Indian Ministry of "Homeland Security" !!!??

Are we seeing another reenactment of 1973 in India?!! Is it all in the name of freedom or authoritarian control .... time would only tell ...



References:

Chidambaram wants to bifurcate home ministry

To tackle terror, Chidambaram wants MHA split

Hitting home

A hand that leaves the plough for the pen never returns to holding the plough ...

A hand that holds the pen moveth to the gun and sword easily than it may, though an impossibility, take to the plough ...




References:

Whither Rural India?

Indian agriculture is in deep trouble

Surging food prices reinforce tightening view

Our Rise is How We Fall ...

If we're one of the living, we got to walk a thousand miles ... but if we keep on exploiting, we shall not survive more than a while ...

Sustainable development is the only way forward, but India seems to be the last to even coming closer to realizing that. All it realizes is commonwealth games and cutting more trees!!! Sadly so, the economy too failed to collapse just as all other failures, be it tiger preservation, rain forest preservation, Delhi Ridge preservation, sunderbans preservation, coral reef and coastal preservation, river eco-system preservation, and the list goes on ... We do however preserve poverty, unemployment, corrupt systems, inflation, diesel car sales, and the like ...

Choice is ours, to rise towards and leap out to our doom!!!


Reference:

CO2 emissions can be stabilized only with collapse of economy

Enemy's Enemy, My Friend!!!

So it is hereby revealed that the scattered Jedi unite to fight the good fight, a common cause that is sacrosanct by itself, the freedom of software, its applications and related avenues. So does this mean cheaper final products? If its Dell and Acer probably yes, if its Toshiba or Lenovo or even Sony its probably a big no. (HP-Compaq fits just right nowhere!!!)

Ubuntu has already dented the MS bandwagon, probably the Chrome OS would do the same. Not to forget the Android OS on Acer Aspire One D250.



References:

Ubuntu's Canonical and Google partner to create Chrome

Acer Aspire One D250 with Android

Bond like the best ...

James Bond, the epitome of the debonair, dashing, suave, philanderer, womanizer, decadent, indulgent, macho, technologically geeky and all that associated jazz. He has inspired a host of Rado Wearing, Aston Martin driving, Bollinger drinking and caviar eating hedonistic generation.

What our culture has failed to adopt from that very character described above is his honesty, loyalty, strong sense of honor, sincerity and integrity, despite his meager salary, and being surrounded by red tape and pompous politicians. He signifies the ultimate weapon of justice, wielded by the MI6, yet his license to kill does not corrupt him into making arbitrary, false or biased decisions.

We humans are very easily blown away by superficialism and most often than usual choose the easy path to glory and success, that hurts no only the weak and un-empowered, but also the deserving and honorable.

The recent Commonwealth Games 2010 at Delhi is a perfect example of how our environment is being sacrificed for the sake of conforming to the superficial, while ignoring the actual need for green cover in Delhi.


References:

SC panel nixes covering of storm water drain for Games

MCD damages 50 trees on Lodhi Road

Medical Profession NOT Medical Business ...

Synonyms? ... nope ... then what's the confusion about?!!

Our nation fails to understand the difference between Medical Profession and Medical Business and the emergence of the latter concept owing to Patent Protection and weak Drug Price Control Order, 1995.

It is sad to see that the world's largest democracy can not become "by the people and for the people"!!!



References:

Obama prods House to pass health care bill

House poised to pass historic health-care reform bill

AARP Takes a Stand, Endorses Health Care Bill

US House Nears Vote on Health Care Reform Measure

Wild Karma!!!

The Koala ventures into the unknown of consumer choice where now we have Windows 7 with difficult upgradability and system hunger, and Snow leopard showing bugs of self-distruct, and then we have but one choice of an OS with a design as rare as the marsupials of Australia and is as free as an animal in the wild.



References:

Ubuntu 9.10 = easiest, cheapest upgrade ever

Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala Scurries Into the Wild

Canonical Matures Linux-based Netbook OS

Hands On with Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmi ...

Ubuntu 9.10 advances Canonical's cloud, enterprise goals

Ubuntu 9.10 [Karmic Koala] Released

10 reasons Ubuntu 9.10 will be a game changer for business

Ubuntu 9.10 brings karma to the market

The Bug!!!

THE AIM OF UBUNTU:

Microsoft has a majority market share in the new desktop PC marketplace.
This is a bug, which Ubuntu is designed to fix.

Non-free software is holding back innovation in the IT industry, restricting access to IT to a small part of the world's population and limiting the ability of software developers to reach their full potential, globally. This bug is widely evident in the PC industry.

Steps to repeat:

1. Visit a local PC store.

What happens:
2. Observe that a majority of PCs for sale have non-free software pre-installed.
3. Observe very few PCs with Ubuntu and free software pre-installed.

What should happen:
1. A majority of the PCs for sale should include only free software like Ubuntu.
2. Ubuntu should be marketed in a way such that its amazing features and benefits would be apparent and known by all.
3. The system shall become more and more user friendly as time passes.

It is the beginning of the end!!! Open is aggressive now, like never before, with the Ubuntu release of Karmic Koala coming up this October end and Lucid Lynx in mid April 2010 to be followed by Mystic Mammoth; the future seems bright for the Freemasons of the Wild in their war against the Orthodox Church of Proprietarians ...




References:

Bug #1

5 years later, 5 ways that Ubuntu has made Linux more human

Ubuntu 9.10 RC edition released

Canonical Takes on Win 7 With Ubuntu 9.10 RC

Relax, kids...Windows 7 is just another OS

Ubuntu's Encrypted Home Directory: A Canonical Approach to Data Privacy

Feature-By-Feature: Ubuntu 9.10 Vs. Windows 7

Windows 7 meets Ubuntu 9.10

Canonical pushes out Ubuntu 9.10 server

Truth about Virtue ...

M.K. Gandhi's greatness is marked by virtue that may be described as under:

Virtue is never in her proper element but when death and danger seem to have hemmed her in on every side; she scorns the prize whose purchase requires not the use of all her nerves. Imperia dura tolle, quid virtus erit? (Remove the restraints of law, where will virtue be found?) saith the Tragic. Inveniet viam, aut faciet: wheresoever she become, she will either find a way or make one. No calamity is of power sufficient to bring her under. This majesty alone knows what it is to suffer check; it can neither be elevated nor dejected. Her greatness, like the highest heavens, is always firm and without clouds. Are you desirous to see her? You shall find her in the temple, in the market, in the court; you shall find her standing at a breach or scaling of a wall, her garments dusty, her countenance all tanned, and her hands as hard as iron. Wherefore, whosoever is possessed with her, let him prepare himself for dangerous assaults.

-- Daniel Tuvill, Essays politic and moral, and Essays moral and theological, (John Leon Lievsay, ed.) (Folger Shakespeare Library, Univ. Press of Virginia, 1971) at p.43.

Existentialist Futility!!!

Why bother about water in Moon, is there a water pipeline planned from there; are we now going to run it dry!? Futility of our civilizational efforts is all around us when all we need is a joint effort to eradicate the earth of more important things as hunger, thirst, inequality, pollution, oceanic submersion & the like.




References:

NASA Wants to Mine Moon Water

Porsche launches Panamera in India

Samsung India bets big on touch screen mobiles

Upcoming Bugatti Galibier 16C to carry a price tag of $1.44 million

Ape Man? Researchers Spot Legendary Orang Pendek in Sumatra

Finest Dawnsong!!!

One of the finest decisions since the pulling out of Iraq, Obama has once again shown an intellectual commitment (rather than a testosterone driven) to International relations. He decided against reaping by not sowing!!!

We are living in the times of a living legend; Abraham Lincoln, M.K. Gandhi, and Chanakya were the only finest people in whose eras one would live and feel that there is still hope for change of heart, change of policy and deliverance from decadence.




References:

Russia Defence Min: No need now for missiles in Kaliningrad

Obama Missile Plan Wins Russia Praise, No Iran Shift

Electric Barbarella ...

We stand here at the brink of the Kyoto Crisis. The need of the hour: electric cars, solar power, oceanic energies (wave, current and tidal power), wind power, geo-thermal power and other alternate sources of energy. Its time to strike back at our self induced decadence. This reminds me of a great song of my teens, that has kept the flame alive of saving the earth from certain destruction ...

What about sunrise
What about rain
What about all the things
That you said we were to gain...
What about killing fields
Is there a time
What about all the things
That you said was yours and mine...
Did you ever stop to notice
All the blood we've shed before
Did you ever stop to notice
This crying Earth its weeping shores?

What have we done to the world?
Look what we've done.
What about all the peace,
That you pledge your only son?
What about flowering fields?
Is there a time?
What about all the dreams,
That you said was yours and mine?

Did you ever stop to notice,
All the children dead from war?
Did you ever stop to notice,
This crying Earth its weeping shores?

I used to dream
I used to glance beyond the stars
Now I don't know where we are
Although I know we've drifted far

Hey

what about yesterday
(What about us)
What about the seas
(What about us)
The heavens are falling down
(What about us)
I can't even breathe
(What about us)
What about empathy
(What about us)
I need you
(What about us)
What about nature's worth
(ooo, ooo)
It's our planet's womb
(What about us)
What about animals
(What about it)
We've turned kingdoms to dust
(What about us)
What about elephants
(What about us)
Have we lost their trust
(What about us)
What about crying whales
(What about us)
We're ravaging the seas
(What about us)
What about forest trails
(ooo, ooo)
Burnt despite our pleas
(What about us)
What about the holy land
(What about it)
Torn apart by creed
(What about us)
What about the common man
(What about us)
Can't we set him free
(What about us)
What about children dying
(What about us)
Can't you hear them cry
(What about us)
Where did we go wrong
(ooo, ooo)
Someone tell me why
(What about us)
What about baby boy
(What about it)
What about the days
(What about us)
What about all their joy
(What about us)
What about the man
(What about us)
What about the crying man
(What about us)
What about Abraham
(What was us)
What about death again
(ooo, ooo)
Do we give a damn

-- Michael Jackson, Earth Song, HIStory (1995)

References:

Reva to Reveal New Vehicles with Remote Charging Technology

GM India could partner Reva to roll out its electric Chevy Spark ...

Tata Indica Vista Electric Vehicle SKD kits to be shipped to Norway

Tata to Build Electric Cars in Europe

Green cars, green shoots at Frankfurt

Ordinary world ...

Our Independence is valuable to us as is our survival. M.K. Gandhi showed that India needed to survive the British and fight fiercely for the survival of the nation as one. We should not now leave the path of struggle when we are free to do what we can; not to turn away from our duties as a nation, especially those that concern our survival.

When will we as a nation stand up to the real issues concerning us? One look at the innumerable news channels on cable TV is conclusive of the fact that Shah Rukh Khan is more important to us than expensive and unaffordable insurance premiums, health care, drought, vanishing ground water, and what not!!! But the government aims only at hiking tax of individuals and not corporates. Where would we go if we cannot afford to live? We all need alternate sources of fuel/energy, health care, and above all employment rights that are being denied to us by planned government efforts.

I fail to understand why in such a poor country like India the Prime Minister is not nailing the real issues, when a richer country like the USA; their President can put up a fierce fight against corporates for each individual's basic necessities.

We are an ordinary people with ordinary needs. We need to survive before we can aim for luxury. Affordability of necessities should be addressed first ...







References:

Obama invokes late grandmother in health crusade

Obama attacks insurance premiums

NASA says Groundwater vanishing in North India

Draft code may make individuals pay more tax

Drought woes claim lives of 20 farmers in Andhra

Drying out

Shah Rukh may have been victim of random selection parameter

If a spade can dig, so can a shovel, if the soil is loose and unsettled ...

The Agricultural Produce Market Committees are marketing boards established by the state governments of India to facilitate farmers to sell their produce to the APMC and get a reasonable price for it. However, due to middlemen creeping in, the system has become so profiteering that the ultimate price to the end consumers is more than 100% of the price of procurement from the farmers!!! It is also illegal to circumvent an APMC under state law. But due to political reasons, the Shiv Sena has shown that circumventing the system can enable them to sell agro-produce to the end consumer at 1/2 the retail market rates, without affecting the agro-procurement prices or the nominal profit margins.

This development poses a very interesting intersection of law, politics, consumer interest, constitutional duties of governments and above all the duty to serve by upholding justice (that may or may not include upholding the law!!!).

As it has been rightly said, Law is merely a tool, if its breaking serves the purpose, so be it.




References:

Eyeing vote gain, Shiv Sena sells veggies at no-profit-no-loss rates

Sena members stage protest against price rise

A.I. Salvation ...

and are we scared of the inevitable? Also known as Technological Singularity, a self-awareness of A.I. Are we on the brink of it, because it is not human to discuss such things out of a science fiction context, except when it becomes inevitable!!!



References:

Scientists fear a revolt by killer robots

Scientists secretly fear AI robot-machines may soon outsmart men

Is the truth out there eluding us?!

May be so, as the actual accounts of UFO sightings and encounters have been made available for the first time by any government. Was "the Abyss (1989)" true is what first comes to mind!!!





References:

Russian Navy Reveals Its Secret UFO Encounters

Russian navy declassifies UFO encounters

Is it not scary?! ...

I'm gonna be
Exactly what you wanna see
It's you whose haunting me
Your warning me
To be the stranger
In your life

Am I amusing you
Or just confusing you
Am I the beast
You visualized
And if you wanna to see
Eccentricalities
I'll be grotesque
Before your eyes

Let them all materialize

Is that scary for you baby
Am I scary for you oh
Is it scary for you baby
Is it scary for you

You know the stranger is you
Is it scary for you baby

Is It Scary?, Michael Jackson, Blood On The Dance Floor (1997)

A few words, true to the situation at hand. There is so much to talk about and think about after the brave Delhi High Court decision in NAZ Foundation that people even from humble backgrounds are taking bolder steps to step up to what they really prefer and want. Is it not scary for the traditionalist-moral godfathers who have kept things under wraps and ruled their communities with iron hands to see their fiefdom swiftly slip away?





Reference:

Married woman marries her 'girlfriend' in west UP

Duel !!!

Kindly read the responses of some of the readers to my following comments I posted to the article below:

I commented:

1. I agree that something needs to be done, but road tax is not a fair PPP (polluter pays principle) enforcement, as the actual pollution does not get cleaned by paying higher road tax, a tax that the government would not do anything about, or will it utilize the same to any useful purpose? We have manufacturers of REVA on the other hand that have no government subsidies or funding to cheapen the REVA or to further conduct R&D for the manufacturers to come up with bigger cleaner cars. India is an economy owned by the oil barons. We need Obama like initiatives to free India from the OPEC clutches and thereby reducing inflation across the board. CNG / PNG will never lead India into an era of energy self reliance. Only utilizing geo-thermal, wave, and ocean-current energy besides solar energy can make that dream possible. But there is little or no allocation whatsoever in any union budget towards any spending towards unconventional clean sources of energy. It is a shame to be facing OPEC and IAEA dependency when India, the vast nation it is has so many alternate sources of energy.


2. The problem is that we as a nation think in terms of aping the west as a show-off of status and consider that our sole aspiration. People want to purchase Tag Heuer watches running on environmentally damaging technologies whereas they could simply opt for the Citizen EcoDrive (solar powered watches). Honda should have sold more hybrid Civics had our priorities been right. The CIVIC HYBRID did not sell even after the price was slashed to Rs.14 lacs. Instead the fuel guzzler VW Jetta sold more, that ran even on diesel engines. It is just ingrained in the psyche that personal profit should surpass global interest. TATAs were the first to start off with diesel cars just when Delhi pollution was reducing with DTC going the CNG way. Today the state is that Delhi has become as polluted due to diesel car pollution as in the pre-DTC-CNG era. Petrol, all said and done, is a far cleaner fuel than diesel. Indians have never chosen cars for their fuel efficiency, but for their lower running cost, thus the move towards diesel. As for cheapness of cars, TATAs can experiment on Indian roads with Indian customers; no need to go to other countries to launch hybrids, BUT they do realize that the Indian customer would fail them. TATAs' move to purchase JLR is also worth noting. JLR produces one of the most polluting cars. They are the Chevys and Chryslers of UK. They could have instead used that money to fund R&D towards meaningful research like Honda has. Enough said ...


I do not think that people understand what I am saying, but my context has always been the climate change and our higher commitment to its prevention. India has never been and seems to never commit to the greater cause. The Indian government does not see beyond its "developmental goals", OR perhaps is so overwhelmed by the Indian oil barons' influence in their decision making!?



References:

A big no to Tata Nano

Himalayan glaciers have shrunk by 38% in 40 years

US unveils spy images of Arctic ice in rare move

and after the curtains fell ...

... no one remembered all that applause or the achievement. The Nano without promise of alternate fuel options is as worthless as is Reva without government subsidies to hasten R&D and production of cheaper versions of the Reva. Nothing but a sales gimmick, we Indians are blind to the needs of the country, leave alone the world. The following reference is the only article I have read, that highlights the gravity of the matter. So enthusiastic is the press that we all have forgotten to press upon the real issues that relate to, and concern the launch of the Nano!!!

Reference:

A big no to Tata Nano

They don't care about him ... only his economic stimulus!!!

Economic stimulus at a time when the world economy is sagging!!! Success is the right thing at the right time. BUT at the cost of the loss of a wonderful entertainer, who inspired a whole generation. Where are such entertainers who are role models of the masses. Let alone entertainers, we have also no politicians, no leaders, no individuals ... NO HEROES to guide the generations to come. Seems we are doomed to our selfish fate of mediocrity, uncreativity and decadence. Our generation is anything but BRAVE ...




References:

Jackson money-making machine set to keep on rolling even after his ...

Michael Jackson's death certificate for sale

Michael Jackson's record sales now exceed those

Who is the greatest – Elvis or Jackson?

Run to the hills ...

Millions being spent on a 70 year old extinction in a region that has ecologically moved on and learnt to live without the cheetah in its circle of life. Has the Indian government not got any other area to spend the tax payers' money on? Human healthcare, energy crisis, newer sources of energy and global warming and related sea level rise are far more important concerns than 70 year old extinctions being revived!!!




References:

Cheetah may be imported

Centre keen on captive breeding of cheetahs

Cheetahs to return to India's grasslands under multimillion-pound plan

Cart before the horse = natural before unnatural!!!

All that is now needed is a probe into our bedrooms. The irony is that by stating that the law has no business in our bedrooms, it has further sanctioned legal peeping by not clarifying whether age of consent for all the 3 types of sexual acts is the same or is different. In case they are different, we all know that legal intervention is unwarranted and such differentiation is useless and humanly impossible to adhere to. Thus the only way to go about it is to have an age parity. OR ELSE start assuming that people get more "perverse" after 18 years of age and only thereafter indulge in the formerly "unnatural" sexual acts.




Reference:

Now, confusion over age of consent

Blunder of the New & Rising World!!!

This is not the first and only civil engineering blunder that is apparent, yet this seems to be the only media attracting blunder nevertheless. In every street of Bombay and new & older parts of Delhi we see bottlenecks because of broader roads emptying out into narrower roads. the Delhi-Noida Expressway, NH8 joining Delhi & Gurgaon, the Western Expressway near Mahim, the Eastern Expressway near Dadar, Andheri-Kurla Road, on either side, Jogeshwari-Vikhroli Link Road near IIT-Bombay, and the list is endless!!! There is no need for a civil engineering degree to realize the asymmetries apparent even to a common passerby?!



Reference:

Bandra Worli Sea Link: Hi-tech incompetence?

The Day of the Triffids!!!

When we are the ones not caring for them, they will have to take matters into their own hands; then the day would not be far when the plants would rule this planet!!!

References:

Boffins say plants can talk

Plants' airborne internet warns of danger

Plants 'talk' to warn each other of threats

Divesting wrong assets!!!

An age old question again needs to be re-looked at. Why should the government only divest its stake in profitable government ventures and leave out Air India type of loss making establishments.



References:

Air India seeks employees' help in 'fight for survival'

Air India asks senior staff to forego July pay to cut costs

CIL disinvestment likely by end of 2009-10: Coal Minister

Govt looking at proposal to divest 10% in BHEL

Shamefully Strange Events

How many days has it been
Since I was born
How many days until I die
Do I know any ways
That I can make you laugh
Or do I only know how to make you cry

When the baby looks around him
It's such a sight to see
He shares a simple secret
With the wise man

He's a stranger in a strange land
Just a stranger in a strange land
Tell me why
He's a stranger in a strange land
Just a stranger in a strange land

How many miles will it take
To see the sun
And how many years until it's done
Kiss my confusion away in the night
Lay by side when the morning comes

And the baby looks around him
And shares his bed of hay
With the burrow in the palace of the king

He's a stranger in a strange land
Tell me why
He's a stranger in a strange land
Just a stranger in a strange land

Well, I don't exactly know
What's going on in the world today
Don't know what there is to say
About the way the people are treating
Each other, not like brothers

Leaders take us far away from ecology
With mythology and astrology
Has got some words to say
About the way we live today
Why can't we learn to love each other
It's time to turn a new face
To the whole world wide human race

Stop the money chase
Lay back, relax
Get back on the human track
Stop racing toward oblivion
Oh, such a sad, sad state we're in
And that's a thing

Do you recognize the bells of truth
When you hear them ring
Won't you stop and listen
To the children sing
Won't you come on and sing it children

He's a stranger in a strange land
Just a stranger in a strange land

Stranger in a Strange Land - Leon Russell & the Shelter People, 1971

References:

N Korean Nuclear Threat Expected to Dominate US - South Korea Talks

Did Indian students falter in etiquette in Australia?

Delhi youth latest victim of racial assaults in Australia

5-member family from US quarantined in city

Israeli PM 'ruins' peace chance

Rahul birthday to kick-start 'woo Dalit' campaign in UP

Maya up in arms against all things related to Gandhi

The economic cost of race violence

Fans burn Dhoni's effigy, ex-cricketers appeal restraint

Roshans cooked up Hrithik-Barbara love story!

tuh-mey-toh (tomato) or tuh-mah-toh (tomato): Racisim or Not is the question!!!???

It seems that intolerance to difference is the bread and butter of the West and Caucasian Southern Hemisphere. Australian cops state that "Indian community members here point out that some Indian students do not behave properly in public places, especially in trains and market places. They play loud music and speak loudly on the phone in public transport, some can hardly converse in English and many choose to just stick to people from their own region."

In what civilized world does such behavior warrant assault on a particular community. Singapore does levy fines for public nuisance, a rational and civilized way to regulate public space (hence the name, "fine country"). Uniformity if pursued so vociferously would then leave us no different from the Islamic fundamentalists, the Hindu fundamentalists, and the like!!!




References:

Indians are not the only ones attacked in Australia: Cops

Australia: Indian university students protest racist attacks


Crikey wrap: Indian press on Australia's racism

Coercion: New Industrial Disease Part 2

Denial of job unless accepting restrictive terms, more so the amount of remuneration is now the norm. Call it ironical, but a while ago overvaluation of workforce only had led to the cash crunch!!! Guess we all are to blame.



References:

Coercion robs workers of $20 bn annually, says ILO report

IIP slumps 2.3% in March

Microsoft may cut more jobs if economy worsens

US shouldn't kill hi-tech talent: Steve Ballmer

Wind out of the Willows ...

Lack of political will to increase employment is evident from the latest Hyundai decision to move production to Europe!!! Probably the government wants more unemployed so as to tap the voter pool for future political prospects.




Reference:

Hyundai may shift i20 production base

Death of the Street Fighting Man ...

Only a few from the private sector remain organized only to be put down by the masters they serve. Is there no hope for the slaving workers, does no political party have their interest in mind, or do we not care for ourselves and be organized on a larger scale? I think the answer to all these questions should be in the affirmative.





Reference:

Striking Hyundai employees arrested in Chennai

They better have wings and fly!!!

So many cars, so many brands; do we have the roads?!!

References:

JLR in India by June

New Audi A6 launched in India

Audi to have 40 models by 2015; to launch its Q3 SUV in 2011

Auto makers report encouraging growth in April

Despite slowdown, April sales accelerate for car-makers

Hyundai Motor launches 'Hyundai Utsav' to tap rural India

Toyota Reveals Pricing for New Indian Compact Car

Honda Jazz – Honda's Small Car

Disguised Retrenchment: New Industrial Disease

About 3,500 Airport workers have been gradually transferred out of Mumbai and Delhi airports to other places after the private consortium GMR took over the operations and management in 2006.

I have been following this disguised retrenchment since a month now and am amazed to see very little or no media coverage on the issue. Possibly it is not as deserving as the IPLs and General Elections (especially the snappy irrelevant chat between L.K. Advani and Rahul Gandhi, neither of them addressing the real issues of this country) that forsake this country!!!



References:

Government should begin talks with AAI employees: Yechury

Airport staff calls off nationwide strike

AAI employees defers nation-wide agitation

The Expendables!!!

Labor rights and employee welfare seem to have lost all meaning. These are terms of a now Jurassic era when they meant PF, retirement benefits and performance incentives. Now these terms are synonymous with retention of productive employees, enhanced training, retraining and multiple evaluations. Somewhere it has become more structured and efficient like the computers we work on; elsewhere it has lost that human touch. Is that all there is to business? Has it no heart and life but is merely a monolith? Are we just tomatoes in a packaged tomato soup factory?

Welcome to the time of the "Live & Let Die"!!!




References:

India Satyam has 10 percent extra staff says chairman: report

`Cisco could announce 10% layoffs'

After the Layoff, Infosys Extends Training Period

The Steel / Brain That Wouldn't Die

MS would support XP till August 04, 2014!!! A job well done can not be overshadowed by subsequent newer versions and more so it refuses to accept its age. Call it Timelessness or the Limits to Innovation and Imagination!!! Something like the Mustang, VW Beetle or Citizen EcoDrive.


References:

Windows XP: the OS they couldn’t kill

XP: The operating system that refuses to die

Microsoft ends mainstream XP, Office 2003 support

The Irony of the "best" !!!

Being the best should also account for best in human interest and relations, or have I got it all up-side-down!!!



References:

Infosys fires two thousand employees

Infosys ranked top IT infrastructure; may sack 2100 employees news

Infosys postpones campus hiring from sixth to eighth semester

Heads they win, tails you lose!!!

They shall however put you on a performance improvement course and give you a chance to improve before asking you to leave!!! OR should they not tell you the truth and just ask you to leave right away. Oh No!!! that would be oppressive rather than being correct Human Resourcefully ... eh!



References:

Infosys fires 2100

2100 Infosys employees face axe

Infosys ranked top IT infrastructure; may sack 2100 employees news

Industrial Disease!!!

Now warning lights are flashing down at Quality Control
Somebody threw a spanner and they threw him in the hole
There's rumors in the loading bay and anger in the town
Somebody blew the whistle and the walls came down
There's a meeting in the boardroom they're trying to trace the smell
There's leaking in the washroom there's sneak in personnel
Somewhere in the corridors someone was heard to sneeze
'Goodness me could this be Industrial Disease ?'

Caretaker was crucified for sleeping at his post
Refusing to be pacified it's him they blame the most
Watchdog's got rabies the foreman's got the fleas
Everyone's concerned about Industrial Disease
There's panic on the switchboard tongues are knots
Some come out in sympathy some come out in spots
Some blame the management some the employees
And everybody knows it's the Industrial Disease

Yea, now the work force is disgusted downs, tools, walks
Innocence is injured experience just talks
Everyone seeks damages, everyone agrees
That these are 'classic symptoms of a monetary squeeze'
On ITV and BBC they talk about the curse
Philosophy is useless; theology is worse
History boils over there's an economics freeze
Sociologists invent words that mean 'Industrial Disease'

Doctor Parkinson declared 'I'm not surprised to see you here
You've got smokers cough from smoking brewer's droop from drinking beer
I don't know how you came to get the Bette Davis knees
But worst of all young man you've got Industrial Disease'
He wrote me a prescription he said 'you are depressed
But I'm glad came came to see me to get this off your chest
Come back and see me later - next patient please
Send in another victim of Industrial Disease'

I go down to Speaker's Corner I'm thunderstruck
They got free speech, tourists, police in trucks
Two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong
There's a protest singer he's singing a protest song - he says
'They wanna have a war to keep their factories
They wanna have a war to keep us on our knees
They wanna have a war to stop us buying Japanese
They wanna have a war to stop Industrial Disease

They're pointing out the enemy to keep you deaf and blind
They wanna sap your energy incarcerate your mind
They give you Rule Britannia, gassy beer, page three
Two weeks in Espana and Sunday striptease'
Meanwhile the first Jesus says 'I'll cure it soon
Abolish Monday mornings and Friday afternoons'
The other one's out on hunger striker he's dying by degrees
How come Jesus gets Industrial Disease?

- Industrial Disease, Love Over Gold, Dire Straits (1982)

& let the disease speak for itself ...



References:

Skoda sees sales slow to single digit in 2009

Sensex crashes by 338 pts as equities plunge on global weakness ...

Rupee recovers sharply, at 50.27 vs the dollar

Auto sector weathers slowdown blues in 2008-09

Akshay completes flop hat-trick

Akshay, Twinkle will be arrested shortly

Economic crisis takes toll on health of employees: Survey

Melting Economy Renders Corporate Workforce Unhealthy: ASSOCHAM

Mayawati hits out at Election Commission

Maya has a new post for booted officer

Aamir, SRK join hands for 'Fair Rights for Friday Nights'

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says Iran is ready to talk to 'honest' Barack ...

Thankless freeloaders Part 2 ...

Despite RBI's persuasion and surplus cash with banks, lowering of interest rates have not seen the light of day. Private profiteering? or just that PSU Banks are stupid!!!



References:

India call rates dive on surplus cash with banks

Bankers say no to lowering lending rates

RBI asks banks to ease lending rates

Real Interest rate increases with inflation dipping down

3rd World Dump ... Uranium!!!

It might be a threat of terror or might just be that fertilizer imports are used to dump uranium and other hazardous waste in unwary countries like India. This might thus be the result of more than a decade long process of covert hazardous waste disposal.



References:

India probes uranium link to disabled children

Panel to probe uranium in kids

Horrifying Presence of Toxins Found in Punjab Children

The fault is in ourselves ...

Lack of political will based upon and fueled by corporate selfish interest, holds back R&D and exploration of non-polluting sustainable unconventional sources of energy and prevents them from becoming conventional, in these dire times, demanding cure for this ailing planet. After all ...

"Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings."

-- Cassius, Julius Cæsar (I, ii, 140-141)

References:

KG gas to save 10% oil bill at peak

RIL surges 4% on gas output from KG basin