Scraps Stuffs - Random musings from apun ka desh

So says MMS. Translation: I lacked the balls to prevent the likes of that senile Arjun Singh and other pro-quota "worthies" from railroading this through, now where are my bangles?

The monsoon arrived in Bangalore over the weekend, a week ahead of schedule. However, monsoon in Bangalore usually means cloudy skies, a revival of breeze, a hint of sunlight here and there, but not much rain. And when it rains its usually what is called office rain - it sometimes rains when people are going to work, but more often than not, it rains when people are going back home.

After assuring that the griviences of the anti-quota crowd would be considered, the current PM, Dr. Manmohan Singh asked the striking doctors to withdraw their strike. The very next moment, the two faced MMS went ahead and decided to impose the quota anyway! The striking doctors are right in stating that MMS backstabbed them. What credibility does he have how? Intent to start applying the quota immediately while stating that increase in seats will only take place over three years (and which idiot believes that?) is a pure case of forked tongue.

If he has any sense of self respect now, MMS must roll back his decision. Otherwise why should anyone trust him in the future?

The NSAID drug Diclofenac has been banned for veterinary use in India by the Drug Controller of India and this ban must be implemented within three months. This is good news but might be too late to save the most threatened vulture species in India as this drug has already killed most of them. India almost lost an entire species due to inaction/delayed action!

I hope that a viable population survives and can continue to thrive and multiply once the ban takes complete effect.

Was just checking the view outside my office to determine whether it would rain today or not. Realized that I could see seven different species of trees outside - a jackfruit tree, a massive mango tree, an even more massive rain tree, a copperpod tree with a few flowers, an unidentified tree which used to be the favourite haunt of a small green barbet (white cheeked barbet) and another unidentified tree which looks suspiciously like a silver oak (but just a little too far to tell clearly). Actually the view is great and the best part is that its just behind my seat! Too bad we have blinds covering the windows and sun film on them too.

There is a huge and very faint rainbow visible in the sky right now - courtesy of the strange combination of heavy showers and bright sunshine. It has been raining in the evenings for four days now, typical thunderstorms with heavy showers starting around 4.30 pm or so and continuing for about an hour or so, except that yesterday it continued until almost 11 pm. I'm welcoming every bit of it as its bringing down the temperatures, but on the flip side the roads are in a mess. Traffic snarls every evening on the way back home is the last thing any sane person needs but there is no option because everyone seems to have discovered all my shortcuts and they are not a secret anymore :-(

Pramod Mahajan lost the battle twelve days after being shot by his brother. I admired him for his articulateness, his candour and his honesty. He rose from humble beginnings to the heights he reached through his own capabilities and capacity for hard work. We have lost a young leader with lots of potential.

RIP.

The recent media coverage of the riots in Vadodara once again serves to highlight just how biased the English language Indian media is. Constantly focussing on one single muslim being burnt to death while ignoring hindus who were stabbed before perfectly brings out the hypocrisy of the media. They conveniently ignore the fact that the muslims rioted when their dargah was demolished whereas the hindus didn't when scores of their temples were also demolished by the Vadodara municipality. What gives muslims the right to riot? Haven't they heard of peaceful protests? Oh, I forget they are muslims and have the god given right to riot and the hindus should just be silent spectators and take whats coming. That is the attitude of the media.

Around the same time, more than three score hindus were killed by terrorists in J&K. Media coverage for this outrage was close to zero compared to the Vadodara riots. After all hindus were killed and muslim blood in India has always been more valuable for these media bastards.

Watched Darna Zaroori Hai this past weekend. Good time pass film. The film doesn't fit into any particular genre, although thriller seems apt. Horror would not quite fit and one needs to see the movie to realize this.

Ram Gopal Verma has got an incredible cast for this movie, no thriller/horror movie in recent memory has such talent on display. Amitabh Bacchan, Anil Kapoor, Sunil Shetty, Sonali Kulkarni, Bipasha Basu, Mallika Sherawat and Rajpal Yadav all do a decent job.

The first story (the one before the credits) was the best proving once again that Manoj Pahwa is quite a talent. Perfectly depicting the slob with a false bravado about not being scared of anything, he does a fine job.

The Anil Kapoor, Mallika Sherawat one was pretty decent too.

Good for a few thrills and at 110 minutes it doesn't get too tiresome.