B2B with K : My indebtedness, to Satish, Subash

My take is our nostalgia trip might interest others, if it has social context and a flavour of local history. Maybe our B2B could be of wider interest if we talk about today things in the light of our past experience. Take this Channel 4 inspired Goody-Shetty spat. What do folks say in your ‘geriatric land’ in coastal Kent? Do you have a race situation in Herne Bay?...More...

Planning for a Social Cause - 'Soften' Meeting

The action plans included identifying the governments schools in Mysore, selecting few interested students, bringing out a short course aimed at improving their English and analytical abilities...More...

Trip to Gopalaswamy Betta

The fog which hits the gopuram of the temple causes a tiny trickle of water to fall from above into the garbha griha. ...we went into the core area.... the forest got denser, the scrubs got thicker, the grass got taller, yet no sign of an elephant. what happened to all the elephants... has veerappan left nothing for the tourists? ...More...

B2B (Kini's take): A New Renaissance

Those of us who arrived in the UK without a work permit but allowed in with no limit on our stay by trusting and generous immigration officers were more than a bit apprehensive about our future stay in England. Labour party’s victory gave us all a cause to celebrate...More...

B2B with K: Irfan Khan re-discovers Kini

Irfan sent Kini a one-liner, wishing him well, not knowing that Kini and he had been on the staff of Patriot daily, New Delhi, for a brief period in early sixties They had since moved their separate ways...More...

Cycling my way to Work

I decided to go to work by cycle. My work place is 15 Kms away... So that thursday (25th Jan, 2006) I left home at 7:15 in the morning and reached office at 8:30. Ha-ha-ha... Travel to work in 2 wheeler takes 45 mins in peak hour and one could travel the same distance by cycle in just 30 additional minutes....More...

Never give up !!

I generally fuel gas for my car at Shell Station. this time i went to the one on mysore road (next to kwality biscuits), as usual parked at the designated # and waited for someone to attend. All of a sudden a guy comes running to me with a board and a marker...More...

Voices (for those who care to hear)

My name is Hema and I am 22 years old. I am a native of Karnataka. 4 years ago I was rescued from a brothel in Mumbai and later brought to the Odanadi home for rescued girls in Mysore. My story unfolds like this…More...

Some more Posers to MCC....

Surely, it will enhance the reputation of MCC, if its Chief Officer, makes sure good quality water is supplied, gets it tested independantly and makes Public ,the results. The MCC can really gain the confidence of the Public by this simple act...More...

B2B with K: Mr Chandra of The Tribune, Chandigarh.

Indian newspapers had to seek foreign exchange clearance from the government to pay salary and maintain offices overseas. It was the Reserve Bank of India that decided whether or not a newspaper could have a fully-paid correspondent, and,if so, what would be the salary payable in foreign exchange...More...

Who sets the global agenda ?

The Internet and other media platforms have given regular folk around the world more power, says UK's Gordon Brown in Davos, " but politicians haven't yet caught on....remain stuck in the slow lane of the information superhighway".
"But that doesn't mean the Internet should drive decision-making", says media magnate Rupert Murdoch, "We shouldn't all lie down and say let's poll the Internet"....More...

Blogging Davos

I reckon the World Economic Forum (WEF) meets at Davos make more business sense than the UN, though both are equally ineffective when it comes to re-ordering the world. At Davos no one hears of a cash-crunch for running the show. Presumably, there is a lot more fun and booze at Davos, going by the blogs...More

Jade Goody learned her trade in London

Channel 4 has pioneered black and Asian programming in this country and continues to do it brilliantly. Such behaviour as Jade displayed is so prominent in this country that it was bound to end up on the screen some day. Fortunately, the programme had an in-built right of reply, as viewers could vote off those whom they despised...More

What became of the land of the Kama Sutra?

India's Information and Broadcasting Minister, Priya Ranjan Das Munshi, closed the AXN television satellite channel because it aired 'sexy commercials' which, he felt, promoted crass consumerism and moral decay. ...An administration that cannot find its citizens enough food, clean drinking water, medical care, primary education and adequate employment, is happy to step in as a keeper of morals...More

Remembering Mr. Chandra in Fleet Street

Mr. Chandra who was London correspondent of the Punjab daily The Tribune.. .. loved reminiscing about his heydays when he had a large office just off Fleet street with a large staff and assignments to match. Chandra was in dire straits financially and hung around India Weekly offices in the hope of a crumb, - a messenger job, a coin or two, or just cup of coffee from Asoke. ...More...

B2B with K: Shroff Saab of Carmelite St.

Kini and I were, what I would call, 'fair-weather' employees who used India Weekly as parking lot, that we left whenever we found something more promising, only to return when the thing didn’t work out. Shroff Saab was indispensable...More...

Just two Posers to Mysoreans..Well, make it 2.5

The Bangalore- Mysore Railway project will perhaps enter in to Guiness Book Of Records for 'sheer slow march' which can beat any Bandset playing the dirge. ... Why is the State Govt. dragging its feet on this?.... Whatever happened to the 'Sound and Light' project of Mysore Palace which was uncorked with 'Lightning and Thunder and Pomp' before the last Dasara festival? Has it been put to the proverbial anasthesia, till next Dasara?...Read on...

B2B with K : Dr.Basu of India Weekly

Representing Hindustan Standard, Calcutta, Dr Basu was much bigger than the professional designation he held. He was un-transferable, unlike his colleagues in Hindustan Times, Indian Express and The Times of India, who came and went away from London once in three years or so. A generous host, Dr Basu knew how to take care of his Calcutta boss, Mr Ashok Sarkar (if I got his first name right) of Ananda Bazaar Group...More...

Mysore trip (again!)

Sify outlet was closed and the DTP shop opposite to her house refused to print “only” 2 copies. I even agreed to print 5 copies but he refused. Since there was a little under 2 hours before the departure I wasn’t desperate enough to print 50 copies of a train ticket. I then went to another DTP shop but the girl there said her machines can’t read from USB drives. I was a worried cat at this point. ..More...

B2B: Our Fleet St. Days

I recall that the minute one entered the street north of Strand with its august buildings, one was plunged in to Dickensian London with the acrid smell of printers ink and the news print which got under your skin. India Weekly was tucked away on a small narrow arterial side street called Carmelite street overlooking the back yard of – I think the Daily Mail. ..More

Who needs words when you’ve a picture?

The women in the picture may well be friends, and good neighbours. But do they have to be shown walking down a street, hand in hand? The woman in sari seems not too comfortable facing the camera...More...

What happens if 1 rupee = 45 dollars

Great news guys. Our George has got admission in the Manasa Gangothri College in Mysore with scholarship for B.A History. A great new field yaar... All are excited...B.A in Histroy...ohh. ..man, enjoy your life there?
George : Yeah. Got the UGC scholarship That will be 1200 Rupees per Year.
s/w engg 1 : Great. Enjoy.
s/w engg 2 : (Thinking loud): 1200 Indian Rupees...! That means 1200 * 45 = 54000 Dollars... with that amount I can buy an three bed-room flat & a Mercedes here...!!!.. More...

Confusing chronology

I could have got as much as they paid, as unemployment allowance. But then, you don't wish to be seen by your friends and neighbours, going to the employment office, twice weekly, to sign up for the dole. Slaving for the Weekly at subsistance wages was a more dignified option...More...

Singapore’s Seletar Airport

Singapore Government has announced that Seletar is going to be made into an Aerospace hub attracting massive investments, aircraft hangar and maintenance facilities and creating around 15,000 new technical jobs. .... and this one, with new buildings, new roads, runways extensions, tarmac expansions and many civil works will be completed in two years. Well, I can’t say we can compare with anything in India with this; India’s pace of doing things is pathetic. I have heard that Singapore plans everything 10 years in advance. We Indians only talk about shining, if you get my drift...More...

Hyderabad Snippets

Kite Festival 2007 : After a sumptuous lunch at Shadab, we went off to the Kite Festival on Necklace Road. We were joined by Ravipprasad, and a most enjoyable time was had by all. The best part was when the kitists (yes, it’s a word!) from Mumbai and Mysore flew their fantastic kites and kite trains. A more detailed posts and pictures will follow. I promise!...Move on...

A b2b chat with my friend Kini

Kini and I landed in London around the same time (May 1964?), though by different means. I took a boat from Bombay to Genova; and from there, a train (later day edition of the famed Orient Express) to London. And Kini, with a friend (Subash Chopra) hitch-hiked it all the way. I wish he blogs about it sometime in Gateway to India... More...

Art Buchwald - So long, Farewell

His demise at the age of 81 is saddening to me personally, even though i have not even met the man - as i am sure it is for all those people who had the opportunity to read his syndicated column for the Washington Post...More...

Gateway to India: a blog, not a building

I have not been deliberately slow in adding to my blog. I suffer bitterly from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and have been unable to maintain my blog. Some of my time has been taken up by building a new website appropriately called http://www.asia-major.com/ ...Meanwhile if anyone has experience of CFS as an illness and have found a treatment, please let me know....Read my blog...

Airline stock: Are they manipulated ?

The price of crude oil fell drastically in the World market. The BSE in Mumbai reacted to that news in frenzy, driving up the Airline stocks. I was just holding my head in my hands. Is the stock market a bit too euphoria driven and less driven by hard facts? Did they think that a drop in world crude prices was going to benefit Airline in India (or anyone else) so quickly...More...

Jade Vs Shilpa: The baddie gets the boot

The latest in British reality TV is that Jade Goody(Baddie) gets the boot; and Shipla Shetty stays in the Celebrity Big Brother house. Acres of media space have been devoted to the Jade-Shilpa ‘reality’ spat. But the spate of words and sound byte expended on, what Brendan O’Neill calls, the bizarre invasion of real life by the British reality TV, doesn’t quite explain why the fuss...More, a lot more...

Columnist Buchwald: Dead, on his own terms

I thought the old man was gone well over a year back when his syndicated column stopped appearing in The Hindu. Buchwald was then very much alive and kicking , though with only his left leg. The right one had been amputated below the knee. His kidneys were failing. Refusing dialysis the 80-year-old celebrity satirist opted, instead, to enter a Washington hospice, to 'go gently into the night when all else fails'...More...

A Powerful Media Can Stop a War

When we talk about reforming the media, what we're really talking about is creating a media that is powerful, not a media that serves the interests of the powerful; a media that is so powerful that it can speak for the powerless, bear witness for those who are invisible in our world, and memorialize those who would be forgotten....More, a Lot More...

A blog-to-flook story

And then we have in Mysore a potential blooker in Mr. Krishna Vattam, an old-time journalist, who recently underwent a crash course in the use of computer conducted by his school-going grandson, so that he could get into blogging to "kick-start his literary writing career...More...

The virus called HAM-bug

The realisation that I was listening to individuals who could build, own, operate and maintain a radio station was something I had not heard of - or for that fact imagined. I decided then that - as the saying goes - I would give my right hand to become a HAM...More...

Snooooooozze

I don't know why I should blog now. It was an escape route when I was in college. To get away from all the madness around me. I guess its still an escape route. The context has changed. I need to escape from all the madness at work now. But its so far, so good. I wont be surprised if I'm being monitored when I post this. If so, "Boss, I didnt do anything wrong!"...More...

when Bangalore became Bengalooru

But where were the Narayana Murthys, the Nandan Nilekanis, the Vijay Mallyas, the Azeem Premjis and the other corporate biggies when the government of Karnataka gave itself the permission to steal? I use the word steal because they've stolen from the coffers we tax-payers fill to preserve "culture" and rename nearly a million signboards all over the state....More...

A touching tale of an untouchable

A word about her foreword. In her incarnation as book publisher Ms Pratap takes a swipe at her own (media) tribe. She says that among the many manuscripts she gets are some from outstanding journalists who can’t write.Their offerings are ‘muddled and fuddled, showing neither talent nor promise’. Hitchhiker is not by a journalist....More

Vivekananda’s Mysore connection

The place stinks, what with emptied liquor bottles, cigarette butts and mounds of garbage left behind by people who engage in revelry. “One would wonder if the Swamiji ever stayed there”, says a Star of Mysore report by BRS (is that my friend, Mr Srihari?)....More...

CEO Arun Sarin's a 'dignity' clause in his contract

But then, do many of those who get fired really care? The shock could be the same whether you learn of it through a decently drafted e-mail or a three-word SMS, saying 'u r out'. ....I once got sacked, but it happened decades before our graceless Internet era. ...More...

A landmark in Mysore bites the dust

The old bungalow has now disappeared to make way for a ‘mall’, to convert the calm and serene Krishnavilasa Road into a busy commercial spot. The end of the ‘West End’ is another example of the changing face of Mysore. It is no longer the beautiful little town of the royal days ...More....

More on the Mysore commune initiative

I am testing land acquisition and transfer of title for urbanites like myself without any falsification or misrepresentation as well as using vernacular architecture and enhancing the open spaces with vegetation which blends with the natural habitation...Read on...

Being positive under provocation

Art's point is that you cannot be said to have arrived till you begin getting hate mail. I only wish my anonymous ill-wisher had spelt out his 'u' and 'r' and abbreviated the f-word....More

Are power-cuts inevitable in Karnataka ?

Some of the short term measures which could help us not only to tide over the situation during the forthcoming summer months, but also provide long term benefits are: ...Read on...

Learn from Zakir Hussein

The seminars were on topics 'Software Development- A practictioner's Perspective', 'Experience Sharing- Grass Root Reality and Expectations from SEs', 'Latest Trends in J2EE' and 'Being a Global Educator'......More..

Bitten by the HAM bug

My inclination was more towards the radio. This was because my elder brother Dinakar was already a well entrenched Broadcast DXer ..... Out of sibling jealousy/ competetion, I too wanted to get into that line of radio listening....More...

The NICE long wait

Want to know the real difference between India and China? Come with me on a drive. Venture 6 kilometers out on Kanakpura road from Banashankari bus stand and you will find an intersection under construction for the famous NICE peripheral expressway.More...

A shocker from HAL

The press in Bangalore recently got this invite from the Hindustan Aeronautics' PR department.To say the least,it came as a shocker...More

Placeblogger Aggregates Local Blogs

Placeblogger is a directory of over 700 local blogs...... aggregates headlines and 200 character briefs from other "hyper localized" blogs around the country (US)....More

Dreams of a commune on the banks of Cauvery

Prem belongs to a small, but growing, band of professionals looking for open living space, rather than the confines of luxury villa in a gated community, to retire in. What's more, Prem and his friends would like to work with local people towards improving the ygiene/sanitation/education of the two village communities close to their site;....More...

The R.K. Narayan I knew

T.S. Nagarajan, in a Churumuri piece, writes: For him an umbrella was “a status symbol and an elegant adjunct to walking”. He had collected umbrellas from all over the world, and the strange thing was that he retained most of them. He hated lending his umbrella to anyone. He liked Kerala and its people because of their ‘devotion to umbrellas’....More

Would anyone know God's e-mail ID ?

My son choosing his own life-partner was, in itself, enough to raise their conservative eye-brows. And a girl born and brought up in the US was clearly an unknown entity. No one in our family circles was familiar with such species....More

Mymysore dotcom(e) no more; it's dot gone

MyMysore site is dead. Our modest civic initiative on the web – MyMysore.com - became a ‘dot-gone’, with the dawn of 2007. I put it to death by instructing the software provider to de-activate the site...More...

Saraswati, an Unschooled Middle-class Mother

Today's middle-class mothers come with an academic degree. Which doesn't necessarily make them more educated. The purpose of education, one would think, is to enable you to cope with the world you come to confront in life. Saraswati's world centred around her husband and children...More...

It’s New Year, but not for everyone

Jan. One is celebrated the world over as New Year, but the celebrations are held at different times of the calendar year by people of varied faiths and nationalities....Read on...

Fascinating World of HAM Radio

Any person who is above the age of 12 years can aspire to be a HAM. In addition there are certain technical requirements before one can go on the air. The aspirant needs to undergo a written test conducted by the Department of Telecommunications....Read on....

The Unsung Sub-editors in Newspapers

reporters are not given to acknowledging the value-addition done to their work by rewrite persons. If anything, reporters are quick to blame the editorial desk for "butchering" their copy...Read more...

Mysore Officers Club

Listening to Karnataka folksongs may not be everyone’s idea of spending New Year's eve. Members of the Mysore Officers Club celebrated the occasion with folksongs, followed by a traditional feast, including bissi bela bath, vada, ubbhitoo, served on plantain leaves...More...

The game of snake and ladder

Here is an attempt to analyse how literacy leads to the development of an individual and of a nation: which are the groups that need special attention in the matter of literacy; and what could be learnt from the international scene. ...Blissfully ignorant of the difference between the child dosage and the adult dosage and the expiry date, Muthamma had been administering some tablet to her son for the past two days. Consequently the child has been hospitalized .... Read more, lots more....