Life is the ultimate teacher. It educates us with the right kind of lessons just at the right time. It exposes us to newer tougher challenges every time, tests our patience, assesses our potential, evaluates our worth & then awards us with exactly what we deserve, nothing more nothing less. Players who survive till the end to get what they ought to have in this atypical yet witty game called “life” are acknowledged as true winners.
Well I have been a witness to a lot of things in my small life so far. I sincerely believe life considers me a gifted player, hence pushes me to put my money on a bit riskier gambles. I don’t know to what extent I have been justifying the tasks but yeah I have been learning a lot in the mean time.
Let’s find some words for those learning. Though some of them sound horribly illogical & boorish but that is what my life taught me.


1- Choose your core group very critically. A small mistake has the potential to really destroy everything & leave you all alone. Be ready to sacrifice yourself anytime for your core group because if truth be told they won’t allow you to.
2- When you feel all happy & in real high spirits, that is the best time to sit, relax & analyze the things you have set as your target & find a space to somehow extend the horizon of that target.
3- Try to be on familiar terms with your weaknesses rather than riding high on your strengths as that is the area in which you are more prone to be attacked by your foe.
4- Don’t be completely open to anyone, not even to your own self. There is a darker side of each human being which is better left unnoticed.
5- There is no need to be straightforward always. Change yourself as the situation demands. Believe me people may say you a chameleon on face but remember it’s always the audience who reacts like this in a show not the performer.
6- Never change yourself for anybody for whatever reasons. Rather give it a full go to change them according to you. Remember, life becomes a life only when you lead it in your own way.
7- Think decisively before finalizing on something & once you are done with it, back your decision till the end.
8- Always consider yourself a perfect human being & never ever expect anyone become perfect like you overnight. Remember it took you years to achieve that status.
9- Actions always speak louder than words. But if you are good at words, then you should use that flair of yours time and again. I believe that actually dampens the spirits of your opponent & delivering a knock-out punch through your actions becomes an easier task.
10- It takes your talent to prove the fact that you are better than everybody else. To be the best, you ought to have something else. That something “extra” is different for different persons. Rather than being content with existing talents, you should try to figure out that something “extra”. Sooner the better.

I was just running through some random internet pages a while back when I found this article on the Indiatimes site. It is an excerpt from a blog post of Mr. Pritish Nandy, a renowned poet, journalist, politician, television personality, film producer and a member of Rajya Sabha. It essentially deals with the ban of a website in India by the I & B ministry of India. The website is savitabhabi.com, probably the only revolutionary female focused Indian website attracting over 60 million fans every month till existence. Mr. Nandy seriously goes up against the order from the Indian government which came in June, 2009 (I am just guessing).

“By banning her site, the I&B Ministry has demonstrated (yet again) how men want to control women all the time. What is Savita Bhabhi's greatest appeal? That she is a typical Bharatiya nari who is brave enough to demonstrate that when it comes to sex she's no pushover. I have known many women like her who pretend to succumb to the sexual politics that men incessantly play around them and yet manage to get their way by cleverly manipulating the XXL male ego. So even as they play coy, subjugated, they are actually free women who live their lives on their own terms. I admire such women and worship on their altar.” Says Mr. Nandy.

If we discuss Maslow’s need hierarchy, ‘Sex’ actually is a basic need. But (obviously) the need & contentment level vary from individual to individual. But talking about a country like India, is not it an utter shame to have such a site showing an Indian lady expressing her sexual desires? I mean I have nothing against expressing your sexual desires but sexual desires are definitely different than pure porn. Right? Well, I had come to know about the site about a year back when a friend of mine told me about it. Out of sheer curiosity, I had browsed the site same day. Believe me, I had not found a single thing that did not have a stuff to tag along a status of being a porn site.

Mr. Nandy feels the site is not a porn site as it does not have photographs of Filthy, vulgar, exploitative actual women. All it has is some comic book characters displaying harmless fun stuff. To be honest, yes. Yes, it does not have any photographs of real women. But is not it pornography when the same comic character removes the top half of her saree to show her ample breasts, drawn carefully to give it an Indian look with the extra big touch, & asking two underage boys to suck on them? (This was the only episode, I had seen that day. Trust me; I almost puked seeing that synthetic stuff.)

He feels the ‘mangalsutra’ & the ‘sindoor’ are there to show that even Indian women want to break free & this is harmless. I guess Mr Nandy “You are seriously mistaken. How can you even think it as harmless? Had the virus been allowed to spread furthermore, it would have created a disaster. Every single male would have started imagining each Indian lady as a sex starved whore.”

Final words, do not glorify this character in the name of Indian women's liberalization or the Indian women's sexual assertion. There still are obscenities quite unashamedly shown in the cartoons. So it has to be a porn site. The fans, who visited the site, never cared to see the liberated woman in her. All they imagined was a sexy Indian married lady acting as a dream girl in their fantasy world. Moreover it is humiliating the word ‘Bhabhi’. Bhabhi is considered next to a mother in Indian culture and if offensiveness is allowed then we would probably see a new site having a mother figure as the sex symbol. These are some feedbacks that I got.

My point is we can address the issues you have brought up by having ‘saree clad’ leading responsible ladies of our country, but have my words, such a site won’t even encourage half the hits what savitabhabi.com could manage. The reason is simple, it was not the liberalized Indian lady who attracted, it was porn.

Wake up! You guys are the representatives of the mass. Show some sense of responsibility.

My end term examination is on. But I had to take some time out to write this before I lose the momentum.

I have been an avid fan of Chetan Bhagat. I have read all his books & uncompromisingly follow his blog. He is probably the only India writer whose manner of writing exerts a pull on me. I came to know about the recent controversy surrounding the resemblance in the stories between the movie by Vidhu Vinod Chopra & the first book from the pied piper of Indian fiction. Just now I watched the movie again & some video clips showing chetan bhagat’s allegations. One thing I must admit right here that I am gravely sorry to see this state of affairs. I am extremely apologetic to see Mr. Bhagat getting bothered by all this stuff.

I know I am entitled to receive a lot of arguments on this, but I guess I have to speak my mind.

He says “The greatest punishment one can give to a writer is not to give him the credit of his script.” I seriously combat this statement of his. I believe a true writer never goes for name, fame, recognition & popularity. His agony fades away once his thought gets a sheet of paper.

He also tries to reproduce his books in his words & says “Bade log hamesha chote logon ke upar nai reh sakte, bhagwan hain, main unme believe karta hun & aise logon ko isi janam main hi unke kiye ka phal milega”. After listening to this, all I can say is “hot ghuma, seeti bajaa, seeti bajake bol bhaiya…W – T - F”. An IIT & IIM graduate, having millions of fans worldwide, who left his highly lucrative investment banking career for writing which does not even assure him a steady income refers himself as a “chota log”. Now I am not going to buy any s*** if he goes on to say that he left banking as he wanted to pursue his dream which is writing.

He also says that he had no intention of coming up with any such statements. It’s his fans who made him do so & Mr. Bhagat, do you honestly expect us to buy that? Had that been the case, then you should have waited for your fans to do that for you.

Lastly, I agree that the movie has almost 70 % similarity with the novel, but I guess film makers like Vidhu Vinod Chopra, Amir Khan & Raj Kumar Hirani are not dumb enough not to follow the legal procedures before getting on board with the movie.

A serious piece of advice for Mr. Writer to concentrate only on writing, the only thing he is good at (apart from studies & wooing IIM girls) & let go all these controversies especially Bollywood issues. 

Insomnia. A word that every ITM student is familiar with. No further explanations. Meanwhile at 3.51 at night, I tried to get into the minds of some of my dearest friends & made an effort to scan them through. Let’s go along with the roll numbers.

Sitanshu – If I opt for any random bank right now, will I be able to shift to “Working Capital Management” later?

Shweta – What does it take to be the country sales head of Credence analytics in next 5 years? No, wait, 3 years is all I should aim for. Somebody tell me.

Nidhi – Wish Udaipur had some better college than ITM. I did not have to move out in the first place.

Mona – I guess I have joined ITM for two things. To read books & to climb up and down the stairs every day.  Kab hoga ye placement. By the way I hate Sales.

Soubhagya – Wish quizzing was a full time profession. I would participate in every single quiz this year & ask Anirban to take up a job in my company.  

Sourav Bikash – HDFC or Research? Research is good I guess. But then HDFC is stable. Na, I should prefer research.

Anand – Finally my own blog. My next targets are my fellow classmate bloggers. Guys I am coming.

Sarabjeet – I need a break from my gtalk status message which says “HalF pLaceD”. Somebody make me fully placed. I know I am not good with numbers, but I am best at other things. Kyun bhai sahi hai na? 3 hi liya hai re. I am not “out”.

Kanak – Need a break from life. Gosh! I am going to get mad. Guys please leave me. I used to like controversies but enough is enough.

Roohi – So many thoughts all getting jumbled up with each other, I feel like striving to get out of the whole labyrinth. Chandigarh, miss you; love Mumbai though. :)

Amit Ahuja – I don’t know what I am supposed to do. Need to go on a trip to Shirdi, I guess.

Rohith Sreekumar – Man, Gunners are back. Another convincing win. Aaja Beta Jeet. We have a match in our hands. Bol Beta abhi.

Nupur – hun….hun….hun….h-u-nnnnn.

Soumalya – I s-A-pport Lal Andolan. Pas-hhh-mi Medinapur is a dangerous place. Forget Junaid bhai. My chicken is better.

Junaid – “Gentlemen”, no catering, no charges. I am doing this for my friends. Hope you “relish” the “experience”. Whatever Das says is completely wide of the mark. I am a better cook. And the party is N-O-T sponsored by DSP Black.

Surbhi – I don’t want to go to kolkatta, but they want me to be there. Even I want to be there but not now. But I love kolkatta. But….

Girish – Got placement. Now fun time. Where to go? Should I stay back in Mumbai or should I go Bengalooru?  

Rohit Ajmera – Lexi my sexy darling, don’t worry we will be having our “Suhaagraat” very soon. Before that let me get back to my usual style once again.

Ashis Bansal – Aahun, aahun, Oye aahun aahun. Ho gaya beta show khatam. Abhi papa soyenge. Kal subhe aana tamasha dekhne.

I am done with Batch A. Batch B & C will shortly follow. As expected, batch A leads the way again. :)

I brought up “Paa” & “3 idiots” in my last post. A day later, I saw “Avatar”, which outshined everything. ‘Breathtaking’, I screamed without delay. Such technologically advanced, truly a Hollywood spectacle. A wonder to behold, I would say. The arresting visuals are simply overwhelming. The last part has a bit more ‘masala’ that it is supposed to have, still it has enough drama, suspense, passion before, that would keep you completely glued to the screen till the climax.

Audiences will find it to be a brilliantly, stunning entertaining fantasy.

It is awe-inspiring, but I would still rate it below Titanic, a vision from the same man, James Cameron.

One suggestion for the makers of Avatar though. Film marketing is more difficult than film making. I guess movie is brilliant but inadequate marketing undersold it.

I don't expect you to believe me if you haven't seen the film yet. Finally a word of advice if you have not watched the three movies yet, go watch them right away.

Truly a master piece. A roller coaster ride indeed. I had watched ‘Paa’ a few days back & rated it as a saintly movie. I did not expect I was going to have another treat. ‘3 Idiots’ made my day so to speak. What a time to watch the movie! When we all are on the verge of leaving college & the whole student life, it really comes as a sweet little flashback.

You know what’s so special about Hirani’s movies. He always comes up with some signature messages which become the driving factors for the movie. He had ‘Jaadu ki Jhappi’ in Munnabhai MBBS, then he had ‘Gandhigiri’ in Lage raho Munna bhai & now undoubtedly the best of them all; “Aal is Well”. The concept is straightforward; but he pulls off the trick so well that it materializes as extremely creative.

Let’s talk about the movie now. Brilliant plot, luminous actors though I thought some actors did not get chance to showcase their flair, amazing cinematography. The biggest edge the movie has is, it builds an instant emotional connect with the youth. There are not any out & out hilarious moments wherein you would laugh insanely, but you would always find a humor touch to every scene. Some scenes have the gift to make most of the audience shed a few tears for sure.

Talking about acting, Amir is miraculous, but does not steal the show like any other movie of his. I believe Kareena, Omi Vaidya both are adorable in the movie. Sharman & Madhavan are good in patches but they do not get adequate opening. Raj Kumar Hirani wastes Boman Irani’s talent in the movie. I would have loved to see Mona displaying her acting skills rather than just giggling, laughing, screaming, crying here & there.

My favorite scene in the movie has to be the introduction speech by Chatur Ramalingam. Only two words “Balatkaar” & “Stan” distorted the speech completely.

It took me to my good old school days & I am sure most of you must have thought of your best friends for a while.  

After watching the movie, you would definitely say one thing.

“I am not smart, I am just a stupid idiot fellow & Man, I am proud of that. Glad to be an Idiot.”

Padho, Kamyab hone ke liye nahin, Kaabil hone ke liye, success ke piche mat bhago, Excellence ke piche bhago, Success jhak maarke piche bhagegi. -  Baba Ranchoddas

This was neither a national level match nor even a state level one. This was just a match that I played at my 3^rd club (Kalinga Cricket Club) ground. Though I have had short stays at different local clubs, I consider myself a part of only three of them; Rising Students, Rameshwar Sporting & Kalinga Cricket Club.

Talking about the match, it was just a friendly match that we played for good practice before an intra-city cricket tournament I guess. I was the captain of my side & after winning the toss, it was an obvious choice to bat first as we were looking for good healthy batting practice. To our bad luck, we lost the first wicket in the very first over & though I was always panicky playing the new ball, I went on to bat after the fall of wicket no. 1. It was a 20-20 game, so intent was crystal clear.

I felt the heat when I had to face the sweet chin music from both the 7 feet gigantic fast bowlers. I even remember of doing a complete somersault when one express delivery knocked my helmet off. Getting pounded by sledgehammers would have been less painful. In the mean time my partner got his eye set & smashed 3 consecutive boundaries in a single over. The ball was losing its shine & so were the bowlers. It was the perfect time for us to capitalize. We both explored the small opening that we got & went all guns blazing. I danced down the track every time a spinner delivered me. After the 19^th over, the scoreboard read 156/3. I was still unbeaten at 84 of just 47 balls. I had 6 balls to score 16 from to get to the triple figure. I took a two in the first ball & then came down the track again, next ball, just to find my stumps completely out of the ground. I was out for 86 of 49 balls. One hell of an innings it was. More than the score, the shots I played gave me immense pleasure. I successfully executed reverse sweep, copybook hook & even hit two sixes with “Jeet’s Trademark Slice”. For those who don’t know, I was known in my cricketing circle for my slice over point, gully & full face drive through the cover point, something that I am proud of.

We finished with 165, a par score. So they had all the chance in the world to win it. I knew we had to stick to the basics only. Wickets will follow automatically. I wanted my other bowlers to have a go, so I did not open the bowling for a change & put on the keeping gloves. Another reason for the decision was I had always been a fan of Adam Parore, the stylish kiwi wicket keeper who also batted first down.

Things did not go as we had planned & we found ourselves really vulnerable at the mid stage with the opponents threatening to surpass our score at 88/2. I would have to admit the blunders I committed during the field placing & bowling change. But someday none of your decisions go your way. I removed my keeping gloves & got ready to bowl the 11^th over. The very first ball I was hit for a four right above by head. A powerful hit it was, but it gave me a minor scope as I found out a loophole in his short playing. I planned to bowl the same ball after a couple of balls & guess what; he played the same shot, but the trivial variation in the pace did the trick. That was my first wicket of the match & it just got better after that.

After 18.3 over, they got all out for 132 & my statistics read as 4-0-21-6.

We won the match by 24 runs & I had a match of a life time by scoring 86 with a strike rate of almost 200 & then ripped through the bowling order with 6 price wickets.

It was just a practice game & guess what in the actual match which we played after a couple of days against Pragati Sporting Club, I got out for a golden duck in the very first ball.

Cricket is a great equalizer as they say. :)

Generation gap, impact of western culture, youth vs. experienced; all these topics have lost their shine after being discussed time & again in different forums. I have always supported the western culture, youthful attitude & strongly believe that the generation gap is a must for the inclusive growth of the society.

But something happened today which made me rethink. “Are we moving too fast?” is what I thought at once. I was having a phone chat with a 9 year old cousin of mine studying in 4^th std in Delhi Public School in the capital city of Odisha. She was elated to know about my placement & gave me a list of things that I had to get her next time I fly to her place. The list did not have the usual things I thought it should have had, but it had a lot of weird things that left my eyes wide open.

Suddenly she wanted to know whether I had a girlfriend or not. I was so stunned that I could not utter a single word for a minute. Then she repeated her question. I said a lot of them & mentioned a few random names also as if I did not get her question. She stopped me in-between & asked me if I was crazy.

“Bhai, I did not mean girls who are your friends, I meant like real girlfriends, you know” was the next thing she said. Without wasting one more second, I asked her to hand over the phone to my aunty.

After hanging up, it stimulated the very active & smart cells of my brain to have a serious consideration. I mean she is not even a teenager. Forget teen age she has not even touched the double figure.

Every photo of my great grandparents has the whole family. There is none having my great grandfather & great grandmother only. I never cracked a silly marriage joke involving my grandparents. My father still feels uneasy asking my mother for a movie or a drive in front of me. I being a messed up little monster, surpassed everything, still go red in the face while talking about my girl.  

But getting to know what the 8, 9 years of my country talk about these days, I would unquestionably say,

“We are indeed moving too fast.”

Clinical psychology is a subject that always exerts a pull on me. It was the next choice of mine when I opted for economics during my graduation. As such I am completely an inexpert in the subject. But the reason which always makes it act like a magnet is the fact that human psychology is something that is more than a science or an art. It is beyond any law, scientific outcome or any fixed tactic.

I remember my father having 6 pairs of white mice to conduct his experiments on them. I don’t know what he did achieve but it at least attracted my interest.

Well leave aside the state of mind of mice or of any other animals for that matter, let’s talk about human psychology. We start off being completely ignorant about the happenings around ourselves.

As toddlers we pay attention to every single damn thing but never try to figure out what those are. We feel miserable looking at birds flying through the morning dew but feel cheerful by tying them with a raw unbreakable cable & literally making the bird suffer a hell. “Feel” is a wrong usage I guess, as we never feel anything but just show different emotional expressions. A gigantic elephant or a lethal tiger becomes the role model. Ask any clinical psychologist without letting him know the age of the person, he would burst out referring it as a serious psychological disorder or if you are strong enough to listen then he would say the patient is off his head.

Coming into teen-age, we start “feeling” & become competent to justify our emotions. But then another problem arises. We become so conscious of our emotions that we lose control over our senses. Our minds become so jam-packed with a lot of ideas & thoughts that we act in a weird manner. We forget something which is generally known as a “Home” & otherwise stored as “Sweet Home” in the phonebook. We like to stay out as much as possible & feel the whole world is ours. We fall for every single person of the opposite gender. We first think of talking to them once, then friendship, then love & finally it boils down to one thing. I remember a hilarious quote. Men often give love for sex; women often give sex for love. Boys grow hair & girls cut down to look “cool”.  Animals are out, movie-stars, cricketers & rock stars suddenly make entries as role models. Without achieving a wee bit, we feel we have accomplished all of it.   Are not these signs of mental disorder? I mean why a normal stable human being would think like this.

Let’s move on now. All are out. Outlook, vigor, liveliness, dynamism, exuberance, enthusiasm, stimulation fade away all at once. Life seems so useless. It feels so pathetic. We feel we are the only responsible citizen of the society, the only person having a properly functioning heart of the whole humankind. We start becoming crabby about practically everything existing that is related to life. We maintain a to-do list always & make every effort, almost equally hard as Mahatma Gandhi did for India’s independence, just to have our own house & car like after that the life is over. After reaching the 3^rd or even 4^th stage of the Maslow’s need hierarchy, we again go back to the primary one; Roti, Kapda, Makaan n hmm. We like to end our lives as soon as possible ahead of the God’s schedule, the same life that we were enjoying about 5 years ago. Symptoms of mess again.

So the bottom line is no matter how hard we struggle, we will always come into sight as insane people. Better take it lightly and treat the life as it comes & as if every single event is the best that could happen with us.

Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly....  --G.K. Chesterton

To enjoy life, we must touch much of it lightly - Voltaire 

Life is not only about being incompetent to see the entire sight in the rear view mirror, it’s also about achieving the speed of a supersonic jet, still going strong & going all-out. – Lagnajit :)

Life has never been easy. No one said it would ever be. But the individual has to make it just worth of it. It all depends on the attitude which he/she treats life with. To quote Oscar Wilde "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."  But to be able to look at the stars you need to have that dream, the rich mind-set & the right approach.

Well talking about my life, it has been so kind to me till date. The phase of it that I spent at ITM taught me a lot, even more than I had learnt in 20 long years. Apart from the routine stuff, I learnt a lot about relationships; with friends, with roommates, with friendly classmates, with not-so-friendly classmates, with seniors, with juniors, with faculties, with greatest buddies & finally with my girl.

Some moments are really worth remembering for the rest of my life & some are such nightmarish that will keep haunting me in the days to come. When I successfully implemented all my plans during my general secretary election to attract 3000 odd smart students, I thought I could judge any person just after a small conversation but I was insanely wrong. I misunderstood so many people in these two years; in fact I got the wrong end of the stick of them all. I felt miserable & dejected in the end.

But life it is. It is supposed to move pretty fast & so it will. I better refuel my veins with the same adrenaline that I used to have & get back to the usual mode as soon as possible. Life is not going to appreciate me taking my own sweet time to recover from all this. So why not face it bravely & get re-energized.

It’s time to move on finally.

“Part of being a winner, is knowing when enough is enough. Sometimes you have to give up the fight and walk away, and move on to something that's more productive.” - Donald Trump