Naxalites

The term naxalites is used for Indian Maoists or communism seeking terrorists. The term came from Naxalbari, an underdeveloped village in West Bengal where the movement is said to have begun. With an ideology which appealed to an intellectual mind and compassionate heart, it lured many a rich and educated youngsters in the organisation, especially in WB (where every man who can just about read and write thinks of himself as someone worthy of a Noble or knighthood, if given a chance). With the young blood pumping rearing to rebel and the spread pf communism around the globe, the ideas were easy to believe too.

All this made the Naxals quite a nuisance back then. But the times were different. From what I understand, police brutalities, although prevelant, did not create a lump in the dog's thorat which keeps a watch on human rights. The political parties and media too were unequivocal in their stand against the Naxalites. This gave the govt. a good support and it dealt with the problem with an iron fist, knocking it down for a good 20 years. The only mistake, perhaps, was that they failed to crush it completely. But a govt. cannot order mass executions.

Times have changed. The movement has changed course. What was an ideology driven movement has now disintegrated in to terrorist outfits who harrass and torture the upper class for their bread and butter. The ideology is pretty much lost with the fall of communism, the learned ones rather had the free market take care of the poor. In spite of all this, the Naxalites are stronger than ever, whether in numbers or affected area.

This should not have happened, in spite of the Chinese money allegedly pouring in. But we are not what we were back then. These days, every action has a multitude of reactions and barring one, all are opposite ones. Suppose the army storms and shoots down a few at a Naxal camp. Apart from the ruling party, it will be criticised by everyone in the assembly. The media will raise a hulabaloo about a milkman who died in the crossfire, pressurising the govt. to take full responsibility and compensating its family. The human rights' people will slogan-shout their lungs out and the Madhur Bhandarkar or Nandita Das will make a film about it portraying Naxals as the Robinhoods and police as the villians.

Add to the mix a govt, which talks more and does a tad less, and you have a rather dangerous situation on hand. Mr. Chidambaram has been reminding us about th threat the Naxalites are to us for sometime now but has not quite achieved a lot. I don't understand why he even needs to declare a war on them. It's a job best done quietly. Just keep going after them and just show us the result. All this talking just seems to have reached those terrorists and might have made them feel that they needed to end a message. I hence think that today's hijack scare had more than a little to do with Chidambaram's statements.

PS: Just to emphasise on my point of hostil reactions to anything govt; there wasn't a single movie made on Naxalism until 1998. Since then, there have been at least 3. Needless to say, all of them take a sympathetic look at them.

Bizzarre Bihanis

Me: Dad, I should gift a note counter. Will give you some rest. (He's in to a business which involves a lot of cash dealings, but not so much cash :( unfortunately )
Dad: You just gift me notes. Lemme worry about the counting.

A team called T&T

Apart from few others, the Champions' League has managed to score one major positive. Succinctly put, that positive is called Trinidad and Tobago. A club team, which managed a berth almost as a favor, coming from a country whose cricket board is doing everything in its power to lose reputation and credibility. The team, for obvious reasons, were the underdogs, but have now barged in to the finals as favorites and in style at that.

I have only read about the West Indies of yore when Malcolm Marshall broke batsmen's bones and Viv Richards destroyed bowlers. The only reminiscent of those times was the genius called Lara who was all but consistent when I started taking an interest in cricket. Nevertheless, he was a treat to watch when on song. With the likes of Gayle and Bravo, there's still some talent in the team but the mainstays, Sarwan and Chandrapaul, are ugly accumulators, a far cry from the style and flair associated with the island team.

Watching this team, you can be sure that cricket ain't leaving these football crazy islands easily. It was a treat to watch the special kinds of drives which go to fine-leg and pulls that go over long-on. With no half measures, the strength and confidence behind each stroke is exemplary. Although the bowling was belted around but that could be blamed on the pitch. Add to this the typical underdog story and it's hard not to support the men in red. These guys could give any national side a run for their money. Aptly named TNT, they are effecting some serious explosions.

PS: These guys are playing with serious pride. Celebrating wickets and man-of-the-match award by waving their flag.

Super over

After AB, another de Villiers shot to limelight. The do or die match for both Eagles and Sussex and resulted in a tie. Eagles scored a very gettable 9 against a peach of an over by Yasir Arafat. In the next innings(?), de Villiers bowled a real super over by taking out the off-stump twice in the 1st 2 balls.
What's his 1st name initials? C.
So now we have AB, C de Villiers. More on the way?

Champion's League

I am having a hard time picking up a team to support. Not that I am watching much of it but neither are the umpires. They have put friggin' mics on the umpires to have a chat with the commentators. What next? Put a mic inside a batsman's helmet and listen to his thoughts after each ball?

Rahul Dravid: 'defend'...'defend'...
Harbhajan Singh: 'Monkey'
Andrew Symonds: 'Boo hoo'
Sachin: "he's only saying 'maa ki'
Ponting: "Screw England"
Flintoff: "I'll go freelance, screw England"
Strauss: "Flintoff is inspring,screw England"

The questions asked to the umpires are the best part; "Are you enjoying the match?". Gimme that much money and I'll 'enjoy' the match, standing on my head. Also, the discussion continues when the bowler is about to bowl or the batsman has hit a four. The drop in entertainment factor is comparable to switching from Bob Dylan to Akon.

Watching Mohabbatein

Since I'm busy all week, I only get weekend time with my parents and more often than not, parents are insensitive to a grown up but still unproductive guy. They make you watch Mohabbatein. Arrgghhh..

The scenes jump like a hopping rabbit, the screenplay seems to be done as a favor, the dialogues are cheesy and the logic consistently flirts with the line between creativity and absurdity. Although the 6 lovers have a whole range of expressions but only if you count in binary. Aishwarya Rai just could not emote and even Anupam Kher is a letdown.

The movie is still watchable. Not because of the premise, which is ridiculous to say the least. It's the Yash, Raj, SRK and Amitabh trio ( the comma after Yash is a deliberate typo). Well, a Yash Raj can pull off anything from a Valentine's much after Holi in this 'Gurukul' and a Volvo in the 70s in Veer-Zara. God knows how many times he has duped me in a similar fashion.

PS:I didn't ENJOY it. It was just watchable.

The Nobel & Other Things Irrelevant

For sometime now I am being bugged by people, newspapers and TV alike as they all dicuss stuff I could very well do without. So I jotted down a things we should not and should discuss

Things we need not think about:

1. Obama winning the Nobel Prize: He may or may not deserve it but does it matter anymore? There are so many better things that precious advertising space called status message could be devoted to. My blog for instance. The way I see it, it might be more insightful to discuss my blog entries, which can be edited and deleted, than pondering over that sailed ship.

BTW, history suggests that if you really,really,truly, badly and desperately want to win a Nobel Prize, becoming the President of US is your best shot. Four, yes four, I repeat, four of them have won it. No other chair has won so many.

2. 'The' austerity drive: Yeah yeah yeah... Rahul Baba travelled by train, Mr. Tharoor tweeted about it and the press wasted reels of newsprint and hours of showtime to it. Was it honest? I don't know and neither do I care because what they are going to save is loose change in comparison to what they spend.

Btw, I found Mr. Tharoor being asked to leave a hotel and occupy his alloted Bungalow quite ironic when MPs (ex) don't vacate their Bungalows months after vacating office.

3. Salman, SRK, Aamir: Saas-Bahu is passe', enter the blogosphere. I don't really care if SRK and 'KJo' are more than friends, what's Aamir's dog's name or if Salman gifted his shirt to a shirtless man and thus himself getting shirtless in the process.

It might be noted that Amitji has been deliberately left out of it. I don't hear much about anyone else and hence haven't grown sick of them yet.

4. Cricket: Think about this one and get back. I'll be waiting for your valuable thoughts and not-so-valuable insults.

I must admit that a some of my recent posts might suggest, I myself indulge a lot in the last fallacy.

Things we should spare more than a miniscule thought for:

1. The Ambani Bros. Feud.

2. Naxalites

3. The authenticity of Pokharan, although nothing can come out of it now.

4. Dev D/ Abhay Deol

PS: A friend's status message: Next year's peace prize to Simpu Sir... What's the zoke bhai???

Gandhi, I and Autos

Gandhi Jayanti is just to get this one rolling. When it comes to Gandhi, I have read his autobiography but cannot understand him. I have played his assassin in a monoacting bit from the anti-Gandhi play, 'Me Nathuram Godse Boltoy', with which I didn't agree one bit, but I still don't have an opinion. Sure he was a great man and stood for independence, a cause very dear to me, but he is difficult to relate to and much more difficult to follow. Perhaps my horizons of wisdom are not vast enough to comprehend his ideas.

Anyhow, this post is about an incident which wasn't exactly non-violent.

My partners in crime were 2 close buddies. These friends will henceforth be called I and I because calling them S and A will confuse that paltry lot of readers who better know them by their nicknames, which begin with I and I respectively.

One fine evening, as I was whiling away time on my computer, I buzzed me to ask if I wanted to watch Dev D. "I thought you'd never ask" I replied. I then dashed to I's room to convince him to tag along. Cutting short the chase, as I was haggling with an autowallah who was demanding Rs. 120, I had managed to find one who agreed to go for Rs. 60 to Woodlands.

This man took us to the Woodland restaurant while it was explained to him in no uncertain terms that our desired destination was Woodlands Theatre. So as he dropped us their, I gave him a Rs. 100 note and streched my palm for 40 in return. I was as surprised as me when the Autowallah returned Rs. 20. I, by the time, was already fuming due to the delay. Hence began the so very common sight of north Indian students haggling with an Autowallah in Chennai. This time around though, the mood was different. I was frustrated of being mooched of for 3 years by them. I had a strong desire to beat someone up and I was low on cash and wanted his 20 bucks.

So as the Autowallah was about to pull the lever in a bid to scurry off, I stomped on the lever. This made him very angry and he gave me a push. As if waiting for something like this, I twisted his hand as I caught him by his neck. I was now happily texting off a girl about this as I and I roughed him up.

Unlike Devdas the story has a happy ending as Abhay Deol tries to get his life back on track and doesn't die.

And oh, we got our 20 bucks back which we gave to the auto we came back in as he requested for it.

PS: I had claimed that the bone of contention was Rs. 20 but I pointed out that it was Rs. 10. So it would have cost each of us Rs. 3.33 to let go of the Autowalla. Cheap Bastards, aint we?