Deewali is great festival of India which celebrates win of good over evil. The festival has universal appeal and is celebrated across this diverse country including Hindu’s and Sikhs. Deewali is the festival of light when Lord Rama returned to his kingdom after spending 14 years in exile and conquering the evil ruler of Lanka called Ravana. This is all according to Hindu mythology and is celebrated to this date with all the enthusiasms. The last few years I have seen White House celebrating this festival,this year was no different with President Obama inaugrating the Deewali celebration in White House. This speaks of the growing influence Indians are having in US politics. You can watch Obama’s Deewali message here.

Deewali brings up fond memories of my childhood. I grew up in coal mines where my dad would head coal mines with 1000s of people working under his leadership. we would have three days of non stop festivities, one day for orchestra , the other day for what is called Kawwali and a third day of Kavi Sammelan or something similar. The night would light up with fireworks, happiness in the air everywhere. I do plan to go to India one of these Deewali’s , may be next year..it’s been a while…really..over 13 years now and celebrate it with mom and dad!!!

Deewali is great festival of India which celebrates win of good over evil. The festival has universal appeal and is celebrated across this diverse country including Hindu’s and Sikhs. Deewali is the festival of light when Lord Rama returned to his kingdom after spending 14 years in exile and conquering the evil ruler of Lanka called Ravana. This is all according to Hindu mythology and is celebrated to this date with all the enthusiasms. The last few years I have seen White House celebrating this festival,this year was no different with President Obama inaugrating the Deewali celebration in White House. This speaks of the growing influence Indians are having in US politics. You can watch Obama’s Deewali message here.

Deewali brings up fond memories of my childhood. I grew up in coal mines where my dad would head coal mines with 1000s of people working under his leadership. we would have three days of non stop festivities, one day for orchestra , the other day for what is called Kawwali and a third day of Kavi Sammelan or something similar. The night would light up with fireworks, happiness in the air everywhere. I do plan to go to India one of these Deewali’s , may be next year..it’s been a while…really..over 13 years now and celebrate it with mom and dad!!!

>
Deewali is great festival of India which celebrates win of good over evil. The festival has universal appeal and is celebrated across this diverse country including Hindu’s and Sikhs. Deewali is the festival of light when Lord Rama returned to his kingdom after spending 14 years in exile and conquering the evil ruler of Lanka called Ravana. This is all according to Hindu mythology and is celebrated to this date with all the enthusiasms. The last few years I have seen White House celebrating this festival,this year was no different with President Obama inaugrating the Deewali celebration in White House. This speaks of the growing influence Indians are having in US politics. You can watch Obama’s Deewali message here.

Deewali brings up fond memories of my childhood. I grew up in coal mines where my dad would head coal mines with 1000s of people working under his leadership. we would have three days of non stop festivities, one day for orchestra , the other day for what is called Kawwali and a third day of Kavi Sammelan or something similar. The night would light up with fireworks, happiness in the air everywhere. I do plan to go to India one of these Deewali’s , may be next year..it’s been a while…really..over 13 years now and celebrate it with mom and dad!!!

Seems like India has found its own Barack Obama in the young Rahul Gandhi. Actually not exactly, there are similarities but stark differences as well, first and foremost – Rahul being a product of India’s Nehru-Gandhi dynasty and second he is no “black” in India. I have always been opposed to dynasty rule , more so in a country of billion plus population where you would think there’s no dearth of talent . When Rahul Gandhi started making news couple of months ago, my first inclination was to brush him aside, he is a kid ( although not exactly at 38-39), what can he do..I wondered.

As the Indian elections started drawing closer and more and more of my friends begin talking about it, my curiosity found me visiting political news pages of Indian dailies like Times of India and Hindustan Times more so often. To my surprise I see Oped columns on how Rahul Gandhi is aggressively campaigning across India and about to change electoral map in UP, a state bigger than Britain and France combined. This novice had started making some serious dent on a state dominated by casteist politics and regional parties like SP and BSP.

Rahul seems to have borrowed a page from Obama’s winning strategy- appeal to the youth, appeal to the poor and avoid divisive and negative politics (of religion and caste so prevalent in India). I am no political analyst but it sounded like he had a solid strategy in going after big prized state like UP ( just like Obama targeted big states like Texas , Ohio and Florida – California was already democratic leaning so wasn’t that tough winning it over).

I wonder how Rahul Gandhi engineered his strategies. Obama had a solid team of political strategist like David Alexrod and Bill Burton and a strong support from liberal leaning new media outlets like huffingtonpost.com, moveon.org and the traditional media also had somewhat favorable bias for him (other than Fox news of course!). I did not see any such supporting factor in favor of the younger scion of Gandhi family. Web 2.0 style campaigning pioneered by Obama obviously wouldn’t have worked for India either, given the low penetration of internet in rural India. This makes his achievement even more commendable.

What do I think of the overall election results. Obviously I am happy, not because Congress won or BJP lost, but because in this clear mandate for Congress we can look forward to a stable government less susceptible to black mail of coalition politics. I had started to think that for India the days of a single party majority are gone and the coalition government is the new reality where getting anything done is always a big challenge. I am glad that Indian democracy is alive and kicking , which can humble the old and complacent and bring new leaders to the forefront. It is yet to be seen how the three troika of Congress party- Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Congress party General Secretary Rahul Gandhi use their new found political capital.

Rahul may be the change India was looking for or he may turn out to be a damp squib- miserably failing to live up to his larger than life image, only time can tell. For now, he has proved his skeptics wrong, including me , and I congratulate him for his outstanding victory. Today is his day in the sun…and a testimony to the power of youth! I have already started feeling good and happy to be on the right side of history..of rooting for whoever challenges the status quo..whoever makes a sincere effort for a better tomorrow..be it Obama or Rahul Gandhi.

>
Seems like India has found its own Barack Obama in the young Rahul Gandhi. Actually not exactly, there are similarities but stark differences as well, first and foremost – Rahul being a product of India’s Nehru-Gandhi dynasty and second he is no “black” in India. I have always been opposed to dynasty rule , more so in a country of billion plus population where you would think there’s no dearth of talent . When Rahul Gandhi started making news couple of months ago, my first inclination was to brush him aside, he is a kid ( although not exactly at 38-39), what can he do..I wondered.

As the Indian elections started drawing closer and more and more of my friends begin talking about it, my curiosity found me visiting political news pages of Indian dailies like Times of India and Hindustan Times more so often. To my surprise I see Oped columns on how Rahul Gandhi is aggressively campaigning across India and about to change electoral map in UP, a state bigger than Britain and France combined. This novice had started making some serious dent on a state dominated by casteist politics and regional parties like SP and BSP.

Rahul seems to have borrowed a page from Obama’s winning strategy- appeal to the youth, appeal to the poor and avoid divisive and negative politics (of religion and caste so prevalent in India). I am no political analyst but it sounded like he had a solid strategy in going after big prized state like UP ( just like Obama targeted big states like Texas , Ohio and Florida – California was already democratic leaning so wasn’t that tough winning it over).

I wonder how Rahul Gandhi engineered his strategies. Obama had a solid team of political strategist like David Alexrod and Bill Burton and a strong support from liberal leaning new media outlets like huffingtonpost.com, moveon.org and the traditional media also had somewhat favorable bias for him (other than Fox news of course!). I did not see any such supporting factor in favor of the younger scion of Gandhi family. Web 2.0 style campaigning pioneered by Obama obviously wouldn’t have worked for India either, given the low penetration of internet in rural India. This makes his achievement even more commendable.

What do I think of the overall election results. Obviously I am happy, not because Congress won or BJP lost, but because in this clear mandate for Congress we can look forward to a stable government less susceptible to black mail of coalition politics. I had started to think that for India the days of a single party majority are gone and the coalition government is the new reality where getting anything done is always a big challenge. I am glad that Indian democracy is alive and kicking , which can humble the old and complacent and bring new leaders to the forefront. It is yet to be seen how the three troika of Congress party- Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Congress party General Secretary Rahul Gandhi use their new found political capital.

Rahul may be the change India was looking for or he may turn out to be a damp squib- miserably failing to live up to his larger than life image, only time can tell. For now, he has proved his skeptics wrong, including me , and I congratulate him for his outstanding victory. Today is his day in the sun…and a testimony to the power of youth! I have already started feeling good and happy to be on the right side of history..of rooting for whoever challenges the status quo..whoever makes a sincere effort for a better tomorrow..be it Obama or Rahul Gandhi.

Yesterday night while casually flipping the TV channel came across this PBS documentary on Climate Change. The documentary took the viewer to glaciers of Himalaya and how they are retreating so fast. The scenes were troubling to me, least of which is because I was born in the great land of Himalayas, India. Yes, probably the documentary touched me more deeply than it would somebody who does not call the region their ancestral land, nonetheless the message was unmistakable and applicable to humanity as a whole. The central message of the documentary was that we are all in this together no matter which part of the world we live in. The Himalaya glaciers may be receding , but so are countless others , from Rockies to Alps to Alaska, to that little glacier they talked about in Montana.

I recommend the reader to watch the video themselves and for those short on time, I will post a summary here when I have some free time. TV reporter David Brancaccio and environmentalist Conrad Anker have done a wonderful job of documenting the ill effects of global warming and the disturbing trend of unsustainable development. According to them this could result into food security issues for millions of people in very near future, mostly in Ganges basin, who have been historically dependent on the river’s water for thousands of years. The displaced population will be a national security risk and would affect the world as a whole with global shortage of food, water, and clean air.

So many well meaning people have started to think in this area, time for me to do some serious thinking as well… nothing concrete so far, but tomorrow is yet another day…will see what it brings!

>
Yesterday night while casually flipping the TV channel came across this PBS documentary on Climate Change. The documentary took the viewer to glaciers of Himalaya and how they are retreating so fast. The scenes were troubling to me, least of which is because I was born in the great land of Himalayas, India. Yes, probably the documentary touched me more deeply than it would somebody who does not call the region their ancestral land, nonetheless the message was unmistakable and applicable to humanity as a whole. The central message of the documentary was that we are all in this together no matter which part of the world we live in. The Himalaya glaciers may be receding , but so are countless others , from Rockies to Alps to Alaska, to that little glacier they talked about in Montana.

I recommend the reader to watch the video themselves and for those short on time, I will post a summary here when I have some free time. TV reporter David Brancaccio and environmentalist Conrad Anker have done a wonderful job of documenting the ill effects of global warming and the disturbing trend of unsustainable development. According to them this could result into food security issues for millions of people in very near future, mostly in Ganges basin, who have been historically dependent on the river’s water for thousands of years. The displaced population will be a national security risk and would affect the world as a whole with global shortage of food, water, and clean air.

So many well meaning people have started to think in this area, time for me to do some serious thinking as well… nothing concrete so far, but tomorrow is yet another day…will see what it brings!

The last couple of weeks have been quite hectic for me, some deadlines, some deliverables, some family commitments…the memorial day long weekend came as a welcome relief. For a change, I kept my schedule totally free, and like many other drivers who are complaining about high gas prices and staying off road this long weekend, I did the same and limited myself to local trips only. Unless I have to, I actually like to travel when it is not a long weekend, roads are more friendly and little less congested..Anyway, some free time is always good to recharge batteries, unwind, reflect upon life and so on..and here I am watching some memorial day coverage on TV. CNN had a live coverage on Barack Obama addressing veterans in New Mexico ( full disclosure, for whatever it is worth, I am a Barack Obama supporter and some of my thoughts, writings may reflect it). Barack Obama has this natural gift of being a great orator, some of the good things he says, you just take for granted, anything less and he risks disappointing his fans ( including me of course..). That said, talking about a soldier he said something which really moved me. He had a bracelet from a woman whose son had died in the line of duty..it read, “All gave some – he gave all”..I was touched..granted these may not be his original line..but coming from him, it made the atmosphere even more sombre and poignant and not just yet another presidential campaign event.You can read the full transcript of his speech here. The war which is happening half a world away..may not impact us in our day to day life, but deep inside we all feel the sorrow of a mother who has lost a child, a kid who has lost his dad and a wife who has lost her significant other in this war.. the ultimate sacrifice some people give to keep us all safe here at home! I just hope we never forget that. I salute these guys who are willing to die for their country, I hope that the political leadership exercises their judgment before sending these heroes in harm’s way! I hope Barack Obama will exercise this judgment and that is why I support him!
Here’s a photograph from last years memorial day by John Moore, I think this photograph won number one prize in one of these photo journalism competition. Indeed a picture is worth a thousand words!!Did I ever consider joining military, yes I did. Back in 1989 we had Indian Navy come to our campus at IIT Kanpur for recruitment. I cleared their aptitude test and the OLQ ( Officer Like Quality) test and started filling up some benefit forms. In the form there was one item which said- next of kin to notify. I asked the recruiting officer what was that and he said who would I like notified if something happens to me. What…I thought, I am just a mechanical engineer, in a support role, never thought I could be at risk too.. and here it was in black and white..asking me to fill up the next of kin. Suddenly the seriousness of this job dawned on me..I realized they are talking life and death here…I realized I wasn’t cut out for that job, didn’t attend the final interview which was to happen in Indian Navy base somewhere…all the more reason I respect and admire those who have taken the oath to defend their motherland.

>
The last couple of weeks have been quite hectic for me, some deadlines, some deliverables, some family commitments…the memorial day long weekend came as a welcome relief. For a change, I kept my schedule totally free, and like many other drivers who are complaining about high gas prices and staying off road this long weekend, I did the same and limited myself to local trips only. Unless I have to, I actually like to travel when it is not a long weekend, roads are more friendly and little less congested..Anyway, some free time is always good to recharge batteries, unwind, reflect upon life and so on..and here I am watching some memorial day coverage on TV. CNN had a live coverage on Barack Obama addressing veterans in New Mexico ( full disclosure, for whatever it is worth, I am a Barack Obama supporter and some of my thoughts, writings may reflect it). Barack Obama has this natural gift of being a great orator, some of the good things he says, you just take for granted, anything less and he risks disappointing his fans ( including me of course..). That said, talking about a soldier he said something which really moved me. He had a bracelet from a woman whose son had died in the line of duty..it read, “All gave some – he gave all”..I was touched..granted these may not be his original line..but coming from him, it made the atmosphere even more sombre and poignant and not just yet another presidential campaign event.You can read the full transcript of his speech here. The war which is happening half a world away..may not impact us in our day to day life, but deep inside we all feel the sorrow of a mother who has lost a child, a kid who has lost his dad and a wife who has lost her significant other in this war.. the ultimate sacrifice some people give to keep us all safe here at home! I just hope we never forget that. I salute these guys who are willing to die for their country, I hope that the political leadership exercises their judgment before sending these heroes in harm’s way! I hope Barack Obama will exercise this judgment and that is why I support him!
Here’s a photograph from last years memorial day by John Moore, I think this photograph won number one prize in one of these photo journalism competition. Indeed a picture is worth a thousand words!!Did I ever consider joining military, yes I did. Back in 1989 we had Indian Navy come to our campus at IIT Kanpur for recruitment. I cleared their aptitude test and the OLQ ( Officer Like Quality) test and started filling up some benefit forms. In the form there was one item which said- next of kin to notify. I asked the recruiting officer what was that and he said who would I like notified if something happens to me. What…I thought, I am just a mechanical engineer, in a support role, never thought I could be at risk too.. and here it was in black and white..asking me to fill up the next of kin. Suddenly the seriousness of this job dawned on me..I realized they are talking life and death here…I realized I wasn’t cut out for that job, didn’t attend the final interview which was to happen in Indian Navy base somewhere…all the more reason I respect and admire those who have taken the oath to defend their motherland.

Harsh Manglik spsent 35 years building his career in the U.S. Then he went home.

read more | digg story

Inspiring!Good story about going back to roots and making a contribution.