And so the day has finally come.....

And so the day has finally come.....

The pictures below reminds me of Shankar's Mudhalvan (Tamil Movie)...infact a very specific scene where the hero Arjun talks with a differently-abled person!

This is already overdue for Shankar reflected the real mood of public in 1999 and politicians kept eluding from the inevitable future! If not for an Arvind Kejriwal some other common man would have done it anyways. And yes there were others who tried but unsuccessful, so lets give AK the due credit for what he had done.

In Shekar Kapur's words 'first they beg, then they knock and then they break open!" (not verbatim)

Food Security - whats the real definition?

"Before 1960 it was Agriculture, after 1960 it is Agribusiness that is import dependent and export oriented, neither the producer nor the consumer is considered but only commerce"

If you know English, its a sin to miss this TEDX video by Dr. G. Nammalvar!

Today and Tomorrow

Today:
Public/Crowd funded political party and Cinema

Tomorrow:
Public/Crowd funded Media, Electricity, Water, Infrastructure, Education, Healthcare,  ...........

So we would eventually stop paying tax, which means there would be no need for a government!

Wow!

So what next?

Does it make me a proud AAP supporter now? Yes but i have to say its still is temporary. I am not talking about not getting the majority since even the media conceded that its already a victory for AAP without even getting to 36. Am talking about the transformation of electoral results to clean governance as someone had already put it. Thats what will make me a real proud AAP supporter.
Am glad and thankful to my friends who donated for AAP, am also thankful to another friend who sat along with me today watching the results turning out, he wasnt aware of AAP till yesterday though aware of Anna and the movement. He is sad that I dint let him know earlier for he could  have donated and felt proud of his involvement today. That is exactly what am hoping and wishing to happen everywhere. It is now, at the least now that every one should wake up to the possibility of saving oneself!  Intentionally or not, most of them are not aware much of the reality of their daily life beyond their family. They are not aware that much of their suffering could be resolved by fixing their govt or otherwise they are not aware or believe that they can fix their govt. When in every single interview Kejriwal repeated the party's manifesto and vision, I got bored and irritated for him repeating the same again and again. But the fact is, there were ppl out there asking for him to do that exactly. They were probably listening him for the first time.
It is not just the honesty, hardwork and donation that did this time, for we know and do talk about so many failed attempts of the past like lok paritran. In my view, it is also the un-parallel intelligence that joined along the race to help the honest this time. No one can forget that there were all kinds of allegations and attacks. I personally wanted AAP to face them, respond them and come out clean. I also warn them to be ready to face even more un imaginable attacks and allegations, for the opponent will also use his own intelligence with power and the victory includes responding successfully all such things.
Now, am not worried about ppl supporting some party even if its not AAP for at least they have a stand now with some reasoning data and awareness and when things unfold in the future they will make their move accordingly. All my worry is about those citizens who are watching this movie without a reaction!. Yes it is those citizens showing any or all kinds of indifference to all the political actions and  more the election results today. If this particular result couldnt get them to move an inch, i just couldnt imagine of anything else that can save them. I pray for them!
I hope and believe atleast those set of ppl who watched everything skeptically holding themselves from supporting in any form will move some inches to do something.
I have to admit my regret for having stopped myself at just donation and fb posts.  I believe my fb posts would have irritated many for so many reasons, but am glad i did what i did. In fact, I did not make it to the rally for AAP today in pune for which i got the personal call from an AAP guy.  Knowing what should be my next step, am myself still falling short as well. I guess I will move there hopefully in the future when its time! Until then i have the right only to ask everyone to stand at the least where i stand today, I mean, Be aware and be supportive in some form! It is not about the country, it is about You!

Angkor Wat

World Largest religious monument at Cambodia built by Surya Varman ll. Khmer Kingdom

Mahabaleshwar again

Made it again yesterday (16th Nov 2013, Sat) with a colleague's family. My wife wasnt along this time. It was more of a better understanding. Did fulfill certain regrets of last trip, like buying radish , visiting Arthur's point, Mahadev and panchganga temples...etc. But this time we missed the shri ram vada pav and also the panchgani point.
Driver this time was good as well but wasnt aware of the points to visit, so took a guide. I realised this trip that there are primarily only 4 locations to visit inside mahabaleshwar and one in panchgani. was actually confused until now by the many different names as points which are actually all grouped to 2 or 3 locations.
So below is the list of places actually to visit in Mahabaleshwar according to my understanding.

1. Needle hole point - Which includes 3 other points like Kate's point, balakwadi dam, elephant head...etc
2. Arthur's seat point  - includes 5 other points in the same location like Malcolm Point, Tiger spring, 3 monkey...etc
3. Mahadev temple - As told by the guide, the Lingam is Swayambu, made of rudraksha and is 5000 years old and the temple structure is 1500 years old. Also the panchganga temple for the 5 rivers (Krishna, sawitri, gayathri, koyna, venna) is near by
4. Venna Lake - boating and horse riding. Paid Rs. 300 for the row boat ride that includes the helper who did the rowing.

The guide took Rs.500 from us after negotiations but thats more than worth it for he actually showed only 3 points as we did visit the lake ourselves. May be 300 would have been right

There is a point at panchgani that we missed this trip becoz of time.

But we made it to other things like the chocolate factory visit (guess this is wat is mapro garden) along with fresh juice shop and restaurant, free strawberry farm visit, tried strawberry with cream, dashing car , go-kart ...etc
The cost of dashing car and go-karting was lesser this trip though was little smaller.
Dashing car : Rs. 90 for double, Rs. 60 for single, Go-kart: Rs 230 for 5 rounds.

We had our lunch at Alishah near venna lake, it was delicious and awesome lunch at 4 pm with lots of chicken.

weather was great with consistent breeze and sun. Though ppl claim the season is between March and May, i found this the right season with right weather.

It seems there is also the Mahabaleshwar market that we dint make it.

Am sure my next trip to Mahabaleshwar will be very better ;-)

My blog of First Mahabaleshwar trip is here

Value of Success!

Only the one who works hard and fails will understand the value of the one working hard and succeeding!

Hate your company? Or loving it?

It only takes one colleague for you to hate your company and it also takes only one colleague to love it as well!

Humanity Reminders

Sense of humanity arise only in disasters, why dont we get yearly disasters 'everywhere' to remind us all the priorities of life?

Sri Ramanin Padhayil - Inspiring Vijay TV Weekend Series

Have been told about this by my mom since last week. She was telling me about this because it had shown some places or temples in and around Maharashtra related to or that were mentioned in Ramayana. Since am in Pune she felt i could make it to some of them as she was also aware i have good interest in traveling, ancient places especially.I told her will look into online. But i had already forgot and today she asked me again if i did check the program on youtube. So had to look for it and found it on youtube under vijaytv's channel.

Its a program in tamil anchored by some one who looks like a priest, he is mentioned as 'Famed Spiritualist Velukudi Krishnan' in the video description. Was little hesitant to watch as the program is 40+ minutes. But within a couple of minutes the anchor impressed me by giving very 'contemporary' advices that too very politely. Advices were generic and about being polite to elders and learned to gain knowledge from them based on their experience and education. And he continued to talk about his travelogue. This is actually a series where, as i understand he narrates the trip  that he had anchored to different places around india that were mentioned/related to ramayana. He had done the trip in 2006 and  2010 taking lots of ppl including young and older and in fact in 2010 trip it was a 15 bus full of ppl for 8000 kms. As he slowly started narrating, he narrated both about the places they visited and also the administrative and handling challenges of such a big trip that spanned more than 10 days. Having done many trips myself with friends and relatives, i could proportionate the difficulties and obstacles he would have faced especially in handling the elder ppl.

It was just one of the total 23 episodes that i watched. He does provide more importantly the much needed sincere, intelligent and contemporary advice through out with examples that every youth of today is missing. I loved his narration equally with the ancient places that he showed. He inspires you to visit the places and also to practice an attitude and behavior that is pleasant for everyone.

Never thought i would but have to admit myself that Am impressed.

Check it out on Vijay Tv's youtube channel. 

Flexible Savings

To be frank, have always been a little scared of saving or recurring deposit schemes which expect  you to pay fixed money for a fixed period. It would also be difficult in closing or withdrawing from those schemes with some making you pay penalty as well. That is why i have one of the least possible life insurance policies. infact i discarded a second policy after paying the first premium in the fear of not paying the future fixed premiums. In these times have come the below three options that have given me hope. The beauty is all three could be managed online, what else will a so called IT guy ask for. (Note: Fourth option of NPS added later)

1. Flexible gold savings: One year back started  with a online savings scheme with Tanishq. it is an 18 month plan where you pay a flexible amount every month online and on completion, Tanishq will give you a bonus which i expect would approx be atleast 6% and you buy for the accumulated total sum with Tanishq at store. The sad part is this scheme is not available anymore but only the 11 month fixed payment scheme where 12th payment is borne by Tanishq. So i had some luck then.

2. Iwish : This is a flexible recurring deposit scheme by ICICI and is available for all ICICI account holders. Ofcourse payment amount is flexible and you are not penalized for missing a month. All maintenance online on your ICICI account that includes opening and closing of the recurring deposit. Am banking on this so much that I hope and wish this will continue for my lifetime with ICICI. Would be great if this spreads to all possible banks.

3. PPF (Public Provident Fund): Ok, this is a retirement planning option, provided by nationalised banks and ICICI, SBI and also ofcourse post office. It would be my savior alternate for the low insurance i have. Since ICICI allows online maintenance with very less paper work for opening it, am looking forward to it as i have just submitted all the docs with the ICICI branch. You can pay as low as Rs 500 for a whole year and as max as 1L per year. Interest compounded annually. It has loan and withdrawal options starting after 3rd year. Maturity on 15 years and option to continue after that as well. Its a EEE scheme which means the Principal, Interest and maturity all exempted from tax where the principal exemption though depends on your 80C limit..

Let me know of other options if any available online or not.

Update 29-9-2013: Successfully using my PPF thru ICICI online. My wife wants to open one for herself as well now. Also, heard from a colleague that SBI also provides online maintenance of PPF.

Update: 22-10-2013:
4. NPS (New Pension Scheme) : Was aware of this earlier through icici  demat account online but got the understanding only now. Under this you can do savings thru two types of accounts (Tier 1 and Tier 2) for future pension. While non-withdrawable Tier I account is mandatory for opening of an NPS account, opening of Tier II account is optional based on your requirements. However, an active Tier I account is a pre-requisite for opening a Tier II account.
Minimum of Rs. 6000 required per year for Tier 1 and Rs. 2000 for Tier 2. Savings under Tier 2 can be withdrawn any time. Most important to note is that you can choose to invest the money in your NPS the way you want in the available 3 options as mentioned below, that too with your choosen fund manager (SBI, ICICI...etc) for better returns
Asset Class E - investments in predominantly equity market instruments. --Max 50%
Asset Class C- investments in fixed income instruments other than Government securities.- Max 100%
Asset Class G - investments in Government securities.- Max 100%
You can also select Auto Choice Investment instead where the distribution is done based on your age.
Though the returns has been good so far (>10%), there is no guarantee on the returns on maturity.
Upon attainment of the age of 60 years at least 40% of the accumulated pension wealth needs to be utilized for purchase of annuity. ICICI demat online helps you open it online. But there are also attached charges and penalties as needed with NPS in general. Tax deduction under 80CCD available
For more details : http://www.pfrda.org.in

Disclaimer:
This post is only to help and give an idea about available saving options in India. Make sure to carefully verify the options before using them yourself. I wouldnt be liable or responsible whatsoever for any kind of loss or impact or effect...etc due to the usage of this blog post.

I hate puppies

Original Date of Post: 06-Mar-2008

Location : Vellore, just in front of gate of our house. (in the first pic we are sitting facing our gates, ie photographer is in our gate side)

Story now: I was with my kutties (lokkesh and rajalakshmi playing cricket, do u see the tennis ball in the 1^st pic?). Infact they were 4 puppies, much identical you could see, from the next street, caught them when they just crossed my home. But unfortunately cudnt get them all in one shot, all were running in diff directionsL

Last weekend,

They ran awy from me after some time J

Thanks & Regards,

Ragavendran

A day out

Original Date of Post: 26-Jul-2008

We booked the tickets for 12.30 show @ Satyam for Subramaniapuram. And we also planned to go for spencers after that.

After nice Ghee Pongal @ uppii, we (Me, Giri anna, Anni, Abi, Daniel from Infy, Arun from Ford) caught the 9.40 train at sp Koil as planned.

Train journey was so pleasant for myself and abi as we were listening to music with my N70 J. On reaching Egmore, Giri anna and Daniel finished their lunch while others had a coffee @ vasantha bavan. Everyone again took Lemon Soda.

I thought we need 2 Autos, and while I was bargaining with auto wallahs, Giri Anna, confirmed one auto for all of us (5 elders and Abi J). We did make it to theatre for Rs. 50.

Interval went off with Popcorn and Coke as usual.

When the film was over Giri anna as usual scolded me for taking to that film as he felt the movie too violent. Wat to do, I already informed them abt the violenceL

And luckily for me, Abi forced us everyone to Marina Beach. I wasn’t that much interested in initial plan of spencers as it is month end you know…he he he

One auto again to Marina…….:J

            Note : Abi won the above race with Daniel J

Note : Beautiful Abi with Beautiful Sea

Me and Abi enjoyed a lot in the salt water…..

Note : Yes… she is vomiting the salt water….he he he

And, We started our dream Fort in the Sand…Giri anna and Arun, helped us to complete the Fort with flag and other decorations.

            Note : Here we Go….

Note : The Fort… Dream Fort….

We also had a snake and a boat from Giri anna, a teddy bear from Abi besides the fort!!!

           

            Note: You see the snake above and  Boat below?

Note : yes, the same teddy you saw abi was drawing in the above pics…

Daniel Performed the Official Photographer Role there with great Photos.

Note: Daniel, driving the boat somewhere…in the sand……

Note : Abi’s Best Again …..

As we discussed in the auto while traveling to beach, we all started to Triplicane Parthasarathy temple. Anna took us by walk in the house packed streets.

Was wet with full of sand all over my body and hungry as well and badly wanted a break. After reaching the temple we saw a small mess, we entered in and had a great time (Bajji, Bonda, Vadai, Chola Poori and a coffee to finish J).

Wow, we had beautiful Darshan of Parthasarathy (special darshan – Rs 10 each),

We started by walk after our purchases (drums and whistes….which we used all the way until we reached home….he he he), spent some time in the street’s book show rooms. Then an auto to beach station. We caught the 6.42 direct train to chengalpet, everyone got the seats. We had a final drink of Aavin flavored milk. And then started the slide show of all the pics we had taken the whole day from morning. As we had been chatting and enjoying, reached the sp. Koil station.

Do you think its done, wait, reaching home (uppili), we almost finished the prasadham we bought in the temple, and also a great Anni’s Rasam saadham to end the day.

I left to room with filled Heart J

Some more pics:

Note : Mr Smart (Arun)

Me and Abi enjoyed a lot in the salt water…..

Note : Yes… she is vomiting the salt water….he he he

Note : A lil exhausted .....?

        Note : Here we Go….

Note : Top View…

Note : Do u see the pair out of focus ? ;)

            Note : Can I name it Two Giants ?

Note : Abi’s Best Again …..

Theerthagiri

Original Date of Post: 17-Aug-2007

I visited this temple a month back approx with my uncle and the two kutties. A lovely peaceful one which is approx 4 kms dist from my home. Its in Vasur. This temple is for lord Muruga.

The sad part is I came to know abt this temple only an year back, and from then on I was very much longing to visit. It fulfilled only now. Check the pics below. It has two ponds one at the top near the main tower other at the foot of the hill, near the start of the steps.

Pond at the foot of the hill

From the top, can u see the lit tube lights in the road?

Nearing the tower.

At the top, before the main tower.

Thats Beauty!!!

The pond at the top:

A big Banyan Tree!! Must be very old.

Low Light view: