Ishant Sharma bangaya Crorepati

Ishant Sharma is being paid Rs.3.5 crores per year for appearing in IPL matches. This is an old news. But the following calculation, which I have seen in one of the dailies in Chennai made me dumbstruck.

Ishant Sharma’s contract amount: 3,50,00,000
Maximum number of matches he is going to play: 14
Maximum number of overs he is going to bowl in a match: 4 (20-20)
Total number of balls (valid) he is going to bowl: 14 X 24 = 336
Amount paid per ball bowled : Rs. 104166.67 !!!!!!

He has got a jackpot! Became an overnight millionaire with just few matches of play (of course he did well).
One of my friends said: ‘We should never assess an Indian batsman based on his performance in Indian pitches. and an Indian bowler by his performance in OZ or NZ pitches’…Words of Wisdom….let’s see how that 1.04 lacs ball works…

Mission: 2009 elections Missile: Budget 2008-09

From the beginning of his budget speech till the end, the UPA Government’s Finance Minister, Harvard Graduate P.Chidambaram made sure he keeps all the vote banks happy. I am not here to criticize the budget completely as the benefits are going to be for us, the citizens of India. But why is the huge difference between his previous budgets and this budget? I am discussing some of the salient aspects of this budget here with my views.

Rs.60,000 crores loan waivers for farmers:
My View: Banks are already under pressure with RBI crippling them. This will screw the commercial banks which have given loans to farmers. Instead our FM should have tried to identify farmers who are really not able to pay their loans and helped them with waivers. Benefit of this announcement can only be seen after a year or two with the agriculture growth. Our FM should try to help farmers get better yield rather than throwing in freebies like waivers which will make them lazier and incompetent to fight against arid conditions…

IT exemption limit increased from 1.1 to 1.5 lacs
My View: This is again an unwanted step. This reduces the regular income to the government. If the FM really wanted to help the tax payers, he should have reduced the tax percentage. Increasing the exemption limit would reduce the number of potential tax payers.

More fund allocation to open new primary schools and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan scheme
My View: Any citizen of this country will welcome this. But, Government should also allocate more funds to eradicate child labor.

Several schemes and funds for SC, ST & Minorities
My View: This is just to appease the left and targeting the vote banks. Again, mostly these schemes will be used by the well-offs like how it is now.

Short-term capital gains tax increases to 15 per cent from 10
My View: A good move but at a bad time when the markets are already tumbling. I will have to pay more tax 😦

No change in corporate income tax
My View: Poor IT companies! They expected some tax rebate but are let down. They have to find some alternative way to fight against the dipping dollar.

Miss-outs:
1) Not enough funds allocated for sports development. May be he can borrow some funds from from BCCI and Indian IPL Players 🙂
2) No solid proposals are made to improve the infrastructure. This is one area which needs immediate attention in a growing country like India.
3) No funds allocated for finding alternatives for the fossil fuels. This again needs immediate attention as the crude oil price keeps jumping.
4) No strong proposal made for monitoring the FIIs into the market. It was just said that they will be monitored. Some strict regulations should have been made.
5) No action has been taken to regulate the sky rocketing real estate prices.

Though some good proposals have been made, as a whole this budget has turned out to be a populist budget as expected targeting potential vote banks election 2009. We will get to know whether this budget really benefited target audience or not after Election 2009.

My Lovely London Life

After 6 months of travail at Cardiff, UK as a production support person for a mission critical system, there was a welcome change in my life. As my tenure was over, the management had decided to transfer me to London for a development work there by extending my stay at Onsite. I was very excited about staying and working in London but at the same lamented about missing Cardiff and Cardiff friends. I was very apprehensive about my accommodation in London as nothing was confirmed. Except for one of my friends who was already in London, I did not know anybody that time. As the project belonged to Kolkata TCS all my colleagues were from West Bengal. With all these dreads surrounding me, I headed my way to London.

All my colleagues were staying in a Paying Guest run by a Gujarati. Its not a proper PG. Most of the Gujjus in London rent a house with 3 or 4 bed room, they stay in 1 and leave remaining 3 for PG. I decided to stay there for time being till I find a better accommodation. But I could not become adapted to that milieu as a small room was shared by 4 persons and 2 rest rooms were shared by 12 people! Though the food provided was good and more importantly pure Vegetarian, some how I felt very uncomfortable staying there and decided to move out immediately.

During my previous junkets to London, I had visited East Ham for having food. East Ham is a Tamilian enclave. You can find the shop names written in Tamil. You can find Saravana Bhavan, Vasantha Bhavan and all hotels of that genre. After few months of eating only rice and North Indian food at Cardiff, having Idli,Dosa with coconut chatni at East Ham was a treat for my gustatory glands. My friend told that I can find the list of available accommodations in front of all the shops near East Ham tube station. One fine evening I rushed there and noted down all single room accommodations and finally got settled with one in East Ham itself there by ensuring good food 🙂

Oh! sorry…some how we have digressed from the actual subject. Lets come back to my lovely London life. My office was not at all in London. It was in Brentwood which was on the way from London to Ipswich. There was a train starting from Liverpool station which I can catch at Manor Park (the near by station from my place) which will take me straight to Brentwood, but I have to shell out 60 Pounds a week. Alternatively, I have to go by bus from my place to Manor Park, catch the same train, get down at Romford instead of Brentwood, catch another bus from there to Brentwood which would cost me only 22 Pounds a week. I chose the later like most of the other desis. Problem with UK is, be it a train or a bus, it comes on time. But we Indians are never used to such kind of strict punctuality. I had to wake up by 6’O clock every day, rush to the station to catch the 7:45 train, reach bus stop on time to catch the 8:30 bus to reach office by 9. It was a 1.5 hrs of journey from my place.

My customer manager was a Scottish born whose accent most of the times makes you scratch your head and tell him ‘Pardon me’. My colleagues were Bengalis who never discussed about anything in Hindi or English. So I was clueless for the first few days about what was going on…if that was the case, why the hell I am calling my London life as ‘Lovely’? It is because of the fun filled weekends I had in London.

Through my friend, I was introduced to a BIG group of TCS guys from Chennai. Most of them were of my age and were working in a different office which was at the center of London. All the guys were down to earth and fun loving. We formed a group and started playing cricket every weekend at the near by park. If we start by 12 PM after having a heavy lunch at Suvai Chettinad Restaurant, it went on till 8 PM in the evening (Sun light was there till 10!). It was the time when World Cup was going on…if there was any Indian team match, we promptly assemble at one of our guy’s room and make as much as noise as possible…If there was no cricket, then people can spot us at Central London…There was no place left in London without our foot prints. If every thing is boring and nobody gives company, I used to go to Piccadilli Circus and do shopping or window shopping (mostly) in the shops in and around Oxford Street and Oxford Circus. Such a lovely ambience in the shops…a nice way to pass time is shopping, at least window shopping if you are bothered about your budget crippling you 🙂

During the weekends, the tube, especially the Central line is always overcrowded…u can see people of all ethnicities in London…a true cosmopolitan city…girls at London are a treat to watch…but I feel a desi in a saree titillates more than a blonde in a décolleté frock…don’t know whether this is the case only with me or all the desi guys out there abroad…Paki gals in London deserve a special mention here…at times, our group use to curse Gandhi for accepting Jinnah’s proposal of 2 separate nations…

I never felt like staying away from home because of the new friends I got at London…I was there in London only for two months and a few more days… but the fantastic time we had will never be forgotten…

Sujatha dies – An unrecoverable loss to Tamil media

Writer Sujatha died! An unbelievable SMS from my friend woke me up late in the night. I couldn’t believe because I was in a Schrodinger’s state between sleep and reality. I taken out my laptop from the bag connected to Internet and searched in Google..no relevant sites or news…still couldn’t trust my friend as once he sent me a SMS saying ‘Ajith has died in an accident in HongKong’…I called him up…he told go and check Sun News (A popular Tamil News Channel)…it was scrolling down in the bottom that Sujatha has expired…Don’t know the reason, but it must have been a natural death as he was having lot of health complexities.

He is one of the very few writers (in fact the only other I have seen is Balakumaran) in Tamil who has written almost about everything…religion, science, fiction, astronomy, astrology…u name a topic…he has written about it…a versatile genius…he placed his foot in the film industry also as a successful screenplay and dialogue writer…his latest dialogues in Sivaji were runaway hits…though I was not gifted enough till date to read many of his works, whatever I read so far have been a step more than just impressive…A great thinker, writer, poet, scientist (an electronics engineer by qualification), the man behind Electronic Voting Machine is no more…It will take a lot of time for Tamil media to recuperate this loss…

May his soul rest in peace…

What a nice thought!

Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth’s surface relative to other matter; second, telling other people to do so. The first is unpleasant and ill-paid; the second is pleasant and highly paid.
– Bertrand Russell, 1872 – 1970

Perfectly reflects us…contrarily, I am doing the second job but still ill-paid 😦

Job hopping in IT

Though I am from IT industry, I couldn’t resist myself from writing about this.

India is shining like never before. So many job opportunities in IT and ITES. Students getting out of any good engineering college from any stream are having multiple yet competitive offers in hand. We are paid to an extent which has made every one envious of us and project us as the root cause of inflation in our country. Even after being paid well, one thing is really deficit with ITians which people working in other sectors have in abundance, Job Satisfaction. 9 out of 10 people from IT industry feel dissatisfied despite being paid well and enjoying the luxury of employee friendly HR policies. We always compare ourselves with a better earning friend in another MNC, feel discontented and prepare for a jump.

If the reason or problem for the jump is genuine and irreconcilable, there’s definitely a necessity for a change. But, without trying to conciliate the problem, if you decide to quit, what’s the assurance that you won’t be facing the same problem with your new employer. At one point of time in my career, even I was put into a similar situation. When I started trying outside, I got numerous, tantalizing offers with lucrative figures. But then since I was able to resolve the issue with my employer, the jump became totally unnecessary.

I have seen people jumping from one company to another within a very short span of time just for the sake of making their pockets heavy. What happened to belongingness and loyalty in this country? Of course, we are skilled enough to ditch the employer at any time and the prevailing market conditions allow us to do so. Any dilettante will be able to jump to another company easily. But is it a good culture to change the job like changing the shirt?

Some of my friends with 3+ years of experience are with their 3rd or 4th employer now. Most of them have shifted only for the sake of a hike and not for exploring new opportunities. With less than 4 months with the current employer, one of my friends is all set for another jump. They all claim that it gives them a moral boost that they are capable and most sought after in the industry when they get a new offer but I feel that they are simply narcissists who don’t bother neither about their employer nor about the values.

On the other hand, does it mean that people like me who are sticking to the same employer from the beginning are duds? I don’t know about others, but I have some principles defined for me. If it was all about money, all the IT companies must be running high on attrition above 40-50%. Current attrition in IT industry is the highest when compared to other sectors but still the majority stay with the same company which is a positive prophecy.

If there’s a justifiable reason behind the jump like learning opportunities, career growth, better prospects then it can definitely be accepted. This is what being suggested by the rest of the world too.

But, if one jumps too often, it reduces the credibility of that person and looks ugly on the profile after 4-5 years. If you are just jumping for the sake of a hike (at regular short intervals), you must be a swellhead who is disregard of everybody else and analogous to a politician who jumps between parties for a seat. Only good sign is that the job hopping percentage is coming down (very slowly) in India nowadays. But still IT and related jobs top attrition and job hopping in our country.

Is it only about money, honey?

Disconnected from the world again :(

My newly bought Laptop adapter is not working from Sunday morning 😦 I am totally disconnected from the world and really don’t know what to do after reaching my room…that’s why I stayed back in office today, tried hard and found a proxy using which I am posting now…in my company, everything is blocked…no personal emails, no orkut, no blogs, no google images..to summarise, no interesting site can be accessed from my office…Gotcha! now you got the point about why I rush from office at 6’O clock sharply…no updates from my end as of now…will get back to you all with more interesting stuffs to share possibly on Wednesday…

you can subscribe to the email notification of my feeds to avoid checking my blog for new posts and getting disappointed (he he he…heights of exaggeration…i don’t think anybody is doing like that)

What’s there in a (sur)name?

Have you ever got the feeling that you should have had a surname (if u r already not)? Have you ever had sleepless nights thinking about what could have been your surname if it was there? Have you ever thought about when rest of the world and rest of the fellow Indians are having surnames why Tamilians alone are deprived of surnames? I had all these questions while introspecting myself for answer…I never got this question arose, till I filled up my passport application where surname is one of the mandatory fields…the person who was sitting in front of me advised me to write my father’s name as my surname…that is where all the problems have started…

as per International standards, my name is already lengthy…added with my surname (my father’s name is Subramanian) it becomes impossible for any non-Indian to pronounce completely and correctly…’You’ve got such a big name!!!’, this was the comment I got in immigration counters, post office, bank, ticket counters and in almost all the places where I filled up my surname as my father’s name in all the countries I visited…I use to grin and tell ‘Yes!…I do…like most of my fellow Indians’…

if that was the case outside, inside the office it was even more worse…my client mail ID came like lakshminarayanan.subramanian@ABC.com which made almost all my friends to yell at me for having such a lengthy mail ID…all of my fellow Brit colleagues at the first instance were calling my father instead of calling me..even my manager, after telling him many times, use to address the mails to my father only…whenever I got a call from any one, the first question was always ‘Is it Mr.Subramanian?’…I don’t know how others who are facing this problem are feeling, but I feel terrible…

according to me, lacking a family name is such a serious concern…u lack ur identity…i dont think this is like this in Tamilnadu from the beginning…my grandpas, both paternal and maternal have had surnames…then why shouldn’t I?…this must have been some unscrupulous act by any of the Kazhagams(political parties in TN) ages back…they must have projected the surname as a symbol of caste and community and banned it while registering the names…ironically, the govt is making caste and community beliefs burgeoning with its non-sense reservation policies…

people from rest of India do have their community name as their surname still..so, are they having any caste or race or community related problems?…no, I don’t think so…on the other hand, no body is diffident to have their community or ancestral name as their family name…I have seen surnames like butcher, carpenter, cambridge, etc in UK…

so, what’s the solution for me?…I really can’t change my surname now as changing the name at this juncture is a rigmarole…I’ve to live the rest of my life with my father’s name as my surname…but I at least have to ensure that the next generation gets its identity, I mean their family name…what do you say?

What’s there in a (sur)name?

Have you ever got the feeling that you should have had a surname (if u r already not)? Have you ever had sleepless nights thinking about what could have been your surname if it was there? Have you ever thought about when rest of the world and rest of the fellow Indians are having surnames why Tamilians alone are deprived of surnames? I had all these questions while introspecting myself for answer…I never got this question arose, till I filled up my passport application where surname is one of the mandatory fields…the person who was sitting in front of me advised me to write my father’s name as my surname…that is where all the problems have started…

as per International standards, my name is already lengthy…added with my surname (my father’s name is Subramanian) it becomes impossible for any non-Indian to pronounce completely and correctly…’You’ve got such a big name!!!’, this was the comment I got in immigration counters, post office, bank, ticket counters and in almost all the places where I filled up my surname as my father’s name in all the countries I visited…I use to grin and tell ‘Yes!…I do…like most of my fellow Indians’…

if that was the case outside, inside the office it was even more worse…my client mail ID came like lakshminarayanan.subramanian@ABC.com which made almost all my friends to yell at me for having such a lengthy mail ID…all of my fellow Brit colleagues at the first instance were calling my father instead of calling me..even my manager, after telling him many times, use to address the mails to my father only…whenever I got a call from any one, the first question was always ‘Is it Mr.Subramanian?’…I don’t know how others who are facing this problem are feeling, but I feel terrible…

according to me, lacking a family name is such a serious concern…u lack ur identity…i dont think this is like this in Tamilnadu from the beginning…my grandpas, both paternal and maternal have had surnames…then why shouldn’t I?…this must have been some unscrupulous act by any of the Kazhagams(political parties in TN) ages back…they must have projected the surname as a symbol of caste and community and banned it while registering the names…ironically, the govt is making caste and community beliefs burgeoning with its non-sense reservation policies…

people from rest of India do have their community name as their surname still..so, are they having any caste or race or community related problems?…no, I don’t think so…on the other hand, no body is diffident to have their community or ancestral name as their family name…I have seen surnames like butcher, carpenter, cambridge, etc in UK…

so, what’s the solution for me?…I really can’t change my surname now as changing the name at this juncture is a rigmarole…I’ve to live the rest of my life with my father’s name as my surname…but I at least have to ensure that the next generation gets its identity, I mean their family name…what do you say?

Taare Zameen Par – immaculately perfect

First of all, I should admit that I don’t watch Hindi movies that often…credit goes to the education system in Tamilnadu which didn’t allow me to learn Hindi…I watch a Hindi movie only if I get really good reviews from my friends and of course if I get the subtitles…all my friends kept telling that ‘Taare Zameen Par’ is a wonderful movie and a must watch…when I read the story in sites, I didn’t realize how the movie is going to be…but after watching the movie yesterday, if I say it has impressed me, its an understatement…

Aamir Khan has just perfectly wielded the megaphones without any traces of debut…the continuity between the scenes, cinematography, way the characters have acted (sorry lived) and Aamir Khan’s role, everything is just impeccable in this movie…Darsheel Zafary as Ishaan Nandkishor Awasthi is a ‘real discovery’…I have no words to describe this kid’s acting…Aamir Khan as Ram Nikumbh is so apt…the scene which describes how Ishaan derives the answer of 3X9 shows the story telling power of Aamir…

I don’t really empathize myself with any movie…but when I watched TZP(without understanding many of the dialogues to the fullest extent), I was burst into tears thrice…that doesn’t mean the movie is mawkish…it is unadulterated expression of emotions…

All 5 C’s of a cinema (Camera, Continuity, Cutting, Close-ups, Composition) are consummate in this movie…I must appreciate cameraman Setu’s job here…it is just top notch…above all, the story and the characters are gems on the crown…

a royal salute to Aamir for taking a dare step in making a movie out of this story and making it perfectly…though janta have recognized his efforts,bollywood doesn’t seem to have…in StarDust awards the best movie of the year 2007 was Jab We Met (I cannot comment as I haven’t watched) and the dream director was Farah Khan for OSO (a total crap except for the heroine 😛 )…

I have already added this movie into my favorites…I urge you to add this to your ‘List of movies I should watch before I die’…if I say this movie is comparable to ‘One flew over the Cuckoo’s nest’ and Darsheel’s performance is comparable to Jack Nicholson, its not a hyperbole…