Salman Khan - "couldn't pass the buck "

The verdict is out and Salman Khan has been sentenced for five years of rigorous imprisonment for killing a black buck late last decade in Jodhpur ....... AND the judgment according to me seems absolutely fair.

Has the sentence been a bit too harsh ????? NOT AT ALL ... The fact that he was proven guilty of poaching an endangered species would mean that he is given some punishment .... And considering that he did it twice would mean that he punishment should be a severe one that would mean he doesn't do it again the rest of his life.

We have a number of high profile "Hunters " in our country who expect to get away with their crime thanks to their celebrity status. We have had a big hue and cry from the film fraternity claiming that Salman was paying a price for being famous... Surely he has to. The fact that you are a public figure makes it all the more important that you do the right things and set examples. These members of the film fraternity don't have a problem when they get laurels for their actions.... But when they they have brickbats thrown at them for being wrong, they are grieved. Epitome of hypocrisy!!!!

The court took 7 years to give a judgement ..... Thats the pace at which any case would move for any common man ..... So where is the so-called "discrimination".

The fact is famous and popular people have to conduct themselves in a much more responsible manner in public because their actions will be monitored and scrutinised. That’s the price you pay for being a celebrity.

One of them commented that punishment for killing an animal is 5 years and that for a killing a human being ( Jessica lall) was going Scot free ... but that idiot did not realise that it was one among them ( Shayan Munshi) who turned hostile in court ... and you have no one from the film fraternity condemning him.


Having said all this its only a matter of time when we will see Salman Khan get a bail and will be free again ..... The fact is that our legal system today sucks big time ... and is all screwed up . Circumstantial evidence is still not given as much importance as it should. The conviction rate in India is as low as 7% . Appalling!!!!!

Unfortunately only the high profile cases are discussed....we have millions of cases involving the common man which go into oblivion .... We may seem to be a very strong country ... but inherently we are very very weak and fragile.

P.S: Having said this its really heartening to see the poor Bishnoi community fight for something that they believe in ..... Thats what gives our country some hope.

Mittal V/s Arcelor - Is It " RACISTance "

The issue is big .... The companies involved bigger and the resultant company will be the biggest !!!!

Then why is there so much resistance to the concerned merger even before the shareholders have had a say ??? Is the issue a truly racist one?

According to me there might be a certain section which still considers this to be a purely racist issue.... But I think We need to look at this issue in perspective through the eyes of the concerned parties namely the French and the Luxembourg governments who also happen to be shareholers of Arcelor.

The facts that we need to take into consideration.
1) Arcelor Is the second largest steel company in the whole world and is probably the fastest growing Steel Company in the world too .

2) About 30% of the population of Luxembourg work with Arcelor and a lot more who work in companies which depend on Arcelor, which means Arcelor means much more to the country than just another company. Its probably the largest institution in the country of any kind and people tend to look at it as their institution.

3) In France its a huge setup and also has a sizable population working for them.

Under these circumstances it is pretty natural to see the kind of reaction that we are seeing in those respective countries. More than being a Racist issue its also perceived as an attempt by an outsider trying to take over a part of the country's wealth.

How would we Indians feel if tomorrow a Posco or a Nippon steel would bid for Tata steel or If a European company would want to take over Infosys or Wipro.

I am sure we would have pictures of Jamshedji Tata standing with Mahatma Gandhi and laying the stone for the building of Tisco or Narayana Murthy trying to build an Infosys in his one room flat in Bangalore flash on all our TV screens and a huge uproar among the citizens here trying to reason why is it important for Tata steel to remain an Indian company or for that matter an Infosys or a Wipro to stay Indian.

This will not be restricted to the Shareholders of those companies alone.


The same may not be the case if An XYZ company was taken over. Similarly I think the reaction there is also a testimony of how much more Arcelor means to them although its just a company.

The racist undertone is probably there but surely it is not as much as it is made out to be ... and who are we to talk about racism??? We need to remember we also have people in this country who think Sonia Gandhi cannot be the prime minister of this country as she is a "Foreigner".

If we measure if with the same yardstick I am sure Its more a Resistance than Racistance . :)

PS: I Admire Mittal to make such a bid though .... You require loads of money and some Balls of steel oops Mittal Steel i guess to do so :).

Sania Vs Maria .........

The came .... They played .... and they conquered...

Well.... The men folk couldnt have asked for better ....... We had a treat on our hands ...... and a treat it was ...... the colourful apparels to the dangling earings ..... to the powerful groundstrokes all were rightly pitted against each other ........ But the scoreline was a bit of a dampner .

Well we always knew it was going to be tough for Sania trying to beat Maria Sharapova and it was .

But yah it definately was refreshing to see an Indian there crushing forehands and backhands .... and doing well in the ATP tour.She surely has the potential ....... and with a better second serve and a bit more consistency am sure she will be a big force to reckon with .

lastly... Kudos to Andre Agassi ....... He truly has a lion's heart .... the man just goes on and on ........ A true true champion ..... he has reached the fourth round ...... am sure still has the heart to go the whole distance ...... A true Legend .

The other disappointment apart from the scoreline was the half screen advertisement by Tata tea ...... It surely was the last thing that people wanted to see .

And the next morning ..... thanks to the hangover of last night ...had a cup of tata tea and then had a bad day at the office ..... :(:(.It surely was a dampner ;).

I love tennis ... Rather have started loving it now ;)

Spare our Defence forces ..............

The highest pride and honour of any country is its territorial integrity ....... and it will always remain so. Thanks to our defence forces today inspite of two hostile neighbours, we are living ..... and are living a fairly comfortable life.

I have always ...... looked up to the defence forces and have respected the integrity of our soldiers and will always continue to do so ............ well you will surely have bad apples in a basket of apples ... and the armed forces are not too different ....and you get to hear these ghastly stories of black sheeps in the military as well ...... but I think by and large most people who are in the defence are proud of what they are.

It was however shocking to see and hear the petroleum scandal that came out where instead of petrol and diesel , they were supplied water .... Its a shame that people in charge of this even thought of doing something like this !!!!!!

Didnt they realise that it was people's life at stake and the country's prestige that they were playing with ?????

Well We all know that corruption is the second most rampant thing in our country ..(next to filth) but to see this spineless act where you start making money on the basic fuel for the army is a bit too much to digest. Where have the concience of people gone ????? Sell Ur country's prestige for some money ?????? and we talk about being proud Indians !!!!!!

Well after petrol there is substandard wood too ... and you still dont know what more to follow ...... I would like to believe that the above incident is an aberration but looking at the frequency of scandals coming out ..... Its getting a bit difficult.

On one end when we have a war like Kargil ... we see a lot of public outcry and sympathy .... but then after everything is over ....... things are back to the same old state.

We can feel proud taking names like A.P.J Abdul Kalam , Swami Vivekananda ... Vikram Sarabhai, Sachin Tendulkar ,L.N Mittal etc ...... but if our country still fails to instill that feeling of selfpride amongst some of us then we are no way even close to being great country that we think we are . Yes it is our fault ... when i say the country ..... It s all of us ...... Surely Things have seriously gotten wrong somewhere.

Our government surely can help by increasing the pay scales in the defence forces .... They surely can....... The families of the soldiers need money as much as anyone of us civilians ........ we eed to remember that they are also doing a job in the end ..... and yah if U need resources to do that ...TAX US ....... I am sure nobody will cringe if you put forth the right argument ..... We all want a happy and proud soldier.

And for our Defence forces ....... A lot of us still look up to you all as heroes ........ Its the best honour one can have to be associated with guarding the nation's territorial integrity...... A soldier has his identity .... Thanks to his uniform ........ And am sure you guys realise this ............. Bcoz there are a lot of people in this country who wanted to wear that uniform but were not as fortunate and priviledged to wear them.

.

Smouldering thoughts of the past ......

A warped mind ......

A burning desire deep within ......

Smoked emotions finding a way out ....

Obscure vision ....

Fearing the Unknown.......

and A ray of hope ......

Thats a sphinx .... an enigma ......

My Mind ........

Vast ...Complex , ... and impatient ....

abstract ... and weird ....

Spilling with ideas ......

exploring in all directions....

Mad that it is .....

Difficult to comprehend ...... changing all the time.

As they say .... The sky is the limit.

Catastrophe all the way .........

The rain god, the earth and the fire god made their point ...... so did our chief minister and prime minister ........ Our chief minister quoted " We can do something only if the rain co-operates with us !!! ". ( I always felt his biggest plus point was that he never speaks ..... but then he did this time )

Our prime minister on his visit to Mumbai said ..... "Our planning to deal with natural disasters needs a drastic change ".

Well!! How many times have we heard this before ???? According to what I can recollect we have had at least 6-7 natural disasters in all forms across the country and every time we hear the same thing ...... its kinda gotten predictable.

It might be true that we cannot do much about it ..... When nature vents its fury on us .. and also compounded from the fact that We dont seem to learn from our mistakes ..............But then why make these statements ?????

These statements emanate when you speak for the sake of speaking ..... and to see someone like Dr Manmohan Singh do the same thing is really sad ...... maybe in politics it really doesn't matter how good u are ... looks like it makes everyone the same .

And our media .... rather sticking to reporting the facts are getting into the habit of creating more hysteria and melodrama about the whole thing.

How many times after a rail accident or any other mishap have we seen these TV reporters stick their microphone out in front of the face of those injured and semiconscious souls ... and ask the most idiotic and dumbest of questions.

The reporting of the BHN Rescue operation was no different ....... One Insane and dumb ( Yes insane and dumb ) reporter asks one survivor .... How did u feel when the platform was on fire and when you were told to jump out ????? Whom all did you remember ????

How would it feel when one is 80- 100 metres above sea level and the only chance of survival is jump into the sea with the float jacket on!!! I am sure U don't need to be a Sigmond Freud to guess what would be going through a human brain during such times!!!

I think the reporters under the guise of reporting news do some absolutely crazy stuff!!! And this surely was not reporting news .....I think the reporters should use more discretion and act a bit responsibly before doing these outrageous "reporting". We see the news because we want news ..... minus the melodrama please !!!!!!!!!

But yah among all the pandemonium and panic ...It really is heartening to see the people of Mumbai who came out to help the unknown fellow mumbaikar and saw to it that the true spirit of the city lives on ...

The city is known as the city that never sleeps ...... and on that ghastly tuesday and wednesday ..... it surely didn't .....

On a lighter note : I think we shud have had the Stanchart Marathon a week from today ...We would have lots of winners and the kenyan who won the marathon this year would have come the last ......