The league by Extraordinary Gentlemen.

Subhash Chandra has tried to give India an option and its irking many. BCCI is worried about its cash flows because now they have to compete for the advertisement time and rate and its going to be difficult for them to compete because they follow a top heavy bureaucratic system where even for a simple decision they might have to go through a couple of meetings. So that means that for an action of ICL they might not be in a position to revert back quickly and that erodes their competency. Kapil Dev backing this effort is another nail in the coffin of BCCI because he is also the chairman of National Cricket Academy (he was sacked recently) and now Brian Lara has also joined it.

Anyways talking about competition, BCCI is really worried and the frustration was evident from the way they announced crisis control measures likeputting a life time ban on the players who will become a part of the league. The other day, top officers were bragging about the fact that nobody will pay attention to these stars of the yesteryears but my dear friend, thou shall not speak when you are not sure. Atleast you shouldn't make forecasts like this which you know are bound to fail.

This league might not benefit the senior players or the Board as such but then it has a lot to give to Indian cricket and to almost all the other stakeholders.

We the public who waste the share of our time on watching our senior players either running after the ball or sitting in the dressing room with a towel draped around their shoulders want to see some players in action. We want something different. We want our men in the thick of the action, we want an identity separate from Indian team, we want to watch cricket and want to identify with these players because we don't treat you as just players, we treat you as our little symbols of heroism and we try to find happinness in your game. We need change.

For domestic cricketers - It will mean a lot to them. In most probability these players will be kept out of the system due to the presence of senior (read OLD) players and also because of political affiliation or due to halo/horn effects Look at the list, try to identify who are they? Deep Dasgupta was in prime when Ajay Ratra replaced him who in turn was replaced by Parthiv patel, whose career was spoiled by Dinesh Karthick and then Dhoni took it all. Kaarthick made it back due to his batting but then everybody is not Kaarthick and even if they are only 11 can play for India at a time. Shalabh Srivastava and Mritunjay Tiwari were the part of under 19 squad who won the world cup. They contirbuted as much as Yuvraj and Kaif contributed but then in India they dont make pitches for fast bowlers and their career is cut short due to the extra hard work they need to put in to extract bounce from a dead pitch. Shalabh has joined and hopefully after one successful season or two Mritunjay will also join provided he has some cricket left in him.

I don't know they will achieve something or not but then they will get to play quality cricket because their compensation will be linked to their performance. They have to entertain public and as they don't have ICC backing they might not care for their records in the long run. In short they don't have to play for the wrong reasons. They don't have to prove it again and again that they are capable of playing cricket. All they have to do is to go on the ground and play cricket.

For Foreign Players - They will bring the much needed experience and expertise into the system. Look at some of the names. Abdur Rajjak's I guess is fitter than some of the fast bowlers of India and perhaps generate more pace too. Nicky Boje is obviously fitter most of the present crickets. For Lara and Inzamam, they quit the game at the last time and as they will be able to operate in a free environment far away from Red-Tapism and bureaucracy, I guess they will flourish under the condition. Meanwhile, getting financial independence is another issue which will definitely bring in some seriousness into the game.

For Advertisers - It gives them option to put their money in. Most of the companies are taking cautious steps after the world cup debacle which will reflect on their balance sheets next march. They are still scared but now atleast they can take baby steps or in marketing terms can test market this ICL which can be aptly titled as league of Extraordinary Gentlemen. They will be having more options for merchandising and sponsorships. And we can see some happy faces there.

ICL will bring in goodies for grounds and small centers also which are solely dependent on BCCI for their bread and butter and the only other option they have is to rent out their facilities to private parties for priavte functions. Now, they will be in the thick of the things because to start at this time, ICL has to contract the grounds and support facilties. Given the kind of hiccups that are expected I guess that the long term viable solution is to develop grounds facilities and this is where BCCI has to depend on the ICL.

Its not like ICL is without the disadvantages but then, on the face of it advantages seems to be outweighing the disadvantages so let's support it as true cricket fans. I am sure that may be our senior players will draw some inspiration from this league of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

What was wrong with Godse?

What really was wrong with Nathuram Godse? Looking some sixty years back I can tell that we haven't ever tried to find for the answer. As a management student I am tempted to look about his motivation to kill a personality like Mahatama Gandhi. But well, Nathuram is braced as he is not alive to take a 120 questions questionnaire of MBTI or FIRO B type and all I have to be contend with is secondary data which is far too rare. Cogress government made is sure that nothing substantial should come out. But well, most of the politicians and policy makers are web illiterate and even if they are web literate they have no control over web content monitoring so some people have put up some important piece of data on web. Among the few rare documents there is a confession statement of Nathuram. and an analysis into it which you can access by clicking on this link.

I might not be able to get much insights from this because its practically of no use to me because HR people like face to face interviews and as I can;t get an interview in this life, I have to wait for my chance. Maybe in next life I will invite Gandhi and Godse both for a panel discussion with Mandira Bedi as the moderator. What do you say?

Villains of Modern India.. An "OUTLOOK"

Call it cheap publicity, call it a publicity stunt or call it a competition for news Outlook has managed all that in its latest edition where it has enough Masala about the villains of Modern india. Bal Thakrey, Sanjay Gandhi, Narendra Modi, Azharuddin and Godse have been portrayed as modern villains. I don't know who murdered Keneddy but I guess the whole of the Indian media had made a hero out of Godse.

Mohd. Azharuddin's case is still in court and though nothing substantial has been proved against him, he was victimized by press, BCCI and media. Poor he, his advisors asked him to make reference to his minority status and that spelled doom against him. Even his non-muslim fans vented their anger on him and his effigies were burnt in different part of the country. Well, he is now fighting a life long battle against the BCCI. I wonder that when people like Kapil Deo, Prabhakar, Jadeja were braced then how come a magazine like Outlook can portray Azhar as a villain. We have seen his craftsmen like cricketing skills and if you takes into consideration his contribution towards Indian cricket then for a moment you might be tempted to think that he was innocent. Well, that is a matter of court's jurisdiction and I feel that its completely unfair for Outlook to take a position against him. Perhaps he was the only sensible Indian middle order batsmen who use to play with run a ball strike rate. Rest we all know about Shastris and Vengsarkars of yester year.

Godse, was hanged in the morning and cremated at unknown place. Even his ashes were not made available to his family members and as alleged were dumped in a river and the place where he was cremated was ploughed evenly so that people can't build a monument at that place. The story goes like that the book he authored was confiscated from the press and his ashes were dumped in a river from where a fisherman actually recovered the eathen pot and claimed that it's godse's ashes. His brother Gopal was freed after serving a life term in jail and in one of his interviews which was sensored, he mentioned that Gandhi didn't utter the word "Hey Ram" because the revolver they used didn't give you that much reaction time after the bullet hits you. Anyways the whole thing appears messy because I haven't even heard any assasination victim uttering even a word like "Oh god". We have seen the Gandhi side of the history but not the Godse side. His confession statement were never made public and I wonder that no Right to Information activist have take up the cause. Well, this is a country where being anti Gandhi is a crime and most of the people who opposed Gandhi's philosophy they died a painful death. Had it not been the courage of Bhagat Singh and a slew of movies made on Bhagat Singh his story might also have ended in dumps. We all know about Subhas Chandra Bose. Government never had the courage to put the papers relating to the investigation about his deaths on the table. Neither they asked Japan or Zermany to provide more information.

I am not compairing, Godse with any of these great leaders but the fact that there is not enough writing in the public which is enough for a magazine to take a stand. Anyways was hunting on google and this is what Nathuram's Court Confession document. Click Here

Sanjay Gandhi was arrogant brat but he wasn't able to match his mother in terms of arrgance and dictator like attitude. Seriously he was nothing. But probably the magazine can go ahead with Sanjay's character and can't take the present government head on by publishing anything against Indira or for that matter Nehru. Congress very easily shrugged off "Nehru Was Naive" comment from American diplomat but the fact is fact. He brought on us the three wars. We still have lot of ground to capture against these two countries. Sanjay could be a villain but we had bigger villains in congress itself.

Modi is a dictator (alleged) but atleast he lead Gujrat to Glory in less than 10 years. What about Lalu Rabri combine who plunged Bihar into a state of poverty and illiteracy. The growth figures were negative and the state became a hub for kidnapping, ransom and daylight murders. Gujrat is still way safer than Bihar and way more developed. Bihar got divided into two states and the state of law and order went to mess. Cattles roam freely on road filled with potholes whereas Gujrat added more than 50000 kilometers of highway. I have no doubts that Modi is acting as a tyrant and is against freedom of press and practicing a politics of hatred but still his sins are of lesser intensity than that of Lalu. By not taking any proactive measures to stop a riot is genocide but what about allowing law and order to fall down to a level when no one feels safe. MCC, Ranveer Sena in their dual killed 1000s of people in these 15 years of Lalu's regime but nothing much happened. And can you beat this that the top brass of Ranveer Sena (the private army of landlords) was a 75 year old man who was a follower of Gandhi and participated in freedom struggle?

About Bal Thakrey, I don;t know much but I know this thing for sure that to get cheap publicity you need to poke into something big and they have hit the target this time. Given the tolerance level of the Shiv Sena I guess that at-least they will take this issue further and will storm the news paper's office at some more places. Though the government is of opposition but still Shiv Sena has powers to break a few window panes to scare even the influential people. Well, now they can be sure of enough text against the Shiv Sena.

God bless them, I guess the biggest villain for modern India have been media which instead of focussing on bringing existing issues to the light is dishing out some exotic flavours to sell more copies. Great

The writing is on the wall.. Smoking kills..

Amazing Creativity.. this poster is on the ceilings of one of the IT firms..

Communication is an important tool, my dear friend!

Read the job description -

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Candidate aged around 35 years would stay in companys colony having all facilities and must be able to handle senior people executives intellectuals etc. whose habit is to make excuses followed by arguments instead of admitting and improving thus wasting time and energy. Person who is not tough and able to take strict action (like & live wire) need not apply.
No softness or looseness and not giving attitude or supporting employees ignoring the interest of the company. No side business or further studies will be allowed.
Attractive salary besides free furnished accommodation and conveyance offered.
Apply to Jt. Managing Director.
Candidate should be backed by engineering degree.
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Can you make out that this job description suits what post the most? Surprise, surprise, surprise, its for the CEO yes my dear friends CEO of Jindal Aluminium (yes you are reading it right of Jindal Group). Now what is funny, the use of the language or the candid confession?

Communication is really an important tool my dear friend..

World's best country for Women?

Date four men at once, Go on an year long maternity leave or have fun with Chic shopping district, Sweden is the World's best country for women. You don't believe me right?? then check out for yourself..

World's Best country for Women

p.s. But they still don't have a woman president, they have better living conditions and human rights for women instead. Anybody listening?

Untold story of The Wood cutter

Untold story of The Wood cutter

Once upon a time there was a wood cutter living happily in a village with his wife the one, whose axe fell in a river and river goddess after testing his truthfulness blessed him with three axes, his original one, one of gold and one of silver. He came back and as gold and silver axe were of no use to them, they decided they will sell it in the market and earn some money. Wood cutter was initially sad that he will loose his profession because when they will have enough money his wife won’t allow him to go to the forest again but they decided to open a store where to collect wood from the wood cutters of the village and to sell it in the market. So finally they went to the nearest town for selling the gold and silver axes.

They had a rosy picture of the city in the mind but after seeing the hunger and poverty all around and getting exposed to the pain and suffering of the street children they decided to adopt some of them and make them worthy citizens of tomorrow who could be a better wood cutter. (The wood cutter’s core competency was cutting wood so he can think only about that profession) They sold the axes and collected the money and decided to open a wood cutting school where they will teach wood cutting skills and techniques to explore forests for other materials of use. So they started their school.

Wood Cutter's Story part 4..

Starting the skill school -

Some of the things that they decided teach were skills related to wood cutting, coping with challenges of the jungle, managing collection and distribution of wood, differentiating between good wood and bad wood, raising finances for wood cutting equipments and most importantly how to become better human beings apart from becoming better wood cutters So with a bunch of young kids they started their dream school with an ever lasting vision.

It was not like present times when there is hell lot of competition everywhere (even for wood cutting, think about paper mills). During those times there wasn’t any organized competition and there was lots of wood for every wood cutter. Presence of jungle mafia was a myth. So there was enough space for everyone to prosper but like modern times at that time also survival was an option. Anyone who was willing enough to work hard was making good living.

The wood cutter grew old and he was not very happy with the progress of his children as most of them will be fooling around for all the time. Some were so lazy that they couldn’t climb the tree and will just pick up whatever has been shed by the tree and they will come back home thinking about some excuse. Wood cutter never put any strong checks in place and was buying all those excuses. Perhaps a person of his age would want only happy faces around so he never pushed his children to work hard.

Wood Cutter's story part 3..

Wood Cutter’s worry -

The wood cutter was unhappy about situation but he couldn’t think about anything partly due to his old age and partly due to his own attitude, as for all these years he was buying the same old excuses. He never tried to separate the good ones from the okay ones and he was responsible for the casual upbringing. He treated all of them equal and imbibed a great sense of democracy among all of them. He never rewarded the bright ones; he never applied pressure on anybody to perform better. His initial belief was to bank upon the consciousness of the individuals. This was not all. He was worried about another reason also. Due to the success of his school there were many other schools cropping up at a blistering pace in the nearby villages and it was on him to make his kids perform. All these relatively new schools were growing at rapid pace and he was sure that some of those schools have brighter and sharper minds. So he decided to test his students and called all of them for what we call now a meeting.

The meeting started with a speech where they were informed that each one of them has to spend three months into the wild. They were asked to study the jungle and collect whatever they can during these 3 months. As I mentioned before, the jungle was vast and there were opportunities for each one of them to explore as much as they can. Now, wood cutter was happy that finally he gave some good task to his children and was so happy about the whole thing that he decided to take a vacation.

3 Months into the wild -
Months went by and the final day came close. People started coming back from the jungle. Each one deposited their heaps of wood in the center of the field where they all assembled. Some heaps were bigger, some were smaller and some were tiny. Some bigger heaps were rotten, some smaller ones were really bad wood and the tinier ones at the center of the field were different from others. The looked dull and muddy.

Wood Cutter's story part 2

Awards and honours -

It was evident that some of the rotten heaps were collected during the first few days only and was picked at random from whatever those people found lying in the jungle. They collected all sort of stuff in a hasty manner and made merry in groups roaming around the jungle for the rest of the days. It was not before the final day that they woke up and found that the woods actually got rot during these days but as usual they put the rest of the time in finding excuses and they made a point to convince the poor old man about that. The poor old man was convinced and the embraced all of them and gave them awards and honours.

Some heaps were small but it was evident that these people could have done better to get more. Well they made a point that they will tell the stories to old man about how it was too difficult to go deeper into the jungle due to the scary animals and fears about dangers lurking in the jungle. The old man sympathized with them and they also received award and accolades.