On Arjun Singh

I dislike the man and I dislike the kind of politics I think he stands for.

I don't think that he is responsible for the reservations mess though.

I think that the main problem is that we have not had real debate on this issue. A few years back, the government mandated that there should be reservations. There was no real debate then on whether or why reservation is a good thing. Now, the government is mandating that there should be more reservation and there is still no debate. All we have instead are televised shouting matches and argument sessions.

To me, Arjun Singh is just doing his job. Its the educated middle class that has failed us, because it has chosen "Death of merit" type rhetoric over meaningful debate and constructive criticism.

On reservations

The proposed reservation policy definitely has serious flaws. I think that reserving 50% of the seats based on caste is bordering on the ridiculous. I think having reservations on Master's level courses is an equally bad idea.

Still, I have the uncomfortable feeling that many people criticizing the reservation policy are displaying their elitist snobbery instead of trying to resolve the issue.

To everybody I know:


- Back off on the Arjun Singh abuse. It is petty, low class, and more importantly, unhelpful.



- Stop saying "We should first have reservation in primary education, that too based on economic status."

It is incredibly complicated to develop a workable framework where the kids of rich software engineers will study in the same schools as the kids of rickshaw-wallas and domestic help.

If you have specific,detailed ideas on how to make it work, put them out. Otherwise, be honest enough to accept that the problem itself is incredibly complicated, that there are no easy or direct solutions, and that it is not only the politicians who are to blame for this mess.

On Irfan Pathan

This is most definitely a premature question, but I will still ask it.


Is there a chance that Irfan Pathan will end up being like Debashish Mohanty: deadly with the new ball, Guy Whittal-esque without?

Im not saying he will, just asking.

On the BMTC

After seeing the public transport in Orlando, I have developed tremendous respect for the BMTC. My only quibble with it is that its buses dont stop long enough at each stop to let everybody get on/off a stationary bus.

I had a rather amusing ride to work this morning on a BMTC bus. The bus was so crowded that the conductor couldnt move through it, so he was getting off at every stop to give tickets to everybody getting on at that stop.

The driver, no doubt influenced by a habit of many years, kept leaving the stop after a few seconds............. without the conductor, who had to run, yell and scream to get back on the bus.


This doesent sound very funny now, but at the time it was really amusing to see the conductor's karma catch up with him.

On home court advantage in the NBA

I have always found it mildly amusing that playing on ones home court is considered an immensely big advantage in the NBA. In fact, in NBA playoff history, the home team has won the deciding Game 7 82% of the time.

Why, the average cricket fan may ask. Are the courts made of different materials? Does the ball bounce differently? Is the size of the hoop different?

No,no and NO. The reason is supposedly that the home team has more energy because the crowd is supporting them.

This seems slightly weird to me, one would think that professional athletes should be able to block out crowd noise.


Cricket is, of course, the weirdest game of all.

Anybody doubting that should consider the following statement: The Indian batsmen struggled against West Indian spinners, in West Indies, because the pitches there were too slow.

On Budhia Singh

I read Malvika's blog http://malvika-who.blogspot.com and
Barkha Dutt's column http://www.ndtv.com/columns/showcolumns.asp?id=1036.

I dont really understand their sense of outrage at whats going on, but what Barkha Dutt wrote got me thinking.


My immediate instinct on reading about Budhia Singh was to think of him as a victim, but I dont feel the same way when I see a bunch of really young Indian Americans win Spelling bees.


The parents who pressure/encourage their kids into learning all the words in the dictionary from the age 5 are fundamentally doing the same thing as what Budhia Singh's coach is doing. Yet, so many of us look at Budhia Singh as a victim and the Spelling bee winners as achievers.

That does feel like a double standard, doesent it?

Nadaswarams and Bhangra pop - The wonderful sounds of the Shatabdi Express

I travelled this Sunday from Chennai to Bangalore on the Shatabdi Express. I had a bad cold and was looking forward to 5 hours of quiet relaxation. What I got instead was a 5 hour and 45 min journey(train was late) that was immensely thought provoking while being some what annoying.

The train left Chennai at 5.30 pm and after the usual meaningless announcements the Indian Railways decided that the best way to entertain its passengers would be to play Nadaswaram music over the public announcement system.

The Nadaswaram is undeniably a fine instrument. In fact, it is considered so auspicious that it played in almost all south Indian marriages. The climax of the wedding is accompanied by the Nadaswaram being played loudly at breakneck pace.(This is done to alert the audience of several hundred disinterested people that the groom has tied the mangal sutra around the brides neck, and that they must now proceed to crowd around the dais and throw grains of rice at the couple's heads.)

In my humble(and undoubtedly ignorant) opinion however, the Nadaswaram is somewhat lacking in its ability to aid the kind of quiet relaxation that I was looking for.

I was able to explain everything when looked around at the rest of the passengers though. They were mainly elderly mamas and mamis, wearing the kind of contented look that comes when you are travelling in comfort, thanks to the efforts of your dutiful NRI children. Surely a few of them were going to attend weddings, and surely there is nothing better than a Nadaswaram cassette/CD to get one in a festive wedding spirit.

The music then shifted to some slow Kishore Kumar songs and I began to drift happily towards a restful sleepy journey.

The calm was shattered with one swift stroke, a loud whoop heralding the beginning of some (probably) obscure bhangra pop song. More Bhangra pop was to follow for the next half-hour.



Once it had gotten over its initial shock, my mind was abuzz with a thousand possibilities.

Did these people actually like Bhangra pop? After its impressive conquest of almost the entire Western civilization and the Indian club scene(right down to Kerala), had Bhangra pop conquered its final frontier- the mind of the elderly Tam-Brahm? Had this happened when I was away from the country, or was I witnessing history in the making?

Or had one of the aforementioned dutiful NRI children arranged this? Could they have been trying to expand their parents' horizons? Could they have been thinking that somebody broad-minded enough to enjoy this music would also be broad-minded enough to accept that their dutiful NRI son/daughter was going to get married to a Punjabi/Iranian/Nigerian girl/guy?

I did not leave the train with the answers to any of these questions, what I left with was a sense of wonder about my country and its people.







PS: Despite my dislike of its choice of music, I consider the Indian Railways one of the finest organizations (public or private sector) organizations in this country. I always have a hard time figuring out why Infosys is such a large part of our national consciousness (despite touching the lives of such a small fraction of the populace) and the Indian Railways isn't(except when there is an accident).