Idle/Random/whatever Thoughts of a Demented/Idle/Whatever Mind

Times of India has again done the unthinkable. Its misguiding its readers completely by its flawed headline which says Opt for e-fling tax, get discounts But whats there actually is an advertisement straight out of a leaflet from some company called Taxsmile. It says, pay Taxsmile for e-filing of your tax and you will get a lot of discounts and prizes. Thats outright stupid to have as a story. If I have to e-file my taxes should not I head over to https://incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in/portal/index.do . Why should I bother to pay someone else for it. And as I have for previous two years, I have found it really simple. So Times of India instead of simply explaining how to do an e-filing, has advertised for a company. Smart people. I guess Times of India is getting itself into a reputation of being an untrustworthy news source, the latest being http://wearethebest.wordpress.com/2009/07/18/25-years-moved-so-quickly-it-seems-like-just-12/ . Probably its good enough for the Page3 a...

I some time ago wrote about the amazing news stories covered by some Indian news channels . Now there is this amazing channel called IndiaTV, which will put any Indian to shame. An awesome story that it was running of late. I think a picture is worth a thousand words. So..            

I saw this amazing headlines from Economic Times, 70% Indians worry about outliving retirement funds . Well my first reaction was "Oh my God" . Most Indians would be unable to sustain themselves once they have retired. More likely they would kill themselves or die of hunger or may need government support. But then I read the fine print there. Well its a survey by MetLife. They sure do see a big market with 70% Indians not having retirement funds. But then another truth is that 50% Indians do not have funds for the next month too. Most of them survive on a daily basis. Mind it survive not live. Then again there is still a large majority who do not invest in retirement funds. Well that reminds me of people like my dad. He has no retirement funds. But then he does not need it either, just like my grand father. He did not need it. My dad is there after all to support him since he has retired long time back. Obviously same applies to my dad of course. The truth also is that yo...

If you thought Indian newspapers were crass then wait a minute, the news channels are better than them. They are in a mode of one upmanship and each channel does its best to get the breaking news first. Here is a small sample of it taken from here . Breaking news 1 : Rahul Gandhi has dal-puri and veggies. Wow thats an awesome news and a must breaking news. This news has surely made my day. Now I can indulge in Pizzas to my heart content.     Breaking news 2 : Mr Bacchan has got cold. Oh so sad. May be I should do something immediately, like hang myself. Probably I should have done it before watching this breaking news.     Breaking news 3 : Ok enough of celebrities, this breaking new is about a common animal. Well the household cat aka Billo Rani and her adventures at the roof.     Breaking news 4 : If cat could be in news, then dogs cannot be behind. Here is a more celebrated dog, the Police Commissioners dog in news. This poor dog...

Whats started as a small idea in the last Blogalorean Meet, snowballed into a big one during the mailing group discussions. Finally it was planned that all interested people would meet at Koshy's on a fine Saturday evening. It was 19th of Jan around 4:30 that I entered Koshy's to find five of them there, busy discussing and finalizing how it should be done. I jumped into that whole thing and soon their infectious enthusiasm got into me. After some random bakwas of mine. Then that waiter was like pushing us out. So last round of discussion happened across the street on the footpath. Finally we decided on something which were worded right by Sandil and put up on the Big Bangalore Blogathon . There are still a lot of things to be done for it. I am right now not in Bangalore to be physically involved but will be providing all possible support virtually and ofcourse by blogging during the Blogathon. I hope this event generates a lot of positives. Some of the people working behind th...

A win in Australia could not be better timed. It was indeed a terrific win, but not without controversial umpiring decisions which went the India way. But surely the umpires did not ask the Captain for judgement. Seems like the Indian Mind games have finally worked. They forced the aggressive and abusive Aussies in the shell. From arrogant to subdued, Ponting and his team made good move. This is what Aussie media Courier Mail has to say "Remember that scene in one of the Rocky movies where Rocky's trainer tells him he's no longer feared by his opponents? 'Kid,' he says, 'the worst thing that could happen to a fighter happened to you. You got civilised.'" "In the space of a week the Australians got civilised...So instead of a confident, arrogant, winning team, we get a nice, civilised one. Maybe a losing one," "They should share their pay cheques with their bullying officials back home, the weak-kneed administrators at ...

I came across this article on Deccan Herald which explained the festival of Makar Sakranti or Pongal which fall on 14 or 15 of January. My initial reaction to this article was Wow. So guys before reading any further I would request you to go through the article.  Following is my criticism for the lady because I feel she has gone overboard with the scientific explanation. Something which VHP leader as well as other politicians are too good at. Prof Dr Geetha Viswanathan says All that is not meaningless tradition. There is hard-core science behind it. White-washing the house with calcium carbonate (collected from molluscan shells) helps to kill spiders and other insect vectors in house. Fresh cow dung in presence of sunlight produces methane which forms a thin film in front of our house and prevents entry of bacterial pathogens and also kills microbes. Red mud will close all pores in the house which are breeding place for many vectors. There is no way I would disagree with...

I was watching an amazing show on MTV. It was filled with true sarcasm by VJ Cyrus,the Virus. He had those seemingly genuine disgust against the 'Life Tips' show called 'Love Bites'. Seriously what are those shows for. They tell you what to wear, what to eat and what to talk. Bloody hell, where is the real you. You want some idiot to fall in love with someone else. Or should I say that all people will fall in love with the person with same kind of personality. Yeah really I would have never discovered how to date and how to fall in love, rather make someone fall in love with me. I admit that I do not command any experience on the subject, (I am still happy) but all this seems farce to me. You would actually be believing that one size fits all. Please give me a break. I wonder if there is any blog which is actually into this stuff(It being there wont surprise me, though being other way round would). Anyways I would seriously like to consider the qualification of the so c...

Well I dont know if accidentally I had made some correct statements in this post about sikhs. I was so sure that it had no intellectual value but then I read this story . So here its says that Mr Anil Ambani is at fault for 'allegedly' circulating derogatory jokes against the Sikh community through its mobile Internet services. The masterminds again are from Lucknow, Lucknow Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee(LGPC). Seems like Lucknow is fast turning hub for all kinds of religious intolerance and communalism. I would like the LGPC people to first read the classics by Khushwant Singh. His jokes are the best of their kind. He is one guy which really made the sardar jokes reach out to the market. Then came the MTV and Mr Cyrus Bakara. They took these jokes to the masses. Each one of the young generation waited to hear these jokes. The final death nail was the Great Indian Laughter Challenge and Great Indian Comedy Show. Both of them literally taking humor and sardars to new height...

The Wall street Journal reports with this as its headline How a Muslim Billionaire Thrives in Hindu India Mr. Premji Has Wealth And Clout as Wipro Chief; The Imam Disapproves. What bullshit is this. Hindu India??? Was it Mr Praveen Togaria or some stupid Hindu Fundamentalist who gave this view. India is not Hindu first of all and it was not he being Hindu or Muslim that made the difference. It was his hard work and vision that saw him make that mark in the International space. More than Mr Azim Premji I feel its former President of India APJ Abul Kalaam who is looked upon a role model than anything else. And if the report is to suggest anything, its the fact that Wipro has made its mark because of its secular policies. I dont know of any Indian Hindu billionaire who would not be secular. Although you are a pious Hindu like the Birlas building a temple in every city in India, but when you do business you cannot constrain yourself on the people front. I dont think its true....

It makes me worry sometimes looking at the kind of reporting that goes on in the media. I feel there are just too many junk heads around who do just the useless reporting. But then I feel that Scott Adam is just so right, everyone is an idiot depending on the situation. Each one of us just acts stupid at some point or the other. But still I always thought that there were a lot many checks in place for the media to not allow such useless comments to come out in the open. Here is the latest by Indian Express . They asked Mr Saurav 'Dada' Ganguly if they are going to win the series in England. What is dada supposed to answer. Yeah the Englishmen are going to beat us our pants down( Yeah I cannot pull off my shirt) or The Indian team is lead by a loser who cannot butter his bread or Dawood paid us Rs 100000000000000000000000000000000 to loose. Bullshit. Hopeless Other known examples. A man has just survived a building that fell on him but left his near and dear ones dead. And the...

Will jail for Salman Khan deter wildlife poaching? Thats the most stupid of the questions to ask actually. But still the CNN-IBN dared to ask . Amazing stupidity. Did Sanjay Dutt's imprisonment prevent people from helping mafia and terrorists. Its stupid that the very same people who made huge hue and cry over imprisonment for Sanjay Dutt are considering jail for Salman. Its kind of a hypocrisy to ask for imprisonment for killing a Blackbuck and not for plotting to kill hundreds of Mumbaikars . I just cant imagine the value of life of humans is lesser than the animal. Strange ways of media in India. Will anyone talk??

After two post http://the100rabh.blogspot.com/2007/08/what-would-you-do-if-traditional.html http://the100rabh.blogspot.com/2007/08/i-as-blogger-has-affected-someone.html I finally get to hear what I wanted. The confession of a journalist...NO A 'feature article writer' . Here is what Mrs Priyadarshini Nandy has to say in her post today And btw, I didnt form opinion on what the TEL guys told me.. It was a feature article and not a journalistic piece. I just wrote what they told me.. if you come and tell me that you have fun at work, I don't know why I should'nt believe you - then, I'd have to mistrust everyone.. What a life that would be! This statement makes it clear for everyone each of the points I had made in my first post regarding this. Let me make that once more. Do not trust Mid Day as a reliable source of information. You never know when they are writing a feature article and when a real review. Tata Elxsi made up all those stories. Tata Elxsi does not trea...

Well I had written about the bloggers affecting other professionals . I can now very well add one more group of professionals to the list, the journalists. Yes thats another set of people who were the voice of the people, the fourth pillar of democracy are under serious threat. Had it not happened to me I would not have had got impression of that. Blogging is making the voice of the people heard directly without the the "censorship" by the so called responsible people. I had read something utterly rubbish written about life at my ex-Employer, Tata Elxsi. I just wrote my thoughts about it. Of course I would never trust Mid Day on any news, unless confirmed by some other sources. But this blog post by the journalist(I just realized its Priyadarshini Nandi who did that awesome job for Tata Elxsi), made me realize the power of blogging. Though I am not a supporter of flame blogs(This would be my first and last post with regard to this thing), I had to write this blog. Because i...

Well this is the gist of the talk that I gave at Bar Camp Bangalore 4 or BCB4 . I am sorry I am very late for that but at least I am writing ;-) It does not require some rocket science to say that bloggers are affecting some professionals. Its obvious that butterfly effect will play its role in this world. There are professionals who are really feeling the heat due to the blogging community. Well lets look at things that we, the people read blogs for. Technical Articles Rumours( All kinds) Travel Ideas Reviews The above is definitely not an exhaustive list. I wish you could suggest me some more. So who get affected by the action of the users. The very first professional who get affected are the technical writers for magazines. But then there is always the hard copy that sells. Probably thats the reason why all the magazines are moving online. They all have a online subscriptions. Sure blogging gives people the power to spread information in a more productive manner. Users do not have ...

I had talked about bloggers not being trusted source of information. But its not just the bloggers or the new media which needs trust of its readers. The traditional media too needs it. But the traditional media has to its advantage belief of its reader set to trust mode. But there are several newspapers who are losing their trust each day some readers at a time. The latest one being Mid Day. I am sure that if not anyone else, it has lost my trust. All for this one article which was published on 14th August 2007 on page A21 and A23 in Mid Day, Mumbai. I being a ex-employee of Tata Elxsi know that this whole article is a fairy tale. The fact of the matter is that all the photos are nothing but a shoot just like for some movie. Tata Elxsi does not promote anything that was quoted in the article. It just seems to have come out of fantasy of the writer Priyadarshini Nandy. I having the first hand knowledge and I know the culture and the environment in which people work there. That itself ...