Some Very and Some Not So Very Useful Sites

May 1, 2009

Election Day experience

On 30 April, 2009 it was the Election Day in Mumbai. And like every responsible and positive minded citizen, with my family for company I left home at around 12:35 pm to cast my vote. It was piping hot out. All shops remained closed during elections.

Soon after, we were close to our polling booth, where I saw army men on duty and little more closer to the booth there were a few police men. It left me pretty impressed with the security, wonder if such security is provided even in areas like UP, Bihar.

At the gate, I saw the queue of voters and got little uncomfortable with the thought of standing in that queue in the scorching sun. 45 minutes in the queue I saw and understood the following few things…

A handicapped guy was not let to vote due to lack of a photo identity. For all those who didn’t know, with the address proof you also need to have one photo identity. If you are going with your family at least one person in the family needs to have a photo identity.

Senior citizen need not stand in the queue.

Now something interesting… one young girl with her mom was so excited about voting. Showing her middle finger (that’s where they put the black ink this time…. wonder why?), she said “I am going to show this to all my friends, losers none of them went for voting”. We can definitely do with more people like her.

According to the news agencies, in Mumbai only 45% voted which I agree is not such a good figure however, I personally know minimum 7 people who submitted all the necessary documents much in advance but didn’t have their names in the voters list. And another 7 who had booked their tickets for the annual holiday 2/3 months back. In both the cases, it was not possible for the citizens to do much!!

I finally put my vote at around 1:30pm and felt ecstatic through out the day. This was not the first time I have voted but after all that our country went through and is still going through, after exercising my right… I thought I did my bit in improving the situation.

April 15, 2009

Would you be voting in the coming election?

This time like never before there is big time focus on election, after all that our country is going through at present, it’s but natural. I remember some people who said in the last election, “what is the use voting, all are the same” are actually trying to get a voter’s ID card. This on people’s front… is a very positive sign. All the recent happenings have made people realize the importance of voting for the right party.

Apart from that we have the media encouraging people to vote. Just last year jaagore.com came into existence, which already has thousands of registrations. As for me, I have always voted, unfortunately my name came in the list of voters little late; however, as soon as I had my name in the list I voted with all sincerity.

Election campaigning is going on in full form. Political Parties are getting film stars to campaign for them. This year the TV campaigning has got much more entertaining unlike in the past. I particularly liked the below Ad campaigning done by BJP.

But the question remains, how we should see to it that our voted is not wasted on the wrong person/party. I have been thinking a lot about this and why not it’s the question of my nation and directly or indirectly it affects me! Should I vote for the party campaigned by my favorite actor? Should I decide looking at the ad campaign on TV that impressed me the most? Or should I just wake up and see around, if the party ruling my area has actually contributed in its development in the last 5 years and if not should I give a chance to another party?

This is our one chance but as they say in Hindi… Sau sohnaar ki ek lohaar ki (Our one equals their hundred).

Before you vote for elections this time, besides you own wisdom and awareness, please do some research on which party really deserves your vote. Following site is the latest tool provided by Google, hope it helps;

http://www.google.co.in/intl/en/landing/loksabha2009/

March 18, 2009

Prithviraj Chauhan on Star plus ends


I was a regular viewer of this show from the time of its beginning until about Jan 2008. My interest went on reducing with the detoriating standards of the show. Gradually, I stopped watching the show. But on 15 March while surfing channels, I saw that Prithvi is in front of Ghauri and in sometime his arrow hits Ghauri and he is dead. I then realized that this was the end of Prithviraj Chauhan serial.

But even the end was not directed well, it’s sad that something that started so well had to end like this. To think about it now, the tv show on the king was quite close to his life. By close I don't mean the story, by close I mean the way the show was so much loved by Indian viewers all over the world similarly the real Prithviraj's life was also something that was talked about not only in India but world over. But because of the brutal mughal ghauri he couldn’t live that life longer. And now when a TV show was made on him even that turned out to be a disaster towards its end.

It is strange why the makers didn’t show what really happened than the imaginary story. No one knows what the real story of Prithviraj Chauhan was but at least if the story of Chand Bardai was followed in its entirety; it could have been controversial but definitely interesting. But perhaps, that would mean to have a huge budget.

As I end my post, I want to give 1000 salutes to the great hero, whom people called Maharaj Prithviraj Chauhan!! There were very few kings like him.

March 9, 2009

Thoughtful SMS

People r made to be loved and things r made to be used. The confusion is in the world bcoz... People r being used and things are being loved.

I received this text message on my phone some days back. Since then I have been thinking over it, and the more I think, the more I am convinced that every word of this sms is so true!

We are definitely in that age, where most of the time we are using people and loving things. Probably, it’s because for the thing we have paid a heavy price and people are free, even when they are not free as in the case of an employee, we want to use them because we have paid for their services. So in every situation, we are using people and loving materials.

This attachment towards our mobile, laptop, TV, car, ornaments, net and even orkut is taking us far from our loved ones. Talking about orkut, we see a column under ‘Personal’ 5 things I can’t live without, most of the times we see people writing family, friends, kids, animals… which makes humans, things. Ofcourse things cover everything but why is there nothing to differentiate between things and living being.

Really, once we clear our mind of this confusion, everything will go smoothly in our lives. Love people and use things, never the other way round!!

February 6, 2009

Spam mails story

How many times have you thought while deleting your spam mails, "What do these people get sending these weird spam mails".

Every time, I sat to delete these spam mails even I would think something similar. And today when I read this news article on how terrorists are using spam mails to pass on messages, I was left thinking why is it that, every good thing is best used by bad people?

According to this news, they have software which sends the mail to millions of people, that is actually a message meant for another terrorist. Now this actually helps in reducing the chance of getting caught. It’s easy to keep a track of few emails but highly difficult (or impossible) to track millions of emails. Now if you are thinking next time you will read your spam mails, it’s of no use because these mails are in code language which only the other terrorist will understand.

How much ever I hate to admit, it’s a classic example of out-of-the-box thinking. Sad, the pace in which evil runs its mind only if good could run faster. This actually is the need of the hour but we need to wake up to this truth first.

Read the full story at:

http://in.news.yahoo.com/20/20090206/1416/tnl-the-spam-mail-in-your-inbox-could-be.html

January 7, 2009

Year 2008-09

New Year has arrived and one week of 2009 is already over. I know time flies but now it’s flying faster and faster. Although this section of the blog is for retrospection, I would hate to speak about year 2008. All those who wanted to know how 2008 was for me got a standard reply that “It was a challenging year”. But to elaborate a bit, it was an eye opener. Accumulated thoughts of so many years got washed away in 2008; one hard blow put me face to face with reality.

Health wise also a very difficult year, can’t recollect when before this I had so many problems one after another. Not much of prosperity either can be claimed in the year 2008. And nobody needs to be told about the social disasters we saw in 2008. Even though, that didn’t do me any damage directly, I felt depressed hearing and thinking about it.

In short, all that we wish for everyone every New Year (Health, wealth, happiness) none was hugely present in the year 2008. So I say it was a very challenging year.

But now putting the past behind, I welcome 2009 with all my heart and soul. They say dawn is closest to a dark night. After the dark night that 2008 was, hopefully 2009 turns out to be the dawn of my life and helps me move ahead like the way I want to!

Professionally and Personally, I can prove myself to my loved ones. I am able to word my thoughts with all creativity and clarity. Talk when I am supposed to talk and stay quite when I am supposed to stay quite (not the other way round as it usually happens).

I hope all this happens in 2009 or I would be blogging about 2009 the way I did for 2008 and who likes bad publicity (except for the item girls). Because time really flies and it will not be long before 2009 also ends disclosing its share of goodies and baddies.