[Arts] Misty Morning

A natural scenery but unlike usual mornings of rising sun, I tried to depict the misty morning at dawn. It was very tough to get the misty look, not completely satisfied with the output I got here.
Time taken  : 3 hours
Material Used  : HB, 10B, 2H Pencils and a cotton cloth (for shading) on A4 paper

 I hope you all like it. Please let me know your feedback.

[Movie Review] Madras Cafe

“Criticizing national politics does not make you anti-national”, says the British war correspondent in SriLanka - Jaya Sahni, played by Nargis Fakhri, to the protagonist Vikram (played by John Abraham) an Indian army special officer, giving a hint to audience that this is not a movie made to praise army or blame politicians but to show the bitter truths of war. We rarely get to see any filmmaker in Bollywood making a political thriller, this film definitely stands out as its been inspired from all real incidents that brought India and SriLanka on tenterhooks, how Indian politics suddenly took a sharp turn and it paid price in form of assassination of its former Prime Minister. Interestingly director does not take sides, as he makes the conspiracy clear to the end that when two nations are confronting it is not just two forces but there are lot of other external forces acting from behind in their vested interests and how such interventions can change the world history.

The story is mainly based on SriLankan Civil war during 1980s which was never touched upon by Bollywood earlier. The movie begins with the disturbing scenes of war crimes and deaths in Jaffna area in the northern part of SriLanka. Then director unfolds the historic events of Indian Peace Keeping forces going to SriLanka, drives us through the political mistakes and military misunderstandings, the conspiracy woven by few foreign powers and how India fell in trap that LTF (a rebel group, inspired from LTTE) which was actually supported by India all of a sudden became its staunch enemy and started operating against Indian peace keeping forces. The LTF leader Anna Bhaskaran (inspired from LTTE Prabhakaran) is only concerned about Srilankan Tamils and he will fight till they obtain freedom, but can India afford it?

Vikram is an Indian Army officer who is chosen by RAW for a covert operation in Jaffna where the situation was going out of control. Vikram gets a team and given a mission but after going to Jaffna he realises the enemy in not outside but he may need to fight within. He meets Jaya, the British journalist, who helps him understand that the fight is not confined to few people but there are some influential people involved in the conspiracy. As Vikram tries to unravel the conspiracy of so called West, he finds about assassination plan of Indian former Prime Minister. Can he save the Prime Minister?

Casting has been chosen cleverly to make the characters look real as many were new faces or not so known except John Abraham, who carries the whole weight on him as story rotates between Jaffna, Kerala, Delhi, and Bangkok. Nargis Fakhri looks convincing as a British war correspondent, speaking only English in British accent. Other actors gave decent performances, two of them stand out – one is Rashi Khanna as Vikram’s wife Ruby who impresses both with her innocent looks and acting, other is Kannada stage actor Prakash Belawadi as Bala, Major Vikram Singh's superior in Jaffna who succeeded to make an impression in the minds of audience in a peculiar character role.

The director Shoojit Sircar’s research gets reflected on screen in unfolding history. Movie lacks any twists or Bollywood style action sequences but still keeps you hooked with a fast paced narration. Apart from being a spy thriller, the movie makes one to ponder on how politics are actually played in international sphere that life of even national heads come at stake. Surprisingly, not just India lost its former Prime Minister but it lost the trust of its neighbour too and till now India-Srilanka relations have become no better. Though director claimed it as a work of fiction, it is known and commendable to make a movie on troublesome events of history which India would prefer to forget.

Police Police..

“Madam Speaker,” the Home Minister was addressing the Speaker and the eminent Members of the Parliament in Parliamentary session, “this Police reforms are being done to enhance the accountability and efficiency of the Police department in maintaining law and order in a responsible and transparent manner…”

Jammu and Kashmir:

Two days before, there was a violation of Cease-fire at LOC, two Indian soldiers were severely injured in the cross firing. Next day an Indian Army Commander gave a statement to reporters, “We caught few suspected terrorists in Srinagar, we have information that these terrorists are planning attacks in India, there is remarkable evidence of some cross border authorities in this, our investigation is in progress”.

One reporter asked “Sir, we came to know that you have arrested only 2 terrorists while 9 guys were shot dead at the spot?”

“They were killed in cross-firing, we could arrest the wounded”, commander said.

Reporter – “Are you sure the people who died are all terrorists, as there is a woman and a 10 year child in those 9 members who died. There are also allegations that mostly innocent people are dying in the war against terrorism. What is your comment?”

“No comments” the Commander left saying that.

Next day, there was a proposal in Kashmir Assembly to reform Police as per Model Act, to empower Police department with more powers, however the people of the State are in no position to trust the State and are strongly opposing any such act.

Chhattisgarh:

They were 11 soldiers travelling in that military truck to Dantewada. “I don’t like being here, seriously, what Army is doing in these jungles, we should be protecting the borders instead or fighting in the war” said one of them.

“That’s right man, it feels great when we return after killing few bunch of terrorists and receive award, but not for killing our own people who are fighting for their rights, who have been exploited by rich landlords. Now these poor men are rebels against the Government, a system which forgot to do anything to these people other than exploiting their land and homes. If you think again, you may find these Naxals are more right than us” said another. Just then a few Naxals attacked the truck in the middle of that Jungle road.

“Naxals attack Army truck in Chhattisgarh: 9 soldiers killed, 2 severely injured”were the headlines in all newspapers and news channels.

Manipur:

On 2 November 2000, in Malom, a town in the Imphal Valley, it was a sunny day; people were standing in the shade in that bus stop, waiting for the bus. Suddenly an Assam Rifles van came there; soldiers got down in split of a second and started firing indiscriminately on the people in the bus stop, 10 people died in this incident.

Later, Military said they had information about some notorious insurgents present among those people so they have opened fire. Sadly, among the killed were a 62 year old woman and an 18 year old boy named Sinam Chandramani who is 1998 National Child Bravery Award Winner. As AFSPA (Armed Forces Special Power Act) gives special powers to Army in North East States and Jammu & Kashmir, there was no case registered for these killings.

Irom Sharmila was moved by this incident and started an indefinite fast for a sole demand to repeal AFSPA, it’s been more than 12 years of her fast still nothing happened, and the worse is, she’s being charged of attempt Suicide case.(Read here) In this country some hard core criminals are becoming MLA’s and MP’s and ruling us, while some souls like Irom Sharmila who are fighting for justice are being dragged to court, what a pity!!

Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh:

Feb 21, 2013, as always it was a busy day in Hyderabad, couple of traffic police were controlling traffic in that busy center of Dilsukhnagar. One of them stopped a biker who was coming from wrong side and asked for license.

“Sorry sir, I just want to pick up a friend who’s standing in that corner, sir pls..”, man was pleading.

The traffic police was not listening to him till then but somehow the man settled him away and went the same wrong way to “Anand Tiffins” where another sat on back seat and they left the place immediately.

“What happened, is everything going as planned?” asked the biker

“It’s done, you’ll hear the hues and cries in few minutes” replied the other guy sitting.

Around 7pm, two bombs exploded killing 15 people and injuring hundreds.

“.. and Madam Speaker, it’s a privilege to say that after these reforms, Police department will be ever efficient equipped with latest technological advancements and the best human resources, to curb any kind of attack on the nation, to maintain peace and law n order.”, the Home Minister’s speech ended with thumping applause from his party members while the opposition remained dissatisfied.

P.S:- This is a work of fiction, though few are inspired from some real incidents I read or witnessed in life.

P.P.S:- When there is an attack in any city, whole media criticizes Intelligence and Police for their failure, but sadly never does any newspaper or electronic media thanked anyone for the sleepless nights Police and Intelligence department spends to keep the nation secure. I dedicate this post to all such sincere Police officials.

women MpowerMENt

“All are equal before LAW, no discrimination shall be made on the basis of caste, creed, sex, and place of birth”, this is a common sentence we read long back in our school, it’s inscribed in our Indian Constitution, the lengthiest Constitution in the world. I’m sure that if a foreigner gets to read this he’ll perceive India as a modern and rational country but in reality we see that sadly the modernity of India is confined only to books and Indian society is still widely orthodox and even moronic.

Women empowerment has been included as the foremost criteria, by the then Government, when India got freedom from colonial rule and even after 65 years of independence we still say “Women empowerment stands first in our goals to achieve” and I doubt when India will be able to achieve this goal and how many more innocent women will have to sacrifice their lives to this men dominated society.

Over the past few decades women rights are proliferated and we see a lot of women coming out of their houses, working at par with men in this competitive world, making it look like an unbiased place but is it really unbiased? When we see the heinous crimes on women in metros, like the recent Gang Rape case of Delhi, we are forced to reconsider what is amiss here that we are unable to curb the atrocities on women even after making strict laws against such crimes. Both the houses of Parliament stalled asking for change in laws and make it as death penalty for crimes like Rape, which seems to be a fair demand to curb the violence on women but will it really suffice to ensure safety of women remains to be answered.

By asking for death penalty for criminals, we are actually going for reformative measures than asking for preventive measures, it’s common in India that we are more concerned with the medicine of disease than taking preventive measures to avoid the disease. Until we don’t go to the root cause of this Superiority complex of men and make every one realize “Equality of women and men” is the essence of any society, we will not be able to arrest such crimes happening on women. So question comes as where does this problem begun? As we dig deep into Indian conservative society, we encounter a lot of shocking rituals like Sati, Purdah system etc. which depict the social inequality rooted in the society. With the efforts of great social reformers like Raja Ram Mohan Roy and few others such rituals are eradicated but the deep rooted conservativeness to view women as inferior and burden is what we need to uproot right away.

Government alone cannot face and resolve this issue but whole society should realize as its moral responsibility to bring awareness among every individual to treat women with respect and value their individuality. Parents must stop treating their daughters as inferior to sons and provide equal opportunities in every aspect, make the boy feel a sense of equality so that he does not feel in anyway superior to his female counterparts. Same needs to be maintained in our educational institutions, teach the children sense of equality, young men and women can get involved in schools and communities to advocate them about women’s equality rights.

All this stuff seem to be too far fetching, idealistic and unreal but there’s no other way to ensure at least in our future generation women will be really feel a sense of equality and Women empowerment won’t be still a goal to achieve. However these preventive measures will not help in any way to save the women of present day so there can be harsher laws against such crimes, however only time can answer how much such laws will help for the cause of women.

unNATUR(E)al Life

On Nov 6, year 1999, it was unusually cold that evening. Raju, a 5Th standard student, was playing with his friends outside his school in an empty place; they were waiting for their school bus. His school's last bell will ring by 4PM everyday and the bus will arrive around 4:30PM so in the mean time kids play different games, today was no different, but all the kids appeared very happy today, the sole reason being, it's "Diwali holidays from tomorrow". Though it was a small time before bus takes them home, Raju enjoyed playing in those few minutes with his bus mates, as he know he'll not meet these people till school reopens after 8 days.

Raju was playing cricket using his writing pad (as bat) and a plastic ball that his friend Karan brought with him hidden in his school bag. There was a heavy wind blowing continuously which was disturbing the game as the ball was flying away along the wind. Raju was batting, Karan was bowling from not more than ten yards away while rest all guys were standing close to the batsman to catch the ball. There was a full toss from the bowler and Raju hit towards long on, suddenly he felt something hit him on head, he looked around and then to the object on ground that hit him, it was a small stone sized white colored object. He picked it in his hand, Ouch, he dropped it immediately as it was so cold, and he realized it's an ice cube. "Who is the idiot hitting me with an ice cube here?" He looked around was bewildered to see that such ice stones were falling everywhere. :shock:

People started shrieking and running, some in panic other in excitement, because this town has never seen such thing happening before. This ice fall appeared so much fun for Raju's friends as they started hitting ice cubes on each other, but Raju was looking worried with things going on. In a few moments ice stones were falling in plenty and it was hurting to stand in open and face them so all guys started running haywire. He quickly ran to his school bag, thrown his pad into it and wanted to run but he observed that no more he was getting hit by ice cubes, it was because he was standing under a large neem tree where he kept his bag. He thought this tree can give him good shelter, as he assumed ice won't fall beyond few minutes, at least not in his town which remains so hot throughout the year. Some more kids and few parents who came to take their children home stood under that tree along with him.

It felt like ages for him standing there and getting constant beatings of nature, the high wind blown away all the leaves of the tree and ice was falling directly on people standing under it. Kids were crying in pain, parents were trying to protect their children by covering them up against the falling ice, one of the parents couldn't restrain this anymore, and he took his kid in his arms and ran towards a small book shop not bothering about the ice stones but making sure his kid is safe in his hands. Raju saw him reach the shop safe and smile victoriously as his kid was unhurt, beside this guy was standing Raju's friend Karan in that shop. With a ray of hope, Raju called out loud, "KARAN.. KARAN.. HELP", but to no avail as the noise of rain and wind was so deafening. "May God help me" he thought to himself, put his bag on his head just like the street hawkers hold the basket and started running shouting RUUNNNNN.. behind him all the kids and parents too ran towards the book shop. Karan saw them coming and made space for them, shop owner was kind enough to give them dry towels to dry themselves, gave them a long bench to sit on and take a sigh of relief.

Rain stopped completely in another half an hour but sky was full of dark clouds. It felt like some dark evil has fallen over the town, destruction everywhere, lot of fallen trees, broken electric poles; Raju was out of his trauma, he was trying to relax his mind, only then he remembered his sister. She awaits school bus on the North end's gate of school; he prayed to God for her, first time in life he wished if there was a cell phone with every one of his family and friends. He was about to start walking to North gate to his sister that he saw school bus coming, he boarded the bus quickly and searched for her, she was sitting there in the middle with her cute smile, he said a great Thanks to Him.

"How are you my little bro? You seem to have had fun in rain and ice" she said.

"Ya great fun actually, what about you, everyone in bus appears like they are coming from different planet, looking so calm and composed as if nothing happened, where were you all this time?"

"We were standing under a tree near North gate when it started raining, fire men standing outside that Fire Station in front of North gate saw us and took all of us soon into Fire Station where we took shelter till it was safe to come out, and immediately after rain stopped bus was ready near gate, that's all. But you appear so tired, where were you?" she asked

"I was also standing under a.. aahhh.. in a shop, that Sai book shop just opposite school gate", he didn't want to share the whole tale now. Bus took almost double time than usual to cross all the traffic and reach their home; their worried parents were so excited to see their kids. Raju was surprised to see piles of ice in every corner of terrace and porch of his home. There was no power supply that night, his Diwali -the festival of light, began with a dark night. That day he learnt that nobody can stop nature.

Note: This story is inspired from true events happened in my life, but real inspiration came from few articles I read in recent times which say some alarming facts like "By 2025, about 25% of Indian cities will face absolute scarcity of water" and "Hindustan is becoming Burfistan soon??" etc. Save nature is what everyone say so I don't want to re-iterate it but just want to remind the famous quote "We don't inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children"

My Worldly Affairs in 2011

2011, January 1^st, “Happy New Year”, she wished me at midnight as I was welcoming year 2011, hoping this New Year will bring in some joy; sadly I couldn’t talk to her much due to network problems. “This idiot network is *BEEP* bad” I screamed, “I wish I could do something”. On  January 20^th, - Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh launched nation-wide MOBILE NUMBER PORTABILITY (MNP) that allows users to switch operators/service providers without losing or changing their phone numbers, thank you Mr. Economist.

With the end of January, our party mood was gone and my life became sober again. Giving some ray of hope to my boring life, ICC world cup began on February 18^th; Sehwag made his best score in ODI’s to give a memorable win over Bangladesh in the inaugural match. To carry on the energy this win brought, we guys planned a Goa trip in second week of March. On March 11^th, as we were enjoying the waves of Arabian Sea in Goa, a ferocious tsunami hit Japan’s eastern coast, nuclear reactors were also damaged in the quake triggering widespread panic across the globe. As the world was busy worrying about this, a new revolution was taking its roots in India, something that was spreading faster than any virus, led by an Old man.

On April 2^nd, MSD hit the ball over the top of the bowler, “ITS A MAXIMUM”, shouts Ravi Shastri, Hurray! India wins World Cup after 28 years. I was celebrating so was the whole nation, except one village, Ralegaon Siddi in Ahmednagar district of Maharashtra. The villagers were waiting for the old man to speak, as he was sitting at village panchayat along with his team, a former IPS officer and an IITan presently a social activist. “This is not a time to celebrate; nation is in dire need of your support to save it from selfish politicians. We need to fight for the nation; it’s the time for SECOND STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE”. As he said that, all the men and women raised their hand in support and said in unison “Hum aap ke saath hai Anna (we are with you Anna).” It was just the beginning. Anna began his indefinite fast on 5^th April at Jantar Mantar in Delhi, to press for the demand to draft a strong LOKPAL bill. On 8^th April the Government of India accepted all demands of the movement so on 9^th April Anna ended his fast.

In last week of May, she rang me to share her woes of life, “There’s some problem with all men in this country, they are so chauvinistic, never allow a women to prove her talent, always try to put us under your thumbs”, now that’s called a predicament. I can’t argue with her now as she is very sad but if I don’t it means I agree that all men are chauvinistic, pity me. :-(  I was listening to her and watching TV(in mute) in parallel, I could see a lady in a saree waving her hand in air to her supporters and the scrolling below read,” Mamta Benerjee took over as the first woman Chief minister of West Bengal today after her party Trinamool Congress in alliance with Indian National Congress secured absolute majority and ended the 34 year rule of mighty Left Front.”

Albeit the nation struck in several problems from east to west, I was not bothered. We in S/W industry are habituated of worrying more about a recession in US but not about any political dramas in our own country, but sometimes you can’t escape some. On 13^th July, my buddy from Hyderabad rang me, “Dude, are u in Pune or Mumbai?” what an idiot he is, always forgets where I’m staying now, “I’m in Pune, why?” I asked
“Thank God! Didn’t see the news? Serial blast in Mumbai again..” he said.

Should I also be thankful to Him and forget about it or is it a time to contemplate on why things are always going wrong here. On 15^th August, PM Manmohan Singh addressed the nation on 65th Independence Day, and said “Terrorism is the biggest threat this country is facing“, if I had been given a chance I’d have asked him to mention clearly was it Internal or External he is talking about.

On 5^th October, my iPod suddenly stopped to play music for 2 minutes, whole world was mourning; I could see posters “I-DIED, I-CRIED” all over Pune, - Steve Jobs, iconic cofounder of Apple, passed away.

November just started, it was around 10PM when I reached home, “what’s wrong with u, why are staying for so long hours in office?” asked my mom. “It’s just some Prod issues, you won’t understand mom. I’m feeling hungry, let’s have dinner first”. She said “You’ll have dinner alone, I’m fasting today.” I asked “Can u explain why the hell people do fast?” she curtly replied “You won’t understand”. Yes, she’s right, I’ll never understand. On November 3^rd, Irom Sharmila completed 11 years of her indefinite fast (it’s not a joke), against Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) in Manipur. She’s the one whom, not just people like me but whole nation, even media never cared to know about, who cares, my life goes on..

Some more incidents were happening which were hitting front page in newspapers but not in my life. CBI Court charged Raja, Kanimozhi, 15 others with criminal breach of trust in 2G scam, trying to prove that politicians are not an exemption from court of law. In first week of November, Former telecom minister Sukhram was awarded five years imprisonment by a Delhi court after being convicted of taking Rs.3 lakhs as bribe and outside court he was slapped by a youth named Harvinder Singh. This news was of no concern to me that day but I didn’t know this young man will have his effect on my life.

On 24^th November, “Let’s Rock tonight” said my team mate; we had a party planned that night in a pub. Party was to start at 7PM and around 5PM we see news in internet, “A youth identified as Harvinder Singh attacked agriculture minister Sharad Pawar in New Delhi. Singh slapped Pawar.” That was not so hurting news but the next few lines were for sure, “After this incident, violence erupts in Pune as Pawar’s supporters go onto streets burning effigies and blocking traffic, police is in action to prevent any untoward incidents.” This news raised fears among us, “This guy could have slapped him tomorrow na, unnecessarily spoiling our party”, we all thought. Luckily the effect was not as dangerous as we expected, but party started with a delay of 90 mins.

When Anna was told about the slapping incident, he asked reporters, “Slapped just once?”

On December 6^th, it was a cool morning, I met her in office. “So how’s life going on?” she asked.
 ”It’s pretty cool, not much work as its Christmas and New year time for the client, so just having fun” I said.
“Great. So what are your plans for New Year this time?” she asked.
“As usual: partying with friends. Just hoping this New Year will bring in some joy“.
Many years passed by and many more will, the world is changing with every year, so is my nation and my life. What remained unchanged for years is my HOPE..

“Your story and the world’s history was written by the same hand”
                                      -The Alchemist(novel) by Paul Coelho

Note: This is a work of fiction.

Few reasons for being [Anti] Social Networking

Please don’t conclude by seeing the title that it is gonna be another boring lecture on anti-social networking by some orthodox. I know how much social networking has encroached into our lives today that we forgot to talk to people offline, in fact some people have completely forgot to live offline, so I can’t dare to go against it.



As a matter of fact I too have accounts in almost all social networking sites like ORKUT, FACEBOOK etc and I too use it for many reasons. So what’s this all about you may ask, here I’ve listed out something which mystified me about the social networking maniacs..

•  One day I’ve seen one of my old friend posting few birthday party photos celebrated pretty grand and the link was titled “My Dog’s Birthday“. I was happy to see people started loving animals so much but was it really worthy to celebrate a dog’s birthday with a 500 bucks cake. I wish she had used half of that money to help someone in need; they would bless her dog to live 100 years and the doggie would LIKE it
•  I never understood why people spend so much time “Growing Farms” and harvesting crops online. If they had used a little time to grow plants offline too, earth would have been a much greener and safer place to live.
•  I was talking to a friend at home, HAAATTCCHHHH… he sneezed, immediately he pulled out his blackberry to update in FaceBook/Twitter “I sneezed”. Do we really need to update even trifle matters of life in our profile for the whole world to know??
•  I find many friend request every time I open my account in FaceBook, or any other social networking site, and it’s no surprise that most of them I’ve never met in life n I don’t think I will. Most of them (not all I say) send a request just to boast a large Number of friends they have or to peep into others life, oh God why people are so much interested in others lives than their own.
•  While stuck in traffic I saw something strange written on a bike “Don’t follow me now, follow me here - twitter/hottest-guy-in-town.com“. What a creativity
•  When someone asks “Shall we play” I’ll ask Indoor or outdoor, now when I ask “Shall we play” people ask me “Online or offline??”

By social networking I met some of my old friends with whom I lost contact long back, I’m very thankful to social networking without which it’d have been nearly impossible to meet them again. On the contrary I hate it so much because I’m losing friends in real world as many are happy to be friends online but never have time for friends in real world.

P.S: This post is just to say what I gained n lost by some websites, no offence intended, no resemblance to anyone in real. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental