My niche in blogosphere

BBC NEWS | Programmes | wtwtgod | Can religion be blamed for war?: "Are religion and religious differences to blame for war and conflict? Many war leaders have claimed to have God on their side, but should religion get the blame? A 'War Audit' commissioned for the BBC programme 'What the World Thinks of God' investigates the links between war and religion through the ages. It was carried out by researchers at the Department of Peace Studies at Bradford University. " SELECTED EXTRACTS FROM RELIGIOUS TEXTS 'Then you must utterly destroy them; you shall make no covenant with them and show them no mercy' (Torah, Book of Deuteronomy 7:1-2) 'Thou shall not kill' (Torah, Book of Exodus 20:13) 'All who take the sword will perish by the sword' (New Testament, Matthew 5:43-44) 'Fight in the cause of God against those who fight you, but aggress not' (Koran 2:190) 'Whoever fights in the cause of God, then gets killed or attains victory, we will surely grant him a great recompense' (Koran 4:74) 'When all efforts to restore peace prove useless and no words avail, lawful is the flash of steel' (10th Sikh guru, Guru Gobind Singh) 'May your weapons be strong to drive away the attackers, may your arms be powerful enough to check the foes, let your army be glorious, not the evil-doer' (Hinduism's Rig Veda 1-39:2)

The Hindu Business Line : India shines � only for some: "Cross over from the mahogany panelled corporate boardrooms of Mumbai, which are announcing one set of robust profits after another, to Bihar, where parents are constantly worried that their child will be the target of the next kidnap; or Gujarat, where the Muslims still feel insecure;or the tribal belts of Jharkhand or Chhattisgarh, where people change their religious ideology on the promise of two square meals a day. Or to the desert State of Rajasthan, where even now, a woman is occasionally pushed on to her husband's funeral pyre by villagers secure in the knowledge that they will anyway be acquitted by courts for lack of conclusive evidence on their compliance in the heinous act. Even in a metro like Chennai, the feel-good factor vanishes when residents have to plot and scheme to beat their neighbours in getting a few extra hundred litres of water before their neighbour does. Or make provision for water charges in an already stretched budget. Or queue up on the road to get a couple of pots of 'free water' supplied by the government in tankers, whose drivers and helpers need to be kept happy. They, in turn, have to keep the water utility engineers happy, who in turn have to keep somebody else happy... And so it continues! As India shines here and there, how many of us have bothered to find out if those tribals of the Kashipur belt in Orissa are still filling their stomachs with mango kernel or plain grass when they fail to get even a fistful of rice to prepare gruel for the entire family? Surely, we journalists will make that journey on Orissa's horrendous roads once again if there are reports of starvation deaths from the region. But, for the time being, we will concentrate on India Shining."

India as a punching bag: "Why are Joe Sixpack and Old Left Comrades angry?" Grassy knolls, glass-skinned towers, sunny expanses of lawn (with 'Do not walk on the lawn') signs, company stores, fancy name-brand coffee bars, subsidized cafeterias. Glossy training rooms with theater-style seating, an LCD monitor for each user. Centers of excellence in state of the art technologies. Comfortable cubicle farms for the engineers, discreet glass-walled cabins for the managers. In a cozy courtyard, a mock-Japanese garden with bamboo and polished river-bottom pebbles, much like the carefully raked rock garden in a Buddhist temple in Kyoto. All this is so much like the Valley that it is uncanny. And this at a time when erstwhile boom areas on North First Street in San Jose, parts of Fremont, Mountain View, etc are now mired in recession. It is a clear vindication of David Ricardo's theory of comparative advantage. Ross Perot was right about the giant sucking sound: it is the sound of American competitive advantage collapsing. For, like some of those Star Trek planets that appear to be the Earth but aren't, this one is an optical illusion, too: this office park is not in the Valley, but in Bangalore's Electronics City; and it belongs to one of India's high-flying software services firms. And there are at least five others exactly as impressive just around the corner in this area a little far away from the center of Bangalore.

U.S. Payrolls Change Lives in Bangalore: ".S. Payrolls Change Lives in Bangalore By SARITHA RAI Published: February 22, 2004 ANGALORE, India, Feb. 21 � A social revolution is under way in India's numerous back offices and call centers. Many of the employees are barely in their 20's, and just a year or two ago they were living traditional lives in their parents' homes, often in smaller towns. Now, caste, religion and other age-old Indian social divisions are being shaken. Empowered by an ample paycheck, often from big American companies like American Express and America Online, some Indian workers are living lavishly on credit cards, and their open-mindedness is breaking conventions about dating. "

A changing India: "A changing India February 21, 2004 What has changed? If it can be explained by any single phenomenon, it would be the dramatic change in the demographic profile of India. Almost unknown to many of us, India has become the youngest nation in the world in terms of the age of its population. There are over 500 million Indians below 21 years of age leading to a median age of the country at an astonishing 24 years! By contrast, the median age in the USA is 36, 30 in China, 37 in Russia, and 38 in the UK. Even in 2025, India's median age would be just 31 years while the rest of these countries would have moved up to 39-44 years. Such a young population, with a significantly enhanced access to education as compared to their parents, significantly enhanced exposure to the world outside India due to the very high penetration of electronic and print media, and a visibly increasing level of self-confidence on account of emerging successes of India in IT and other sectors, is behaving very differently to what most 'experienced' professionals would have imagined or known."

Much ado about GDP growth: "Much ado about GDP growth January 31, 2004 On exactly 10 occasions in the last half-century, Indian agriculture has grown by more than 7 per cent when a good monsoon followed a drought year and agricultural decline. GDP growth in those 10 years averaged exactly 8 per cent -- and this includes performance in the first three post-Independence decades when average GDP growth was the miserable 'Hindu rate' of 3.5 per cent. The feel-good year to beat all feel-good years was of course 1988-89 (when Rajiv Gandhi was at the helm), for GDP growth crossed into double digits for the first and only time, hitting 10.5 per cent on the back of 15.4 per cent agricultural growth. "

Feel good and you: "Feel good and you February 04, 2004 15:53 IST Let's rewind to March 2003. The stock markets (represented here by the 30-share Sensitive Index of the Bombay Stock Exchange, the Sensex) are struggling to hold up above the 3,000 levels. There is fear of war, problems at the UTI and issues pertaining to divestment. There is also uncertainty about the monsoon. Interim Budget 2004-05 India Shining! The pessimism is underscored by the fact that leading stock market players polled by a business magazine forecast the index to be about 3,700 by the end of 2003!"

Deep Listening and Loving Speech: "She should be more responsible!'' You think that way because you already have some internal formation about the other person. The shortest way is always the direct way. ``B'' can go to ``A'' and say, ``Sister, please come and help.'' But you do not do that. You keep it to yourself and blame the other person. The next time the same thing happens, your feeling is even more intense. Your internal formation grows little by little, until you suffer so much that you need to talk about it with a third person. You are looking for sympathy in order to share the suffering. So, instead of talking directly to ``A,'' you talk to ``C.'' You look for ``C'' because you think that ``C'' is an ally who will agree that ``A'' is not behaving well at all. If you are ``C,'' what should you do? If you already have some internal formations concerning ``A,'' you will probably be glad to hear that someone else feels the same. Talking to each other may make you feel better. You are becoming allies -- ``B'' and ``C'' against ``A.'' Suddenly ``B'' and ``C'' feel close to each other, and both of you feel some distance from ``A.'' ``A'' will notice that. ``A'' may be very nice. She would be capable of responding directly to ``B'' if ``B'' could express her feelings to her. But ``A'' does not know about ``B's'' resentment. She just feels some kind of cooling down between herself and ``B,'' without knowing why. She notices that ``B'' and ``C'' are becoming close, while both of them look at her coldly. So she thinks, ``If they don't want me, I don't need them.'' She steps farther back from them, and the situation worsens. A triangle has "

Attitude. (May get really long, don't know yet) Do not want to be poetic or narcissist but may be little bit philosophical. This is an incident happened few years back. Those days were little hard for me. The days were when you like listening to Ghazals or good slow English songs. When you enjoy the lyrics and feel like they are written for you. Bogged down, frustrated, jealous, high on inferiority complex, etc. Tears knew no bounds, flowed every now and then, standing in front of the mirror and showing myself the way I can smile. Smiled, I did, in all the conversations, meetings with people, still social, but inside a small piece of shattered glass was tearing apart the heart. What happened in reality doesn’t matter now. Just felt like going towards the sea and have a word with the giant ocean. (Location: Nariman Point, Mumbai) I started walking just like a piece of paper, which flows with the heavy winds. With no direction, no destination, just wherever the winds takes it. However, to my surprise, like a movie scene, I was standing and looking at the sea. I was all alone. I can still remember how badly I needed someone that time. Don't you get that kind of feeling myriad of people around you; still you manage to find yourself fighting with your thoughts all-alone. Anyway, I started looking around and the feeling that I was who needed help was gone. It was about the time that sun was just setting down. Trying to run away from the time. Lots of people were looking at the sea, trying to find answers in the eternity. Most of the people were loners. It is still a very clear picture in my mind. Some people were having newspaper folded like they wanted to take some revenge from it, sitting idle on benches. Some were having peanuts like it was their only meal the whole day. Some just sitting on the sea face, dumbfounded, expression less. Lots of hungry, disgusted, dejected faces there. May be some didn't get any job after trying their best, some didn't manage to get some food for the night, some didn't get the money for their family, some worried about their loans. That moment I compared myself with all of them. My tears were gone. I felt I was uselessly cribbing about my life. I was fortunate enough to have food, shelter, clothes, and of course best parents. I felt very sorry for all the people. I hoped and wished for the best to all of them. But I think life's lesson was not yet completed. I decided to sit on the rock nearest to the sea. I sat, thinking all the things, reacting to them, blabbering all alone. And I saw the most influential scene of my 24 years, umm 18-19 then. There were these big black rocks all around the sea face to stop the mighty waves. Sea was little angry that day. I could see these huge waves striking to the rocks. Most of the rocks were in line near to me. The waves were striking those rocks and rocks were forced to bear the gigantic force. Just like the life was making these saddened people all around me. Life was playing games for sure. Treating like those rocks. People were receiving the poundings that's it. No answers. No results. Just testing the patience and integrity. At the same time when all these rocks were being beaten by the waves. There was one big rock little away from the shore and all its brothers. It was standing alone. Bearing the strongest force of sea as it was in the very front row. Leading all the rocks. Now the interesting thing was. When these huge waves were striking it. The waves were getting divided in two parts after striking it as opposed to the rocks near the shore, which were just submitting to the waves and the waves happily swallowed them. That rock was the winner. It faced the strongest force but still managed to break the huge waves. The reasons of that, and morale of the story, dare to do things differently and face the problems with open heart, and we can break the problem. I took that incident as a great motivation in my life. I was heading back home with all issues resolved and a strong heart. After that day I've never allowed any problem to bog me down. I've faced everything and solved all the problems. That rock has taught me the more than any book or person can. Since that day I have believed in Patience, Perseverance and the most important, Attitude. If you think what I said is bullcrap that's ok. I've derived and found the solution to my problems thought would share it with the net. Three quotes: Patience: We usually learn to wait only when we have no longer anything to wait for. Perseverance: When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on. Attitude: If you think you can. And if you think you can't, you're right.

Writing from 26505. uhuh...uhuh...check dis out.. listenin to dis songs.. reminds me of yaa..it always do. cuttin straight thru my heart its jus right der.. flyin like a kite in da sky i can hold it but jus can't catch it month 12 day 31 me..chillin wit my dawgs.. dancin, sippin martini..hollerin at people.. and its 0000 hrs in da clock.. dem showin people kissin on TV dawgs cats homies all huggin der sista dat rite moment i jus saw myself away from dat crowd 1000 people still jus me (uhuh, uhuh) me and you go back long time jus can't imagine you not wit me me still playin da songs you gave me. wish i can go jus back in da time (to be cont'd)

This is an article I wrote for the E-magazine of the Indian Student Association at WVU. My Vision of India

Star n stripes Vs Tricolor Note: No offenses. These are totally my personal views. Please do not be judgmental. The land of free. The land of opportunities. Living style and comfort. All the resources cheaply available. Real cool nightlife. Real cheap beer. That’s what you need for a good life right? You just to go to GAP or Aeropostale and get nice trendy clothes (BTW made in India, China, Bhutan or Pakistan) for 10-20 bucks. Or you go online order a PC or laptop. Doesn’t matter if you are just a student. Wow. That’s cool. Buy a car if you want. The roads are so clean and nice, dude. Awesome. So that’s America huh? That’s really wonderful. The US of A rocks man. What do you need more to lead a happy and fun filled life? Compared to that what India’s got? Long queues for anything. Sweat and pollution taking its toll on you. Crowded streets, offices or parks. Want to buy a PC? You a student right? Haha.. forget it then. Trendy new clothes, yeah, sure take 1/10th of your dad’s monthly pay to get branded jeans. Professionalism in government work? Think you can get your job done in 1 hour? Not in near future. Then now the question is do I miss and love India? Answer is yes. Yes? Confused? Nah, it’s not an oxymoron. Let me give you insights about my country. For a moment do not think of materialistic things. What we have as a nation that others don’t? Diverse culture, rich traditions, family values, and life ethics. Big words, eh? What do you call an elderly person in India? Prakash or Rakesh? No. we call them as uncle or Bhayaa (big brother). That’s how we see elderly people with respect. What about your neighbors? Do you have to call Rahul and ask him if he’s got time so that both can play together? Nope. You just go straight to his place and even if he’s not there, you can spend whole day there. You treat his parents as your parents and his family as your family. They also don’t think of you as a “neighbor”. Even if a small thing happens the neighbors are always ready to help. If there is a marriage in your family, who is invited? Everybody. Your maid with her whole family, your neighbors, your tenants. Sometimes your doodhwalla. That is a bond we all share without thinking of race, religion or color. Years pass by the bond never fades. Your old neighbors still keep in contact. You always make friends everywhere. You invite them to your place for whatever holy festivals or occasions. What do you do while traveling in train? Keep quiet? Guess what I found in my recent trip to Boston. In Amtrak, that is a train service here, hardly anybody talks to anyone. They all keep quiet. One lady was talking making some friends all the people around her were thinking what kind of woman is she. Huh? Train. I love trains. But now I have to say I love Indian trains. Why do we like trains? We meet all sorts of people. We can sit on the door and feel the fresh air blowing through your hair. We can get down on every station and eat whatever we feel like. I know so many people those who have made friends forever on the trains. Life may not be easy in India. But it’s worth. The upbringing we have got, the respect we have got for people. How our parents have taught that money is not everything. They did teach us how to be happy even when you fight hard to meet your daily needs. Happiness is a state of mind. Money or materials cannot bring happiness to you. You don’t get happy if you a buy a TV. Happiness comes through the contention, respect for the things you have, and accepting every situation as it is. Yah may be we don’t say everyday that “I love you, dad or mom!”. But the love or the gratitude is all inside. We don’t leave our parents house not because we are dependent on them or we cannot buy our own house. We don’t leave our parents place because we so much care about our dad’s blessings or mom’s hands over our head. Hundred and thousand pages can be filled and still it won’t suffice to tell what is India. You might find living comfort replacing with troubles, queues, pollution or corruption. But you have to live there for years or may be take birth to really understand and really enjoy India. Indian culture or India is really out of scope from a materialistic point of view. So you want fun go to Europe on your next vacation. Want happiness for your soul? Pack all your belongings and migrate to India. Where India really shines!-Must read article.