Else you may just dream

It was a quite Sunday evening. Looking out of my room’s window, I could see the sun moving down and finally it went away.

I was trying to keep track of time. It happened to me how time has flown away in the last couple of weeks, months, years. Life has changed completely in many ways.

In the last couple of months, I have been stupefied by various happenings. I didn’t have the courage to write.

Just a few months back one of my best friends was struggling to convince his parents to marry his girlfriend. We were discussing various way outs and then we came up with “Theory of multiple choices – Love Marriage.” Believe me, this is the best name two engineers can come up with.

We decided that first and foremost thing, he will make it clear to his parents that he will marry the girl of his choice, but parents are free to choose from a list of options. We came up with a list of girls with a mix of odd profiles based on religion, caste, height, weight, etc.  In a list, there were four girls such that combination will result in inter-religion, inter caste or had height/weight issues. No offenses to anyone here. Because parents contended that girl and boy can’t be from the same city, we created combinations focusing on larger issues i.e. girl and boy can’t be from different religion/caste, etc.

After listening to ambitious plans of my friend, his parents were able to appreciate the fact that there is a girl on the list who is from the same city but has same religion, caste and fulfills their other criteria of height/weight, family background, etc. Same town issue came out as a minor one and obvious choice to them. Finally, his parents agreed, and he is getting married soon.

Creating odd combinations can be a good idea to many others as well. If it is inter-caste, you can create odds for inter-religion, inter-country, interstate, etc. else you may just dream.

A Tribute to Shaheed

23 March, 1931, a black day in the history of Indian Independence movement. Outside Lahore jail, a group of people were shouting slogans,

Inqlaab Zindabaad…!!    Inqlaab Zindabaad…!!

Long Live Revolution…!!

Just few hours before the execution, Sardar Bhagat Singh was informed that his execution has been advanced by 11 hours on 23 March 1931. And as time struck 7:30PM, mother India lost a great son, a revolutionary of the Indian independence movement.

Time itself may regret to be a part of that distress moment. Nature may have shed a tear or two.

 It is said that no magistrate of the time was willing to supervise his hanging and the jail authorities broke rear wall of the jail and secretly cremated the martyr under the cover of darkness. Why Englishmen were so cautious, when they were well established in India? And that too from a young, 24 year old man. It was because he was a revolutionary. A young hot blooded man, whose single minded approach for the freedom struggle, made easy for him to sacrifice all the worldly desires. When his parents were looking for a suitable match for him this is the reply that they got,

 “My life has been dedicated to the noblest cause, that of the freedom of the country. Therefore, there is no rest or worldly desire that can lure me now...”

A true freedom fighter, once in his childhood, while playing in open fields was asked, “What do you do?” and pat come the reply, “I sow guns” and the reason was none other than “To secure freedom for my country.”

The man, who gave a hard time to Englishmen, went on hunger strike for 116 days, fought for freedom with determination and great courage. And this is the longest hunger strike of the world till date.

Here comes 23 March, 2012 and there is a question that needs to be answered.

“Have we forgotten the hero of our freedom struggle?”

The man who sacrificed his life, so that we can live in a free country, have we forgotten him?

Let us don’t blame it on government; Government loves only politicians and their family members. Government has never celebrated his birthday, as they did for others. Neither it consoled, it simply ignored him. Indira Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Rajiv Gandhi, or say other family members are blessed with these celebration and consolation. Bhagat Singh doesn’t need that from government. Celebrations and consolation should be from the people of his beloved country.

He has always been a hero for youth of the country and today India is having highest percentage of youth population. So, we are the decision makers. We are in the right place at the right time and for the right cause. So let us just do it.

It’s a call upon youth of India to rock the virtual world with name of the legend.

On 23 March, 2012 let’s tweet as much as we can, let’s update facebook status, let us change our profile pictures to that of the legend, let us create facebook page, and let’s show the world for what we stand for. Let this year, Writers write about him, painters paint him; Singers sing  for him and artists live in the world of Bhagat Singh.

This is a call for youth of India to wake up from slumber and fight for the hero. If government is busy in giving titles to politicians, so can we, if not officially let’s give the title out of love. The government can only impose some names on us, but let people choose the beloved one. They can only name buildings, airports, roads, etc, but can’t buy respect. Let it be people’s voice to prevail, let it be people of India to decide to whom they want to give their heart to. But before each one of you makes your decision just remember that he was just 24 years old, when they hanged him till death. Just like anyone of us.

As he said, "it takes a loud noise to make the deaf hear", let us make a loud noise in virtual world, so that deaf could hear. Let us pay tribute to Shaheed Bhagat Singh.

Chup khade hain aaj saare bhai mere khaamosh hain
Na karo to kuchh kaho mazhab mera mushkil mein hai

Sarfaroshi ki tamannaa ab hamaare dil mein hai

Dekhanaa hai zor kitnaa baaju-e-qaatil mein hai

Inqlaab Zindabaad…!!    Inqlaab Zindabaad…!! 

Rohit Garg

Murder of a Messiah

“Hey, Punjabi’s you people broke my heart!”

This is what Sardar Manpreet Singh Badal might be saying to himself. The man who sacrificed his well established political career and stood for fighting against the looteras of Punjab. Just fifteen months back he was finance minister of Punjab, life would have been easy for him, but if only he was like other politicians. Little unfortunate for him, it seems he is not the one, who cares much about the power and money. A simple man, he drives his own car. Though it may seem quite normal to many but not to those who are aware of Indian politician’s lifestyle. He neither has any security cover nor does he use red light. He once said: “I am in public life on my own choice and feel no threat to my life from anybody”. How many of Indian politicians you can find these days saying this thing.

When everyone was busy in hoarding money, hunting for power, establishing close contacts with Badals (fate deciders of Shiromani Akali Dal politicians), agreeing to Badals each and every statement, he was the one who stood up and said,“ Hey, they are lying to common man”. And that was his first suicide attempt in terms of a politician’s language. But, he is a man of courage, he stood against the mighty. He has guts to say a liar is a liar and that too, to Chief Minister of the State.

When Prakash Singh Badal was making false claims of debt of Punjab and debt waiver required from center government, he enlightened common man of Punjab with real situation of the so called Khazana. He said that Punjab has small tax base and it cant afford the debt of Rs.70,000 crores. He said that revenue defict of Punjab is much higher, though senior Badal was shouting other way. He also made us aware of a common fact that not all farmers of Punjab need subsidy on power.Though he was not against subsidy on power. He just wanted to rationalize the subsidies for better financial management. He said that he was a rich farmer and he didn’t need subsidy on power, it should be for the poor and needy. Can anybody please tell, what is wrong in these kind of views? They are perfectly fine, but they are not meant for a guy who is in political arena.  

He went on to form a political party, for fighting against corruption, injustice. He fought for common man. Very well aware of the political situation of Punjab and challenges ahead, he took a plunge. In the start he got decent response from various sections of society. Educated youth was well aware of his objectives; they supported him in the virtual world. Media called him, “Man of masses”.  When everything was looking rosy, here we got a shock. We lost it. Yes indeed we lost it. Not even a single seat for his party, PPP.  

Punjab lost a golden opportunity to come out of a messy situation and put an end to family politics. Instead of zero any number would have been his source of courage and dedication for the work for next five years. Unfortunately, we deprived him of even that. Yet another fight for Messiah begins; now not only he has to fight for common man, but  also for his survival in politics.

Signing off

Rohit Garg

Masters Of Coalition Government

As the country is waiting for the outcome of the five state assembly elections results.There is high unpredictability especially in four-cornered contest in Uttar Pradesh.A few hundreds of crores are at stake in satta market predicting winning candidates, coalition governments, President’s rule; number of constituencies won, percentage of vote share and God knows what else. With UP being favorite of bookies, odds are 1:1.1 in favor of President’s rule and 1:1.2 for Congress-Samajwadi Party alliance. But it is shocking to see youth of India predicting Rahul Gandhi to be next Chief Minister of the state.It is well known fact that Rahul baba has been devoting more time for these polls than anything else, with prime focus on UP from eating with poor people to staying in their homes, he has done it all. But interesting thing is not what all he is doing, in fact the reason why is he doing all this, even when congress is well established in center. Why he is not enjoying all the power and smelling dust in fields of UP.  

There are several reasons for this, first and foremost is UP has been contributing major share of MPs for Lok Sabha i.e 80 out of 543.Another fact is out of thirteen Prime Ministers, UP has provided India with eight Prime Ministers, this explains the importance of UP polls. If, Congress wants to improve its overall condition in India, it desperately needs to work on UP part. It seems Congress is no longer comfortable with forming a coalition government at center. Sharing powers at center with smaller players has its own problems and congress might have seen them all. Tough it doesn’t seems that congress will be able to form government on their own at center but still it can shun some stubborn MPs and will be in a position to choose from a lot.

Though, it is highly unlikely that congress will be eyeing first place in UP polls, as that is too far from practicality, but they will be highly satisfied with third place as well. Congress will look forward to increase their vote share, as it may not  be able to  win elections on their own, but still they can manage to win sufficient constituencies so that they can form a coalition government with Samajwadi Party at state level. If that comes true, congress will be in a position to play a master stroke of present Indian politics; they may give support to Samajwadi Party at state level, and in return will ask for support at center. Samajwadi Party with 22 MPs in 15th Lok Sabha, will be a good partner to have. This will give them choice to say good bye to All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) (19 seats) or Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK)(18 seats) and choose SP. Most likely Congress will part ways with AITC, and if that happens Congress will be in better position to pass those pending bills, on which it has been working from many years. AITC, as partner has created more problems for Congress then finding solutions to the problems, be it is FDI’s in retail, Teesta water pact, or NCTC, it is behaving as angry and aggressive wife, who agreed to share bed first but now is having problem with each and every move of Congress. If SP lends support for Congress at center, it cannot afford to be aggressive, as it will be more than happy to rule UP after a long gap and will try to reestablish itself there. Second thing is, Congress forming government in UP, will be outcome of Rahul Baba’s time devotion and will establish him as potential Prime Ministerial candidate and will be much needed relief for Gandhi parivaar. Thirdly, if Congress will be able to pass those pending bills, it will give them edge for next general elections and will give them some agendas to cover the damage done by corruption cases. Fourthly, Congress will be able to find a answer for Mayawati’s social engineering politics.

But Congress is taking each step very consciously, with diggy uncle saying that madam Sonia and rahul baba are congress’s national leader who are not to be blamed for Congress’s bad performance in UP, and rather taking responsibility of any such performance on himself. It’s a situation in which Congress will not let anybody tarnish Rahul’s image at any cost, even if it losses. And, if they win all that will be because of Rahul Baba and we may end up seeing him as next Prime Minister of India.

Rohit Garg

Driving LYF...

Sun is done with his job. Now it is moon’s shift. Yes, it may sound odd to you. But, after working for 8 months in an IT company and especially in deployment team, where you work mostly on black screen (UNIX), you will almost lose all sense of humor and poetic charm if there was any. I always felt that working on this black screen, that black color has slowly slipped into my life, making it a bit darker.

Anyways, I am not here to crib. Working on black screen is my job, I have to do. So, we are moving ahead.

That evening, leaves were wafting, enjoying the light breeze and twilight. Birds are done with their job too, moving in flocks, discussing their daily routine jobs. But they are lucky. They don’t have a boss to curse.

It was raining. A beautiful evening was in making. All was set for those lovers or say beauty admirers of the nature. That day, nature was at its best. The sky was like a canvas of a painter, as his imagination was painted all over. I hate colors. He has used his colors very efficiently. It gives you a feeling of veil of a beautiful girl. The wafting leaves are hairs of that damsel and while mild breeze blew them, i fell in love with the beauty out there.

So, to enjoy that beauty i started off with my bike. I have strange attraction for beauty and driving alone, that too for long drives. That day, i was mesmerized by the beauty, i was finding strange relationship between life and driving. It may seem weird to you as well, but i have some points to make. So, please hold on before you reach some conclusions.

First and foremost thing common between life and driving is that for both you need to know the destination. Say, you are driving a  bike, car or any vehicle for that matter, if you don’t know where you want to reach, you will end up reaching nowhere. That’s absolutely because you don’t know your destination. The same thing is true for life, if you don’t aim for anything in life you will end up reaching nowhere. The process starts with most sophisticated machine in this world, Human Brain.

When you know where you exactly want to reach, your mind will create a picture, say a view, vision, and you see yourself at that place. Only after this process you start driving in order to reach that destination. But unfortunately, that is not the case with life, we don’t let our mind imagine where we want to reach, as well said by the great scientist Albert Einstein, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” So, let the imagination work.

Another one is, if you don’t know exactly when or say in how much time you want to reach that destination, you will end up wasting a precious resource, time. According to Parkinson's Law, "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion."

This is so true. Same is true for life, if we don’t have a time limit in which we want to achieve a particular goal, we will surely waste time.

So, in order to increase efficiency of driver, provide him with proper destination and time limit. Let him imagine.

Another thing is, nearly every vehicle is provided with rear view mirror, but you can’t drive vehicle by keeping your eyes continuously on rear view mirror. Same is true for life we have so many rear view mirrors, photographs, dairies, all those things that have some relation with your past, all these things will pull you into past. These things will stymie your futuristic approach.

While driving we get all kind of paths, if some are as smooth as silk, they are rough ones too. While driving through a rough patch we have to slow down, same is true for life. We can’t remain aggressive all the time, so there is a need for perseverance. So, you can’t expect every road in life to be smooth, there are rough patches which may test your driving skills.

Everybody likes driving, many like it with their best buddy, some with a group of friends, others with their love. That may define a little bit of our approach to life.

That beautiful evening i enjoyed the beauty too fullest, driving in those long roads of Bangalore under dim moon light; i found some rough patches as well as some smooth ones too. But i promised my best buddy that i will fight till i last. That lonely drive on silent roads may have something with my life too, but that feeling of driving through the darkness is ineffable.

Rohit Garg

Note:- All the views expressed are personal and totally based on perception. As, i like driving alone, So, this article is based on thoughts that came to my mind while driving.