How IT making our lives complex!!!

Read it all the way through! It's a good laugh! AND really quite true!!

When my son got me a Blackberry, I thought about the 30-year business I ran with 1,800 employees, all without a cell phone that plays music, takes videos, pictures and communicates with Facebook and Twitter. I signed up under duress for Twitter and Facebook, so my kids, their spouses, 3 grand kids and could communicate with me in the modern way. I figured I could handle something as simple as Twitter with only 140 characters of space.

That was before one of my grandkids hooked me up for Tweeter, Tweetree, Twhirl, Twitterfon, Tweetie and Twittererific Tweetdeck, Twitpix and something that sends every message to my cell phone and every other program within the texting World.

My phone was beeping every three minutes with the details of everything except the bowel movements of the entire next generation. I am not ready to live like this. I keep my cell phone in the shopping bag.

The kids bought me a GPS for my last birthday because they say I get lost every now and then going over to the grocery store or library. I keep that in a box under my tool bench with the Blue tooth [it's red] phone I am supposed to use when I drive. I wore it once and was standing in line at Barnes and Noble talking to my wife and everyone in the nearest 50 yards was glaring at me. I had to take my hearing aid out to use it, and I got a little loud.

I mean the GPS looked pretty smart on my dash board, but the lady inside that gadget was the most annoying, rudest person I had run into in a long time. Every 10 minutes, she would sarcastically say, "Re-calc-u-lating." You would think that she could be nicer. It was like she could barely tolerate me. She would let go with a deep sigh and then tell me to make a U-turn at the next light. Then if I made a right turn instead. Well, it was not a good relationship..

When I get really lost now, I call my wife and tell her the name of the cross streets and while she is starting to develop the same tone as Gypsy, the GPS lady, at least she loves me.

To be perfectly frank, I am still trying to learn how to use the cordless phones in our house. We have had them for 4 years, but I still haven't   figured out how I can lose three phones all at once and have to run around digging under chair cushions and checking bathrooms and the dirty laundry baskets when the phone rings.

The world is just getting too complex for me. They even mess me up every time I go to the grocery store. You would think they could settle on something themselves but this sudden "Paper or Plastic?" every time I check out just knocks me for a loop. I bought some of those cloth reusable bags to avoid looking confused, but I never remember to take them with me.

Now I toss it back to them. When they ask me, "Paper or Plastic?" I just say, "Doesn't matter to me. I am bi-sacksual." Then it's their turn to stare at me with a blank look. I was recently asked if I tweet. I answered, No, but I do fart a lot."

P,S - senior citizens don't need any more gadgets. 

The TV remote and the garage door remote are about all we need to handle.

एक दिन का गणतंत्र व् आजादी

एक दिन का गणतंत्र व् आजादी 

26 जनवरी या 15 अगस्त आते ही हमें देश की याद आती है। हर चैनल और अखबार गाँधी, बोस, नेहरु या भगत सिंह के बारे में लिख लिख कर हमें शायद याद दिलाते हैं की हम जो हैं अभी इन्ही की कुर्बानी की वजह से हैं। हमें हमारे गोर्वमय अतीत की याद दिलाता है। हमें याद दिलाता है की हम "अनेक में एक हैं"।  खेर जैसे ही 27 जनवरी या 16 अगस्त आती है, देश भक्ति की जगह परिवार, समाज और पैसा ले लेता है। 

ऐसा क्यूँ है की आज हमने अपनी आज़ादी को और सविधान को महत्व नहीं दिया हुआ है । हम में से बहुत ही कम शायद सविधान को अछी तरह से समझते हैं, हालाकि हम सबने इससे पड़ा है स्कूल में। आज भी हम सब अमीर और गरीब में भेदभाव करते हैं। आज भी हमारे घर में मज़दूर को रोटी और चाय अलग बर्तन में दी जाती है मगर 26 जनवरी को स्व: डॉक्टर अम्बेडकर साहब को याद ज़रूर करते हैं।

आज़ादी की लड़ाई में गांधीजी ने भेदभाव से लड़ने की शिक्षा दी मगर 1984 में और फिर 1992 में हमने उनके विचारों को दरकिनार कर दिया। शहीद भगत सिंह ने नौजवानों को निडर हो कर देश सेवा करने की शिक्षा दी परन्तु हम स्वयं सेवा और परिवार सेवा में ही उलझ कर रह गए। यह तो भला हो 70 साल के बुजुर्ग श्री अन्ना जी का की हम नौजवानों को अपनी ज़िमेदारी का एहसास हुआ और आगे बढ़ कर हमने गलत के खिलाफ आवाज़ उठायी है ।

आजादी की लड़ाई नारी शक्ति के बिना भी असंभव थी। हर एक आन्दोलन में बढ़ चढ़ कर हिस्सा लिया। सुभाष चंदर बोस की सेना में रानी झांसी रेजिमेंट थी जिसने अंग्रेजों के खिलाफ मोर्चा संभाला था। परन्तु आज हम उसी नारी जाती का अपमान करते हैं, तिरस्कार करते हैं। यहाँ भी सोच बदलने की ज़रुरत है।

अभी बहुत कार्य बाकी है। देश और समाज एक दुसरे का प्रतिबिम्ब ही है। अगर समाज सही होगा तो देश भी प्रगति करेगा और रोज़ हमें एक आज़ाद और गणतंत्रत होने की एहसास देगा।

वन्दे मातरम।।। जय हिन्द ।।।

Gang Rape Incident - Introspection for all us...

The recent "gang-rape" incident brought tremendous amount of anger, anguish and sense of helplessness to most of the people across the country. It also led to many questions to each one of us on what needs to be done to prevent this. 

The initial outburst was to "give death penalty" to the 6 accused people and to create fear among the others not to do it. The view is absolutely right as fear prevents human beings from do heinous acts. We fear pain and miseries and that is why we pray to God. We pay taxes because we fear that Tax Authorities may catch us. Most of us try to earn and not steal because we fear that if we get caught while stealing, we will be punished by authorities. Thus, sense of "fear" should be placed in the accused minds to ensure they don't resort to such heinous crimes.

But in my view, many more steps are required to prevent such incidents. Most of the social issues arise from society's own structural setups. There is a deep sense of divide in the name of religion. Each religion followers think his religion is superior and hence, whenever he gets the chance to downcast the other religion, he does that. The very same way, "Gender Inequality" is a big issue which is prevalent in almost every family and household.

We have seen in almost every household that Women are treated badly. The kids, especially boys, watch the head of the family (usually their father) dominating his mother, wife, sister and daughter. Thus,  gets the sense that it is the right way to treat women. And when he grows up, he tries doing the same with his wife, mother, sister and daughter.

So the very first place it needs to be stopped is in our very own household and ensure that kids while they are growing up should be taught to treat everyone - younger /  older / any gender - with respect. Teachers in schools should also play an active role to monitor the kids who are aggressive or abusive in nature and take corrective action at the very first place.

So by taking steps early, majority of social issues can be handled. The law can only prevent when something is exception. But when we all know that domestic violence is so so common now a days amongst Indian families, any law in  the country cannot enforce discipline.

So change begins from within us. I am sure if we are able to change our mindset and start treating women like any other human being, such crimes would not happen at all.  Let us pray for the girl that she survives not just the body but also the mental and social trauma that will haunt her in the days to come...

Bharat Bandh kisliye????

"Arrey Bhai, aaj kyun bandh hai??"

"FDI Retail ko leke hai bhaiya."

"Acha, fir parso kyun tha??"

"Woh Coal scam mein ruling party paisa kha gayi hai na... Isliye"

"Oh! Aur peechle hafte???"

"Woh! Jat Bhaiyon ko bhi SC/ST mein shaamil hona hai na, isliye Bharat Bandh kiya tha."

"Arrey bhai, aaj India-Pak ka cricket match hai na??"

"Haan! Aur agar Indian Team aaj haar gayi to kal isliye bandh kar denge ki Captain, BCCI aur Sports Minister ka resignation chahiye..."

This "Bharat Bandh" culture has now become the part of the our social spectrum now. On every small or major issue, social or political parties organize Bandh in the country, state or city. The emergence of Anna and Baba Ramdev too has further re-ignited this form of protest, which in the last few years, was somewhat not too visible.

But is it justified??? Is our society so ignorant that you need to force every citizen of the society to go through the ordeal of not performing their respective duties? Can't these issues be managed without disrupting the routine social duties??

The society has given us other tools to register the protest. Media is one such medium which can be used to give interviews, press releases to put forward your opinion. Another medium are "Courts". In case you feel some unjustified is happening around you, you may also approach the court of law for the same. Only if these two mediums don't work for you and you still feel that unjustified is happening, one may resort to "Dharnas, Bharat Bandh or similar measures". So this should only be used as the last medium, not as the first medium of protest. 

One should be sensitized that such bandhs usually don't affect those whom against these are organized.  For instance, today's Bharat Bandh for Retail will only affect common man as he is not able to reach office, kids don't able to attend school, markets closed so major needs are not fulfilled, the ill people not getting treatment in the hospitals.. Will Prime Minister / Finance Minister not get food that day because markets are closed, or will he not able to reach office due to lack of buses, or will he not been attended in case of medical emergency???

Thus, it is my view that until and unless there is strong consensus among the common men, one should not call for Bharat Bandh, etc...

Life tests everyone as it tests my insecurity

Someone has very well said that "Change is the essence of human nature.". For last few months, I started thinking about "Insecurity" and how it has tied our lives and made our life insecure. I realize that I too living in various circles of insecurity - insecurity about my job, my career, my friends, my car, laptop and 'n' number of things.

Till few months back, my life was almost perfect. I was working tirelessly and a sense of strength was present in my working life. My closest buddy was also my team-mate in office that made my professional life much more easier. I had just found another good friend in the form of my car pool and she has been a real strength whenever I want to talk about something where I need the perspective of someone from the other gender.

When life was at its full swing, somekind of insecurity started creeping into my life. To overcome it, I started teaching my inner self that insecurity is unjustified and started talking about the same in front of my friends in a hope that I escape from this monster.

But Time is more powerful. The situation around me changed in the last few weeks. My closest buddy has just got a good job and moving out. He will no longer work with me after a week or so and now insecurity of working without him is making me weak. Some differences have emerged with my other friend on some personal issues and she and I are now behaving more formally than we should, though I feel that it is nothing but a temporary phase in our friendship. But still some sense of insecurity too has creeped in regarding her on whether my this formal behavior can actually ruin our othewise good friendship or we will back to our good self in the coming days. My job has not been as great which have made things much more difficult for me.

This entire turn of events has taught me a very good lesson which I would like to share. Life always test your beliefs and your attitude towards life. For ex., if a drunkard man decides to leave the liquor, the time will put him in front of pub or his circle of friends who drink with him several times to test whether his change in belief is really strong or not. Similarly, I think that time has put me into "Testing phase" and checking whether my change in belief of "leaving insecurity aside" has any substance in it or not.

The time is taking away everything around me that I rely upon to see whether I re-instill insecurity within me or not. Albeit, I hope that things will again turn on my side and I will be together once again with my friends or lead a great professional life. But before that, I need to be strong and patienty let the time play its role of a teacher perfectly.

We all might have played a role of a teacher or a mentor sometime, be it as small as teaching how to play cards or a game to our friends / family. If we closely introspect, how we do it???? We first teach the person how to play and then ask to play against us only just to see how much that person has learnt. I believe in a similar manner, the time instills a belief in us and then tests us whether we have learnt it properly or not. I am praying to god that indeed my belief in "leaving insecurity aside" will be tested successfully and I emerge out as much better person for myself and for my friends and family.

Jai Mata Di... Good Night!!!!