All hail Kim Il-sung!

The above-mentioned name contains the secret to ending all the world's strife and war. It contains the key to ending all the hatred, the crusades, the jihads.

Now for those lacking sufficient knowledge about the North Korean people, their ruler, and their religious beliefs, I present a few interesting facts from the perspective of North Koreans (for the rest of the other world's point of view click here).

1. North Korea is run by the Worker's party of Korea. It was founded, brought to power and headed by Mr Sung. Thereafter it has been run by his son, Kim Jong Il.
2. The entire population of North Korea follows the ideology called 'Juche'. Practice of any other ideology/religion is an offence.
3. Juche basically guarantees citizens independence in thought and politics. The will of the masses is the guiding principle of the ruling class. Therefore, Juche gives the citizens all the freedoms and satisfaction that is impossible in a place that has as many religions as people want, and the will of the majority is often overlooked (eg. returning the Amarnath land).

Among other things, Juche also dictates that for 3 days around Kim Il Sung's death anniversay, the whole country must mourn. Anyone found looking insufficiently unhappy is probably shot. or worse. Mr. Sung and his son are worshipped as gods, and their birthdays and death anniversaries are big events. As you can see there are too many advantages to this system to ignore it. Let me list them down:

1. Since there is no other religion/ideology, people do not go around converting/re-converting/rioting/demolishing/desecrating etc. Overall greater efficiency. Such a situation also leads to demise of crappy channels like India TV.
2. There are only a handful of government holidays annually.

It would be great if we could impose a similar ideology on the entire nation. As it is, almost everyone is worshipping the Gandhis anyway, we can use them as the Kim Sung family. Alternatively, your truly can volunteer for the job. In case it is me, I will introduce some fun exercises. Any suggestions?

Cynics and scientists

CERN has completed some random experiment in their 27 Km dia tunnel somewhere in western Europe. They strive to create conditions that replicate the initial moments of the birth of the universe. This has a lot of people worried, and me intrigued at the same time.

Since I am a nice guy, others first. Some leading scientists hypothesized that the experiment would lead to the creation of a miniature black hole that would eventually suck the world in. Yeah right. Another leading light (German guy, chemistry prof, commenting on a physics experiment) stated that as per his calculations, it would take the tiny hole till about 2012 to swallow the entire earth.

This gives me some food for thought. What if everyone found out that the world was going to end within 4 years? What would people be doing? I have certain guesses:

• Since we know that whatever they have been upto has been pretty much a waste of time (now that the planet is going to go whoosh), we would lynch all the likes of green-peace, pollution control guys etc. etc.
• Finding random people on the street having wild sex would be a common sight.
• All the schools would shut down
• Ekta Kapoor would be in deep shit. She'll have to sit down and think about finales of her crappy TV shows.
• etcetera

As for me, this whole business makes me wonder what would the scientists achieve by spending 9 billion dollars on finding out what happened in the first few moments of birth of the universe? Does it solve problems like cancer, AIDS, hunger? Then WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED SO LONG BACK AT THE RISK OF DESTROYING THE WHOLE DAMN PLANET?

Comments? 

Tata gone looney tunes

Who the hell in his senses decides to put up the plant for a product that depends so much on efficiency and discipline in (present day) Bengal?

Expected Tata to do better than this.

On the other side, maybe he has taken is up as the ultimate challenge. I can imagine him thinking 'Now how can I make it tougher? Idea! Lets not just try and make the cheapest car, lets try and produce it in the most unproductive set-up in the country. Bring it on Murphy!'

Thank you MTV!

Early 90s were especially atrocious for the Indian male. For entertainment they could watch films such as 'beta ho to aisa' or 'swarg'. Rishi Kapoor was still playing roles where his character was 20 yrs old. Kumar Sanu was the hit singer and Anuradha paudwal was hot property in female vocals.

Any adrenaline inducing scene would be preceded by a saxophone tune or the dialogue 'bach ke kahaan jaayegi Rani'. It was in these dark days that the cable TV revolution happened, and brought with itself things like Baywatch, TV5 (damn, kya yaad dila diya yaar khud ko) and top of it all - MTV. All under 24 yr olds (as of today) cannot understand how big a revolution this was for us.

Apart from those in the Metros, music meant T-Series and HMV releases, and good music meant Kishore Da or RDBurman with Jhankar beats. Some lucky blokes had Michael Jackson tapes (Palika Bazaar, thank you)

Hot girls used to be those who wore jeans and skirts, hot pants meant a pair of trousers left out in the sun too long. And don't get me started on make-up.

MTV changed it all for us. There we were, virgins to Madonna, Metallica, George Michael, Aerosmith, Snoop Dog, Dr. Dre etc. etc. The VJs (mostly NRI imports like the bubbly Rubi Bhatia) wore clothes that were not available in towns (and even in Metros not available easily). They spoke in cool accents and made complete idiots of themselves on the screen. What this did for the Indian youth is a contribution which is surpassed in scale only by Jayalalitha's shoe collection.

Anu Maliks started stealing tunes to make better music. Then they started getting caught. Girls started wearing clothes that made the look good. Then they started getting fitter, so that they could look better minus the clothes. Indi-pop got a leg-up and our actors and actresses had to start learning to dance. A clutch of music composers and singers retired.

As the initial feed was not India-specific, a lot of hollywood got introduced because of the movie reviews and trailers.

Our accents got Americanized as we tried to croon (unfortunately) Brian Adams songs. I bet my pennies on the fact that this has played the single largest role in creating our call centre industry.

To sum up, respected members of the audience (I was reminded recently that the number is at least 3), we should pay our respects to MTV for how it has helped to shape out economy and society.

heights of political napunsakta

Finally they've managed it. It takes more than a few wild horses to shake my belief in the Indian story. I am a hardcore patriot. So much that I have bet without fail on the Indian cricket team (even when we are touring South Africa for tests), I have given up lucrative job offers abroad, I have argued with returned-home-NRIs about how they can stop cribbing and start working.

But all it has taken is a numb political leadership, unconcious PM and a lost Home Minister to make me take a long hard look at my passport and think about getting another one from some other country. A country where they still have balls.

The final 2 nails in the coffin of ASR's nationalism were put in during the recent days.

The first one is how our Government has conveniently let the separatists take the agenda, lead and their asses in the Kashmir mess. It defies logic and sense to see how could they not pre-empt this situation. On top of that, why are they shy to shove bullets down the throats of obvious traitors. In any country, the law is clear on traitors - shoot em, bury em, forget em. Now if these assholes still believe that they will get some more Muslim votes by not doing this, they are doing the nation great harm. Also they must remember that the country is still called HINDUstan, and the votes of those mentioned in caps matter as well - if it indeed is about votes.

The second nail was put in when we let the recent Bihar flooding take place DESPITE knowing well in advance about it. All we had to do was send in some soldiers with some engineers and repair the damn structure. We didn't. To top it all, we all know very clearly that those fuckin Bahadurs depend on us for pretty much everything. They cannot simply have the balls to do what they did. And in the end, we have 3.5  million displaced poor in Bihar to worry about.

It is an exercise in boiling one's blood to see Shivraj Patil giving statements when his confidence level is indeed so low that , when it ever rises from the depths, it will bring along some dinosaur fossils or maybe some crude oil.

To listen to the fact that Nepalis did not allow our engineers to carry out the necessary repairs is even more disheartening. Nepalis! They depend on us for pretty much everything. All we had to do was send in some troops, and that would've been the end of it.

But anyway.........

A Chacha's (Uncle's) promise to his Bhateeja (Nephew)

Everyone leaves behind a legacy for the future generations. While most of you would leave behind big hospital bills, and a negative Carbon footprint, I will leave behind a very grateful bhateeja. And no, it will not be because I will leave him a lot of money. It will be because his uncle will get him more kisses from damsels than he can ever imagine. From good ones too.

Now, what in the name of the lord has gotten into me is the question in intelligent person may ask. (Some may also ask their uncles why they aren't trying to get their nephews the sweeties) And my answer to the above-mentioned question from the intellectually unchallenged fellow members of the specie and gender is that if a 5'9" Emraan Hashmi can manage to romp with all the hotties that passed the Bhatt casting couch in town, that if Uday Chopra got an on film smooch, that if Kishan Kumar found a camera whose lens didn't commit suicide, then why can't I, Abhimanyu Rana not produce, write and direct a flick for my nephew.

You see, in this unfair world, when Mahesh Bhatt could have picked up any of the struggling actors in tinsel town, he let his love for his Bhateeja cloud his judgment. This proves 2 points:
1. Mahesh Bhatt is straight. Else we would've seen another Aryan Vaid or Arjun Rampal in his flicks
2. I want him as my uncle!
Next he picks up catchy tunes from Pakistani singers (I'll find some from Eastern Europe!. Suck my left toe Mahesh!), a new babe who performed well on the couch and his nephew. To make matters sweet for his boy, he even put in nice kissing scenes. What a guy!

I will go a step further. Each of my flick will have 1 common plot angle. There will be 2 heroines. This will happen via:
1. The hero's chic would die before the interval and a new one will walk in. OR
2. Alternatively she will have a plastic surgery. OR
3. I will simply change the actress without effecting the story.

I will do this to let the boy also enjoy some casting sessions. THAT is how I will make my legacy.

I hope the lad turns out straight!

Karzai got balls!

The president of a war ravaged country that relies on Indian to help set up their public toilets, has done and is threatening to do again what India should have done ages ago but don't have the balls to.

Mr. Karzai has threatened to send his troops into Pakistan to eliminate threats to his country. He has the balls to say this when Pakistan is a close ally of Afghanistan's pocket money and protection giving daddy - USA. I have a mixed feeling of admiration and jealousy towards this guy.

Despite the Advanis (Iron Man, he he), Vajpayis, Singhs and so many more the nest we have managed is to destroy a few bunkers, and that too when we had an ex wrestler (Mulayam S) as the defence minister. Beyond that, the only thing we have done is try and poolute the rivers that flow into Jihadistan. Maybe we need to take a cue from these guys about decisive action that goes beyond PR pranks.