Most B-schoolers discover Ayn Rand classic during their MBA preparations. In fact it is probably a matter of prestige for B-schoolers to have 'The Fountainhead' as their favorite book. But I have met quite a few people who call 'The Foutainhead' their favorite just because everyone else does so. By doing so they go against the very philosophy that this book tries to teach. Such people are the living copy of the character - 'Peter Keating'. Relievingly, I have found many people who have a mind of their own and do not feel ashamed to confess that they either do not understand Rand or the book itself is complete bullshit! I just completed my 3rd reading of the book. I had failed to complete it 2 times and had to restart every time. After completing the book I felt that the core of the book is the testimony given by Howard Roark (the protagonist of the story) in the court at the end of the story. However, Roark's (or rather Ayn Rand's) ideas are so fundament

Watched "Bose- The forgotten Hero" on Saturday. Gem of a movie and probably the best of Shyam Benegal. Subhash Chandra Bose has always been an inspiring character in the history for the youth. This post however is not about the movie, its about the lead song 'Tanha Rahee' which is based on the poem 'Ekla Chalo Re' by Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore. I had pasted the English translation of this poem on my blog earlier. http://the-complete-man.blogspot.com/2004/12/tsunami-times_30.html However, yesterday I found the original bengali text of the poem and found that the meaning in the above translation was not exact. So I have endeavourer (with the help of Shubham ) to re-translate it into English and Hindi by myself. Here is the output of my work: Bengali Jodi Tor Dak Soone Keu Na Asse Tobe Ekla Chalo re Ekla Chalo Ekla Chalo Ekla Chalore Jodi Keu Katha Na Kai Ore Ore O Abhaga Jodi Sabai Thake Mukh Firae Sabai Kare Bhay Tabe Paran Khule O Tui Mukh Fute Tor Maner Kath

The following news was published recently in newspapers (and some probably even hailed our foreign minister for this) India refuses UNSC seat sans veto power http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1066729.cms And then came a very candid and practical comment from the UN general secretary Kofi Annan that “. . . it would be ‘utopian’ to expect the current permanent members to give up their veto power, or grant the same to the new members . . .” No veto power for new UNSC members: Annan http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1091625.cms Let us analyse the whole situation. The UN Security Council was formed when the world was just out of the Second World war with allies being victorious – especially the U.S.A. emerging as a powerful nation. The Russian Revolution and Stalin on the other hand contributed to the rise of a strong, communist U.S.S.R. and the world became bipolar. The Veto Power emerged as a major tool to maintain the power equations in this era. Conversely the

If you read science fiction from the 70s and the 80s you will find that writers had imagined the year 2000 and beyond to be much different from what it actually is. Androids, Space Travel, Space cities and ability to transmit humans from one place to other, are few of the fantasies that they imagined would be reality between 2000 and 2050. But as many would agree – hardly any of these fantasies seem to be coming true by 2050. Conversely many of the present day innovations and lifestyle components like mobile phones and the internet were never imagined in past by scientists or fiction writers. However there is a parallel between what was imagined and what we have today. For example though we cannot transmit humans from one place to the other but communication technologies have marked the death of distance. By 2050 we may not require to transmit people even if the technology for such a phenomenon is available. Already ‘net-meetings’, telecons and forums have become a part of our day to d

This blog has completed 3000 hits today . . . and to commemorate this event let me post about an event that left a deep imprint on me and deserves to be christened as the "turning point" of my life . . . [Pardon me for being a bit senti . . .] Our school (like most other schools) had a tradition that every section would conduct the morning assembly for one week in the year. I was in class VII and our class was allotted the turn. The class teacher selected 6 students to deliver the 'thought for the day' on each weekday. I was the last one to be selected and so was placed for Saturday. Unfortunately, an unexpected holiday was announced on Wednesday and every student's schedule shifted by a day and me who was on Saturday was kicked out. I was sad, dejected and frustrated when I went to my class teacher (Mrs. Subhadra Basu Roy). She consoled me and told me that I was good and would definitely get a chance next year but this consolation wasn't enough for me. F

Disclaimer: This is a naughty satire on the ever-make-n-break affairs of nowadays – it is neither a comment on serious affairs, nor intended against any specific person, any specific group or sex. Please do not read further if you think you may be offended by this post. ‘I need a girlfriend!’ I said aloud and Anish started laughing. ‘Hey come on! I am serious. Damn, I have been requesting each one of you to accompany me to Juhu – even promising that the ride will be on me and none of you are still ready! Had I had a girlfriend she would not have deserted me like this’. ‘Oh Yea, on the contrary she would have been happy that you are asking her out ’ Man!! Really you do miss a lot of adventure in life when you don’t have a girlfriend. Like there’s no pressure at all on you to cut your expenses – its like ‘Main akela to hoon! Apna paisa apne pe nahi to kispe kharch karoonga’ Oh yes! Having a girlfriend helps you get economically disciplined – after all when you have to buy her the most e

While Googling on Information security(see previous post for details), I landed up on a message archive - I was amazed at the span of the discusion going on there - the audience to this discussion ranges from software developers, network-admins, managers, IT professionals, IT managers and even social researchers . . . http://honor.trusecure.com/pipermail/firewall-wizards/2003-April/014383.html The discussion begin's with a harmless techie doubt about opening ports and tunneling (browse the link below if you want to read the techie replies - the current post does not cover them) http://honor.trusecure.com/pipermail/firewall-wizards/2003-April/014339.html The next few replies were techy in nature, but the discussion turned soon to Good Software development practices with people taking moral high ground. . . http://honor.trusecure.com/pipermail/firewall-wizards/2003-April/014386.html http://honor.trusecure.com/pipermail/firewall-wizards/2003-April/014390.html http://honor.trusecure.co

As my winter project with KPMG, I am currently doing research in the area of Information Security in order to prepare an authoritative 'guidebook' for IT professionals in this area. To tell the truth I mostly search content on the net, screen it and realign it - of course my work is then reviewed by people with experience in the area who improve it, plug the holes and correct mistakes. But fundamentally we are just recycling the same old concepts . . . . Even during our MBA, when we submitted assignments to our Profs we used to 'compile' them from what we found readymade on the net. There were some professors who would themselves indulge in extensive Googling and thus catch 'googled assignments' red-handed. Once that started, we changed our tactics; we used the same readymade stuff but changed the language - changing active to passive, or using synonyms. We were still caught at times but more often than not we escaped unscathed and ended up with above-average gr

Raj, Kshipra and me (M. Rajkumar and Kshipra Katakwar - my batchmates at NITIE) were sitting in the mess waiting for our '5th meal of the day' (night mess... another habit of NITIEans) to be served when Kshipra blurted out - "The tragedy of life is that one gets used to it" . And suddenly I realized - how true! Everyday while returning from office when I get on the Mumbai Local I see numerous faces - most of them are tired, sweating and stressed, and on every face you see the expression of acceptance - acceptance of their life, acceptance of the crowded local, the sweat and the stress that their life comprises of! These are not happy people (not by their looks at least) but they are not sad as well - their life is still; constant . . . . should we say lifeless? I wonder! None of these mortals would ever want to create a revolution but they would also not be a hindrance to it. They are like a buffer solution - oblivious by what goes on in their surroundings. But mind y

The weekend is here and many of you must be planning to watch a movie. I saw ‘My Brother Nikhil’ (yes my own name too is Nikhil!) yesterday at R-Adlabs, Mulund. The movie is well made and does justice to the sensitive subject it deals with. Here’s a review of the movie from me. If you are not interested in my review here’s a link to a good professional review http://in.rediff.com/movies/2005/mar/25brother.htm While Swades was a documentary presented as a movie/fiction, ‘My Brother Nikhil’ is a fiction presented like a documentary. It is a flashback narrative primarily by – Nikhil’s sister Anamika (Juhi Chawla), mother (Lillete Dubey), father (Victor Banerjee) and most importantly a dear friend Nigel (Purab Kohli). With dates appearing in the bottom left corner as every scene changes the documentary effect is so complete that sometime one wonders if this is indeed fiction or reality. Those of you who have seen ‘Phir Milenge’ will find this movie a better presentation in terms of depth a