Tushar and Windows 8 - A Birthday Wish

Tushar, my son decided to upgrade his laptop to Windows 8. This adventure taught me something and force me to take a critical look at the software development so far.

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Tushar, my son, is quite a geek. He wants to possess the latest in gadgets and games, if only his dad could afford them all. However, he does read up on them and loves to window-shop. His swanky new laptop was barely out of the bubblewrap with all the glory of Intel i7, a 1TB HDD and multiple gigs of RAM, all under the glorified umbrella of Windows 7 Home Premium, an object of envy for lesser mortals, yet he decided to upgrade to Windows 8, which was offered to him for a small payment.

Even though he is quite an expert, Tushar’s reasons to upgrade were simple – faster booting, longer battery life and a tablet-like interface which is now the industry standard. In his decision to do so he laid bare the myths that software giants like Microsoft had built so far – the bigger the better. That Microsoft too participated in breaking it is no consolation to them, since they did so after being battered into submission. The tablets, whether of the genres of iOS, Android or Blackberry proved beyond doubt that same, nay better, experience can be offered with lean operating systems and leaner applications, what with everything crammed into a measly 8GB, with ample space leftover for your data to boot (pun intended). The “office” packages, such as “Office to Go”or the “Quick Office Pro” are infinitesimally small compare to that bloatware called MS Office, yet deliver everything that one needs to function in his business, with charts, fonts and formatting galore. These iOS or Android applications cost small change compared to the king’s ransom one was expected to pay for the so called productivity suites, most of which was junk inside anyway, just like the junk DNA that we carry and think that we are superior to the rest of the animal world.

Tushar also introduced me to those sweet little things called “APPS”, tightly written codes of software that do nifty things for one, like buying movie tickets, checking one's PNR status or reading a newspaper online. Games suddenly started becoming available for seventy five rupees instead of five thousand, all tuned for hi-res called the retina display. The colossal games, which came on double layered DVDs, asked for a supercomputer to run with mega-power graphics cards and water cooled microprocessors; software and hardware were soon found promoting each other’s builders. If the Windows 8 can boot in a third of the time it took its predecessors, provides a better interface, offers seamless integration of tablets and mobile phones with the desktop and yet consumes less battery, one wonders why Microsoft was keeping employed the umpteen thousand code writers and paying them fat salaries, only to be recovered from the hapless consumers. After all why didn’t anyone think of writing apps for Windows or Mac, leaving it to the poor home PC user to slog it out everytime by logging into high-traffic websites and doing the needful afresh every time he needed to buy a movie ticket or read an ebook, starting with a www.someweirdplace.com? Why compel the customers to do everything himself even after he had pawned his house and his car to buy the OS and the Office Suite?

Has Microsoft learnt the lesson and made amends in Windows 8? Only time and Tushar can tell. Tushar has asked me to wait a few days till he is through with his own beta testing and only then will he advise me on upgrading my older laptop to Win 8. The new MS OS is quite clearly leaner and cleaner. I only hope they do not offer a hundred updates over the next fifty days. I also hope that Tushar does not ask me to buy a new laptop with a touch screen, so that a “complete” experience is his deliverance.

I also wonder what Microsoft will now do with the army of old-fashioned code writers, who in spite of writing a million lines a day could never offer tightly integrated software free of security holes. Or was it because of the million lines that they fumbled all along? It would be interesting to see how many of these programmers are sent home and how many for retraining.

Meanwhile, as Tushar is on his exploration of the unknown and the inevitable, I wish him a Happy Birthday. It is October 30 today. Maybe he could also learn a few tricks from this upheaval in the IT world and emerge leaner, faster and stronger, with lots of apps to embellish his personality. 

Happy birthday, Beta! You do me proud.

Kurien and the Cow

Verghese Kurien, the  "Father of the White Revolution", passed away on Sept 9, 2012. His milk-cooperatives and the 'billion-litre idea' brought about the world's biggest agricultural development programme, enriching lives of millions.

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Is the white revolution dead? The country recently lost its greatest hero in its war against malnutrition and rural poverty. But the revolution lives. It lives in the lives of millions of milk producers and a billion of India’s citizens, it lives in lakhs of healthy disease free cattle and it lives in thousands of cooperatives and hundreds of state-of-the-art dairies that dot this land. The country lost one of the greatest nation builders a few days ago, Verghese Kurien, illustrious son of the land, the man who delivered a nutrition-deficient, import-dependent country from the clutches of multinationals and depths of malnourishment to a place of pride in the world. He left behind a country, where the proverbial milk and honey flowed once again, an India which now ranks as the largest producer of milk in the world.

Before Dr Kurien achieved the previously unthinkable feat, milk came in cows. Milk still comes from cows, but in my childhood milk walked up to our doorsteps actually riding in a cow. The milkman, as a daily ritual, would march to my house every morning with a cow ambling alongside. My neighbours wanted their milk delivered in the evening. No problem with that! Since cows can be milked twice a day, the milkman and the poor cow would do the round of my neighbourhood again in the evening, repeating several miles of round trip from the cow shed to the Point of Sale (POS) and back. What a change from those days! The cow of today has all her meals delivered at her place of residence. She has no choice of plucking out a clump of grass from the roadside or a clutch of blossoms from the neighbour’s flowerpot. The cow’s diet today is confined to the industry standard oilcakes, husk and some grains past their use-before dates. No fun in eating, none in giving milk either – everything has been industrialised, even the milking is done by machines. 

Back to our milkman. As soon as he arrived, one of us children would be deputed to supervise him, to ensure that he did not mix water in the milk on the sly. The milkman would always carry two steel buckets, one of them contained water, which he claimed was to wash the other bucket with. He drew milk from the cow’s udders in the empty bucket. In case the child deputed to keep an eye on the process of milking slipped up, the milkman would quickly pour some water from the other bucket into the milk bucket. A wink or a momentary lapse of attention was enough for him to perform the crafty act. His measure, the “paav” or the “pauua” as he would call it, was said to be a quarter of a seer and was always an object of suspicion. I was sure that unlike simple arithmetic, four of his quarters did not add up to a one, but to a substantially lower quantity. Our neighbour was smarter. He had his own “paav”, which he wanted his deliveries to be measured with. But that was not to be. In his case the milkman insisted upon measuring the milk with the froth, which came naturally in the milking process. You could never win against the wily fellow – if he used his paav he delivered less and if he used your paav he still delivered less, which you discovered once the froth settled down. The cow, oblivious of the devious ways of her master, strode along delivering a seer here and half a seer there, till she was ready to go home.

Milk in the Kurien era began coming in bottles and polythene pouches. No, the polythene that modern cows eat by the roadside does not package the milk inside the cow. Milk is now processed in large dairies, which Dr Kurien seeded. Milk is collected from the doorsteps of the milkmen, organised in cooperatives, carried from the nooks and crannies of the hinterland to the processing dairies in a matter of hours, filtered, standardised and pasteurised, packaged and delivered quicker than the time it took the cow of my childhood to do one round through her multiple retail outlets. The modern milkman, on the other hand gets a fair price for his produce, the cow gets better fodder, we get better quality milk, curd, cheese and butter, all proudly produced in India at affordable prices. 

Gone are the days when one depended on imported milk powder and the poor just couldn’t think of providing the white elixir to their young ones. We have also forgotten the days when the cows were skinny, milkmen impoverished while milk would just go bad waiting to be marketed. All this while there were millions waiting and willing to buy it. Dr Kurien did indeed change the lives of millions like few others. He alone brought cheer to the millions of producers and consumers linking them through innovative cooperatives and modern dairies.

But, Dr Kurien! You also changed lives of many others – the cows do not go on their morning and evening walks, the milkman now sits at home and has almost become a paragon of virtues. Gone also are the days of endless fun from the lives of children out of the game of detective they loved to play against the shrewd milkman. But, on the whole, there is a huge surplus of good that you have done to us. The nation needs many more like you.

We will miss you Dr Kurien!

A Birthday Wish to My Wife

As years pass by of my togetherness with my wife, I continue to discover new pleasures and new meanings of happiness. Wishing a Happy Birthday to Jyotsna.

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A Happy Birthday to the anchor of my life. To the one who has given a new meaning to fulfillment  happiness and contentment. I wish the best to the woman, who raised the standards of my way of life from mere existence to one of sophisticated social mien. I wish the finest and the best that life has to offer to my wife of nearly a quarter of a century, to the beacon in my journey through life, to the mother of my children and to my soul-mate  One who would hold my hand in days of despair as if the same pain stabbed her heart too, jump with joy at my achievements as if they were her own, console me in times of distress, teach me how to bring up our children, deal with ease with relatives and friends benign and hostile. One who would be equally happy in the salary of the third pay commission and of the sixth pay commission. One who would wear a chikan kurta and a solitaire with equal aplomb and satisfaction. One who would be equally understanding in a tiny type IV flat with Spartan belongings and in large bungalow with her antique collection of high class furniture. One who would watch a 20-inch single channel television with as much glee as she watches a 50-inch plasma with today.

In a few months we complete twenty five years of togetherness on this planet, a period which undoubtedly surpasses the previous twenty five years in cheer and bliss, a period which whizzed past so quickly it has left me breathless and makes me crave for another quarter century and then yet another. They say there are seven lives a couple gets to spend with each other. I only hope that my cycle has just begun and will not end at the seventh.

Jyotsna! Wish You Many Happy Returns of the Day.

Last Name Conundrum

My parents decided in my childhood that I shall have no surname (or lastname, as the Americans call it). Little did they know how, in a flat world, it will make my life a constant struggle.

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Having lived with a last name for over a year in Facebookville, an inescapable appendage in this two-name world, I have finally recovered my pristine identity of Firstname Nolastname variety. Since facebook and several other faceless websites just wouldn't let you progress to the next "field" without filling up a last name, I had no option to assume one, my father's of course.

But after several people commented and asked whether it was the same me (!) I finally decided to challenge Lord Zuckerburg himself. That I did it when his chips (literally the stock of his company) are down and quoting below $20 is no coincidence. Rather than angering a valuable member, on whose shoulders he sell everything ranging from women's perfumes to luxury yachts, paper-clips to cat-food, he quickly succumbed and agreed to let me drop my surname. That I submitted a scanned copy of my passport, signed by a mere section officer of the passport office helped too. Imagine Zuckerburg vs the Section Officer; and who wins? The mighty Babu of the supermighty Government of India.

So friends, here I am, at your service again. The same "Shubhranshu" that you knew all along and not a stranger "Shubhranshu Verma". It is springtime once again!

DARA SINGH

Dara Singh, the Original Superman to all Indians, passed away on 12 July 2012. He has left behind an entire generation of men and women, who in their childhood, loved this man and adored him for his boundless strength. Indeed, Dara Singh was the substitute for all that we as a society and a nation, in the dismal decades of sixties and seventies, longed for - strength and courage.

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Dara Singh is dead, long live Dara Singh!

Dara Singh, the eternal superhero of our time, the object of all our childhood fantasies of the ultimate in strength and power, is no more. Even though he had passed away unnoticed into the noisy alleys of the modern era of fake heroes and animated supergiants, he remained an object of admiration in our subconscious, something our children and grandchildren will never understand.

Wasn’t Dara Singh always on the side of every child? If you fought with someone, you presumed that Dara Singh would side with you because your cause was always right. India lost the war with China, simply because our army did not deploy the ultimate war machine, Dara Singh against the foes. Wouldn’t he alone have decimated single-handedly the mighty PLA? Wouldn’t he have been an impregnable moving frontier against the marauding Chinese, their tanks and aircraft, their guns and grenades? Well, they corrected their mistake and sent Dara Singh to the front when the Pakistanis attacked us in 1965 and in 1971.

Dara Singh was the Superman, the Batman, the Spiderman all rolled into one. He was also the single-body incarnation of the Phantom, the Lothar and the King Kong. The icon of our imagination, where puny fighter like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mike Tyson and Sylvester Stallone would qualify for only valets of the greatest, the mighty Dara Singh. The WWE and the World Wrestling and Boxing Championships would be mere sideshows in the presence of our protector, fighter and guardian. Children of today, whose software heroes live in PS3, Wii and in Cartoon Channels would find it impossible to comprehend that a bigger hero did exist in flesh and blood, the hero of their fathers and grandfathers, one who could never be excelled or defeated, one who was larger than the combined lives of the Hulk, the Hellboy and Keanu Reeves .

Dara Singh of our imagination was not only unbeatable in strength but also in virtues and the do-good intentions. He could always be counted upon to come and vanquish your enemies (frenemies?). After all weren’t you always right and deserved his support most naturally. But, Dara Singh disappointed us all when he took up those lover-boy roles beside the demure Mumtaz! I guess every macho hero has his weaknesses too. So, I and my friends decided to forgive Dara Singh with heavy hearts. O Dara Singh! Why didn’t you wait some years more? You could have had the entire trio of Charlie’s Angels, who would not only be as beautiful but also of an equal fighting class.

Dara Singh! Now that you are gone, “the fight has gone out of our lives”.

We will miss you Dara Singh!

Nursery Rhymes in the Vernacular

Nursery Rhyme to bridge the language divide

Why should only students of English medium schools have the benefit of the nursery rhymes. I wanted to bridge the gap and translated some of them into Bhojpuri.

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Humpty-Dumpty

हम्टी डम्टी ऊपर बइठले दिवाल 

गिरले भड़ाम से, भईल बुरा हाल

राजा के घोड़ा अइले, राजा के आदमी अइले

हम्टी डम्टी के लेकिन जोड़ नाहीं पइले

Jack and Jill (not mine)

जैकवा और जिलवा गयिल उपर हिलवा

पनिया भरन के वास्ते

जैकवा गिर गयिल ओकर खोपड़ी फूट गइल

जिलवा लुढकत आइल पूरे रास्ते

Little Jack Corner

जैक बबुआ सोना बैठ गईले कोना

खात रहले हलुआ मिठाई

अंगुरी जे ढुकवले मोटा मेवा पवले

बोलले, केतना नीमन हम लड़िकाई!

Shri Raghuvansh Narayan Ji

SHRI RAGHUVANSH NARAYAN JI

(Raghuvansh Narayan Ji was our teacher in the subject of agriculture or the krishi-teacher. He was seen as a tough taskmaster and his classes seemed like concentration camps to us. Raghuvansh Ji passed away in the year 2010. The news brought back a flood of memories from my school days in Netarhat.)

One of the lasting memories one has of the Netarhat School is that of the krishi classes. Agriculture or krishi, as one would expect would consist of sowing seeds, tending to the plants and crop and then harvesting them with a sense of satisfaction. But krishi in Netarhat School consisted of endless classes of digging up hard earth and making beds for someone else to farm on. The only thing that made the unending hours of hard labour of krishi classes was the supervising presence of Shriman Raghuvanshji a.k.a. Hitler.

We may all have done well in subjects like Physics, Chemistry, Geography, Hindi or Biology, but what still persists in my mind till date is how many plots of land I tended to with a kudal. I still boast to my children how we worked like real farmers; and at the same time I find it meaningless to brag about my scores in physics or mathematics. Such has been the impact of the low tech, aimless (so it seemed at that time) and hard labour we put up with in the krishi classes. Raghuvanshji, who would sit by the side in a folding steel chair with a detached air, would oversee all that we were doing with a curse between our lips. When the going went tough, we would cry out, HITLER! HITLER!! That seemed to somehow lessen the burden of the intense labour, apply palliative to our blistered palms and create a breeze of apparently cool air for the entire class. Shri Raghuvanshji would pretend not to hear. I am sure that after decades of overhearing the word Hitler he was pretty sure who was being addressed. But he seemed oblivious to our cries of anguish. We would vent our anger, frustration and irritation in one single word - Hitler.

I often suspected that Shri Raghuvanshji had a smile suppressed in his lips which seemed to convey, "Son! This hard labour will make you understand one day how tough and demanding the life of a farmer or a labourer is. Destined as you are to become white collared babus, this krishi lesson will help you retain your links with your roots much later in your life." How true, Sir! Shri Raghuvansh Ji! I get goose pimples as I write this and remember you. About the only things that still linger fresh in my memories are the practical classes of dhatukala, kashthkala and above all, krishi.

I remember that a classmate once commented that the teacher himself would never have done such tough work on land. Without getting angry, Raghuvanshji called him and showed him his palms. We all went up to him out of curiosity. Those were two hands upturned into our faces, hands of a real farmer - callused and hard-skinned like we had never seen before. All our grievances seemed so small at once, even of having to do the SINK-1 (where we cleaned dishes after meals) after the krishi classes. I do not remember who that classmate was, but I am sure he remembers it vividly to this day. 

The krishi classes of the school still enable me to think how thankless and unseen are the toils of an average farmer. Much different from the romantic ideas about agriculture of a youngster who may have studied in a Doon or a Mayo, in a metropolis or in the protected environs of a city school. Shri Raghuvanshji gave us the vision to see that beneath and beyond the seemingly green croplands and swaying-in-the-breeze ears of corn and wheat, there has gone the unacknowledged and unseen hours and days of the farmer's back breaking hard labour. We had heard in our childhood that India was principally an agricultural country. We learnt how and who made it so.

Thank you, Shri Raghuvansh Ji!

कितना तुम पर गर्व हमें

मुंबई में २६ नवंबर, २००८  को  हुए  आतंकी  हमले  में  शहीद  वीर-सेनानियों  के  नाम  एक राष्ट्र,  एक पिता, एक  पुत्र  तथा  एक  पत्नी  की  श्रद्धांजलियाँ

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ओ सैनिक …

महाप्रयाण की क्या जल्दी थी
ओ शहीद! कुछ रुक कर जाते
कितना तुम पर गर्व हमें है
यह तुमको बतला तो पाते

सिर्फ़ कल्पना के संबल से
क्या तुमको हम याद करेंगे?
कैसे आँखों में पानी भर
छाती में हम गर्व भरेंगे?

घुसा देश में जब बैरी था
मचा रहा था हाहाकार
दौड़ पड़े तुम कफ़न बाँध कर
पीछे हुई अनसुनी पुकार

घुसा घरों में सड़कों पर
जब शत्रु आग बरसाता होगा
हर मोड़ हर चौराहे पर
तुमसे हुआ सामना होगा

दुश्मन के कलुषित मंसूबे
तुमने काट गिराए होंगे
कलम किए होंगे उनके सिर
घाव स्वयं भी खाए होंगे

गली-गली में घुसे कायरों
जैसे आतंकी दुबके थे
निरपराध अनजान जनों पर

बमों गोलियों के भभके थे

देख प्रलय की इस अग्नि को
खून तुम्हारा खौला होगा
देश प्रेम के पलड़े तुमने
प्राणों को तब तौला होंगा

दौड़ पड़े होगे बेबाक
तुम महाकाल की बोली पर
हाय तुम्हारा नाम लिखा था
आतंकी की गोली पर

घायल हाथों से भी तुमने

खल को धूल चटाई होगी
हमें यकीन है गोली तुमने

हँसते-हँसते खाई होगी

पर ऐसी भी क्या जल्दी थी
ओ सैनिक कुछ रुक कर जाते
कितना तुम पर गर्व हमें है
यह तुमको बतला तो पाते

ऐ बेटे ...

छोटे थे जब हाथ तुम्हारे
फिसल खिलौने गिर जाते थे
अपनी तुतली बोली में तुम
तीन-चार तक गिन पाते थे

कैसे उन हाथों ने थामी होंगी
बंदूकें शमशीर
और उतारी होंगी गोलियाँ
दुश्मन की छाती को चीर

होली के रंगों से चिढ़ तुम
भाग-भाग कर थे छुप जाते
फिर किस-किस कोने में छुप कर
हम पर खूब रंग बरसाते

पर यह खून की होली तुमने
आगे बढ़कर खेली होगी
बर्बर आतंकी की गोली
हँसते-हँसते झेली होगी

मन तो है ग़मगीन परंतु

शान से चौड़ा सीना है

नकली पत्थर के रत्नों में
मेरा लाल नगीना है

हर शहीद को स्वर्ग मिलेगा
नक्षत्रों ने यह लिख डाला
पर मुझसे पहले जाओगे
इसीलिए क्या मैने पाला?

पर ऐसी भी क्या जल्दी थी
ऐ बेटे कुछ रुक कर जाते

कितना तुम पर गर्व हमें है
हम तुमको बतला तो पाते

ओ पापा ...

मेले, बाज़ारों, उत्सव में
उंगली पकड़ घुमाते थे तुम
मेरी ज़िद और नादानी पर
नहीं कभी झुंझलाते थे तुम

किंतु आज अपनी अकुलाहट
अब मैं किसके सम्मुख खोलूं
कई प्रश्न भी अनसुलझे हैं
अब किन बाहों में मैं झूलूँ

किंतु सोच कर रोमांचित हूँ
तुमने खूब खदेड़ा होगा
सब पापा हों, जैसा मेरा
पार न उनका बेड़ा होगा

दुश्मन को तो चुन-चुन करके
तुमने खूब रपेटा होगा
हाथ तुम्हारे पड़ते ही वह
झट धरती पर लेटा होगा

पर पापा क्यों चले गये तुम
अभी कहानियाँ पड़ीं अधूरी
कैसे करूँ अकेले पार
जीवन की यह लंबी दूरी

आँखों में आँसू हैं मेरे
पर सिर बरबस तना हुआ है
मेरा शेर बहादुर पापा
आज देश पर फिदा हुआ है

पर ऐसी भी क्या जल्दी थी
पापा! कुछ तो रुक कर जाते
कितना तुम पर गर्व हमें है
यह तुमको बतला तो पाते

प्रियतम …

इन सशक्त हाथों में मुझको
जीवन का आधार मिला था
सुख ही सुख से भरा हुआ
मेरा अपना संसार मिला था

इन हाथों की सेज बनाकर
मैं अपने सपने थी बुनती
इस सीने पर सिर रख कर मैं
मीठी नींद की आहट सुनती

पर हाय मैं भूल गयी थी
तुम न कभी बस मेरे थे
तुम पर निर्भर और देश में
मुझ जैसे बहुतेरे थे

मुझे याद है चाय की प्याली
भी तुम हौले से पीते थे
जीवन के हर पल को रस ले,

ठहर-ठहर कर के जीते थे

पर शत्रु का नाम सुना तो
दौड़ पड़े तुम ले हथियार
ना ठिठके, ना तनिक भी हिचके
नहीं ज़रा भी किया विचार

आज तुम्हारे रणकौशल से

धरती दुश्मन से खाली है
युद्धभूमि में बिखरी किंतु
मेरी माँग की ही लाली है

आतंकी की गोली ने जब

वीर-वक्ष को बींधा होगा
एक बार निश्चय आँखों में
मेरा चेहरा कौंधा होगा

छोड़ चले जो तुम अपना था

मन में दुख छाया तो होगा
साँसें उखड़ीं तब अधरों पर
नाम मेरा आया तो होगा

जाओ! तुम्हें अब क्या रोकू मैं

बेड़ी नहीं, संगिनी हूँ मैं
सुप्त तुम्हारे इन होठों की
केवल मूक रागिनी हूँ मैं

उफ़ न करूँगी दुख पी लूँगी
सिसकी अंदर ही ले लूँगी
राहों में तुम याद आए तो
आँसू अंदर ही पी लूँगी

पर इतनी भी क्या जल्दी थी
प्रियतम! कुछ तो रुक कर जाते
तुमपर कितना गर्व हमें है
यह तुमको बतला तो पाते

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