Bollywood is NOT dopey!

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"I don't like dopey song and dance numbers.""Bollywood singing and dancing getting famous in Hollywood as well.""Jacky Chan wants to sing and dance in Indian movies.""When will Bollywood get over this typical song and dance style?". Enough! Lately I have been encountering these phrases more often than before. This adds to endless list examples of low and mean self-esteems of most of Indians assuming everything foreign to better than Indian. I can not just figure out that how can same things are bad when associated with India while good while associated with foreign, usually United States. If you have to present doctor's certificate for asking for sick leave in India unlike US, then it is smugly labeled as excessive bureaucracy, instead of proper professionalism! Why on earth our actors and actress are running over Hollywood projects - with false pretense of representing India in global scenario and "not for money"! Why do you give a damn about Oscars as if all Hollywood directors are dying for film-fare awards? No, before you jump into comparing Oscars with film-fare, think if you are not just going to present a sample of one of those Indian? This is our award, and that is theirs, what is wrong?



Of course, without taking things on either extreme, I am not suggesting that all Indian things are better, but if some are, why not appreciate it? Indian Railways with its enormous size and traffic load, still do pretty well compared to many countries. There are chances of improvements, but then, where aren't in whole world? Personally, I feel that once in US, Indians can be broadly classified into two categories. First set of people consider themselves Indians, as they were before coming here, while second set takes all care to disassociate itself with all Indian identifications. Soon they find their system malevolent combination of inefficiencies. So cleverly they label all Indian corrupt or ignorant forgetting that they are - or at least have been - part of that very system.



Who claims that singing and dancing are not as essential ingredients of movie as the cast, script, cinematography and direction is? Just because Hollywood or other country don't make musical cinema doesn't set standards. Next time somebody says that Bollywood movies are funny because of singing and dancing and speaks low of them, I will just say that singing and dancing are as much life-and-blood - and not an anomaly - of Indian movies as talking is of any other movie. Can you imagine a silent movie these days? Then better not imagine, and wish for, a Bollywood movie without music!

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Flexi pricing for theaters

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When was the last time did you go to theater in India to watch a movie? A typical answer will just confirm the abysmal state of theaters in India. Aplenty of cheap and pirated CDs/DVDs and cable channels have hampered the revenues of Indian theaters to verge of closing. Like all good-old-things viz. kathputali show village fairs, theaters soon will not be able to survive the latest backlash in demand. Didn't you notice that Bollywood directors are eagerly seeking out foreign markets and NRI's revenue than ever before? One reason is, of course, more recognition of Indian film industry, but also that cinema owners in India are not able to provide enough to keep going.



One thing that need to done now is to open markets and remove restrictions on rates in theaters. When airlines can charge flexi-pricing for same seat depending on when you buy them, why not cinemas? Running a movie will half full of capacity is worse than filling the capacity even if ticket price have to be halved. Would you pay same for Govinda's movie as you would do to a Shah Rukh's? It makes common sense to let theaters charge different rates for different type of movies, and different shows - like weekends and weekdays. And as market forces fight, basic principles of economics will tell you that it will be good for all of us.

Corresponding Rediff News

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Call centers and negative impact on Indian culture

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Call center bubble is growing fast enough - to be busted at any moment. While US and UK Congresses are piling up legislative support against off shoring, public has started playing its best weapon: customer satisfaction. Incidents of customers crying foul over accent and 'level of service' are on rise while abuse of India based call center worker over phone is dramatically catching up. Nevertheless, young educated English speaking Indians find this profession lucrative enough to drop out of college and lead a life only handful of Indian can afford - except that it does not augur well for India and Indian culture!



If I am guessing right, you are at least little surprised at the change of tone above. Well, the following is the result of three news articles that I happened to read in this regard. Call center workers tend to work night shifts making them completely out of phase to their family, and associated responsibilities. Added fuel to trouble is due to initially forced - and later voluntary - Americanization of an Indian. They try their newly learned accent over their friends and family making any interaction, at least, irritating for them (friends). Availability of pizzas and burgers during office-hours soon gets out of hand, and budget, of other relatives, specially spouses. What more, late night hours soon push them into what is typical American culture - bars, clubs, smoking & drinking.



Work hard weekdays and party hard weekends is one of the common lifestyle of West which is in conflict with work hard everyday type Indian. Increased earning potential is even not enough many times for the ambitions that these call centers boost into young people, letting them spend their money into fancy items completely ignoring long term social requirements. If you belong to an Indian middle class family, to which these call center operators mostly belong to, then you will realize the severity of above effects on near and dear ones. In the end, remember, bubble may burst - anytime?

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Olympic torch rally

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I agree wholeheartedly. I do not have much to say expect that I hereby register my complete unconditional agreement over idea of not giving prestigious Olympic torch to film and other celebrities. By the way, I wonder if Olympics still represent those values that it stood for in this commercialized world? It is not unnoticed that sports are badly supported profession in India while near all except Cricket players playing for virtually no money. What they desire is but respect. But then, this is also snatched away, for how many of us are aware of even their names? Nevertheless I know however bad and disheartened they feel, they will continue to shed their sweat and blood for India. After all one didn't start this for the money in the first place. I once read, "Never doubt that a bunch of dedicated men and women can change the world. Indeed that's the way it ever has been." Amen.

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Sonia playing queen?

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Sonia Gandhi's sacrificial denial of crown no longer appear sacrifice to many people, including myself, thanks to true/false analysis of situation by various newspapers. Actually, it is no bad either, for this is politics, and one can be considered downright fool to expect ethical things by Indian politicians. For example, this excuse of BJP and allies to stalemate LokSabha over 'tainted' ministers issue while Vajpayee so proudly defining the definition of 'tainted' just enough to exclude George Fernandes and L K Advani. What about this latest statement over Narendra Modi being cause of debacle all over now? So when Sonia deserted the seat, even ignoring those political moves behind this decision, one would have expected her to leave the path. But, oh, no! She continues to be king (or queen) herself. Why did Pervej Musharaf have to call her to discuss India-Pak talks? Why do international leaders have to visit 10 Janpath instead of 7 Race Course Road?

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Why the NDA lost [NEWS CLIP]

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Rediff Article

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Isaac Asimov is just too much!

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I have been the fan of this legendary science fiction writer ever since I read my first English non-academic book, The Robot Vision. My feelings for his work, specially in this area, are beyond my vocabulary. That was also when I realised my penchant for science fiction genre in relatively new reading habit. My belief are further reinforced when I read his second book, a novel this time, The Caves of Steel. He is just amazing! Isaac Asimov was born in Russia and lived in USA - between 1920-1992. He started writing at the age of 19 on his favourite topic, the Robots. Actually, he is credited with other science fiction books as well, but I love him for his robot stories. For a person like me who prefers logic, mystery and suspense to romance and thrills, his books are just perfect. Isaac Asimov is also considered first person to use word "robotics" in print. Not only that, his harmless and ingenious creation of foundation of his robotic stories still, and will continue to guide real scientists in their advances in this direction. He was the first person to propose The Three Fundamental Rules of Robotics. He loves to quote them in his books, and myself will present them here.



1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where that would conflict with the First Law.

3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.



As you can see, these rules are simple but fundamental, and exceedingly amazing if you see his ingenuity in his use of them. His most of stories are just about various consequences of these laws and their precedence, without going into too much of technicalities, which anyway would be nonsense since, after all, it is science fiction. Of course, just to make things sound big, he claims robots to be made of "posistronic" brains. After reading his two collections of short stories - The Robot Visions and The Robot Dreams - I am going to "predict" the future of world as foreseen (or imagined, if you wish) by Isaac Asimov. Some of which may be imaginable now or simple enough, but remember he wrote these stories in 1950s when the state of science was quite different. And if you have read Alvin Toffler's Future Shock then you must be well aware of the fact that rate of change in current society is just awesome. If you have not, it tells you what I have just stated in last sentence! All right then.



Moon will be habitated, so will the Mars and Saturn! Robots will develop from humanoid mute chunk of metals to anthropomorphic geniuses which can't be differentiated from humans (except, of course, three laws still holds)! From a machine to do its job to creative, imaginative and emotional ones! Size of computers will shrink from miles (remember in 50s when he wrote it computer's were huge) to nothing, or from Multivac to Planetry AC to Microvac to Galactic AC to Universal AC to Cosmic AC - as Isaac Asimov likes to call them - omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscience! Ever intelligent robots will strive to be humans and world will be single country! Of course, what else but USA! There will be still be portions of humanity against use of robots what the movie Artificial Intelligence portrays as flesh traders!



In the end, I would like to mention that you would fathom his amazing work only after you read them. My little analysis above is nothing but my homage to such great writer.

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Anbe Sivam and others...

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This makes it third in the row. First was some Rajanikant movie, Basha, and second one was Kaka Kaka. Well, they were just some normal average movies. But of course, this is different, and thats what makes me write about it. Well, first time I appreciated the looks of Madhvan, prominent character of the movie, but more importantly the storyline and picturizations. In brief, the story potrays the life of a communist-athiest-labour workers' helper protagonist, the legendary Kamal Hasan. It has a healthy mix of humour, tragedy, emotion, romance and social message. Story unreveals how Sivam (Kamal) falls in love with the daughter of his employer against whose ideologies he is launching a crusade, and how is countered by power hungry father of his beloved, to the extent that leaves him disfigured and handicapped. And how he happenes to meet typical "cool" dude Aaras (Madhvan) and ends the saga with both befriending deeply. And the message is, of course, Anbe Sivam, whose Tamil translation means, Love is God.



Actually, I have been seeing lots of movies lately since my semseter at MIT got over. Other was Gods Must Be Crazy (I and II). A different storyline and good movie. I liked it, not very strongly, but still, though cannot say why. May be, it was unparalleled? Never mind.

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