Malgudi Days.

Fond memories of one of the best serials to grace Indian television, written by one of the best writers India has produced, R K Narayan...here is the title track of Malgudi Days (apparently one has to wait 45 seconds for the download link to appear).

The official website.

Original link via Arjun Prabhu. I was reminded of this classic tune from the post on RasaMania.

IP for software ?

This is a debate that has been raging for a while now, what with the Free Software Foundation being up in arms against software patents.

A UK judge, Sir Robin Jacob, a judge at the UK's court of appeal who specializes in intellectual-property law, has thrown his hat into the ring, stirring the controversy afresh.

As for my personal opinion, well, I am not in favour of either side...while each side has its own merits, I don't agree with evangelising a particular technological cause just because corporations want to make huge profits, or that they should be prevented from working towards their bottomline. So, the jury is still out on that one...

Original link via slashdot.

Happy New Year !

Albeit a little late...

Ethics over economy.

Finally, ethics wins over economics.

The above NY Times article reports how a large number of child porn portals have been shut down. This may only be a temporary setback to the sick folks out there, but at least it's a start. The web portals have shown some sense (and not economic mind you, quite the contrary I would think) to shut these off from their listings.

Political photographs...

Washington Post has a list of its best political photographs of 2005.

Actually the same popup also shows the best in other categories such as Metro, Nation, Sports, and the World.

Red Christmas ?

Apparently, 70% of the world's Christmas paraphrenalia originated in the officially atheist China !

Here are some interesting snippets from that article...

Even the White House now celebrates a Made in China Christmas. In 2003, seven of the trees adorning the US president’s residence were manufactured in China.

In fact more than two thirds of the world’s artificial Christmas trees are made in the single city of Shenzhen.

Well, the times they surely are changing...

Previous posts on "the times they are a changin'" series : 1, 2, 3.

Adjust...

Sumanta Sen writes an excellent article in the Telegraph, about bribery and corruption. And no, its not the same old rant..he is in favour of bribery, and makes a good case for it.

An excerpt from the article...

Thus Bofors made an issue without, as has now transpired, an iota of evidence against Rajiv Gandhi. In fact, no proper inquiry was allowed to be conducted into whether arms can be purchased without some cut money changing hands. It is the same about the oil purchase from Iraq. If the Iraqis had demanded, and received, extra payment they were just playing the game by its rules. Other countries obviously understand this and so the report has evoked little interest in Britain, France and elsewhere. But in India a holier-than-thou attitude must be adopted. For, aren’t we a society untouched by corruption and other such evils? Incidentally, neither in the case of the Bofors cannon nor that of the oil coupons was national interest jeopardized — the guns are good and the oil never posed any threat to the country’s security.

And in lieu of the latest "money-for-questions" scam, here is another interesting paragraph...

Some of the ‘exposed’ MPs have reportedly claimed that they accepted money for their party. Here the Indian political establishment can perhaps follow the Brits. Their political parties accept money from the rich and ambitious and in return, make them lords and knights. Why cannot the same practice be introduced in the country which has adopted the Westminster model?

Some of the Padma awards can be kept aside for the highest bidders. This will certainly bring greater transparency in the conferring of such awards and also explain how some of the funds that parties always have at their disposal make their way into their coffers. But try and suggest this to our leaders and immediately the collective hypocrisy will raise its head, screaming that this will be against Indian culture. Just as every crime is against our culture.

Also, as a friend of mine asked after the Volcker report and the Natwar Singh issue...

How does it really affect Indians and India if someone made some money off of the Iraqi dictator and his oil scam? They were enterprising folks and saw the opportunity for making a quick buck. Let them be.

Team India !

The Indian cricket team has become the most valued global brand in sports ! Here's why...

• Sahara India paid Rs 330 crores for displaying their logo on the players' shirts
• Nike paid Rs. 196.66 crores for kit sponsorship

So, the BCCI will receive $ 27.12 million per year for sponsorship alone !

Previously Juventus held the record at : $ 22.2 million per year.

Good...now if only some of that money would trickle down to improve grass-roots developement of cricket...and may other sports as well.

Secret Diaries.

A collection of secret diaries of characters from the Lord of the Rings series...hilarious to say the least.

Original link from Crystal Blur.

Mallu Blog.

Suryagayatri has a malayalam blog !

BBC's take on Hinduism.

The BBC's article on Hinduism is pretty interesting.

Particularly worth reading is what they write about the Aryan invasion theory. Excerpts from this article...

• There is now ample evidence to show that Muller, and those who followed him, were wrong.
• Modern historians of the area no longer believe that such invasions had such great influence on Indian history. It's now generally accepted that Indian history shows a continuity of progress from the earliest times to today.
  
• The changes brought to India by other cultures are not denied by modern historians, but they are no longer thought to be a major ingredient in the development of Hinduism.

Well, looks like the civilised world is waking up to the truth of the situation.

Of course, certain experts would like us to believe otherwise.

Original link from Varnam.

Other posts related to similar issues : 1, 2, 3.

Corpse Bride.

A corpse bride has been drawing attention in Chihuahua, Mexico. Named La Pascualita, local legend has it that the figure is actually the decades-old embalmed corpse of the former store owner's daughter !

There are also supernatural stories doing the rounds...

• visits by a love-sick French magician who is said to bring the dummy magically to life at night, and take her out on the town
• people say that her gaze follows them around the store
• she shifts positions at night in the darkened shop window to the surprise of passers by

Hello future...this is your past...

Now you can send an email to yourself, to be delivered at a future date !

An excerpt from their website...

it's sorta cool to receive a letter from yourself about where you thought you'd be a year (two years? more?) later. FutureMe.org is based on the principle that memories are less accurate than emails. we strive for accuracy.

Irony.

Akkaraipettai, in Tamil Nadu has a post-modern school, with the latest teaching facilities, state of the art computers and buildings, and has even received a visit from the President.

This is the same school that lost 53 school children in last year's devastating boxing day tsunami. Ironically, the school would never have received all of these facilities, but for the tremendous loss of life it experienced. It received nearly 1.4 crore in donations, which helped rebuild it and provide all of the facilities...

What was once a dilapidated building, where classes were held under a tree, now stand seven new buildings, spacious classrooms, steel desks and benches, an LCD projector and even computers where the students spend an hour every day. Even President A P J Abdul Kalam has gone visiting.

This is an interesting excerpt from the Indian Express article...

In fact, and this is the irony that many here mention when you ask about the school: Had it not been for the tsunami, a fisherman’s daughter could have never laid her hands on a computer keyboard. This village would never have imagined having a Rs 1.40-crore modern school.

Life has its little ironies it seems...

IIT developing rikshaws ?

Since Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattarcharjee has determined to take down the "inhumane" hand-pulled rikshaws of Kolkatta, a design engineer from IIT Guwahati has decided to step in and help out. The result : a nifty tricyle rikshaw !

Other posts related to this story : 1.

Textbook reform linked...

A recent post about Michael Witzel's attempts to block textbook reform, got mention on Desipundit and on the Bharateeya blog mela.

These are great for increasing the coverage for this issue on the blogosphere, and I believe that a concerted effort should be made to ensure that the reforms do go through.

Update on Dec 21, 2005 : Varnam also has a post about this and related issues and has been kind enough to link.

Killing India's "roots" ?

A good write up about the recent spate of name changes for citites in India, in a hurry to "get back to our roots", on Style Station.

I agree especially after the recent ridiculous decision to change Bangalore's name to Bengaluru.

Original link from Desipundit.