MUKHBIR and DELHI 6

image courtesy...http://www.pingsense.com/myimages/delhi6.png

Ultimately i saw Delhi-6. And everybody has written so much about, so I wont go into the details, for me...
I t drags at places with an over dose of Ramlila and black monkey.
For me an interesting movie is the one where I get irritated with any interruption the way it happened with fashion, but here I went out to get tea:).
it has Cliche...hindu muslim characters with their fixed specialities:)
Whenever Abhishek smiled, I knew he is going to take the photo from his mobile:).
Roshan is a lovable grandchild who takes everything so sportingly, even the children born and brought up in India are not so accommodating.
Liked the shots of....statue of liberty in chandni chowk,
Bittu eating jalebi in times square.
and the song...genda phool
and in the actors..Abhishek, Sonam and Divya dutta, felt very sad to see Atul kulkarni in such a bad role, I liked him very much in Satta.




This is directed by Mani shankar..no wonder its so interesting, i still remember his earlier...16TH DECEMBER. Its a very different type of movie....This is the story of a Mukhbir...mole....how they are made and how much danger they face, and their mentors also put their life at stake for them.

Kailash( Sameer Dattani) is a Mukhbir, recruited by intelligenc officer..Om puri who is an honest , hardworking officer, its different the way he recruited him as is explained by him that all the mukhbirs are made that way only.
Once Sameer a boy of 18 gets arrested for some crime he didnt do even, and he is all alone in this world, and Om puri leaves him no option..either go to jail or become his informer and then he is trained well. But then Om tries always his best to save him in all tricky situations, and ultimately dies in saving him because his wife took a promise from him not to let kailash get killed, as many of his informers have been.
Then Life ofSameer forms the story..how he goes thru everything..he wants to get out, but once Ompuri is killed he gets a new resolve to avenge his death and goes there willingly with a new mentor..Rehman(Sunil shetty) another upright officer. and then starts the killings, betrayals by govt. officers..the story is chilling at times but very gripping.
and the end saves it from being morbid.
Great movie with great actors, really wonder why didnt they publicise it well.

MY HEART BEATS...FOR EVERYONE

I am asking this question to myself for the last 2-3 days and with a lot of introspection these are the results:-----

I have a heart and it

beats for everybody,

If I feel the pain of a DIL being harassed by inlaws , so I feel sad for the news of... two senior citizen being left on the road every day in Chennai..so much for a city of traditional people.

If I mourn for the Gujarat carnage, so I feel the anguish of people of Godhra.

If I dislike BJP supporting the RSS, so I dislike Congress for supporting Muslim League in kerala.

If I support the freedom to children, then i ask them to respect the elders also.For me Duties and Rights are joined together and inseparable, one cant ask for one thing without taking the other.

If I am a religious person and go the temples regularly, then I go to Haji ali, also ( my father used to send a Chadar every year to Ajmer Dargah) and keep a pin drop silence in the church, as they demand that and I respect them.

If I am proud of my language and state, then i do the utmost efforts to learn Tamil also as I love this language......( I felt very sad to see on this blog( it is a beautiful post I loved it, but it was spoiled by few words) that still there are educated people who hate Hindi and us, I asked them why? If you can embrace English which is a foreign language and even can take pride in speaking it, then what is wrong with Hindi..after all its the language of your fellow countrymen.)

If I love my daughter a lot, then so I do my son too, would like to see both of them happy, not one at the cost of other.

If I want the justice for the dowry harassed girls, then my heart bleeds for the boys also who are being victimised by our laws.

My heart bleeds the same for everyone whether they are people in Mumbai riots or Mumbai blast victims or Hindus in kashmir, it doesnt differentiate the casts.


I never learnt to get bigger by making someone smaller.....kisi line ko bada karne ke liyedoosri ko chhota karna jaroori nahi ha, rather khud ko bada karna jaroori ha

If I rejoice the marriage of my maid Suman and give her a saree then i feel the same joy when my tailor Rashid miya is blessed with a daughter and give her a doll.

For me being secular doesnt mean to down grade anybody, I take pride in my religion, but I respect all other religions also...thats what secularism is all about. and it has to be practised in day.to.day life, not to be discussed only at the time of election.

If I like Premchand then i like Kahlil Zibran also.

If I like Namak Haram so I like Shaheen ( a serial based on muslim story) also

And for me hoisting a Pakistani flag or rejoicing over their wins is not being patriotic or secular.

I am wondering why, my heart doesnt beat selectively like those celebrities or politicians, it should beat only when I can get something out of it.....................I
Is my heart in the right place? please tell me.

I want justice to all and appeasement to none, whether its by caste or gender and that will be the real equality, we must remove all the reservation based on cast or gender anywhere in life, if at all we should have some, then it must be on economic criteria.No subsidies nothing.

I know. for sure ...... I am a truely secular and humane.

WHITE TIGER----ARVIND ADIGA

WHITE TIGER by Arvind adiga..he got the booker prize for this, so i thought I must read it to see what these people write which is so special.
First a little about the story...it s the story of Balram told by himself only to Chinese premier through a letter. Balram comes from the lower strata of society and how he rises to be a top entrepreneur without any good formal education, but with the help of deceit, crime and MONEY.He is a mighty irreverent person talking about even Gods in a foul language.
Though I must say that most of the descriptions or details are true whether they are of people or places. here the writer has used lots of metaphors, like for him there are two type of people in India..one coming from the darkness...poor
others in light..his master and landlords or other rich people.
And he has shown how money can solve everything and can make you a successful businessman or bring you at the top in politics, if you have no ethics or morals yourself.....and this is what i dont like about the story that the protagonist kills his own master cruelly and then doesnt even bother about getting his whole family wiped out by the kins of the person killed...it shows him in a very poor light of humanity...one who has no consideration or compassion even about his own family, leave aside others, are these type of persons worth talking about? or giving them fame? For me he didnt rise in his life, rather fell to the lowest depth possible. Do we want entrepreneurs like him?

few excerpts from the book worth mentioning:---

Fully formed fellows, after twelve years of school and three years of university, wear nice suits,join companies and take orders from other men for the rest of their lives.
Entrepreneurs are made from half-baked clay.

India is two countries in one; an India of Light, and an India of darkness The ocean brings light to My country. Every place on the map of India near ocean is well off. But the river brings darkness to India.the black river.

For me, if the writer wanted to tell the story of deprived people in India, he has done it very poorly, because Balram doesnt get my sympathy at all. And deprivation cant be removed by crime and blood.

Nobody would have given second look to the book , if it was written by somebody else or not got a prize. Once anything is awarded, we start looking at it from a different perspective and seek motives where there are none. So nothing great about it, but yes its not boring, the story is narrated in an interesting way.

JOKER IN THE PACK

This is a book by Ritesh Sharma and Neeraj pahlajani both from IIMs.Its so engrossing and interesting that once you open it, cant leave it without finishing. Seems to be so real, as if its autobiography. Like I read White tiger also..that is also in first person, but this is totally different...one lives those two years with the protagonist.
This book reading was really specially for me as I felt I was peeking into the the two years of my son's life thru the protagonist..Shekhar Varma. I always wondered, what they teach in IIMs to completely transform the personality. My son was totally changed person after these two years.. so confident with a certain charm, whereas earlier he was this care free person, exactly like Shekhar . paragraphs I liked....

Ashok and Vasudha ( parents of Shekhar) had made a silent pledge within their hearts to leave no stone unturned in pampering him with all that they never got during their own lives. " All they never got was not an idyllic garden laden with cookies and cream pies, All that they never got was good schooling in an English medium institutions, tutions to supplement the schooling and circle of friends focused on education.

If four consecutive questions were answered as one of either options b or c, there was a high probability that one of them would be right and greater than 50 percent probability that two of them would be right.

Two kinds of people go on to become successful....... those with extraordinary merit or those with extraordinary jugaad.

A long as they are getting what they want IIM guys can be really nice people.....its just the expectations we have that are so high, that its hard to get us what we want.

But in the end I felt sad when he (Shekhar) said, he felt happy to be back at hostel from home........ and realised that children grow like this only:)

WHAT IS IN A NAME, NO...SURNAME?

This post is continuation if my earlier one, just the way a dress cant decide our status and thinking, so is the surname.Its only a part of our patriarchal society, now most of the girls will say..oh they want matriarchal...but that wont change anything..we have to follow a system, if today its the name of husband..the girls have a problem, tomorrow it will be the name of wife and men will have a grudge.

What is in a name.. a lot, but what is a hot discussion now.a.days is that....... changing of surname after marriage. One girl says she doesnt want to change her name, its her identity and what she has been for last so many year:) and all the girls flock to her comment section declaring...me too, me too:)..

Is the surname our identity? or our identity is limited to our surnames only? For a woman of substance her identity is..

Her qualifications.......when we see a doctor, do we ever bother about what her surname is?

her deeds.........any good person is loved and appreciated who cares for her surname.

her personality.

I dont write my surname on my blog, does that mean I have no identity? Most of my blogger friends tell me that i am a traditional person with values intact....How do they know? maine to surname laga nahi rakha:), its thru my views only.

This changing of surname after marriage is just conforming to the system made to facilitate many things in life, just imagine a scenario where... ( Rohini --a blogger on whose blog I read this discussion)also wondered about this though)

Amit goel marries Leena chopra

after marriage she becomes Leena chopra goel and suppose she is a firebrand feminist then she would like her children to be called.......that

and then these children marry the progeny of another feminist...Rita bhatia gupta, so now the children will be called.......................too long to write:) even. Why we are putting our children to so much of funny ideas and complications.

Changing the surname and following the culture and traditions of inlaws( imagine a scenario where a girl comes into the family, and the family has been celebrating a festival for last 40 years in a certain traditional way, now the girl wants it to be celebrated her parent's way also, now what will happen...

If two ways are followed, any traditon is diluted, rather its not a tradition at all,and creates a confusion or

if she wants to do it her way..will she and other family memebers go their own way? and the boy who has been doing it his mother's way so far will now be in a dilemma, living in same house its not possible to celebrate it separately.) is not a domination by anybody over anybody--its just to save the confusion in life, for the family to be homogenous..all with the same surname....A family of

Amit gupta..husband

Leena chopra wife

and children.....gGupta chopra doesnt look like a family even.

I just dont under stand from where all this ego is coming...I, my identity.

Everybody knows Kiran Bedi..she has an identity of a strong woman.surname changed or not nobody knows or wants to know.

Indira Gandhi...Did she loose her identity even after changing herself to Gandhi, she was a person par excellence and she remains that.

I can give you hundred examples where women have shone and created a niche identity for themselves, without bothering about this surname business. All these dilemmas are created by western thinking where family means only husband wife and children, but even then abroad also they take the name of husband.
Yes names are important, not surnames. I never put surname with my daughter's name, because before marriage one lives only one fourth of life, major part is lived after marriage only, and I didnt want her to have any hassles of changing the surname. I dont know why people want to live a life of denial, like denying all the things which are important after marriage or for grown ups.
Childhood is a foundation on which the building of life is constructed. Foundation is best in the ground, then only the building will be strong. A tree has roots which give it support to stand but they always remain buried in the ground, its only the leaves are visible,it cant live without roots but cant have any fruits without shoots(leaves)
Change is the only thing in life which is constant and necessary for growth. Men and woman are not adversaries but compliment each other beautifully, no one is complete without the other,we need them as much as they need us, it should never be we versus them, but only you and me= we, as sometime back someone wrote on my blog...life is not about looking at each other only but looking in the same direction TOGETHER.

WEEKLY UPDATE

Now-a-day whatever you see our celebrities, they are always in western dresses or sometimes in sarees. Earlier even in Movies, film star used to dress in something so glamorous and royal, that public used to fawn over them and copy and today public derides them. What a difference!I can find much better sarees in the showrooms without any designer tag and price, and here our designers produce something so drab and nonstrikingand non descript types.
Then there is these words.......Behenji and Diva..but i really dont know what that means...Is anybody wearing our own Indian attire becomes behenji, then for the foreigners salwar kameej clad women must be the modern woman?
Or it is that wearing a saree without a blouse makes you Diva? then all those adivasiis women are really Divas from the time immemorial?
Literally we call sister.behen..when and how that became a negative word I dont know, or we have started taking that relationship this way?
Why a western wear Gown makes anyone elite or designer or a fashion diva?
or this is all about skin show? Even then shouldnt a person respecting indian culture must be ATLEAST CONSIDERED equal to those westernised, isnt it?
We have so many myths like.......
A person speaking good English is intelligent...helloooooo.....English is just a language, and proficiency in any language doesnt make one intellectual.
Wearing western dresses helps you climb the steps in the hierarchy of society...... and its a fact that still in India anything western is given more attention, all of you must have seen that even in our neighbourhood, our relatives living abroad are given VIP status.
And now what is the purpose of all this debate? i just want people to give due importance to the person..not the language or dress. and my personal take is this... ATTITUDE not the dress makes you Diva or whatever.
I find Rathna pathak Shah much more stylish than all those Bipashas and kareenas.and Gauri's
Shabana Ajmi..much more elegant in an ethnic saree than all those skanky ones.
Rekha in Silsila..in sarees..my ultimate idea of elegance and fashion combined..she started the trend of plain saress with those necks in the blouses.
Kiron kher..most of the time.
But now I must be sounding like an old person being nostalgic and blah blah.....:), present days I like katrina, Genelia, Asin, Kajol, Rani.....
Yesterday there was this award show....Gr8 INDIAN WOMEN ON ZEE TV, a beautiful show and women of really substance in all the fields were awarded, and it had a large no. of REAL women dressed most elegantly and looking beautiful.a sight to behold.
Then I saw Fashion.....after a very long time i saw a movie, I dint want to end:). We always say he has shown how the fashion world works..I cant say that, because I dont know anything about them , but whatever is there..its totally entertaining, and I specially liked here.... That friend of Meghna..Rohit ( I dont know this actor, if somebody knows please tell me), Kitu Gidwani, Priyanka, Mugdha..in the same order. I felt sad to see Sameer soni., I first saw him long back in a serial..MOUTHFUL OF SKY for the first time and in that serial he was just superb..in looks and acting both, how he has gone down. Arbaaj ..his expressions never change, quite a saintly person:).sukh ho ya dukh kuch effect nahi hota..hehe.
And then i saw I LOVE TROUBLE...another Julia Roberts' movie and a thorough entertainer:).

POT POURI

The more time you spend as a caregiver,
the less time you will spend as the cared for.

The more you provide, the less you will be in need.

Science bears this out with hard facts. Those that do volunteer work to help those in need stay healthier than those who don'tdo volunteer work.

If you do not like something, then change it. If you can not change it, then change the way you think about it."

Distances does not matter when the memories are
and Special People are not forgotten when they remain in Heart Beats"..........

You do not choose your destiny,It chooses you.

मैं खुद को कुछ इस तरह पाता हूँ ...
चेहरे बदलने का हुनर मुझमैं नहीं ,
दर्द दिल में हो तो हसँने का हुनर मुझमें नहीं,
मैं तो आईना हुँ तुझसे तुझ जैसी ही मैं बात करू,
टूट कर सँवरने का हुनर मुझमैं नहीं ।
चलते चलते थम जाने का हुनर मुझमैं नहीं,
एक बार मिल के छोड जाने का हुनर मुझमैं नहीं ,
मैं तो दरिया हुँ ,
बहता ही रहा ,तूफान से डर जाने का हुनर मुझमैं नही


Always ask God to give you what you Deserve,
Not what you desire,
Because your desires may be few,
But YOU deserve A LOT !!!

Life never turns the way we want,
But we live it the best way we can,
There is no perfect life,
But we can fill it with perfect moments.

An arrow can be sent only by dragging it back,
So when life is dragging you back with difficulties,
it means that it is going to launch you into victory.

Alexander's beautiful last words....
Bury my body, dont build any monuments,
Keep my hand outside, so the world knows-
Who won the world had nothing in hand,
when he died.

Never design your character like a garden,
Where anyone can walk.
design it like the sky where
everyone aspires to reach.

A mentor is not a person who gives you advice.A mentor is a person whose advice you follow.~Mike Murdoch~

Learn to write your pains on the sand,
Where waves of forgiveness can erase it.
carve your joys in stone,
where even rain cant erase it.

Source..all collected either from newspaper, or sent by Rahul

HOLI KE RANG---KITNE ALAG AUR KITNE SANG

Khaa key gujiya, pee key bhaang,
laaga k thora thora sa rang,
baaja ke dholak aur mridang,
khele holi hum tere sang.
HOLI MUBARAK!!!!

Holi par sabhi ko sabhi rango se milkar ek rang,
apko mile jo apki khusiyon ko rangin bana de.
Happy Holi!!






Rang udaye Pichkari
rang se rang jaye duniya sari
holi ke rang aapke jeevan ko rang de
ye shubha kaana hai hamari.
HAPPY HOLI !!!

Rango Ke Tyohar Me Sabhi Rango Ki Ho Bharmar Dher Saari Khushiyo Se Bhara Ho Aapka Sansar,
Yahi Dua hai Bhagwan Se Hamari Har bar,
Holi Mubarak!


Makki ki Roti, Nimbu ka Aachar, Suraj Ki Kirne, Khushiyo ki Bahar,
Chand Ki Chandi, Apno ka Pyar,
Mubarak Ho Aapko, HOLI ka Tyohar



Pichkari ki dhar,
gular ki bauchar,
apno ka pyar,
yahi hai HOLI ka tyohar.
Wishing you and your family a very hapy and colourful HOLI.




Lal, gulabi, neela, pila hathon me liya samet
Holi ke din rangenge sajni, kar ke meethi bhent.



Gul ne gulshan se gulfam bheja hai,
Sitaro ne aasman se salaam bheja hai,
Mubaraq ho aapko holi ka tyohar
Humne dil se yeh paigam bheja hai.



Rango ke tyohar mein sabhi rango ki ho bharmar,
Dher saari khushiyon se bhara ho aapka sansar,
Yahi dua hai bhagwan se hamari har bar,
Holi Mubarak ho mere yaar!


Dipped in hues of love and trust has come the festival of Holi. Happy Holi!! Bright colors, water balloons, lavish gujiyas and melodious songs are the ingredients of perfect Holi.



Wish you a very happy and wonderful Holi.



May God gift you all the colors of life,colors of joy, colors of happiness, colors of friendship,
colors of love and all other colors you want to paint in your life.
Happy Holi.
If wishes come in rainbow colors thenI would send the brightest one to say



Happy Holi.
Best wishes to you for a Holi filled with sweet moments and memories to cherish for long.Happy Holi!!!

Source..email

MIX N MATCH

For last 5 days I was without my comp:( and it was as if life has just stopped:). and now i dont know what to write or where to start, seems to me as if I have lost the touch., So this post is about nothing special, just a pot pouri of many thoughts and things.
Since I didnt have computer working, so i saw a lot of movies..Ruthless people (its remake was i think..mujhe meri bibi se bachao) , Dear Frankie, Far & Away Donny brasco, Erin brokovich.
In Hindi there was nothing good on TV and nothing which I havent seen earlier.
TV serials...i have stopped watching Balika badhu, and so have most of my aquantances i talked to, as its going down the drain as it happens with all the serials. Now there is a new channel..REAL.. and it has started with a lot of promise.. i saw 2 episodes of a serial..NAMAK HARAM ( no resemblance to the movie except the corruption of bussiness houses).....Sachin Sharma has done a swell job and Narayni shastri is also very convincing as an IAS officer except that i am yet to see an IAS officer with a hairstyle of a model:). and then there is a new reality show...SARKAR KI DUNIA and few game shows.
Then I watched yesterday Filmfare Awards............so lets have some gossip:)
The function was very lifeless..no spark at all...no good performances, no good designers, absolutely nothing to watch for, Deepika as an anchor wore a saree looking totally washed out and blouse has become a total casualty in this generation,and Konkona was looking like a heroine of 70's. Bipasha always makes a mockery of dressing in an elegant indian saree, I wish she restricts herself to western dresses. indian dresses look elegant only covered .Total ceremony was so lacklustre. Om Puri, one of my favourite actor got a life time achievement award and was given by Amitabh bacchan, and I was waiting for some powerful speeches, but sadly both dissappointed me, both gave the shortest speech possible.
Shahid gave a performance and Kareena aplauded, but Shahid has lost his smile and a sad person performing is not a treat for viewers, Abhishek was looking like a clown, only Katrina was looking beautiful like a porcelain statue she is. Farhan sang but only Adhuna liked his song so much to get hyper excited,he is a looker and a good director also, but singer???? But see the irony......of our ways....he got more aplause than Sukhvinder( he didnt perform but came on stage to take his award for best male playback singer), we never aplaud the talent but the person.
Trying to avoid controversies, this time Imran and Ranbir were so sugary sweet that one could become diabetic:) Both were looking dashing but they need lessons, I sorely missed the combo of Saif and Shahrukh. Even Karan johar is now-a-days repeating himself all the time.
Earlier there used to be some good performances from comedians and others, now nothing was there...itni badi industry aur lag raha tha ki koi ha hi nahi.and i was surprised to see Rekha with Sindoor, earlier also on some channel they were showing like a detective serial that they saw her going to mahalakshmi temple with sindoor and all....aakhir chakkar kya ha? , nobody has the guts to ask her this question, so they keep guessing.

And then yesterday in our complex we celebrated Woman's day.......with games eats and then felicitating our women workers. and then i got two sms, which I am sharing with all my women friends:)

A woman of real beauty smiles in trouble,
gathers strength from distress and
grows brave through prayer. ( this is from my sister)
She is elegant,yet strong.
delicate yet powerful
beautiful yet dangerous
Tender yet bold,
She gives life,
she gives love,
She makes the whole world.....yes she is the one and only you.
Proud to be a woman.....Happy woman's day! ( This is from Sandhya..my friend from blogville)

SOULFUL, SLOW AND MELODIOUS SONGS

I was tagged by Destination Infinity and Dust unsettled for this. This is a very musical tag where the tagged is supposed to write 10 favourite songs--soulful,slow and melodious, in each of the languages they know or any two given by them. I dont know songs in any other language than Hindi,Plus I cant upload them, may be I will ask my daughter to do that for me:) if possible My favourites will be more than 100 and its very difficult to shortlist them, may be I will keep updating the list as and when I remember:), so the list starts like this...

1. Aapki aankho me kuch mehke hue se khwab hain.....movie is..GHAR
2. Aji is kadar yun na sharma ke.........movie is MASOOM....the one with Naseeruddin shah
3. Beiraada najar mil gayi to.........movie is SANAM BEBAFA
4. Ham se nahi sahi gairo vse sahi......movie is PIGHALTA ASMAN
5. Jis din se juda woh ham se hue is dil ne......non filmi..Sonu Nigam
6. Na kajere ki dhar, na motiyon ke haar....MOHRA
7. Arey dwarplaon kanhaiya se keh do.garib dudama kareeb aa gaya ha....this is a bhajan, I dont know from where, my nephew gave it to me and I just love it
8. Maula mere le le meri jaan..Chak de.. and I likeD it more when Varun Badola sang it on Sahara reality show, he sang it with so much emotion.
9. Ma tujhe salaam....A R Rehman.
10. Najar se phool chunti ha najar...Ahista ahista..old movie with Kunal kappor and padmini kolhapure

Then i love the ghazals of Talat Aziz and music of OP nayyar, all songs of EK MUSAAFIR EK HASEENA, JAHANAARA BAZAAR etc.
I would like to tag.....
Nancy , Enigma , Frankly speaking, Sandhya, Piper ,solilo., Deeply dip and Pixie. and all of you may do it in any two languages you know.