Author: Pradeep

  • Aanandam (2016)

    Aanandam is a coming-of-age movie looking at the various issues faced by the protagonists on a four day industrial visit.

    After watching Pulimurugan we dropped off our aunt, uncle and grandmother at their home and left to Kurla to watch Aanandam. The movie with a new star cast was watched with several flashbacks in my own mind to my own industrial visit to Goa.

    The movie looks at friendships, college romances and relationships, has some interesting history trivia and mostly has some decent advice on how to spend your college days. These are given from the various experiences that the protagonists have when they go on a four day industrial visit via Mysore, Hampi and Goa.

    I enjoyed watching the movie because of being easily able to identify with various of the characters in the movie with the people I encountered whilst in college. The advice that some of the characters in the film give are some that I wish was given to me when I was in college.The English sub-titles the movie had on the screening was also good with helping in understanding some of the references in the jokes made in the movie, which was nice.

    The advice includes not worrying too much but accepting that everyone is as confused when they were in college.It is the smaller joys like time one spends with friends, the learning experience and interacting with others that leaves us with memories in the long run. These are lessons we learn and the memories we cherish much longer than class lessons. One has to learn to enjoy life whilst taking on responsibilities. Else we will never know when our hairs turn grey and we’d have become too old to enjoy life.

    I would recommend you go and watch these movies.

     

  • Pulimurugan (2016)

    Pulimurugan is an action film starring Mohanlal and Kamalinee Mukherjee.

    It’s been a long while since we went for a movie. We only had a wedding reception chalked in to attend in the evening and so had booked to watch Aanandam in the evening. When my aunt called to ask if we could catch Pulimurugan for the morning show, we decided to go after getting the wife’s assent.

    Pulimurugan has two or three strand story. There is the story of the protagonist’s life, the story of the constant struggle between man and animal for land and the exploitation of the forest by miscreants big and small. The story interlaces all of these and their meeting points make the movie interesting for me.

    The protagonist of the movie is a tiger hunter but he only hunts for man-eaters. This leads him to constant skirmishes with the law, which does not allow for the killing of tigers. The protagonist turns hunter because a man-eater kills his father when he is only a child. As an adult, the same protagonist admits that it is the humans who are the real trespassers and not the animal.

    The protagonist’s innocence having lived in the forest his whole life leads him to break the law transporting forest produce (sandalwood and ganja) illegally from the forest. The miscreants treat him as an asset in their trade. The protagonist at one time admits that humans are worse enemies than animals in the forest.

    The last thing that everyone I asked seems to have been going on about was the wonderful action scenes. The action scenes are beautifully choreographed and shot. There are some wonderful close calls that almost take your breathe away and have you at the edge of your seats.

    All in all, I loved watching the film and would recommend that you watch it too.

     

     

  • Gurcharan Das on the Dharmic Economy

    Gurcharan Das writes on the role of Dharma for individuals and for a competitive free market economy.

  • Happy Diwali

  • Time Machine with Neelesh Misra

    I just took advantage of the fact that I was down with a fever-cough-cold combination to listen to Time Machine with Neelesh Misra. I stumbled on to the show while looking for something to listen to whilst lying bored in bed.

    Mystical retelling of the Mahabharata and Ramayana like those of Ashok Banker’s Prince of Ayodhya and Ten Kings are finding favour with a growing audience, it is sometimes lovely to hear these mythic story in their original. Neelesh Misra narrates stories written by members of his writer’s group called Mandali in this series on Saavn. The story telling is compelling with sound effects that we would have imagined as kids listening to the tale from our grandmothers lending the dramatic touch. Misra made me feel that in losing the art of storytelling, we have lost something significant in our busy life.

    I shared it both with my wife and my brother and thought I should share it with you as well. If reading is not your thing, maybe listening to these stories might bring back fond memories.

  • The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up

    You would not think that you need a book to learn how to tidy up. When your mother asks you to tidy your room, you tidy the room. When you think back, you had not paid enough attention to remember how you learnt to tidy the way you did. You either picked it up from here and there – mostly from your parents and then improved over the years if you paid any attention or it became worse.

    I picked up the book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing from the Kindle store after watching a couple of videos of it’s author, Marie Kondo. I first saw the video on Talks @ Google and two NHK videos featuring her work with two clients(#1 & #2).

    The English translation of the Japanese book is a pleasant easy read. The book takes you through all the steps in a clear and concise manner, if you want to try the method for a few days. I read the book in totem before deciding to try it out. My parents had just moved out of home and left it to me and my wife.

    After reading the book, I spent the afternoon explaining KonMarie’s whole process to my wife. We disposed a lot of clothes and began to try folding clothes as explained in the book. My wife though, kept tidying the way she always went about doing it. After a few more tries, I reverted as well. I think the book is best read by someone who actually tidies the home. It’s probably good to watch the #1 or #2 video that I pointed above to you before reading the book. Else it’s just another book read this year and you keep tidying the way you always did.

     

     

  • Intercontinental Space Weather Balloon Network

    I read on Spaceweather.com today morning about an intercontinental network of space weather balloon released by the website in collaboration with Earth to Sky. The data is released on the website.

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    The Intercontinental Space Weather Balloon Network. Image Credit: Spaceweather.com

     

    It would be lovely to get a few balloons from India as well besides the ones being launched from TIFR’s National Balloon Facility in Hyderabad. It would be a fun lear

  • Integral Humanism

    September 25th was the centennial birth anniversary of Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya. I had heard the name mentioned and was curious to know who he was. A cursory reading of the Wikipedia article on him pointed out that it was his philosophy that the Bharatiya Jan Sangh and later the Bharatiya Janata Party followed. His philosophy was called Integral Humanism.

    The text that forms the basis of the philosophy is a 1965 text of the same name and can be found on the BJP’s website here. I read the text on Sunday and quite agree with the analysis provided on The Wire.

  • Satish Dhawan

    On the day prior to PSLV’s launch, FactorDaily has a near 2 minute video on the man who succeeded Vikram Sarabhai, laid the foundations for India’s rocketry programme including the PSLV, started the Earth observation and communications satellite programme and after whom India’s space port, Sriharikota is named – Satish Dhawan.

  • Middle Management

    C Gopinath writes in The Hindu Business Line on the lack of attention on mid-level management in relation to the news related to Wells Fargo. I found this paragraph to be instructive and applicable to many organisations in India today:

    The problem lies in a managerial culture that has eviscerated the role of the middle manager. Mid-level managers are key to an organisation, translating the policies of the top to operational systems and procedures, and in reverse, interpreting and communicating issues and market intelligence from the bottom. Thanks to new ERP systems and misplaced process re-engineering, the role of the middle manager has been castrated. ‘Yes managers’ have come to occupy those positions. They tell their bosses only what the top wants to hear.