Author: neoalchemist

I have been contemplating to move to a gpl content management system for some time. Now with movable type moving towards commercial objectives (eventhough free version is still on), I am giving serious thoughts about changing to either wordpress or b2evolution. Mostly I might go with wordpress. Any suggestions welcome.

I have also discovered gimp. I have been trying for sometime to add border to an image with shadows. Finally I am able to do that.

This eerie looking picture was taken during a cold winter noon after snowfall, from the backyard of my house. The tree itself looks spooky. Though the picture appear to be artificial, no major change has been done to the image, except for the border addition and shadow effect.

finally its done

I am still speechless to find that Sonia might become the Prime Minister of India. I still wonder how this happened. Amazing thing was that even the exit polls didnt predict this. For BJP its going to be a bolt from the blue. What lessons might they learn from this?

That next time onwards, when they are in power, they need to abuse it. Forget development and economy, the indian voter will throw you out anyway. So make money when in power. These common people do not deserve anything better.

I believe the same holds true for Chandrababu Naidu, the ex CM of Andhra Pradesh. YSR Reddy (praise the lord) has already declared free electricity to farmers in the state. All the hardwork that Naidu must have put in will be blown away soon.

There is a possibility that vision 2020 will have to wait for another 150 years. But who knows, Congress might just turn a new leaf. Maybe they will emerge as a new party with new faces. But then again, they will be supported by Left, who is anti<everything>.

One thing is sure… India is on crossroads and history is getting enacted.

ps: now pizza too will remind me of India.

few more puzzles here

Assets worth 15 crore were found in the name of Mayavati and her relatives! Most of us dont comprehend the value in such simple terms and need a bit of explaining, as to how much value that 15 crores have.

Say if I deposit 15,00,00,000.00 Rs. in any nationalised bank in India today, I get an interest rate of average 6.00% in the long run. So per annum I get 90,00,000.00 Rs. Yes and thats just interest, the capital remains untouched. 90,00,000.00 Rs translates as 7,50,000 per month or 24,657.50 daily. I wonder how I would be able to spend Rs.24,657.50 daily.

I think the stock exchange should also start listing politicians from our country. people should be allowed to buy shares of political leaders. The upcoming political leaders can take advantage of “going public” and raise money for their election needs. Once they are in power, they can obviously start accumulating and pay some dividends out of the interest they earn from the assets amassed.

I now want to buy 100 shares of Mulayam singh yadav.

It was not supposed to be perfect, but it all went wrong. It happens only in India almost anywhere.

Prime Minister Zia led some 1,000 representatives of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association in standing for the anthem.

But after a couple of minutes of embarrassed silence, which officials ascribed to “technical glitches”, it was decided to move on to a recitation from the holy Koran, while officials tried to restore the sound system.

Then a second attempt to play the anthem only got as far as the first phrase before the music stopped.

Read the full story at bbc.

Anything to get masses involved. Its reported that, in a new cassette, the VHP has said that the only way to fight terrorism is to build a temple in Ayodhya. For, that would be a tribute to Ram who annihilated ??Aatankvadi Ravan,?? (Ravan, the terrorist).

I dont think the plan to thwart terrorism by building a temple at ayodhya is a workable one. Well, let me think again. No, still I dont think this is going to work. Most likely way I can think of now to eradicate terrorism is by a combination of force and anti-propoganda (other words, make people undestand the futility of terrorism in this day and age to create a nation or fight a holy war).

But I was not as surprised at the funda of fighting terrorism by building a temple as I was reading about annihilation of “Aatankvaadi Ravan”. Ahem ahem, Raavana – a terrorist?! Thats taking it too far. From whatever little mythology I have known, Raavana was a great and just king, who took care of his people really well. Ever thought what happened to Lanka which was burnt down by Hanuman with his tail on fire. It was rebuilt overnight by Raavana for his people.

Not only was Raavana a great ruler, a scholar well versed in scriptures and a great musician, but he was also a great devotee of Lord shiva. Ravana was grandson of Pulasthya maharshi, and son of Visravas maharshi, who had two wives. Ravana’s half brother Kubera was the richest man during that time and ruler of Sri Lanka. A tussle between them led to Ravana and his brothers doing austerities to achieve power and eventually oust Kubera.

Ravana was a great devotee of Lord Shiva, and once went to Kailas requesting Lord Shiva to come to Srilanka. Lord Shiva gave a shivalingam with his presence to Ravana, and asked him not to keep it down on earth on the way back, lest it might get established at that place. Raavana heads back to lanka with the shivalingam.

The Devas grow worried over this. They know that if Raavana is successful in taking the shivalingam to Lanka, then he will become more powerful, with the blessings of Lord Shiva. They hatch a plan. Varuna the god of water plays role in that that Raavana feels the need to urinate before continuing the journey. But since he is holding the shivalingam, he cant do it either.

As if on cue, a brahmin boy appears on the scene, who volunteers to hold the shivalingam till Raavana relieves himself. By the time Raavana relieves and comes back to get the shivalingam, the brahmin boy, none other than disguised Vishnu, keeps the shivalingam down and disappears. The shivalingam on touching earth becomes rooted there. Raavana tries to uproot it, but he is able to just break a chink of it and returns empty handed. This Shivalingam is one of 12 Jyotirlingams in existance, worshipped by thousands of devotees in India.

I can understand that VHP is trying to create a mass movement to preserve our culture, but sometimes they have to think before shooting from their mouth.

ps: Raavana plays role in several mythological stories. I have heard that there is a temple still in existance where Ravana is the presiding diety. Unfortunately Google failed to get me the location.

thaadham thadham dham thathadham dha dham dhaaH

This was the samasya put by king Vikramaditya to his courtiers. Samasya – the sanskrit word loosely translated as a problem, was a literary riddle to solve, where the last line of a quartet was given, and the poets have to come up with first three lines. Sounds easy, but then again they have to follow certain rules of line construction.

During schooldays our malayalam sir took us into the world of vriththam and how to identify a it in poems. A vriththam was like a raga which followed a certain pattern. This pattern was deduced by breaking the sentences into sections of 3 syllables, and then finding which ganam the section belongs to and then what is the ganam rule for that sentence.

Ganam was found for a section by classifying each letter (sound) as a short – laghu note denoted by a small crescent u or a long – guru note denoted by a long dash ^_. Mathematically there can be 8 ganams. Now the poets have to work out the vritham by finding out the pattern of ganams for the last sentence. Then they have to work with words following given pattern to solve the problem at hand, and most importantly the poem should make sense. Samasya’s followed these rules.

These set of rules were from sanskrit poetry and most of the languages which have originated from sanskrit also followed these rules for poetry. Though modern poetry has bypassed most of these, there are still poets who write poems within the set rules and solve the samasyas. I liked that poerty, where poetry was not just a set of rhyming words put together, but where it was like a problem waiting to be solved.

The “thaadham thadham” samasya was given by king vikramaditya after an incident he saw in his palace. A beautiful palace maiden was fetching water for worship from the pond. While climbing the steps she accidentaly drops the pot, which rolls down the steps making the noise, which vikramaditya puts as samasya to tease his courtiers.

Kalidasa was a poet in king Vikramaditya’s court. When all the other couriters failed, He asked for two days to solve this riddle. Kalidasa watched kings daily routine with care and found which all places he regularly visited. He keenly deduces what might have happened to cause this samasya. By the end of second day, he solves the samasya as below.

raamaabhishEke jalamaaharanth~yaH
hasthaachchyutho hEmaghaTo yuvathyaaH
sOpaana maargENa karOthi Sabdam
thaadham thadham dham thathadham dha dham dhaaH

roughly translated ::

fetching water for the worship of Rama,
the golden pot slipped from the maidens hand,
fell down the steps making the noise
thaadham thadham dham thathadham dha dham dhaaH

ps: this samasya is more than 1000 years old

The BBC has done an analysis of the Kashmir problem and has listed possible solutions for the same. Kashmir problem has been pulling back India and to a certain extent Pakistan for quite some time now. A resolution of the same will allow both countries to concentrate more on thier economic and social development. Currently the only country having any advantage with the Kashmir issue is China. Kashmir issue will keep both India and Pakistan occupied, while China can work on becoming the superpower of the region.

In the BBC analysis, it was interesting to find that the chinese occupied territory of Jammu and Kashmir does not come into picture at all. Neither India nor Pakistan brings up chinese occupied territory in any statement/discussion/rhetoric about Kashmir. Even the kashmiri’s who want Jammu and Kashmir as an Independent country are not interested in that territory! The plain truth is no one wants to offend China, who are militarily strong. (High time India modernised their army)

Another interesting point to note in the analysis is that nowhere was the possible solution of converting Actual Line of Control to International border discussed. I personally believe that it is the right solution to resolve the kashmir issue. Proposing An independent kashmir or Jammu and Kashmir belonging to either India or Pakistan, as a solution for the issue is fanciful thinking, all of which practically not implementable.

With the conversion of Actual Line of Control to International border, India can in effect abolish all the special staus given to Kashmir and integrate it completely to Indian mainland. The threat of terrorism will still exist, and voices will be raised, but in the long run it will be beneficial to India. Unfortunately this could only be achieved by bullying/coaxing Pakistan to sign on the dotted lines.

In the article, Proselytization In India: An Indian Christian’s Perspective, C.Alex Alexander does a brilliant job in putting forwards a message for secularism in the Indian Context.

In my opinion, most Christians born and raised in India’s diverse milieu are innately liberal and pluralistic in their outlook. Therefore, they should now raise their voices against the divisive activities of the evangelical Christians, especially those that are bankrolled by the Western churches. Failure to do so is likely to do harm both to the religious freedom of India’s minorities and the territorial integrity of that nation. The peripatetic foreign missionaries certainly have no stake in preserving the territorial integrity of India. But, Indians of all religions do. Besides, separatist movements in Northeast India have been suspected of deriving support from foreign missionary groups. Given the sordid history of Western Christianity, eternal vigilance is indeed prudent.

Alexander continues…

If India is to maintain its hard-won nationhood and regain its past level of religious tolerance, all Indians of goodwill must do everything possible now to stifle the voices of religious fundamentalists. Muslim and Christian clerics must learn to tone down their assertions of monotheistic superiority as well as refrain from denigrating religions that do not subscribe to their views of salvation. They must come to terms with the fact that the Hindu perception of God in myriad forms is just as sacred and inviolate to them as the monotheistic concept is to the followers of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

The Christian evangelists and the literal Islamists must also realize that they cannot continue to maintain their exclusive monopolies for marketing the road maps to heaven. Likewise, Hindu organizations should not allow their legitimate concerns about insensitive and duplicitous missionary groups to degenerate into generalized bashing of minorities through acts such as indulging in mass distribution of tridents or creating a climate of suspicion against all minorities. Pluralistic Indians of all religious faiths have an urgent need now to close their ranks and drown out the rhetoric of religious fanatics if they truly want to allow India to emerge as an economic and political power. Otherwise, India will remain a weak and soft State much to the glee of the Western nations.

This article was really something attracting a lot of comments from the readers. But unfortunately, I think his ideas will fall on deaf ears. Read the full article.