well over 3 hours. And the story just keeps unfolding. Personally, beyond the 150-minute mark, I kept peering into my watch telling myself, "Oh, please, let this movie not end." And that's because each scene has been handled with utmost care. So much that one cannot say which is the best scene in the movie. Each scene clashes with every other scene in the fight to be called the best.

The background score is brilliant; top marks to Yuvan. Arvind Krishna's camera work is magical. Every actor has chipped in with a good performance. In fact, the person sitting next to me quipped once, "How do they spot these actors? They are so natural, and so very good." Sneha has put in a good performance. The same cannot be said about Sonia Agarwal though; but her screen presence is limited, and the characterisation is weak.

The only real spoiler, if you ask me, is the last ten minutes of the movie. There is a point in this film (just as Pasi Sathya departs) where the credits should have come up, and the audience would have left with a heavy heart, and in absolute praise. But the three ensuing scenes dilute that effect, and make you wonder, "Why did they do this? Why spoil the experience?"

However, if you choose to overlook the last ten minutes, I think this movie deserves a perfect ten! A movie like this, I have not seen before in Tamil. At least not since Dalapathi!

Pudhupettai is not a modern classic; it is a modern epic!

Shunya - India's slashdot?

2006-05-24T09:45:00.000-07:00

Thanks to a friend, I stumbled onto Shunya - a site which claims to be "a community site for people interested in contemporary Indian Technology." Slashdot users will find the layout familiar.

The content is India-centric. For example, today's front page has articles on whether semiconductor fabrication plants are a wise move, outsourcing, Microsoft's desi-centric applications etc.

To compare it to Slashdot would be, I agree, just too much. However, the site is good for a start. Maybe with more users and more traffic, the site can take off big time.

Shunya is also available in Hindi, which is pleasantly surprising.

Where is the BJP?

2006-05-23T10:05:00.000-07:00

The decline began two years ago, when India's electorate rejected the claim that the nation was shining. And ever since, the Bharatiya Janata Party has never been taken seriously.

Of course, you get to see a few leaders on news channels, and sometimes protesting outside the Parliament, but the party which once trumpeted "Able leader, stable government" is on the brink of caving in.

Picture this. Two years of the UPA. Such a poor excuse for a government. On the second anniversary, as everyone in the UPA gathers to celebrate (?!?), there are so many burning issues. Arjun Singh doesn't even know what he is doing, and triggers off Mandal II. Protesting medicos. And to top it all, Meira Kumar suggests that the private sector should voluntarily bring in reservations within two years. Srinagar is rocked. The Sensex crashes. There is talk of a major fuel price hike.

And yet the BJP, the main opposition party, is nowhere to be seen or heard. Any other party would have torn the Government to shreads. The BJP though is quite content in stoking its own internal clashes.

A couple of weeks ago, five states went to polls. Of more than 800 assembly seats, the BJP managed to win a very low number. This when projected in the Parliament would give them less than half a dozen seats. And every other seat would have gone to the UPA. Agreed that the BJP has never done well in any of these states. Agreed that the Left is spineless enough to support the Congress at the Centre after engaging in slanging matches in Kerala and West Bengal. But that is no excuse for the BJP.

The situation is compounded by the fact that the party is treated as an untouchable almost everywhere. No one wants to get into an alliance with the BJP. And their own parivar is unhappy that the party is compromising its core ideology.

That leaves them only one choice -- unless the BJP can sweep the Hindi heartland, 2009 is a lost dream. But that is easier said than achieved. Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Gujarat have BJP governments, where anti-incumbency might come into play. Uttar Pradesh's polity is fractured, and indications are that Mayavati is the current frontrunner. Maharashtra, Bihar and Jharkhand, well you never know.

Though the present Government is bumbling, the BJP is at pains to find an issue to touch base with the common man. Worse, the party is unable to keep its own flock together. Even worse is the lack of solid alliance partners. Add to this the loss of Pramod Mahajan, a key strategist and negotiator... and you have a party which seems doomed.

One wonders, what's cooking at 11, Ashoka Road?

Kakuro \

2006-05-22T07:45:00.000-07:00

You might have come across this term while browsing. I tried solving one about a month ago, but left it half-way. But I didn't know it was such a rage before Kaps wrote about it replacing Sudoku in bookstores.

Wikipedia defines Kakuro or Cross Sums thus:

... is a very common type of logic puzzle that is often referred to as a mathematical transliteration of the crossword. In principle, Cross Sums puzzles are integer programming problems, and can be solved using matrix techniques, although they are typically solved by hand.

That itself is enough to drive away a matrix-averse person like me. Hold on, it isn't as nerd-ish as it sounds.

A typical Kakuro puzzle looks like this. The objective is to fill out the white squares (the ones without any numbers or crosses) with numbers from 1 to 9 such that the sum of numbers in the same line as a clue adds up to the clue. That sounds pretty easy, but unless you tinker with a puzzle or two, it is quite tough to get the funda behind this game.

There are a lot many websites where you can try your hand at this new craze. Kakuro.com and Kakuro.net are the top links from Google. It is also a good idea to check out a host of other websites which offer Kakuro games. If you are just starting, do try out the Kakuro tutorial applet and the walkthrough on Kakuro.net.

Can you bear this?

2006-05-21T23:36:00.000-07:00

Sensex? Senf***ed-up!

Trivial matters

2006-05-19T11:32:00.000-07:00

Ok, here's a bit of trivia, if you like... What connects me to Petr Cech, the Chelsea and Czech Republic goalkeeper?

Tough one, eh? I'll give you another clue... What connects me to Petr Cech and Iker Casillas (Real Madrid and Spain)? And Roger Milla too!

Enough of footie, you say? How about the movies? What do James Stewart and Cher have in common with me?

Puzzled? Can you think of a connection between great Israeli general, Moshe Dayan and yours truly? Or His Holiness the Late Mahaperiyaval of the Kanchi Mutt, Sri Chandrasekharendra Saraswati?

Or the great Honore de Balzac who wrote the immortal statement, "Behind every great fortune, there is a crime"... Or the proponent of utilitarianism, John Stuart Mill?

It's the 20th of May, Sherlock!

Spielberg's Munich

2006-05-19T09:31:00.000-07:00

This is the kind of movie you would want to recommend to anyone asking him / her to drop whatever he / she is doing. Spielberg's Munich is a modern classic!

Fiction friction

2006-05-18T04:34:00.000-07:00

Thankfully, The da Vinci Code has been cleared by the Censor Board after a special screening was held to please the leaders of the Indian Christian community.

Rediff.com reports:

After watching the controversial film Da Vinci Code at a special show in New Delhi on Thursday, the Censor Board has cleared the film with an 'Adult' certificate.
The film has been cleared without cuts, but it will carry a disclaimer at the beginning and at the end.

"Sí, sí, sí..."

2006-05-17T17:55:00.000-07:00

"... la copa ja està aquí!"

deserve... persevere... succeed!

As Simon Barnes, Chief Sports Writer for The Times, described it:

There was no Miracle of Paris, then, just a predictable victory to the predictable victors. But it did not come about in a predictable manner...

Barca! Barca! Barca!

Random thoughts

2006-05-15T19:18:00.000-07:00

Take for instance, The Hindu's decision to waste the first page of yesterday's edition by displaying a picture of members of the Indian cricket team having a fun time in Caribbean waters. What an utter waste! I'm not saying that there are enough burning issues to occupy that space, but this certainly does not qualify to be there. Why should "the grand old lady of Mount Road" stoop to the levels of the page 3-est DC?

Confessions of a young girl

Last evening, some careless channel browsing led me to NDTV Profit. The family of the slain Indian engineer Suryanarayana was back in the news. His wife, the one who had consumed some poisonous stuff, is recovering. Personally, I detest this affliction of TV channels to place a camera in front of wailing family members; however, this news item was different.

It seems that Suryanarayana's eldest daughter, Anisha, is good at drawing. And she had drawn something (I don't remember what). When asked, she was saying, "I used to draw and show the pictures to many father. He used to appreciate me very much..." At the next sentence, I froze. "My brother is too young to understand anything. I don't know how I am going to explain to him." Perhaps only a simple sentence, but I found it heart-wrenching!

Thiruttu Payale

Watched this movie, partly because it was highly rated by the newspaper reviews. Not disappointing. The story is not quite believable, however the screenplay made it engaging. Despite Mirchi Suchi's dubbing, Malavika's performance in a negative role was good. The director could have chosen to avoid protracted stunt scenes. Not one to steal your heart, but worth a watch.

Ilaiyaraja's Thiruvasagam

After a gap of about 2 months, I am back to listening to the mastro's rendition of Thiruvasagam. What about it draws me so much, I wonder. Perhaps it is because this work combines three things I like very much - religion, poetry and music.

I have heard of oxymorons (contradictory terms, like "deafening silence"). Come to think of it, "religious poetry" is probably the best anti-oxymoron ever coined.

Excuse my lack of vocabulary; however, none of the online dictionaries I consulted have an antonym for the word oxymoron. And it is time to invent one. How about oxygenius? Or hydromoron? Alright, pardon me, I just woke up...

In conversation: Santhanagopalan Vasudev

2006-05-14T00:50:00.000-07:00

This morning, Vatsan and I met Santhanagopalan Vasudev for an informal chat at his residence. Lok Paritran's Chief Advisor and candidate for the Mylapore constituency made many heads turn by finishing an impressive third at the hustings, above many established parties and candidates (BJP, DMDK, Chandralekha, Americai Narayanan, Mukta Srinivasan). And he patiently answered our questions. Here is a transcript.

So how does it feel to have performed impressively in your maiden election?

It is a good feeling. We are enthused by the response from the electorate in Mylapore. Of course, given that it was a spontaneous decision to contest these elections, and also that we had limited resources at our disposal, we have reason to feel satisfied at having made a decent start

There have been a few who have remarked that your party did not campaign enough...

(smiles) I don't think that is true. The fact is we went on a door-to-door campaign, but the response that you get from people during a door-to-door campaign may not be taken as a certain vote for you. People tend to vote according to allegiances.

You have had a lot of support from the media, especially the new media. Blogs, emails et al. But can they serve as alternatives to the traditional campaigning methods.

Yes, that is true. But we have left no medium untouched. Some bloggers did their bit, so did people who forwarded emails in support of our party. But the fact remains that unless people come out with us and campaign, things won't happen. The media is no alternative.

But with people in blogosphere, you have the problem of your ideology not being communicated properly. There are many we have come across who hold the view that every educated citizen should support you. They even call others 'morons'.

I have no control over such individuals. And that is not my view, nor is it the view of our party. However, in case anyone had questions about our party's ideology or our modus operandi, they could have called us instead. Our numbers are published everywhere. They can even come up and talk to one of us. With us, accessibility is not a problem at all. I have given you an audience.

And the TV and print media have given you some good publicity. They associate you with characters from Yuva and Ayutha Ezhuthu...

Well, the media has been calling us the IITian party, whereas we are a not a party only of IITians. None of the seven candidates who contested in Tamil Nadu are IITians. It does give us a name-tag, but just because our founder is an IITian doesn't mean the party should be identified with the IITs. As for the comparison with Yuva, we had a 56-year old housewife as a candidate. The media picks the easier bits and makes them big.

How do you break the perception of elitism? Your vote bank would be the educated class, and the forward classes. How do you garner votes from the slums?

I'm pretty sure that a good number of the votes I polled came from the slums. In fact, I came to know from various sources that people from one of the major parties went about telling the slum-dwellers that we had been formed by the other major party just to break their vote bank. If we weren't successful at wooing the slum votes, why would anyone indulge in such a cheap tactic? The truth is the parties know that they can buy votes from such people. Logic does not work with them. You and I can sit and think about national problems. But for someone whose next meal is a doubt, it is instant money which works.

Not just that. Let me give you an interesting statistic. The total electorate in Mylapore in 1996 was 2.1 lakhs. In 2001, it was 2.8 lakhs. Today, it is 2.33 lakhs. What does that mean? It simply means that there are things beyond our control, invisible forces. I personally know a person whose name is not in the electoral rolls. But both his neighbours have their names. The reason is this person belongs to one party, while the other two both belong to another party.

What would you have done, had won you won in Mylapore?

Mylapore, or any other constituency, has a few fundamental problems. I would have set out to address them. If you think about it, no one has any doubt what the problems are. And everyone is sure that they must be addressed. Yet the same problems remain. Our agenda clearly addresses these fundamental issues.

Take for example, the traffic problem. Everyone knows that the number of vehicles is increasing day after passing day. But which city does not have traffic problems? Even New York City is no exception. So what is the solution? The solution is that Chennai should grow. It is a small city, and it must grow. The solution is obvious, it doesn't need a scientist to figure it out. The most basic problems are all like that. You don't need to be intelligent to arrive at a solution. But putting that in action, that requires a lot more.

There is a criticism that your party follows the Hindutva agenda...

Well, I can only say what I know. As a Hindu, I have been exposed to the Vedas, so I can quote from them, and use the knowledge of the same. If one of us believes in a particular religion, what is wrong? We don't want to be pseudo-secularists. There are just too many such parties in India.

In any case, I do not think that this criticism is well-founded. Nowhere have I or any of our other partymen brought out the issue of caste or religion.

But Dravidian politics is caste-based. For example, the PMK always plays the Vanniyar card...

That is true. Caste is an identity. The strategy employed by parties has been to garner votes on some such identity. If the people are divided on casteist lines, they play the caste card. Else they play the religion card. We do not believe that we should be doing that; if we did so, what is the difference between us and them? That said, we cannot wish away identities. The idea is to reach out to everyone and not play isolation games.

Was your approach to the elections correct? Would you not have been better off with the bottom-up approach? Being a new player, why contest directly for the assembly?

We have spent considerable time thinking about the strategy to follow. Of course, there are a hundred different ways to do it. However those who proffer various ideas do not know the ways to implement it. You suggest a bottom-up approach. Do you know how long it would take us?

Yes, it takes time, I'm sure. But how do you build a cadre? Especially given that your party relies on college students for campaigns... That's not permanent, don't you think so?

True, but a bottom-up approach does not necessarily mean we can build a cadre. Maybe we should go to villages and start from there, that's what you imply. But how many villages, and how can we ensure a presence everywhere? The point about a floating cadre is correct. But that also ensures that we have people who would be willing to work with us. If one batch passes out, we have the next batch coming in. Moreover, it is not just about having a permanent vote bank. It is about creating an awareness.

But college students tend to be romantics. How do you get work done?

Yes, the idea of being part of a change is very appealing to a romantic. But there are also many who would like to work with us. It is not about those sitting at home and cribbing about things not being right. If things are not right, they have to be set right -- you have to set them right.

Instead of waiting for elections, isn't it a good idea to involve yourself in social work?

The point where social work differs from politics is that the former evokes a spontaneous emotional response, whereas the latter need not. If I said, "Come, let's go clean up the slums" a hundred people would join me immediately. However, if I wish to convert the same into vote bank, that is not service, that is exploitation, and I don't want to be party to that.

In India, social activism in on one side, with numerous activists; politicians are on the other side dealing with macro problems. There is a divide between the two, with social activists being outside the system. beyond a point its policy which matters. It is also important to consider the scope of the work. When you get down to doing social work, you are attempting to solve micro problems, say the problems of one person, or a small group of persons.

A case in point is Medha Patkar. She is able to win hearts, but the problem she is trying to address is limited in scope. Moreover, she is not able to turn her tireless work to fruition. In active politics, you get the chance to tackle macro issues, and also the power to solve them. We are a national party, and I believe that we should ready ourselves for addressing social problems with political activism.

Do you have plans to contest the local body elections?

We are discussing about that.

And what about Gujarat and Delhi?

(emphatically) Yes. We will contest many more seats in Gujarat. In fact, that is one wrong thing we did in Tamil Nadu. When people saw that we were contesting only 7, they obviously thought that we couldn't do much, so why vote? The problems in Delhi are of a different nature, and so is the electorate. We will give both these our best shot.

And if your focus shifts to these two states, what are your plans for Tamil Nadu or Chennai?

Of course, we have plans for Tamil Nadu. Our focus on Gujarat or Delhi will not lessen our commitment to this state. Presently, our constraint is the number of volunteers we have. In Tamil Nadu, that is about 90 now. We will seek to expand that. As I have mentioned previously, our decision to contest the just-concluded elections was spontaneous. Our future decisions will be calculated and well-planned.

For a political party, especially a new one, staying in the limelight after the elections is a huge task. How are you going manage that?

We are a national party. Hence we will always be able to stay in the limelight. In fact, we already have a large number of people in Bangalore and Hyderabad asking us when we will come over there. I'm sure the response there will be just as good. And as we progress, it will become better. Our ideology is one, but the strategy we choose will depend on the place and the circumstances. A single strategy will not work everywhere. However, the problems in many areas are essentially the same.

Any comments on freebie politics?

That's on its way out.

Reservations in education?

That is a classic case of the solution creating more problems than the problem itself. I'm sure there is a lack of equilibrium, and in order to establish equilibrium, some sections of society need to be given a push. However, I'm very doubtful about introducing reservations in medical education. After all, it is a question of life and death. Why would I want anyone who is incompetent to be handling such a situation? Should we open up reservations in niche areas? I will not favour it.

What is on your economic agenda? How are you going to set right India's economy?

Frankly, I don't have any concrete agenda. The fact is we are a new party. We know that there are plans now, and that they don't work. The existing policies are flawed. So, we need to do a lot of research on those lines and come up with policies that will work.

How do you fund your party's activities?

People like you have to share with us your resources.

You can dip into NRI pockets...

Sure, that is an idea. But the requisite infrastructure for that has to be put in place. We have a small team working with us. And we need more people to implement all these ideas. Even setting up a Paypal account and a Donate page takes some effort. The effort may be very little, but it still requires someone to do it.

What change do you think you can bring about?

We know for sure, all of us, that the current political setup is not correct, and it has contributed negatively to our country's growth. You and I are in the same mess. I think it is time to clean up the mess, and I seek your support. It is all too easy to pass comments about politicians and the state of our country. We think it takes courage to stand up, and we think we have ideas to make things happen.

I am not saying only I can do it. We feel that anyone interested in this country should stand up and be counted. I have no problems if you join the DMK or the ADMK, so long as you do good work. I'm not saying only Lok Paritran can give good governance. If you can clean up the mess, I'm fine with it. I have other things to do, and I would be happy and supportive if you can do it.

As I have always maintained, it is not about political power, but about political activism. Why stay away when you know you can be an agent of change?

'Thank you' note

2006-05-12T06:05:00.000-07:00

Recently I had loaned out money -- a considerable sum -- to a friend. He sent me a 'Thank you' note, which read thus:

Dear Vijay,

I've received your money. Thanks a lot for the same. Considering the situation I was in, it proved immensely useful. I will remain eternally indebted to you for the same.

Thanks,
...

What? Eternally indebted? Come on, friend, that is not the way to thank me!!

My vote

2006-05-11T10:19:00.000-07:00

So whom did I vote for in the elections three days ago? The answer is irrelevant really, but at least I had a reason -- and most voters don't have one.

My mom recalls that in 1967, when C.N. Annadurai, fondly known as Arignar Anna, was campaigning, it was his practice to walk past every home and personally ask people to vote for the DMK. Those were days when Chennai had no TV station. Air-conditioned, high-security cars were not in vogue. And candidates used to walk, walk and walk to canvass for votes. (You see, they still remembered Gandhi in those days.)

Cut to 2006. The sitting MLA (2001 - 2006) in my constituency didn't come to within 2 kilometres of our locality. That's ok, really, because people in power forget those who voted for them.

But during this campaign, neither the DMK nor the ADMK candidate visited my locality. Agreed, it is the largest constituency in Asia, yet it is their place. If they want votes, they better come around and ask. I'm not saying they must come to every home and break bread with all of us. But what stops them from a drive past every single road?

I voted for neither principal party. I voted for the candidate who drove past my home canvassing for votes. He belonged to a party that won't win at all, I was sure. But he had passed the simple criterion. It was like Alan Shearer or Francesco Totti staying put at the same club though they knew they wouldn't win anything - yet they played week in week out. All they played for was the cheering crowd.

I voted for _____ of the ______ party, because he was the only one who cared to come around.

Election fun

2006-05-10T22:22:00.000-07:00

As the counting progresses, it seems evident that the DMK alliance is going to form the next government. However, the guys at Rediff.com, definitely over-enthusiastic I'm sure, are showing a surplus number os seats for the alliance. Check this out!

I've voted. Have you?

2006-05-07T20:15:00.000-07:00

I've exercised my democratic duty. It's your turn. Please vote!

Chennai-Delhi distance, boon or bane?

2006-05-07T01:20:00.000-07:00

CNN-IBN's Battle for Tamil Nadu was probably the best election show by a "northern" news channel on tomorrow's elections. Perhaps I'm supporting the show because it was shot in the lawns of my alma mater, but really it was much better than NDTV's show hosted by Barkha Dutt - the latter was simply too distant from the people.

Cho Ramaswamy was there, as he was in NDTV's show the other day; it is a tribute to his popularity that he is sought after by every news channel. And Cho-isms were in abundance. The best of it all was this...

Rajdeep: "So, is the Chennai-Delhi distance a boon or a bane? Mr Ramaswamy, you have the final word."
Cho: "Without doubt, the distance is a boon. You can pack off 60 people from Tamil Nadu, and keep them a long distance away from here. Of course, it is a boon!"

Blogging with the pundits

2006-05-05T10:33:00.000-07:00

I've joined the DesiPundit team, and will share with you the best of my expeditions into Indian blogosphere, along with my co-pundits. To borrow the words of my fellow-joinee Jinal, "it's a little surreal to join the pundits, but I'm not complaining."

Question on Mani Ratnam's movies

2006-05-04T05:43:00.000-07:00

A friend asked me this thoughtful question over lunch today: "Barring Kannathil Muthamittaal, is there any Mani Ratnam movie in which some portion (even a song) was shot outside India?"

We tried recalling all of Mani's Tamil movies.

Pagal Nilavu - no idea
Nayagan was set in Bombay, so no chance
Anjali was set in Chennai
Roja, in Kashmir, so might have been shot in Shimla, Manali, or even Ooty
Dalapathi, somewhere in South India, methinks Mysore
Agni Nakshatram, no
Mouna Raagam, Chennai and Delhi
Bombay - duh!
Thiruda Thiruda, probably not
Iruvar, probably not
Uyire, somewhere in North India, maybe along the border, seems like the only doubtful choice
Alaipayuthey, no, don't think so
Ayutha Ezhuthu, no

Kannathil Muthamittaal, then, seems like the only movie which has been set outside India, and that too, because the story warrants it - it is the tale of an adopted child, whose biological mother fights for the Tamils of Sri Lanka. Even this movie could have been shot in some Lanka-like region in Tamil Nadu or Kerala. In none of the movies listed above could we think of even a song which was shot "in phoren". Mani is one of India's best directors and yet the above statistic! Very, very surprising!

If you know anything to the contrary, dear reader, please let me know - I would be glad to stand corrected.

P.S.: The list above does not consider movies produced by Mani. I think the Rayile rayile song in Five Star was shot in Europe.

The Girlfriend Maintenance Allowance

2006-05-01T18:35:00.000-07:00

(a fictitious glance at burning election issues in future elections)

Chennai, c. 2011 AD - In a bid to garner the attention of the youth of the State, the main opposition party has announced, as part of its election manifesto, a new allowance called GilMA - Girlfriend Maintenance Allowance. When asked, party sources informed this reporter that the people of this state who were given land, food, clothing and entertainment for free, are now clamouring for new and improved freebies.

It has come to light that whenever a boy and a girl go out on a date, it is the poor guy who has to spend a fortune on his lass. This imbalance has resulted in a statewide protest by the youth to bring down prices of cinema tickets, gift articles and designer apparel. An appalled government has been at pains to set right the situation in the state.

In an exclusive interview the leader of Opposition in the Assembly argues that if the Opposition is voted to power, they will dole out Rs. 2000 every month as an allowance to every committed male in the State. This money is exempt from taxes. The leader of the Opposition also enlightens us by putting forth the theory that such an allowance would add to the spending power of the youth of State, thus spurring economic growth in the State.

This new TV ad is the craze of the state.

Cut - three or four guys in some college campus. One person ventures "Dey, namma mattum thaan kaasu selavu pannanuma? Indha ponnunga purse-i veliya edukka maattaangala? Namakku eppoda vidivu kaalam varum?" ("Why should only boys spend on girls? Will they never take out their purses? When will this situation change?") - cut - "Enga katchikku vote podunga. Maasam 2000 rupaai vaangikkunga. Jolly-a enjoy pannunga!" ("Vote for our party. Get 2000 rupees per month. Enjoy!")

Arguably, the ruling party is baffled by this new election assurance by the Opposition. Not wanting to be left behind, it has just now come up with a better scheme. It has announced an allowance Rs 25,000 per year for all males between the ages of 18 and 30 in the state, irrespective of whether they have girlfriends or not. Also, there is a rumour that the Government is considering an additional allowance of Rs 25,000 per extra girlfriend, upto a maximum of 3! Sources close to the ruling party reveal that a special scheme, targeting single-and-looking males called GAG - Get A Girlfriend - is also on the cards.

The $1 salary!

2006-05-01T07:42:00.000-07:00

No, there is no billion or million after the 1; and no, this is no prank. In this age of skyrocketing salaries and ever-bulging paypackets, some American CEOs are actually taking home a solitary dollar for their year's toils. Chris Gaither of the LA Times opines that the one-dollar salary is America's latest status symbol.

As companies file their annual reports - disclosing how much they pay their head honchos and inevitably ignite outrage about exorbitant executive salaries - consider Google.

Every two weeks, the three billionaires who run the Internet search giant get a paycheck for about 4 cents. Before taxes.

That's true. Larry Page, Sergey Brin and Eric Schmidt take home a whopping one dollar. And they are not alone. Steve Jobs (Apple), Rich Kinder (Kinder Morgan), Jeff Katzenberg and Roger Enrico (DreamWorks) and Jerrold Perenchio (Univision) are also part of this elite club.

The company cuts Kinder a single check for 93 cents, after taxes, at the beginning of each year. Kinder owns stock worth more than $2 billion, and his 24 million shares will generate $84 million in dividends this year.

But he cashes the check.

"Rich works hard for that dollar," Kinder Morgan spokesman Rick Rainey said. "We expect him to spend it."

So the next time you think of searching for a new job because the pay isn't alright, think of the Google guys - they must be knowing a thing or two about searching.

What is home?

2006-04-30T20:28:00.000-07:00

As part of the BBC's ongoing series on Europe, Simon Davis visited the beautiful French city of Nantes. Situated in the Pays de la Loire region (the Loire country, after the river that flows through it), close to the Atlantic, Nantes has seen a rapid increase in the number of people who comes from Paris, and other big cities to make it their home.

Mr Davis had the good fortune to meet the Mayor of the city, Mr Ayrault. And he pushed forth the question, "So, why do so many people from other parts of France come and settle in Nantes? Parce que c'est la ville la plus belle en France? (Is it because it is the most beautiful city in France?)"

The Mayor's reply: "Oui, il y a des parcs, des jardins, la qualité de la vie... (Yes, there are many parks, gardens, and the quality of life...) But more importantly, this is a place which you can call home. You know, it is like what people say 'Home, sweet home'. Your home need not be the best in the world, but it is still your home - the only place where you don't feel like a stranger. That is Nantes. Anyone who comes here will say, 'This is home!'"

No Roon for World Cup?

2006-04-29T08:53:00.000-07:00

Manchester United and England star striker Wayne Rooney had to be stretchered off the ground, after a challenge from Chelsea's Paulo Ferreira today at Stamford Bridge. It was a heart-wrenching sight to see the 20-year old clutch his right foot in agonizing pain. The expression on his face said it all. Even the hostile Chelsea fans, who were booing Wayne every time he pressed forward, were distraught, an indication that England's hopes of securing the World Cup would take a beating if Rooney has a long lay-off.

With doubts over Michael Owen's fitness and form, and with no other top class poacher, England's strikeforce looks depleted without the Red Devils star. For English football fans, the next few hours and days will be crucial, as they wait to know if it is another case of "Roo woe", as it was in Portugal two years ago.

Let's hope the injury is not major, and that the Roon can shake it off soon.

Update

Manchester United's website has confirmed the worst. The star forward has broken a metatarsal in his right foot. He will be out of action for 6 weeks. Incidentally, the World Cup kicks off on the 10th of June.

One man show

2006-04-28T02:45:00.000-07:00

This past weekend, Ilaiyaraja and Lakshman Sruthi joined hands to bring One Man Show - a live concert, in which the maestro sung some of his best compositions for movies.

Friend Selva was there, and he terms it one mesmerizing experience, despite the troop not being at their best, nor some female singers, whom the organisers could have done without.

Inspite of the lack of proper arrangements, pathetic compering, average music by the troop, Sadhana sargam, one man really lit up the show. I now understand fully why the show was called "One man Show".

English football's annus mirabilis?

2006-04-26T20:12:00.000-07:00

The Champions League semifinals ended as expected, with the teams which scored in the first leg, making it through, after (surprising) nil-nil draws over the last two nights. Barcelona have surprised no one by sailing through to the finals; Arsenal are anything but. The final should be an interesting match-up, as it pits two teams that are bent upon playing attacking football, punctuated by slick passing and dynamism.

In a way, the 2005-06 season has been one of the best for English football in recent years. Not maybe in terms of domination. But given the number of teams that have come good in various competitions.

Chelsea are one point away from winning the league, and retaining their title as champions of England. Manchester United, who are pushing them, won the Carling Cup. Liverpool and West Ham United will face off in the finals of the FA Cup in May. Arsenal, despite a poor domestic season, are in the finals of the Champions League. And if Middlesbrough can overturn a 1-0 deficit at home tonight against Romania's Steaua Bucharest, they will be in the final of the UEFA Cup.

If the Gunners and Boro go all the way, England would have clean-sweeped Europe. That may still be a far-off dream, but English clubs have had a thing or two going their way this season. Interestingly, it is not the case of one club dominating the others, as in 1999, when United won the treble. The two surprise packages this season are West Ham and Wigan Athletic. Both clubs, in their first season back in the top flight have reached the finals of the domestic Cups.

English football's hopes don't stop there. The prayers of that small island would be pinned on the national team winning the World Cup in Germany. Most people agree that the current England squad is probably the best England has managed to field in the past few World Cups. Rooney is in sublime form. Gerrard, Lampard and Joe Cole are in superb touch. And captain Beckham can suddenly push his football to an inspiring level. Defensive worries still plague Eriksson's team, but given the attacking strength, England would start among the favorites for football's highest prize.

This could be England's best footballing year yet. But it's funny old game. Ronaldinho, that smiling assassin, can pour cold water on all those hopes - twice over!

In praise of "internalization"

2006-04-26T08:12:00.000-07:00

Computer programmers, especially the not-so-fortunate ones, are condemned to life of monotonous coding, the key to which lies in three strategically located keys - Ctrl, C and V.

"So, which project are you working for?"
"ABC-ZYX, Inc."
"Oh, that Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V thing? Poor you!"

Well, not any longer. We are all "internalizing" - the fine art of looking too much into something, and then deciding to pass it off as our own. Many thanks to Kaavya Viswanathan, our deliverer! You made us discover ourselves!

How Oh Pale Mehta Got Plagued?

2006-04-26T01:05:00.000-07:00

The controversy over the plagiarism allegations levelled against Kaavya Viswanathan (of How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life fame) have come to such a pass that one has to fall back on Nietzsche to find solace - "There are no truths, only interpretations." Plagiarism is very tough to fight, because it concerns things intangible. Yann Martel and Dan Brown have both been accused of stealing ideas for their most popular novels. But what works against the Indian-American Harvard sophomore is the hard evidence against her.

It surprised me that the author could come back with only a tame, "I internalized Ms McCafferty so much that I thought I had the right to copy it over." Whereas the jury is still out on the truth in that apology, The Harvard Independent has rubbished it by quoting from some of her earlier interviews.

On April 15, Viswanathan wrote 259 words for the Times of India about her favorite books. She mentioned that she was currently reading Zadie Smith's On Beauty — "I like it a lot" — and she expressed her admiration for the works of Evelyn Waugh, P.G. Wodehouse, Henry James, Jane Austen, the Brönte sisters, Kazuo Ishiguro, Margaret Atwood, Dorothy Dunnett, and Ian McEwan — hardly the stuff of mass-market chicklit. At school, she wrote, she keeps up with the belles lettres "by reading all the books that are short-listed for the Booker," a reference to the Mann Booker Prize for Fiction, a prestigious award for novelists from the British Commonwealth and Ireland.

The article also quotes her as saying she really liked Kazuo Ishiguro, when interviewed by UniversityChic.com

But one author Viswanathan never mentioned was Megan McCafferty. And while McCafferty's books aim at a young audience and contain romance, few would describe them as "old children's books" or "romance novels." If McCafferty's books had "spoke[n]" to Viswanathan "in a way few others did," she kept it to herself.

In another detailed article, Shane Wilson talks about how the book might have come through from the genesis of an idea to its entry into the bestseller list. Wilson claims that books by debutant authors pass through different hands, and that some of the content might actually be thrown in by others.

It is therefore quite possible that there is some truth in Kaavya's apology. When she said, "I was very surprised and upset to learn that there are similarities between some passages in my novel, 'How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life,' and passages in these books", she might have really meant what she said. Namely: I didn't write those passages. And I didn't even know there was a Ms McCafferty. Only when I was nailed down did I realise that it is not such a good thing to get others to write your novel.

The Crimson reports that Random House have called the author's apology "deeply troubling and disingenuous." Well, seems like there's going to be some serious fun!

My 15 seconds of fame!

2006-04-25T07:20:00.000-07:00

After living a life of 22 years and 340 days without doing anything significant to get my name into a national newspaper (my mom tells me some local newspaper even published my photo for winning a local Math Olympiad - those were great days!), I got indeed a pleasant surprise today, to find my name published in the Deccan Chronicle of today. And that too, in a page reserved strictly for Page 3 celebrities - the front page of the Chennai Chronicle.

The article, titled Bloggers Track TN Polls, features the co-blog I write with friend Eshwar. Many thanks to all patient readers who helped me attain Blogging nirvana! Thank you!

The article, which is an almost faithful copy of the one published in DNA (forgivable, since plagiarism seems to be the flavour of the season) a week ago, needlessly ruffles the Mafia, calling him an inflammatory blogger. You may want to know what he feels about this.

Superhit "Thingal"

2006-04-24T07:00:00.000-07:00

Sun TV, which had hit the capital markets with a 600-crore IPO, listed on the bourses today. And boy, was it a super-duper hit! The IPO, with an offer price of Rs. 875, opened above Rs. 1000 at start of trade today. But as the day wore on, it breached 1100, 1200, 1300 and finally breached the 1500-rupee mark! That's a whopping 70% gain in just a few hours.

(courtesy: Yahoo! Finance)

That's very much in keeping with the trend of IPOs opening at very high prices. Anyway, the promoters of Sun TV would be pleased that they have been able to complete this exercise before the elections.

And, if you made some money in this scrip, don't forget to vote for... ;-)

Hindi football commentary on ESPNStar

2006-04-23T02:35:00.000-07:00

For the last few months, ESPNStar has been getting on my nerves by including Hindi commentary in the football broadcasts. Though they might want to take football closer to the Indian audience, this is not the right way to do it. For the commentary is downright bad.

Throughout the match, the commentator tends to give himself some free advertisement. Every 30 minutes, you'll hear him saying, "aur mein hoon Sunil Taneja!" That's okay, but there is worse to follow. Mr Taneja shows us how it is possible to give commentary with the use of very few terms.

The Barcelona-Chelsea Champions League clash was described with just the following few words... "Ronaldinho, Brazil ke khiladi he ye... Ronaldinho... cross badiya... lekin John Terry... aage chal raha he Frank Lampard... cross badiya lekin Rafael Marquez..." Believe me, that was all you could hear. The name of the player, his country and that he could play a good cross only to be collected by the opposition defender. The country identification part is simply irritating because it is overdone. "Rafael Marquez, Mexico ke khiladi he ye..." a couple of minutes later, the ball comes back to Marquez, "Marquez, Mexico ke khiladi he ye..." Poof! I didn't know that the stylish Mexican captain would change nationality every time a back pass is played to him.

This annoying commentary made one even more irate because the commentators forget many a time that they are covering a football game. Like in a horse race, they keep giving running commentary. Mr Taneja might as well contact those who compile the Guiness book of records and ask him to be entered as the person who can speak non-stop for 90 minutes, repeating the same few words. Only those reciting a mantra repeatedly would be Mr Taneja's competitors.

Even worse is when ESPNStar displays a message that says "Both English and Hindi commentary available." One could say "Well, yes! I'm getting both, and I can make out neither!" But at times, when one could make out, the difference was evident. For example, Wayne Rooney against Newcastle. During the closing minutes of the first half, Rooney struck a powerful drive, but it hit his captain, Gary Neville, who was in the penalty are, on the side of the face. The Hindi commentator passed it off with an insignificant comment. The English commentator seized on the opportunity: "Well, Gary Neville might reeling under the effect of Rooney's powerful strike. But really, it is Newcastle who have taken it on the chin. At half time, it is Manchester United 1, Newcastle United nil."

The solution

But miseries don't last long. My friend, Vijay Anand, thanks to four years of diligent study in the field of Electronics and Communication engineering, understood that digital signals can actually be split and regrouped, and that ESPNStar won't be an exception to the rule. Further research on his part revealed that ESPNStar relays Hindi commentary only on the Left speaker, and that English commentary is available on the Right speaker.

Voila! If you live in Chennai, have a set-top box and hate Hindi commentary, simply modify the Audio option for the channel that you want! If you set it to Right, you've set it right! No more Hindi commentary, no more Sunil Taneja and no more cross badiya, lekin... Enjoy maadi!

Farewell, Big Al

2006-04-22T11:29:00.000-07:00

Like all great careers before, Alan Shearer's comes to an end. Yes, the Lion of Gosforth, the pride of St. James' Park has decided to call it a day. A sparkling career, though not one littered with trophies, yet in its ability to wow the spectators, was nothing short of the very best.

The Telegraph sums up the Newcastle and England centre-forward thus...

In some ways, Shearer is an old-fashioned hero. Ever since Blackburn's Jack Walker broke the British transfer record to sign him from Southampton, he has been aware of his price but given value for money. To paraphrase John F Kennedy, he has not asked what his clubs can do for him but what he can do for them. Thus, having helped Blackburn to their first championship since the First World War, he rejected the relatively easy option of Manchester United in favour of his beloved home-town club so St James' Park rather than Old Trafford could harvest the further fruits of his labours.

Despite the lack of club success at Newcastle, Shearer's personal success knew no bounds. He won the awards for Football Association's Overall Player of the Decade, Domestic Player of the Decade and Outstanding Contribution to the Premier League, in addition to being the top goalscorer since the beginning of the Premiership. He also holds the record for the maximum number of goals by a Newcastle player.

The fans from Tyneside, while wishing their most popular son farewell, will expect him to come back soon as manager. Let's hope that Shearer's next innings is just as sparkling!

Here's a wondergoal by the Newcastle legend against Everton. For more spectacular videos, please visit Google Video or Shearer9.com

When he moved us to tears...

2006-04-20T10:17:00.000-07:00

A couple of days ago, I watched Thillu Mullu for the umpteenth time. It is, without doubt, one of the best comedy movies in Tamil. Visu's dialogues and screenplay couldn't have been better as K. Balachander turned Hrishikesh Mukherjee's runaway-hit Golmaal into a movie that was just as good, and one which had not a trace of being a remake.

Rajnikanth's acting prowess was matched by 'Thengai' Srinivasan's portrayal of Sriramachandra Moorthy, probably the latter's most memorable role since Kaasedhaan Kadavulada. A landmark in Rajnikanth's acting career, Thillu Mullu proved the superstar's ability to adapt to a comedy role with ease.

Surprisingly, I was drawn into thinking about the movies in which Rajnikanth essayed roles which brought to fore totally opposite emotions - sadness and melancholy. Here are my top five picks (in no particular order).

Aarilirundhu Arupadhuvarai

A simple movie which narrates the life of the eldest son of a large family, starting from the age of 6, when he loses his father. Singlehandedly, the boy raises the entire family and, at the cost of his own career and well-being, provides a good life to his brother and sister, only to be ditched by them later. Few directors other than KB could have visualised Rajnikanth in such a subdued role, and the actor delivered one of the best performances of his career. This movie features the melodious song Kanmaniye Kaadhal Enbadhu...

Mullum Malarum

Many of us, children of this generation, hasten to liken Kamal Hassan to Sivaji Ganesan, and Rajnikanth to MGR. However, during the days they learnt their trade, the reverse was true. It was Rajni who essayed the more mature, performance-oriented roles, whereas Kamal tried his hand a popular roles. The role of Kaali in Mullum Malarum stands out as Rajnikanth's finest acting performance ever. Not unlike KB, director Mahendran brought out the best in Rajni, who plays a brash villager who, without much reason, hates a city-bred engineer (Sarath Babu). Upon watching this one, I realised why films are called movies - for their ability to move the audience!

Shoba and Rajni as siblings brought inevitable comparisons to Sivaji and Savitri in Pasamalar. This movie, which features the evergreen hit song Senthazham Poovil... won Rajni his first State award for Best Actor.

Nallavanukku Nallavan

Rajnikanth's next movie, the eagerly-awaited Sivaji (The Boss), is produced by AVM. The superstar should feel indebted to the production house, because they gave him his first break as a hero in Murattu Kaalai. Rajni has acted in many other movies under the famed AVM banner, but Nallavanukku Nallavan should rank as the best of that lot. He portrays the transformation of a brash misled youngster into a refined and successful man with elan. Radhika, as the leading lady, excelled in an equally good role. Rajni's portrayal of a mature father won him critical acclaim.

Dharmadurai

This is personal favourite of mine. Rajnikanth doesn't utter a word for the much of the first 30 minutes, yet has a magnetic screen presence. Yet, as the characterisation begins to strike us, we realise how many sacrifices he has done for his undeserving brothers, and how they respond to it by milking him, and finally even sending him behind bars. Another fine example of a movie in which Rajni's character undergoes a sea-change due to the progression of events. How can one forget Maasi maasam aalana ponnu...?

Dalapathi

For all the success that it has achieved, Chandramukhi is a crass movie without anything to write home about. One wonders what reception a movie like Dalapathi would have got had it been released last year. Mani Ratnam, who had achieved iconic status with Nayagan, returned with another gangster movie, this time with Rajnikanth in the lead. It is a tribute to Mani Ratnam's genius that he can retell a story we all know, and making us remark that his version is the better. Based on characters drawn from the Mahabharata (Kunti, Karna, Duryodhana and Arjuna), Mani weaves an interesting tale of a gangster, siding with the man who took him in his arms, fighting his own brother.

Dalapathi marked the first occassion when Rajnikanth was paid a salary of Rs 1 crore. GV, who produced the film, must have surely felt that the money was well-spent as the public ascribed it instant cult status. Mammooty as Deva provided such a compelling performance that some people argue till date that he was the better actor - again, a tribute to Mani Ratnam's casting. Powerful scenes punctuate the movie, like when Rajni expresses his dilemma, when he confronts his mother (Srividya) or when he is confronted by Mammooty... scenes during which yours truly, a boy of 9 years old, jerked with tears in Chennai's Albert theatre.

Some other movies in the list: Engeyo Ketta Kural, Pudhu Kavidhai, Padikkaathavan, Muthu, Mannan.

AC Milan 0 - 1 Barcelona

2006-04-18T20:29:00.000-07:00

We are all extemely fortunate to be watching Ronaldinho perform during the peak of his career. If not, we would never have known what we had missed!

My knowledge of such footballing greats like Pele, Cryuff, Puskas, Yashin, even Maradona is limited to an odd clipping on TV, or a book or column on the history of football. Maybe, I can feel happy, even proud that I did not miss the magic of the great Ronaldo de Assis Moreira, nicknamed Ronaldinho.

And when this smiling assassin took on the giants in their own lair, he produced a special effort that sees Barcelona going back to the Camp Nou with a crucial away goal. The men from Milan would be pleased that they are not trailing by more, because they were almost clueless for 45 minutes as Barca cut open the solid Milan defence time and again in an exhibition of football of the highest order.

The game though started very differently. AC Milan are probably the most complete club side in Europe. They have some of the best attackers in the game - Shevchenko, Inzaghi, the young Gilardinho and Kaka. And are blessed with the best defence - Cafu, Nesta, Stam, Kaladze, and the peerless Paolo Maldini. With a midfield that can attack or defend at will. Barcelona, contrarily, rely on attack. Minus Puyol and Marquez, Barcelona's defence is uninspiring. So, the tie of the tournament would actually favour the Milan side, because of their tactical strength.

Milan started off in attacking style, probably wanting to capitalise on Barca's characteristic slow starts. It paid off, as Gilardino hit the post, and Puyol having to clear the ball in penalty area with his knee. Milan had a gameplan, and played it to perfection. Barcelona thrive on space, and Milan cut that out. And they cut out Barca possession time too. Gattuso was excellent, winning balls in the the midfield with remarkable ease. Milan's left flank was very active, with Serginho making deep runs, with good assists from Seedorf.

In the first half hour, Barcelona had a couple of chances, though none was dangerous enough to cause panic at the San Siro. Eto'o was surprisingly off-colour, wasting a few good chances. Around that time, Barcelona started waking up. Iniesta was good, winning possession for his team in the midfield, however Milan ended the first half stronger, though they did not have anything on the scoresheet to show for it.

The second half saw Milan give Barca more space. Wave after wave of Barca attack was arrested by the Milan defence. And then, the inevitable happened. Barcelona strung together a hundred passes, with Ronaldinho orchestrating it, playing in the central midfield. Crosses went to either side, and finally Ronaldinho picked out Giuly, and the Frenchman found himself at the end of a well-measured chip. With Kaladze and Nesta in front, Giuly rushed past a diving Nesta and beat Dida at the near post. Barcelona were ecstatic. They had done the improbable, especially given Milan dominance in the first half.

Once in the lead, Barcelona played fantastic football, the kind that propelled them to the Spanish title last season. Milan, surprisingly, seemed dazed, and their football lacked inspiration. Ronaldinho could have doubled the lead for the visitors, but his shot hit the inside of the upright and rolled across the face of the goal. A good save from Dida off Iniesta (who orchestrated a splendid one-two with Edmilson) meant that Milan go to the Camp Nou with just the one-goal deficit. That game, a week from today, should be a definite treat, for Milan, the wounded tigers, beaten at home in a European game for the first time in so many years, will want to inflict defeat in front of 98000+ spectators. As Carlo Ancelotti said after the game, "They have done it, beating us at home. So, we should be able to do it too."

Tonight

Arsenal welcome Villareal for the last European night at Highbury. Villareal look depleted, with both their central defenders out, as also is their first-choice stopper. Arsenal look the stronger side.

Men to watch: Thierry Henry, Francesc Fabregas, Juan Roman Riquelme, Diego Forlan.

A rare moment...

2006-04-17T03:35:00.000-07:00

Captured 5 minutes ago...

We came in peace...

2006-04-11T06:23:00.000-07:00

This Sunday, Manchester United beat Arsenal 2 - 0. The win was much more comprehensive than the scoreline would suggest, with United dominating the game for almost 80 minutes. Wayne Rooney was in magnificent form, and led United in a comprehensive demolition of their traditional rivals.

What follows is not about football. It is a revelation of how peace triumphs over brute force.

I was reading one of the football message boards on Yahoo! Sports today. I'm pasting the contents of a particular thread here. The thread starts with a United fan starting a stinging attack on Arsenal and their manager, Arsene Wenger. Titled Cheaters never prosper, Arsene, the post points out how many decisions went against United, including a penalty which was not given when Kolo Toure became goalkeeper for a single second, pushing away a Rooney strike with his hands.

The thread gains lot of steam as many fans line up expletives in the name of replies. Some samples here.

manunited_til_i_die: It doesnt suprise me one bit that United fans hate arsenal so much, wenger couldnt have made that club more anti-united if he tried. Well its always nice to know that they dont know how to cope with us anymore. Everyone was going on about arsenal before the game, saying fergie was quiet and arsenal were the team to be feared. What a load of nonsense! I wonder if these people were even watching them recently. Were Juventus and real madrid not awful?? Neither side created much at all! Juve lost 2 players in the first game and were not a good advertisement for italian football. Very dull. Their performances in the league were nothing special either. United however...blimey we have been on fire havent we!!? Arsenal were all over the place as soon as we had an attack. Flamini didnt know what to do and the normally superb toure was glad the whistle went for full time!

It gets worse as the thread progresses...

ian_harris48: you ar*e fans are polite?lol,some of you are ,but not the ones singing disgusting songs yesterday,they wer'nt polite at all,still all fair,still i think next time w*nker oops wenger sorry says he'll help mourinho he'll cringe,lol

shadyaftermath2k: What a loser too, he still that "fu** you but have a nice day" off 8-Mile that black dude. Arsenal fans "Talk out of there ar**s, instead of there mouths"

Until someone decides to restore order...

read_chris2002: An Arsenal fan in peace. Yes you were the better team in the second half and deserved to beat us yesterday. I really hope you overhaul Chelsea but I fear it's too late as they were superb against West Ham yesterday. We've had a lot of your fans wishing us well during the champions league run which is much appreciated. Good luck to you.

Just this one message in a red-hot board. And then there is peace and bonhomie all around...

ian_harris48: chris thanks,and good luck against villareal

read_chris2002: Cheers Ian. There still seems to be loads of hatred between Arsenal and United fans. Shame really as it's only a game and although I'm Arsenal through and through I can recognise when my team is well beaten. You'd have beaten Chelsea with that performance yesterday and it's a shame that your not playing them sooner. I'm hoping United replicate that performance a week today because Tottenham will not be able to handle you.

jim_888_2000: Well said Chris. There are a lot of idiots on these boards who probably couldn't recognise good footballers. Arsenal have a very good young side, United are just a little better at the moment. Hopefully both will improve again next year and overcome Chelski,we just might do it this year if Bolton get at least a draw on Saturday. At last both managers spoke sensibly after the match and gave deserved praise to both teams, if this continues perhaps the 'hatred' felt by some will turn into healthy rivalry.

read_chris2002: I really hope it does turn to healthy rivalry. The only reason the hatred exists is because the two managers don't get on very well although this season I've seen more respect between Fergie and Wenger and with both sets of players so why don't the supporters follow suit?

Need I say more?

I'm currently reading a book called How Soccer Explains the World by Franklin Foer. The author, an American soccer aficionado weaves an interesting account of how different facets of the game explain diverse and (on-the-surface) unrelated things. If he had read this Yahoo! Sports thread, he might have added a few pages on the triumph of peace.

Not surprisingly...

2006-04-05T08:47:00.000-07:00

clumsy artwork: Yours truly

Look who's joined Blackburn Rovers

2006-03-31T22:07:00.000-08:00

With the football season nearing a close, all of Europe is abuzz with transfer speculation. Will van Nistelrooy stay at Manchester United? Is Henry Barcelona-bound? What's going to happen at Real Madrid - a clear-out?

Well, at least one club would consider itself lucky at having made a swift move. Blackburn Rovers have signed a star striker. Trying to guess who? Let me give you a clue. This person's most famous achievement was to wipe out most of Iraq with a wave of strikes. No, not the Iraqi football team, I'm talking about the normal people of Iraq - civilians.

Yup, you got it. It is Condoleezza "Condi" Rice.

However, signing Dr. Rice has invited a lot of criticism.

Blackburn has a large Muslim population, some of whom are unhappy that Mr Straw invited to the town a key figure in the decision to invade Iraq; a local mosque refused to allow her to visit yesterday.

And when the foreign secretary and his guest visited the Pleckgate school in the town, they were greeted by a group of parents protesting against Dr Rice's presence.

Rabiya Adam, a mother of five who had kept her children at home during the visit, said Dr Rice "is not welcome" in their home town. "She was behind all the killings in Iraq. When I found out she was coming here to speak to our children, I didn't want her to preach what she did in Iraq," Mrs Adam said.

Earlier in the day, Dr. Rice had visited Liverpool and had faced even more embarrassment there.

After a day spent valiantly trying to ignore the hundreds of peace campaigners who gathered to protest at the visit of Condoleezza Rice yesterday, Jack Straw must have drawn a sigh of relief as America's most powerful woman settled down in Liverpool's Philharmonic Concert Hall for a medley of classical favourites.

But the Foreign Secretary was set to find himself beset by diplomatic embarrassment beyond his own worst imaginings, as singer Jennifer John began a rendition of John Lennon's peace song Imagine - then switched to the late Beatle's most famous anti-war anthem Give Peace a Chance.
Liverpudlian singer John, who had introducing the song by acknowledging "the people demonstrating outside peacefully" said she had deliberately staged a protest.

[pictures and quoted text, courtesy: The Scotsman]

Chennai joins the Metroblogging bandwagon

2006-03-26T18:13:00.000-08:00

Till yesterday, I didn't know what Metroblogging meant. Well, I don't claim much knowledge even now. But Chennai has been placed on the Metroblogging circuit, and that's great news!

Many thanks to Kaps, Kiruba, Nancy, Keerthi, Chandru, Vatsan and Echo.

A hero and a martyr

2006-03-23T05:49:00.000-08:00

This morning, I saw this photo pinned to the cubicle of a colleague. Curiosity overcoming the better of me, I asked him if the person in the picture was Bhagat Singh. My colleague replied in the affirmative, and being a native of Punjab, said in a fit of patriotism that today marked the 75th anniversary of the martyrdom of Shaheed Bhagat Singh.

All I knew about Bhagat Singh was that he tried bombing an assembly of something, and failed and was caught and put to death. I confess that I was in the wrong, as these articles from Wikipedia and Kamat's Potpourri would prove. Also, I didn't know that Rang de Basanti has a strong link to the revolutionary sardar.

An interesting sidelight

The article on Kamat's Potpourri has the following lines, which I found very relevant to today's burning(?) issue.

Instead of finding the root cause for discontent of Indians, the British government took to more repressive measures. Under the Defense of India Act, it gave more power to the police to arrest persons to stop processions with suspicious movements and actions. The act brought in the council was defeated by one vote. Even then it was to be passed in the form of an ordinance in the "interest of the public."

Petty politicians never change, huh?

Stunt awards 2006

2006-03-23T02:36:00.000-08:00

Is there an award for the best stunts performed in public life?

If yes, then I will back Sonia Gandhi to win this year's award.

Puzzled? You shouldn't be. She just resigned her Lok Sabha seat, stating...

"In the last few days some Opposition parties are trying to create an impression that the Congress and the United Progressive Alliance are using Parliament and the government only to protect me. This has hurt me very much."

"I have stated earlier also that I am in politics and public life not for my selfish ends," she said. "I have taken a pledge to serve the people of the country and to protect secular ideals. So, in keeping with my public life and political principles and according to my own belief, I resign as member of Lok Sabha and Chairperson of National Advisory Council. I have full faith that brothers and sisters of Rae Bareli and the whole nation will understand this feeling of mine."

(quoted text, courtesy: Rediff.com)

Catch-22

2006-03-22T18:36:00.000-08:00

Q: Describe a catch-22 situation that you were in...

A: Once, I was in Ayanavaram (a locality in Chennai), and wanted to go to Anna Square (also in Chennai). I didn't have a bike or a car. There were no auto-rickshaws either. I thought I was stranded. I didn't know what to do. Thankfully, bus # 22 came along, and I caught it, and reached my intended destination safely. That's a catch 22 situation I've been in!

Hasta la "Vista"?

2006-03-22T05:24:00.000-08:00

Microsoft has announced that it is going to delay the launch of the will-it-ever-come Windows Vista.

Mary Jo Foley of the PC Magazine explains the reasons in her article, "What's Really Behind the Windows Vista Delay?"

To say that Microsoft's bombshell decision to delay the launch of Windows Vista until 2007 was due to quality concerns is an oversimplification.
Microsoft actually is pushing the Vista launch back to January 2007 to appease the marketing gurus as much as the quality grunts...
The week of March 20, Microsoft was faced with an internal deadline, Goldberg said. Microsoft needed to give its partners a firm commitment on when it would deliver to them the final Vista bits.
"We made the decision this morning [March 21]," Goldberg said. Rather than be sorry, Microsoft decided to play it safe and build some extra time into its testing and bug-fixing schedule, he said.

His last bow?

2006-03-17T10:29:00.000-08:00

[cross-posted in TN Assembly Election '06]

Rajnikanth's decision to stay away from the political theatre this time around is probably his best move yet. The actor, who was once touted to be future Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, has now politely removed himself from the race. This offers an excellent study of the characteristics a leader requires, most of all, ruthlessness.

Ten years ago...

I remember that day (April/May 1996), and that televised speech vividly. My grandfather was in hospital, and I was at my cousins. There was buzz all round that Rajnikanth might appear on TV to support the then recently formed DMK-TMC alliance. And appear he did. Rajnikanth, who had just had the biggest hit of his life yet (Baasha), was the toast of Tamil Nadu, and people were certain that he would mince no words about the unpopular ADMK government. He didn't disappoint. The statement was made, and the DMK-TMC combine got a great boost. Not that they were on a sticky wicket before, but the support of a man of Rajni's charisma does sway many.

Subsequent Rajni movies were huge hits and were sprinkled with generous amounts of anti-JJisms. No one was in any doubt who the inspiration behind Neelambari in Padayappa was. Padayappa was then the biggest grosser in the history of Tamil cinema. That was the moment. He had to decide. He missed the moment.

Doubts, doubts and doubts

For all his studied pragmatism on-screen, Rajnikanth failed to carry it into his real life. "Will he? Won't he?" filled the air. Some said he would float a party and forge an alliance with the DMK. Others wished he would go it alone. Rajnikanth missed the boat at that moment. His doubts were compounded by the fact that the parties he placed faith in shifted alliances and allegiances at the drop of the hat.

The last blow came when the BJP and the DMK split, and Dr. Ramadoss' PMK aligned itself with the DMK. The BJP sided with the ADMK. Rajnikanth's friends were on either side, and in an uncalculated move, he released a statement that he would vote for the BJP, and that his supporters would work for the downfall of the PMK. Seasoned political watchers knew then that this man had gone to a point of no return. The BJP lost, and the DMK alliance romped home 40-nil.

What went wrong?

Rajnikanth became a victim of his own indecision. A man who spends 30 minutes of a two-and-a-half-hour movie deriding his political rivals would not be doing it just for fun. Thus, one cannot believe that he did things just to please his audience. There was a calculation behind his moves. Where he failed was to capitalise on the right moment to launch himself into the political arena.

In politics, survival demands a high degree of ruthlessness. As the strategists at Toyota will tell you, "Plan carefully, and implement rapidly." The plan was careful, but the implementation never happened. The iron wasn't struck when hot, and hence the man failed to strike gold!

Budding politicians should see a clear lesson in this. Charisma goes only half the way. It is like the business card. Unless it is backed by solid planning, flawless calculation and well-timed manoeuvres, it is of no use. It is sad that Rajnikanth, who might be one of the main characters in a book on Tamil cinema, will only be a forgotten footnote in a book on Tamil Nadu's politics.

Saving the game

2006-03-12T18:47:00.000-08:00

South Africa beat Australia and all that. A Himalayan achievement, no doubt. Yesterday's match was a tribute to the human spirit, a celebration of the never-say-die attribute of sportsmen who immortalized themselves by entering the annals of cricket history. But it is also a reminder, of the sorry state of bowlers. About the ruthlessness of the one-day game, and how it brutalises wantonly the men who run up to deliver the ball only to see it wallopped to the fence. So much that the most pertinent comment from yesterday's game was "After watching this game, who would want to take up bowling as a career?"

It is interesting that the comment comes just a day after Anil Kumble prised his 500th scalp. But that was in Tests, and test cricket is not so unbalanced as its shorter version. It is the one-day game that needs ~~some~~ lotsa rethinking. The rethinking did happen, but the results have been counterproductive.

For example, the Powerplays hardly help the fielding team. Unless, of course, if the batting side are five down already. Since that happens seldom, the fielding captain is often left to rue the new change in rules. The futility of the super-sub option is already out in the open, with both Graeme Smith and Ricky Ponting agreeing not to use super-subs in the recently concluded series.

The ICC needs to act, and fast. Some oft-repeated reasons like making the game more entertaining to the viewers are turning out to be short-sighted excuses. How can the ICC say ok to torturing bowlers? In short, how different is Twenty20 from a rape scene in the movies?

I have been thinking of some possible rule changes that the ICC can bring in. None of them might sound plausible, but this is the best we can do to avoid plunder.

1. Three fielders outside the ring

When the batsmen slog blindly, the fielding restrictions during the first 15 overs (now during the Powerplays) are only helping their cause. Just two fielders outside the ring means the fielding captain places a third-man and a fine-leg by default. This enables the batsmen to go over the top in front of the wicket. How about placing an extra man outside the ring? This gives the bowling side extra options. A deep cover, a long-off or a deep mid-wicket to offer extra protection.

2. Only one catcher

This can ideally be coupled with the previous rule. Instead of mandating two close-in fielders, we can relax the restriction to one catcher during the initial overs and powerplays.

3. Naming super-sub after the toss

Nowadays, the super-sub must be named prior to the toss. Thus if Rahul Dravid names Murali Kartik as his super-sub, but he wants India to bat second, the super-sub option goes waste. Thus, the captains can be allowed to name their super-sub after the order of play is determined.

4. Twelve fielders

This is a ridiculous suggestion, I know. The game can be played with an extra substitute, who is always on the field. He won't bat or bowl, but he can be used for fielding. Too often we know that one more man would have done the difference. This extra man would give the fielding captain multiple options, say one extra man on the leg side.

5. Twelve-a-side

Another one, more ridiculous than the previous. Each side can field 12 players, of which 10 players would be regular. Of the other two, only one can bat and the other must bowl. Both of them can field. This is like selecting an Indian team with 11 players, and picking say Murali Kartik in addition. Kartik can bowl his full quota of 10 overs, but won't be allowed to bat. Before the toss, both captains would name their teams including these two special-function players.

6. Restricted slog overs

Restricting the number of overs with field restrictions to 10. As a compromise, this could be split as the first and last 5 overs of an innings.

7. Mandatory bowler-friendly pitches

In a series of five games, at least 2 should be played on tracks that assist bowling. Like some slow tracks in India, or fast and bouncy tracks like in Perth.

I could think of some more, inspired from the Indian street game. Like having four stumps, or legalising the one-pitch catch. The latter was devised, rather ingeniously, I must admit, by some shrewd cricketing brain on some bylane in India, which knew aeons ago that supports were needed to quash the imbalance plaguing the game.

Notwithstanding the aboe, I'm quite sure that the ICC would do nothing, because they are in the money and why would they want to do anything to disturb that? They will come up with some more "amazing suggestions" like HighFives, a game of just 5 balls. Cart 'em and win! After all, when in school, even I was a slogger. For all my vegetarianism, I know how tasty the blood of bowlers is.

"Who's the man?"

2006-03-12T08:17:00.000-08:00

I am constrained to repeat the opening line of my previous post.

"How do champions respond to bad patches?

By rising like a phoenix does."

Oh, and there's a similar photo too...

The South Africans, who were mauled earlier in the day, responded like how some superstar-wannabes in Tamil cinema do: "It doesn't matter who gets to 400 first. What matters is who wins the game at the end!"

What a game! What a truly magnificent game! For once, I pity the fact that a large section of Chennai could not play witness to simply the greatest one-day cricket match ever (because of CAS regulations). Mates, you missed it!

Chasing an ungettable 435 for victory, at a staggering 8.7 runs per over, South Africa reached the target with a ball to spare, thanks largely to a fine knock from Herschelle Gibbs, and important contributions from skipper Graeme Smith (90), Mark Boucher (50) and Johan van der Wath (35).

Herschelle Gibbs, who scored 175 off 111 balls, was in a murderous mood, and could have become the first man to cross 200 in a one-day game, before he holed out to Brett Lee trying to go for a hat-trick of sixes. South Africa looked comfortable for the most part, as they were consistently up there with the asking rate. But in a game like this, the chasing team is always precariously placed, because a wicket or a good over is all it takes to swing the game away into the fielding team's favour. But fighters as they are, the Proteas never gave up, and man after man came in a played a crucial knock. Even the portly Roger Telemachus put his morning blues behind him and carted a couple of important boundaries.

This match, the final of this series, has broken a lot of records. The two highest ODI totals, the maximum number of 4s and 6s, and the unfortunate Mick Lewis who was pummeled for 113 off his 10. I feel sorry for him, in fact for all the bowlers. As one commentator put it, "Who would want to take up bowling as a career?" Yes, that is the only sad part to this game. Cricket is becoming increasingly batsmen-friendly, nay, it is becoming bowler-unfriendly rather. ICC, are you listening?

Anyway, it was a fabulous game. One worth the money. It is time to celebrate South Africa's victory (and incidentally, VKpedia's 150th post too!)

Dial 'em for murder

2006-03-12T04:23:00.000-08:00

How do champions respond to bad patches?

By rising like a phoenix does.

And that is what the Aussies have reiterated today. The punter and his men plundered the South African attack, making the Springboks look like bunch of schoolboys. Ricky Ponting led the rampage with a blazing 164 off 105 balls, as the Aussies carted the sorry South African bowling to all parts of the ground.

Net result: Australia have posted the world's highest one-day total ever. A staggering 434. This is the first time any side have scored more than 400, the previous best being Sri Lanka's 398 in the 1996 World Cup.

Needing to win the final game of the series, which is tied 2-2, the Aussies have responded with such character and grit that emphasises their pre-eminence in the game. Gilchrist (55), Katich (79) and Hussey (81, off 51) were the other demolition men.

Leading the honours for the Proteas was Roger Telemachus giving away 87 off his ten overs. Ntini and Hall chipped in with 80 each, while van der Wath and Kallis managed to reached the 70s.

Microsoft backs Firefox

2006-03-10T10:21:00.000-08:00

If you ask me what the best feature in Internet Explorer 7 is, I wouldn't think twice before saying it is the Uninstall option.

For once, the guys at Microsoft decided that the Firefox guys had done enough to come up with a good browser. So Bill's men decided, "Ok, these guys have toiled hard. Let's do our bit to help them." And they developed IE 7.

With all its supercool features, IE7 offers you probably your worst browsing experience. I haven't felt as bad even about lynx, and lynx was a totally different kind of browser. With an interface designed to make you feel stupid, and with tabs that make you loathe yourself for using tabs and a host of other amazingly useless features, IE7 is your perfect recipe to spoil a nice week.

To describe it in a sentence, IE7 is the most imperfect copy of Firefox that was ever made. For example, previous versions of IE had the FTP browsing option, through which you can browse FTP sites as if they were folders. IE7 no longer offers that interoperability, and lists down files as Firefox or Netscape would do. However if you open an FTP address from a Windows folder, it launches the old IE style window. So Microsoft, why screw up a nice feature?

If you are thinking I'm being hypercritical, that's because I feel so bad about this. How can a browser take ages to open on a machine with a gigabyte of RAM? What can one say about a software which you are only too happy to uninstall? What is happening to / at Microsoft?

A friend described the feeling after uninstalling IE7 thus: "All along, Microsoft was good at copying other people's products and doing a good job at that. Now, they are beginning to do a really sick job even at copying!"

No words were uttered, none were necessary

2006-03-07T19:43:00.000-08:00

The big ticket

2006-03-07T09:03:00.000-08:00

I'm trying to conceptualise a TV ad. It starts like this.

First a long shot of the sun. Then we show random shots of Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn etc. They are all rotating and revolving. The earth too. We focus on the earth. Suddenly, the earth stop rotating. The lights in the background go on. A whistle blows. Deafening shouts of "Barca, Barca" all around as Ronaldinho kicks the ball. It is Barcelona v/s Chelsea tonight. Just a few hours away, the biggest game of the season so far, worthy of the Final is about to commence.

Barcelona have a vital 2-1 lead, with two away goals that they will carry with them to their own Camp Nou. Chelsea know the weight of defeat. Especially when they have lost in the semifinals in consecutive years. Chelsea must win tonight. They must score. And I will be praying against it.

For the second season running, Barca are the best team in Europe. By far. Chelsea's tactical play might win them league points and trophies in England. But their style and long-ball play are boring to watch. Coach Mourinho would reiterate that they play to win, not to entertain. Well, if I wanted to see a side winning, I would rather play the football games by EA Sports. Manchester United look like a haunted team. Arsenal even worse. And Liverpool are counting on luck to bail them once again.

The Italian game is hardly inspiring. They will give you sexy-sounding names -- catenaccio, for one -- that are high on tactics and low on entertainment. Juve, Milan, Inter, they aren't very different. Score one goal and defend like it is the end of the world. In Spain, many a feared side has dropped guard. Real Madrid look like a a team of stars who have run out of gas. Valencia and Deportivo sound like names from the past.

Barca offer the difference because they are out-and-out entertainers. They are like the typical Rajnikanth movie. Flair, finesse, style and sometimes arrogance. And who better to display all that than Ronaldinho - entertainer number one.

Chelsea and Barca met at the same stage last season. Barca carried a 2-1 win to Stamford Bridge. They were riding high on confidence. But Jose Mourinho pulled the tactical ploy of the year. Chelsea began the game with four strikers, and in the first 20 minutes, they lead 3-0. A stunned Barca managed a fightback. Ronaldinho converted a penalty and followed it up the most nonchalant goal of the year. A goal of such quality that tears involuntarily rolled down my cheecks. It was 2 AM then. John Terry ruined the party by heading Chelsea home.

This year though, the story is a bit different. Barca rocked the Bridge in the first leg. A similar scoreline, but this time, Barca play hosts in the return leg. The first game was awesome, but not without its share of controversy. Asier del Horno was sent off for a needless, stupid, clumsy, idiotic etc. challenge on a young Argentine boy called Lionel. True to his last name, this lad had messed up the hosts with some excellent runs, for which he won lots of praise, and comparison with the hitherto incomparable Wayne Rooney. He drew lots of catcalls too, most notably from a chronic ~~whiner~~ wailer called Jose, who felt that his team had been short-changed yet again by poor refereeing. Had it not been for his captain, Jose would have travelled to Barca facing a four-goal deficit.

Two weeks seem like a distant past. A new game. A new stage. The same actors. A raucous, partisan crowd. And two managers, radically different in legacy, approach and spirit. But one thing will remain unchanged - the will to win. I will support Barca, but as our own Ravi Shastri would repeat ad nauseum, "Whichever side wins or loses, it is the game of ~~cricket~~ football that is the ultimate winner!" Be there. Enjoy the beautiful game. This is the night -- glorious night!

Men to watch: Ronaldinho, Messi, Lampard, Terry.

Elsewhere

Juventus play hosts to Werder Bremen, thankful to their two away goals, and more so to the fact that Bremen could not manage more than 3 at home. A tantalisingly poised game. Juve might scrape through.

Villareal, hosts to Rangers, too have two away goals to their credit, and one less in debit. Can the Gers pull off an away win?

CRASH!

2006-03-05T20:24:00.000-08:00

CRASH wins the Oscar for the Best Picture this year. That is a surprise - S-U-R-P-R-I-S-E - because, just a few moments earlier, Ang Lee took the Best Director award for Brokeback Mountain.

Philip Seymour Hoffman and Reese Witherspoon take top acting honours, as George Clooney and Rachel Weisz walk away with the Oscars for the Best Supporting Actor and Actress.

Tvam jeeva sharadām shatam

2006-03-05T05:20:00.000-08:00

The following appeared in the Obituary section of The Hindu today.

RESPECTUL HOMAGE:

Mrs. Kalyana Sundari (93) Demise: 14-02-2006
Kolinjivadi V. Narayana Swami (102) Demise: 24-02-2006

United in Life for 82 years.
Reached Heavenly Abode within 11 Days.

I'm truly stunned by this. These days, when the average life expectancy is around 70, here is a couple that has lived together for almost four generations. Leave alone arguments about modern marriages not working, or about the durability of the marriages of old, just imagine what things of history they would have beheld together...

My uncle, who brought this piece to my notice, throws in another line. According to Hindu religious belief, the soul of a departed person does not immediately attain its destination. Rather it is believed that the soul wanders in this world for 11 days - some say, the soul remains close to the bereaved, and enters Heaven only on the 12th day. This is the reason why the first ceremony is conducted on the twelfth day.

Here are two people, united for so long, and the wife never left her man. She stayed with him in life and in death, and when the time came for her to bid adieu, she took him along.

“Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be.
The last of life, for which the first was made.”

Deconstructing Washington's "wows"

2006-03-04T05:04:00.000-08:00

In a February 15 article on Rediff.com - Narayana Murthy wows Washington elite - Aziz Haniffa sings praises of India's international software icon. The Chairman of Infosys Technologies is, without doubt, the face of Indian software. But he has also transcended into a kind of statesman-CEO voicing his views on areas not directly under his domain. The "sage of Bangalore" (as Haniffa calls him) has set new standards in corporate governance, and has raised the bar high enough so that Indians can start competing with global behemoths.

So, if Infy is all that, then why was it downgraded yesterday by JP Morgan? In a point-blank interview to CNBC-TV18, analyst Bhavin Shah of JP Morgan brings to light the fact that "the company is facing a crunch in the middle management layers." Shah points out that Wipro is also on the brink of such a crunch, but that TCS is a bit safe.

Can this be true? How can such a thing happen to some of India's most successful, most loved companies? The fact is, and Indian IT majors are waking up to it, there is a serious shortage of skilled manpower that is hitting the industry. And real bad.

Well yes, you read in the papers that "TCS (or Infy or Wipro) added 15000 into it ranks this year. And the numbers are growing." True, but it pays to find out how many of those joined straight from college. That number would be a staggering 80+ percentage. Given an attrition rate of 10-12%, a company like Infosys would be losing 4000 people every year. Huge as it may seem, one might still be tempted to think "But they added four times that number, right?" The real impact of this can be understood only when we appreciate that these 4000 were people who had served for 3-4 years.

In effect, people with lots of experience leave the company, and they are replenished with freshers. As Indian IT tries to move away from doing the menial tasks to some really challenging work, the people capable to executing such work are no longer there. A year or two ago, the picture wasn't this bad for two reasons. The people who quit one IT major found their way into one of the others. This way attrition was equitably peaceful for recruiters because if 10 people from company A went to companies B, C and D, a proportional number would come from B, C and D to A. These days, however, with the arrival of big names (like Accenture, for example), the other names have become some kind of uncool. Secondly, IT professionals have realised that B, C and D are really no different from A, so that makes them uncool anyway. Recently, a friend of mine, who is a Project Manager at one of the Big Three, recounted how a Vice President of his company accepted that people are no longer seduced by the company. "Earlier 2000 people used to walk in for a single ad in the papers. Now it is hardly 10% of that number we are able to attract. And they are simply no good."

The other problem coming to light in the IT industry is that the growth in the past few years is inorganic in nature. Adding 10000+ new folks into your fold every year is akin to buying out another company. Inorganic growth has one advantage - you can learn from the expertise of others. However, in this case, "this other company" has no skill set whatsoever. And the more people you add to the company, the more expectations you add. But big companies can, by nature, only work slow. Thus things get a long time to get implemented. Which only adds to employee frustration. In effect, "Expectation Management" is a function which bigger companies need to work on.

The "sage of Bangalore" and his disciples (as well as their peer-sages in other companies) have issues to address. If you read in the papers that all is fine, don't believe it completely. Yes, things are good, they are rosy still. But not without problems. Problems whose magnitude we might not realise, and might suddenly rear their ugly heads, when we are most unprepared. After all "the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist."

S for Shameless

2006-03-03T21:45:00.000-08:00

Rediff.com reports that the Vaiko-led MDMK in Tamil Nadu has severed ties with the DMK and will go to polls along with the ruling AIADMK.

Irked with the offer of just 22 seats by the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, which is heading the Democratic Progressive Alliance in Tamil Nadu, the Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam on Saturday decided to walk out of the grouping and cross over to the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam camp.
MDMK General Secretary Vaiko is likely meet the AIADMK supremo and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa at her residence before Saturday noon to finalise and ink an agreement, party sources said.

I'm wondering if S stands for shock or shame. Ms Jayalalithaa had Mr. Vaiko incarcerated under the Prevention of Terrorism Act for the latter's fiery speeches in support of the LTTE. There was so much outcry against this. And yet, like a smitten canine, Mr. Vaiko has proved once again that politicians will remain politicians. Credibility, anyone?

Much ado about...

2006-02-25T17:52:00.000-08:00

Budget 2006 is just two days away. And news channels are falling over each other in debating what the Finance Minister is going to say.

Personally, I couldn't care less. Yeah, I would be happy if he brings down tax rates, lowers excise on imported goods etc. That can and should be covered in a couple of hours of programming. However every news channel has been inviting people from the higher echelons of industry, who would only say "Well, last year we expected some decisions from the Government. Our industry badly needs this to compete globally. We hope the FM listens." Yeah, as if...

My uncle, a trained economist himself, wants to reserve his comment on the budget. All that he told me was "The FM will say what he is going to say. These news channels have nothing better to do, so you get deluged by people who think they can go one up on him."

Jessica Lal...

This is something for which I will salute the media. They have done a fantastic job in terms of bringing it to the viewer, and making his voice heard. Given the kind of response from the public (the NDTV count had crossed 110,000 as of last evening), the case might be reopened. How different the end result will be, we don't know. Nevertheless, this signals a great beginning.

Pudhiya Dhinakaran

Sun Network's newest offering is the new Dhinakaran newspaper, which hits newsstands today. In usual Sun style, there is so much advertising, both in TV channels and on radio. "Super ma!" is the tag line. As I don't read Tamil newspapers, I won't comments. However, I found one particular line in the ad funny. "Dhinakaran irundha andhasthu!" Which means "Dhinakaran is a status symbol!" At one rupee...

Awaiting Mr. 10000

2006-02-22T07:20:00.000-08:00

As of this writing, VKpedia has received 9996 hits (of which a good number should be from a narcissist, whom my parents named Vijay Krishna). When I started out, I did not know that 40 people would care to look up my corner in Cyberia every single day.

I didn't realise I would be part (however small that might have been) of something as ground-shaking as Bloggers v/s IIPM. Never realised I would meet hundreds of new people - none of whom I have ever seen or spoken to. Yet, I have wondered how they would react to some news, incident or occurrence.

I remember, when I was in high school, I dreamed that I would be a great person some day, and I would have a website where I would put my thoughts and people who fall over each other and read it. In a way, therefore, my idea of blogging had started even before blogs first originated.

My first blog was christened Notes of a Nomad, rather appropriately I must say, because I subtitled it "a wanderlust in spirit". That fantasy ran for four weeks, after which I had decided that it was enough. Subsequent attempts should compete for stupidity awards. Then one fine day, I stumbled on the name VKpedia as a play on Wikipedia. I created a blog more to hog that name rather than with any other serious idea. The rest is his-story...

Blogging has been a learning experience through and through. I might not have been a devoted learner, but the new vistas this hobby has opened are boundless. You may not like it, dear reader, but I love blogging, and I will continue doing it!

Spoonerism

2006-02-08T09:07:00.000-08:00

Spoonerism (spn-rzm)
n.

A transposition of sounds of two or more words, especially a ludicrous one, such as Let me sew you to your sheet for Let me show you to your seat.

I made up one last night...

Harry Potter <--> Happy Rotter

Help and grow rich

2006-02-05T21:10:00.000-08:00

"Some are born wealthy.
Some achieve wealth.
And some have wealth thrust upon them."

I should consider myself to belong to the third variety. But this thrust-upon-me wealth might as well lead me into bigtime trouble, because I now find myself in the midst of an international conspiracy, one so big, that Robert Ludlum, if he were alive, would write a novel with Vijay Krishna as the central character.

It all started two weeks ago. Sergeant Irwin Shawn of the US Army contacted me. It seems he belonged to the First Armored Division that entered Baghdad during the Iraq War a couple of years ago. As luck would have it, Sgt. Shawn stumbled upon a mountain of cash, which was so much it took him a good 2 years just to count it. The Sergeant estimates the amount to be 250 million US dollars. It seems Sgt. Shawn has inquired far and wide for a man with good investment skills. And (as I hold a triple major - summa cum laude - in Finance, Banking and Capital Markets from the Wharton School) he wants me to invest the sum. For this help, I get to keep 40% of the sum - 100 million dollars, all in 100-dollar notes.

I was at first skeptical about this. My south Indian brain, with all its in-built conservatism and sense of security, urged me not to trust a renegade sergeant. However, yesterday, Major Richard Atwater of the same division sent me a mail. Major Atwater (who attended graduate school with me) urged me sincerely that even he was taking only 30%, but was offering me the lion's share. I missed sleep last night thinking about the things I could do with a hundred million. That's a cool 440 crores in Indian money. I could have breakfast with Aishwarya Rai, lunch with Mallika Sherawat and dine with Katrina Kaif. I am prepared to ignore the fact that they are not good at cooking. Even better, I could holiday in Provence forever.

I had almost finished composing a reply to Major Atwater, when in came a pleasant surprise. Princess Stella Ajana of Nigeria needs my help. And she wishes to transform me instantly into her Knight in Shining Armour. This damsel in distress wants to commence a long-term relationship with me, if I help her family out in investing a sum of 7.35 million USD. On the one hand, there is Major Atwater's 100 million, endless holidays in Provence, Ash, Katrina and others. On the other hand, there is this seemingly paltry sum of 7 million, but it comes with a Nigerian princess as an added attraction. What do I do?

I think I have decided. Of what use is so much money to me? If I don't have someone else to enjoy it with? And that someone is a princess? Dilemma? No dilemma! After all, what's life without a royal challenge! I'm going to mail Princess Ajana -- no, my wonderful Stella. I'll give her a helping hand, and win hers in love. Rest assured, dear reader, you might have heard of platonic love. This is one, and I'm the ONE!

See ya in Nigeria!

Raaja... raajaadhi raajan indha raaja!

That elusive Oscar

2006-02-05T00:03:00.000-08:00

Since last Friday, Sathyam Cinemas in Chennai has started a new series called "Pure Cinema". With this, they intend to bring the best of world cinema to Chennai. The first in this series, for which there is one show during each weekday and two during the weekend, is Terry George's Hotel Rwanda.

The movie is a modern classic, and tells the story of Paul, a hotel manager in Kigali during the bitter and bloody conflict in Rwanda. Don Cheadle gives a compelling performance as the man who has to balance pressures on all fronts, as he strives to protect his family and hundreds of refugees who have thronged into his hotel. Reminiscent of, and in the same class as Roman Polanski's The Pianist, this film provides a fitting start to this new series.

After being mesmerised by Hotel Rwanda, I'm led to think of a related story. Earlier this week, Paheli, India's representation at the Oscars failed to win a nomination. As usual, our media has made so much noise about it. I wonder why.

Firstly, all this talk about Indian movies winning Oscars is plain nonsense. It is a very critic-ish thing to expect each movie to be Oscar material. Even before some actor or director starts doing the groundwork for a movie, the media is abuzz with speculation. The media puts on this faked obsession with Academy awards immediately. You know it is faked because none of the Oscar-nominated films are released in India before they are nominated. Also, there is this growing criticism of the Oscars in the West. Frankly, after Titanic and The Return of the King (the concluding part of the Rings trilogy) were showered with 11 awards each, one should have realised the phony nature of the awards.

Even then, it is not wrong to set such lofty benchmarks but those are not the reasons that drive Indian mainstream cinema. (Of course, they are an excellent, more peaceful way to spend D-company's money.) Indian moviemakers aim to cater to an Indian audience. We folks are so used to seeing our favourite heroes jumping across mountains, driving trucks on 2 wheels, and board time machines in order to dance with their ladylove in Switzerland one moment, and in New Zealand the next. I don't want to sound elitist, but our movies are hardly realistic. And to expect a world jury to reward us for such expensive khichdi is madness.

Aseem Chhabria writes in Rediff that a member of the Academy told him about Devdas, "The girls were pretty, but the movie was... " I remember there was a huge uproar from the South that year, that Devdas was not India's best movie. Mani Ratnam's Kannathil Muthamittal was far better, more realistic and much in tune with the issues of the day. Yet, we decided to stick on to a two-bit nightmare.

We must acknowledge that our movies just won't make the cut. Of the hundreds of movies churned out the factories of Bollywood, Kollywood and other woods, hardly a few would pass mention as being really good. It is ok with us. We don't need to ape the West. Our cinema is our cinema. Impure as it may be, it is what we accustomed to. Let it be. But let us try to be a bit more practical, and not run after Oscars. Page 3 media, this one's for you!

Can you feel it?

2006-02-01T10:17:00.000-08:00

Just back from a dinner hosted by a colleague. This happened over dessert...

I was telling a colleague what I had heard about ice-creams - "You know, Aman, someone told me this. Seems like when you eat ice-cream, it triggers some part of your brain, and you feel some sensations as you do when you are in love. Am not sure how true it is though."

Aman, feeling very concerned, replied, "Well, Vijay, after eating this ice-cream, I'm feeling an ache in this tooth. Could this be the same thing as in love?"

Just Samachar

2006-01-31T02:34:00.000-08:00

Friend, philosopher, and fellow-blogger, Thejovardhana Kote, has come up with a news aggregation website, which he calls Just Samachar. In his email introducing the new(s) service, he writes...

I built it because I got tired of all the ads on samachar.com, the site I was using earlier. I wanted some additional features too...

Built using RSS feeds, the website offers links to content on various Indian news websites, including The Hindu, The Indian Express, The Times of India, Rediff, NDTV and CNN-IBN. The site even features a Technorati-style In the News section, which displays the hot topics in the news in the past 24 hours.

Thejo reveals that he built the site "over the weekend". The About section of the site has the scoop on the site's raison d'etre and also some technical details on how the site was built.

Great work, Thejo!

The sacred lily tank

2006-01-30T19:04:00.000-08:00

Most people in Chennai would be baffled to know that there is a famous locality in the city whose name translates to "Sacred Lily Tank". This one can attribute partly to the classicism of the name, and partly to the anglicism of the same.

Triplicane, a name which which actually can pass of as a borough in some English county, is the anglicised form of Thiruvallikkeni, whose Tamilised form is thiru alli keni, and hence sacred lily tank. I consider the Parthasarathy temple in Triplicane different, rather unique because it is probably the only temple where one can find Lord Vishnu sporting a moustache. The explanation I got was that the Lord (Partha + sarathy = charioteer to Arjuna, the fabled bowman) was taking part in the Mahabharata war, and hence he was depicted as being bellicose.

The pushkarini or the temple tank (from which the area derives its name) is generally dry around the year owing the lack of rains in Chennai. This time, however, thanks to the more-than-copious rainfall, the tank is a visitor's delight.

Here are a couple of pictures I received in the mail. The pictures were taken on the 1st of January, and show the tank full of water. Nice ones, I thought. For those who know the place, the sender wishes to add that the photos were taken from east to west, in front of the Yadhugiri Mantap.