RECESSION BLUES

Now at this moment of time you have the whole world talking about recessions,take-over,bankruptcy etc. But the problem is how do we know that recession is around. We don’t watch CNN neither we work at GM. We have no company to take-over nor a company to be taken over by our poor Indian government. We have just voted for a long standing government and we believe that it will take care of the recession in India as we have its leader a lecturer from Cambridge in economics. For us whether India is doing well or not depends on how our stock markets are performing and an occasional glance at the GDP. That too we only know its good if it is around 8% as China maintains that. So how do we the insolent, ignorant people, rustic from the backwaters of a Third world country know it is recession. Well do not fear cause the expert is here. Here are signs if you notice this around you know it is recession.

1.Your daily rag-picker carries a Satyam, Wipro, Cognizant, TCS identity card. No he is not flashing a style statement nor is he emotionally attached to the company. But he is actually a recruited guy waiting for his appointment letter.
2.You find a General Motors or a Satyam hoarding in your garbage. Or you might find your son using those hoardings as stumps during gully-cricket.
3.You find I luv GM,I luv Satyam coffee mugs, flash-drives, T-shirts at Sunday Bazaar, Revdi Bazaar, Mohammad Ali Road, Chor Bazaar and don’t know how many other Bazaars. Caution : The above listed products will not be found at Big Bazaar because Big Bazaar is one of the items kept for sale at Chor Bazaar.
4.You will find people writing more posts on blogspot. They have no useful thing to do.
5.You will find scraps from those guys that have never scrapped you or poked you or tweeted you , I don’t know what those mean but suddenly such occurrences increase and you say Whoa! Duggu, he still remembers me.
6.You find that your resume cannot be accepted at any of the company websites because their server is overloaded with them.
7.You find some guy coming in the night and knocking at your door and asking “Walk-ins chalu hai kya?”. This is insane.
8.Suddenly you find that there are youngsters working in all the kirana stores, mom and pop stores, grocery stores (sabzi mandi ,I had to be subtle), hair saloon (hajaam ki dukan, again I had to subtle) etc. You think the trends of the western countries are picking up in India where children for their education but one more look at the person at the grocery stores and you say “Yeh to wahi ladka hai jisne IIT clear kiya tha” And you are left to wonder.
9.You will find parents of engineering students exclaiming that “Mene kaha tha ki Mechanical engineer mechanic banta hai, electrical engineer electrician banta hai aur computer engineer dono bante hai i.e.(mechanic and electrician).
10.Sadly the author cannot find the 10th sign because he is a computer engineer and on the keyboard he cannot the find the number 10.

ESPN STAR COVERAGE

Its cricket season again and we have some of the best tournaments coming this year. We all see our stars on the television performing their hearts out against different teams and they do entertain us.
However one unsung hero who goes unpraised often is the media coverage which brings such live action right into our homes, with some flavours added on their own to entertain us even more. One thing however that I noticed was that not each and every channel is able to maintain high quality viewing to us viewers. For e.g. the ESPN coverage is the most optimum and they have set a benchmark which other channels should dream of achieving. We have Set Max's coverage of the IPL and the world cup upto 2010. And I have to say their coverage of the game is the worst. With prematch and post match analysis populated by the "so called" celebrities rather than proper cricket pundits. You have experts like Ian Chappel ,Gavaskar bewildered by the discussion going on during the prematch analysis. Like what does the astrologer say about the match analysis. is there some rift between the senior and the junior cricket members. One other day I heard cricketers were not able to concentrate on their matches because of their faces being used on the advertising boards. All this tamasha just to degrade the purity of the game. You have Laxman Siva RAma krishnan sliding down some slides while a four or six is being hit. You cannot see what happened to the last and the first ball, because of silly ads being thrown in. You don't what happened to the last ball of the match and hence have to wait for the limca girl to stop hopping and dancing around to know the result of the game. Steve Waugh a legend once commented that Indian coverage of the game was unwatchable.
However one can be assured of the quality offered by the ESPN coverage with ball by ball replay with greats like Wessels, Shastri, Gavaskar,Hadlee in com-box talking serious cricket instead of fake celebrities.

Pakistan old script new cover

Last week with the release of the Lakshar-e-Toiba chief Sayeed, Pakistan has once again shown how indifferent it can be on its set of policies. Even after so many attacks by the militants in Lahore and other major Pakistani cities, still it has not learnt the lesson. And the lesson is to stop sheltering terrorism on its homeland. And as it stands the attacks that have been made have been on religious shrines and other such holy places. Just yesterday a bomb blasts in Lahore killed around 40. Capturing of training cadets was another incident of blantant disrespect to law and order. All these attacks are again reinstating that Pakistan as a state is failing. Yes such chaos in a country states its on the verge ending its life.
But does such a state of affairs affect any of the world administration. Already we have U.S. drones attacking the Pakistani SWAT just to flush out the terrorists. The FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas) are not in favour of such a move, because in the name of flushing out of the terrorists innocent victims are the one being hit.
Even in such state of affairs Pakistan is releasing international terrorist for lack of sufficient proof. Such blatant disregard to the constant efforts by the Indian government to nail such terrorist are another chapter in Indo-PAk deaing with terrorism.
Instead of looking at this grave situation and the turmoil being built by them, they are more concerned with India's hand in shifting the Champions Trophy from Pakistan and into India. I think they are forgetting the attacks on the Sril-Lankan Cricket team just recently. All and all if such state of affairs continue then it would be not long before we see Afghan like Pakistan.

BING VS GOOGLE :WOLFRAM ALPHA

The name suggests it and it is quite right that BING is not Google.Bing the newest search engine developed by the evil Microsoft Corporation who intend only to do evil Yeah that is right MS has again tied quite shamefully google’s method of earning money that is placing no advertisements on their homepage of bing. It has done nothing new to enhance searching capabilities of Google. It is the same thing it is like you are seeing two same results on both Google and Bing. Yeah there is no difference between the search results of Bing and Google. I think that Bing has a provided a Bing like interface with some really poor design and behind that dirty interface they have secretly kept a Google link. By seeing its results by the search engine it seems the same. Again Bing has added some really stupid features to prove its genuinity first of all it has added in the images section the history or extra details for the search term. Then the maps is almost the same. One another thing that I noticed about Bing is that it takes an awful lots of time to get loaded. I don’t what is the reason behind it but the coders forgot the slow modem testing thinking that it is an extinct variety.

After Bing another new and recent opening is the Wolfram Alpha the computing engine. Basically people have mistaken this for another search engine. But actually it is a search engine with some serious computing power and huge amount of statistical results. For e.g. if you want to know the population of a country then in Google we get the link to the particular information, but not so in WolframAlpha,it directly gives you the required information. By the way its name suggests it to be some Nazi secret project but actually it is of its creator. It has awesome computing power where you can get anything related to numbers done. You can enter equations get conversions, graphs and other sort of mysterious information required by high end experts I suppose.

T20 Analysis-Team Australia

The Australians could be the surprise underdog in this years T20. Not that the Australians are ever labeled as the underdogs in any tournament but a quick look at their team formation and we can see that they are not the favourites that they are always so used to. First of all they have not found a potent opening combination since the departure of Hayden and Gilchrist. Although they have found some respite in Haddin and Clarke. But both are essentially middle-order specialists whom I doubt would be as successful as their previous kings. Haddin is essentially a straight down the ground hitter who is good in clearing the in-field during the power-plays.Clarke will essentially play the anchor role with others. Then comes their real strength their explosive middle order, here is where the tournament will be won and lost for them. They have classy Ponting to begin with,followed by the explosive Andrew Symonds who is already looking in ominous form during the recent IPL. They have the Hussey brothers who can manuoevere and use the handle to good effect.Then comes their selection dilemma between Watson and Hopes.Both are equally destructive and chances are that both of them will be played at the cost of mostly David Hussey,the Victorian bomber. Then comes their bowling line-up which is mostly uni-dimensional and pace oriented. Except for Bracken all the others are fast and furious who can hit the deck hard without too much lateral movement ,which could be a case of not exploiting the English conditions to the full. Lee has struggled on the English pitches because of his failure to use the Kookaburra balls. Moreover Johnson would be their only potent attack,who too is relatively inexperienced. The major problem that Australia faces in the bowling department is absence of a quality spinner. This could be a chink in their armour as far as I am concerned. As we have seen that spinners even part-timers have an important role to play in this format. Last year when Yuvraj went on a rampage against them in the semi-finals the absence of a quality spinner hurt them, as Yuvraj was pulling their hit-the-deck hard kind of bowlers over midwicket with relative ease.

Although the Australians do seem to be an underdog, but in T20 format it is not bad to have that tag, because as we have seen from our past experiences that it’s the cup of the underdogs.Hence this could be a blessing in disguise for Ponting and his men who would be in real pressure situation this time around, because the Australians don’t like their trophy section to seem empty.

BARACK OBAMA MR. PERFECT

Its been more than 100 days for the President of USA and we have found out that the guy is impenetrable. Not that he boasts of some of the best security in town.But he has a certain demenaour with him that makes him a strange man to talk about. The reason I am saying this is that after so many days in the office not many have been able to make fun of him. Yes that's right try hard think hard and tell me the last time that Obama was made fun of. Not that America consists of some guys with the dryest sense of humour,but yeah its true that its hard to make fun of the President.

If you see during the Bush era everyone was taking potshots at the President. He I think was the most made fun of guy in the entire U.S. presidential legacy. I think some of the comedians earned their living by making fun of Bush. I think along with recession these guys are also facing hard time. That was because Bush was the most unpredicatable caricatture that a cartoonist named God could ever draw. No one can know what he was upto at the very next moment. At the very extreme is Obama, he is the boring, perfect kind of a guy, whom political satirist hate.He is very much like the common man who leads a boring well planned life with his pension secure.

They say its hard to rob an honest guy,similarly its the most difficult thing to amke fun of a simple dwon to earth guy who knows what he is doing.

Australia's racist turn

With the recent attacks on Indians on Australian soil one has to wonder why the hell are the Indians being the constant targets of racist groups. Whether it’s the English, Americans, and now the Australians. We are the butt of so many jokes which are not taken seriously but still if there is a joke, there is some feeling of resentment that is hiding its ugly face inside. I think now it’s the time that the Indians instead of holding silly peace rallies in foreign countries and ranting same old reasons for attacks like we better than the foreigners and they being jealous of us, look ourselves in the mirror and give ourselves a dress rehearsal to ourselves.

If we are so better than those foreigners then why do we leave India in the first place and work for those racist pigs. If you are so brilliant then use it in India you will earn far more respect in India than all those dollars can ever buy. Today if a guy prefers to work in India he is called a rustic, a man who does not have the guts to leave his home a man who is afraid to leave his house and who thinks small. If that is the case my dear friend if you are so enterprising, daring and extrovert why don’t you choose to set up a company of your own and make an acquisition of a foreign firm instead of licking somebody who thinks that all Indians know is to set up a damn shop in corner and all he can do in his life is cook curry and get married at the age of 25.

If red tape is the reason which is stopping you from setting up your firm then stay in India and vote damn it instead of flaunting your green card of H! visa own a Indian voter ID first. Even if it’s a small step at least it’s a positive one. Why do you point your crooked finger at the Indian system instead of accepting that you are too afraid to compete in India because of the large amount of guys who think that Indian education is no less than a foreign degree? If you think that India is run by Babuism then you are the only one who is leaving it to die at their mercy, instead of changing the system we try to run away from it. If its reservation that is stopping you in getting into a college open a college of your own who is stopping and stop reservations and others will follow suit. It is far better than cleaning foreign college toilets just to pay the fees of your college. It is far more easier to open a burger chain in India than to serve burgers at Burger King and much more rewarding, don’t worry about failure ,it is better than getting fired from Burger King. It is better to walk on the unpaved potholed roads of India than paving one for the foreign guys.

However we guys are used to taking shit from the colonial days so it does not matter to anyone what the hell Baljinder is the one who got hit ,I am not that unlucky. Okay man then try your luck.

India defends T20 crown-Analysis

With India reaching England where the men in blue look to defend the title of T20 champions on English conditions. Starting from the first match against the New Zealand, then against the Pakistanis ,we could well say that the Indians are well on the way to defend the title this time around. But think as it happened to Manchester United last week the law of averages will catch up with Team India.

Lets look at the Indian lineup, On paper India looks like a world beater.But as we know cricket is not played on paper but between the 22 yards. It has explosive opening pair in Gautam Gambhir and Virender Sehwag. Both have done well in all forms of the game. And especially both can be devastating on their day. Although gambhir has become a touch conservative but more effective than he ever was. For Sehwag he is the belligerent himself. I think this is the first time since the Ganguly Sachin duo that India is going into the tournament with a steady opening pair. Then comes the middle order with Suresh Raina the natural choice and him being in the most dangerous of the lot.Moreover his bowling exploits in this year’s IPL has made him all the more potent. India surely missed him in the last year’s T20 cup. Then comes the batting God that is Yuvraj Singh.God because on his day he can make hitting seem simple one of the cleanest striker that the game has seen since Gilly. Then comes our Captain Cool MS Dhoni with his uncanny knack of playing crucial knocks at the end and finishing the game with surgical precision. His captaincy has been the most talked about aspect about his game. A canny operator with him at the helm one can feel that India is never out of the game. He has a certain degree of Australianness to his game , is innovative and thinks on his feet which is the most important thing in T20 rather than letting things shape up he shapes things up for the opposition. Then comes the most dangerous finisher in this year’s IPL Rohit Sharma and he like Raina has found his bowling boots on this time and with his much talked back lift could give a real whack to the leather. The middle order ends with Yusuf Pathan as the big hitter taking hitting to another level but should be promoted to No.3 if not too many wickets have fell and less overs are remaining.

In the bowling department we have Zaheer Khan leading the attack not sure about his fitness, but if he plays he can be very steady in his attack.And moreover he absouletly loves England ,here is where he reinvented himself as the bowler that he is today.Then we have Ishant Sharma who is young but I think he enjoys the bouncy wickets more than the swinging English conditions where he would have to pitch it up. I think Irfan Pathan would have been a better choice due to his clean hitting but that’s upto Dhoni to decide whom he takes the gamble with. Then we have two spinners Harbhajan and Ojha vying for the single spot but I think the spot would go to Harbhajan with his new found technique in T20 and of course his habit of hitting the balls in the strangest areas in the field.

So unless India presses the self destruct mode I don’t think it will that much of a problem in retaining the trophy. However the law of averages might show its ugly head again. And one more thing please don’t give the silly excuse of burn-out in International stage ,these guys are professionals and not some 19 year olds to talk about their fitness.Moreover its their only job and I don’t think anybody can say tirdness is a factor in your job.

Life cycel of a software project

The life cycle of a software project which is built by two master minds both expert in goofing things up in the extreme is quite different from the software development lifecycle in actual. I would like the compare the two different life cycles in two very different perspectives. The two perspective that I would like to bring forth are one an IBM software project manager known as Ben and other of the two masterminds combined known as ajni no, its not a short form of Gajni.

Ben; The standard requirement gathering of a project that is why we need the project and what purpose will it serve to the company.
Ajni: Requirement gathering which includes knowing whether we have any idea about the project ,ever heard of this name, is there another prototype available on the internet.(Notice how the author uses the subtle ,scientific term prototype for shameless plagiarism). Does the team beside you have any idea about the project, the tools required and is he an expert at coding (cause at the end its his damn project and not ours). Only after such minor details are covered do the two master minds accept the project.

Ben: After knowing the problem statement we start designing the project. the architecture of the project the user interface of the project , the database design of the project etc.

Ajni: After the problem statement has been forcefully given to the master minds after rejecting many other projects and threatening to be removed from the organization and throwing tantrums by the project guide ,the master minds set to look-out for any similar projects available on the Internet, by typing simply the name of the project on Google, wikipedia and other such search engines.

Ben : After having designed the application the coding of the software begins by the team members indulge in some rigorous coding and developing of the software creating loops and nested loops and constructs calling and uncalling of the functions ,passing variables and bugging and debugging the code.

Ajni: After knowing that not everything can be found on Google harassment of the team beside you begins by rigorously putting them under undue stress so that they can code our application instead of doing theirs ,giving them temptation of gaining valuable experience of doing two projects at once and knowing the pressures of corporate world.

Ben: After coding comes vigorous black box testing and white box testing and other testing and if many errors are found the code is sent to the development phase again to recode it.
Ajni: After the team beside you completes your project you start to wonder whether you should have taken up the course in human psychology instead of computers. Breaking two software professionals is not easy.

Ben: After testing the code is implemented on the client system. eliminating the legacy systems.
Ajni:After the project is completed the snapshots are taken and put up in the slideshow to show that the code is not exposed by the company.

FISHY POLITICS

As we come to terms with the end of the massive Indian election which is synonymous with the Great Indian Weddng where there is a massive amount of people involved ,in which everyone is waiting it to end and nobody where its going.However funny things do happen in politics but some patterns do remain same. First of all the UPA government inspite of all the recession stuff and bding led by the a weak minister stilll came through with startling results. Secondly the end of an era for BJP supremo L.K. Adavani and the failute of Modi magic.

UPA came in with some very good results because of some very clear ground work done by them.They stuck to their pro poor agenda and it really worked. They projected a dual campaigning policy in which they formed different faces to address to different places to different masses and different demographics. And it clicked. On the contrary we have our BJP counterpart relying first of all too much on Modi magic. It was like the Rajasthan Royals relying too much on the Warne magic and doing very little themslves. Modi was given the resposibility of around 52 seats allover the country inlcuding states like Goa and Southern Indian states. Not only he failed to get important votes from such places but also failed to get a convinving victory in his homeground. In gujarat Congresss took about 15 seats which by Congress mesaures is more than good results ,this is where they were expected to get thumped big time.

But due to his tour duty and a little over confidence Modi took Gujarat to be granted and boy did the Gujaratis reply .One thing is for sure they don't like to be taken for granted. Secondly an interesting trend shown in Gujarat was that most of hwom who had voted for Modi in the State elections voted for MANMOHAN in the General elections. This trend was a major factor in knowing two things that the peoplw donot want Modi to leave them even if he is good for the country but he is even better for the state.

Secondly BJP fell short in all major cities of India ,where we can see that the modern Indian is not a fool and chooses wiselu although voter turn out is a cause of concern but still those who do turn out do it wisely. Anyway there are lessons to be learnt for BJP firstly it has shake of thier cobwebs of age old policies of Hindutva ,it has to get some new faces into its team, it has like the South African cricket team come out of the Cronje era and appoint thier new Graeme Smith which will take time but ultimately can beat the Australians on thier own soil.

EPL VS IPL

AS we move to the final stages of the UEFA champions League we find that an increasing dominance by the English teams have taken charge of the championships.Take for example since Liverpool had turned the tables on AC Milan on that eventful day at Istanbul when their talismanic captain Steven Gerrard had taken the coveted trophy that had eluded them for so many years.Yes the English had it in 1999 when United beat BAyern Munichen but that was it.This time again last year we have seen an increasing number of English teams clearing the league stages quite easily and securing the semifinal and final spots.But what is the reason of this sudden increase of English teams performance in the Champions League.

One major contributor could be the money involved in the game.It seems unlike the past years where you got star players in mostly a Real Madrid or a AC Milan.Now there is a slow but a very definite shift in power between Europe.You can see top players want to wear the English club jersey come what may.England too instead of taking their old and conservative stand have welcomed players from abroad with open arms.It could be very evident from the RooneyCristiano Ronaldo issue.Moreover Ronaldo staying at ManU dropping Real Madrid,Robinho's concern over Real Madrid,defines only one thing that England is now the strength of European football.However coming to today's tie between Manchester United and Porto ,given the momentum that Man United are riding on they should quite easily put this out of the window.Even though they had survived a scare against Villa last week ,but that in itself shows the confidence that the team is riding on,and of course not to mention the character it has shown during crucial times in the past.

Seeing the success of the EPL over the last few years and the success of it in attracting mass coverage around the world,there is a lesson to be learnt by the IPL,the Indian Premier League that is.For years the ICC has tried to reach out to the other world countries to spread cricket in the even the remotest of areas like Papua New Guinea.But what they are missing here is that they have an excellent opportunity at hand now.They have the most spectacular bonanza that cricket has ever seen starting from April 18,so they could make use of it in a much more efficient.I think one rule that the ICC has to scrap is the 4 foreign player rule.I think unlimited number of foreign players should be allowed to participate in a team,so that teams would go out that extra mile in buying players from lesser known countries but are quite talented.This will lead them toexposure to the international level and such players when they go back they can show a determined fight in the World Cup.Lets face it no country like their players to lose no matter how inconsequential the match is.The case in hand is our national football team.Football is largely not famous because we have not won a major tournament since ages and people really
dont like losers.So if we give the IPL franchisees to take up players from lesser known countries they will learn a lot and will come back stronger and better.Once these teams start giving a tough fight in International tournaments then their respective countrymen would start taking them seriuosly and gradually interests would start growing insuch countries which would take cricket on a different level altogether.

ASSAM BOMB BLASTS

The recent bomb blasts in Assam has proved one thing that India is not liked by any of thier neighbours.India still is being diplomatic about anything and everything.I think India now has to take a stand.A stand against cross border terrorism,against infiltration,against our neighbours,against Pakistan.In the past one year how many times have we heard about bomb attacks,suicide bombers etc.We have heard it so many times on the news that now we dont even care.We are now so used to such things that we flip news channels when we hear such things.I think its time our so called vote friendly stopped giving subsidaries,false promises,and ensuring free T.V sets to voters.Instead its time to become bold.I think a strong concentrated military attack should do the needful.Our forces are ready.They have taken this for too long.Its time we show our prowess and pickup Islamabad.Its time we stopped thinking short term.Its time we stopped hiding behind the fake lame excuse of recession.Because once its done we can have much safer place to live in .Still so many Indian soldiers die just because of cross border terrrorism.They now know that India are not going to attack,and with this confidence they kill with gay abandon.

Taking a cue from the attacks on Hamas by ISarael.Just look at the country and the resilience shown by it.Israel is a country which is surrounded by the Arab League.Once it was even attacked from all its sides ,still is had the guts to stand up to them and fight for something that was rightfully or wrongfully theirs.The whole world knows about the terrorist activities that take place in Hamas.So Israel took the initiative and went for an all out air strikes which crippled Hamas to the core.They didnot listen to the U.N.,not even providing them with the facility to transport food and medical aid to the needy in Hamas.Such bottleneck was created by Israel.People may say that it was politically motivated ,but at least it had a motive ,it had decision and it had action without any excuses.Ther were no threats,no talks,no sittings.That should be the mode of operation that India should follow.Has India not talked enough,sat enough,threatened enough.Its time that U.N. goes to hell and take some serious military action against erring nations.Then and then only will the terrorism will take India seriously.Otherwise now we have people threatening to kill ministers,netas,beauracrats and I dont know who.

The fall and fall of Pakistan

As we move towards the G20 summit we have a grave problem at our hands.The existence of pakistan as a state.What is pakistan as a state trying to do.Let me go through the sequence of events that has led to this pathetic conditions.First was the toppling of the democracy led by Nawaz Sharif.While the former president was on flight under his nose his government had been overthrown and the Musharaff era had begun.He brought in the military rule.From there on the real downfall of Pakistan as state began.Nothing went right from there.He stoped free elections converting himself from a General to a dictator.But only this dictator was not as strong as people thought.He was a pupppet in the hands of Taliban.He was sandwidched between the Taliban and the U.S..

Then under extreme pessure he had to give up his regime.But he made sure that the right person,Benazir Bhutto didnot come to power.Her husband Zardari took power and he also like other ministers didnot last long.Back came Mr. Nawaz Sharif who was on exile and started the long march to throw away the government(dont know why the elections are held).At the same moment days after a terrorist attack on a mosque .The police training centre was attacked.All this has a grave effect on Indians and their neighbours alike.With no end to this mockery of democracy insight,its time that India took some strong military actions,because already India has been attacked numerous times at multiple locations.This is not doing any good to national security.I think that this year the General Elections campaigning would be a lot easier.One just has to promote an attack to Pakistan that's it.Ultimately you have the people's vote .Instead of beating around the bush holding talks,meetings,faking mobilization of the army,take the initiative like Israel and attack.I am sure that the Indian army is capable enough to conquer the Pakistanis.

Because this is the limit we have had enough.Lets not hide behind the lame excuse of recession and not do what we have to do in proper time.This is the time attack Pakistan and let that be a statement to both U.S. and China that India has arrived,who under the veil of friendship supports vehemently the Pakistani armed forces.

OIL AND POLITICS

Oil the black gold of the world today stands at a crucial juncture. No I am not going to blabber about the emptying or the replenishment of the same. But I would like to state its importance in world politics today. For example today just recently Russia had hit a big oil reserve round about the Siberian region. It is more popularly known as the Sakhalin project. Of course it has on its own lead to much controversy. First of all Vladimir Putin’s bold decision to state that Russia would not let anyone have its piece of cake no matter what. That Russia’s in mood to enter into a trade agreement with any of the states. But one thing that Russia forgets here is that for refining the crude oil it has its centers in China, Japan and other such countries. However with Russians planning to get into the Refining business it would be costly decision that Russia has to take, because of the capital intensive market that oil sector currently is.

Coming to India with its nuclear agreement on the right path its time the government took some measures to get into oil sector and sort out the long standing controversy of oil with its neighboring states. First of all India comes after China in terms of oil consumption. Its the sixth largest consumer of oil all over the world.Still India has grave problems regarding this sector which is leading to huge economic losses. First of all the long standing pipeline from Yemen and Turkmenistan which if laid will go a long way in resolving India’s major chunk of problems. But India’s not so good relation with Pakistan leads to a failure of laying the pipelines from Afghan till India through Pakistan. Even though India is ready to pay something around $500 mn in transit fees Pakistan cannot guarantee the transit of the pipelines. The other option that India has is to go around the Pakistani state from the Arabian Sea and enter into India. But that too is a costly affair, which would require huge capital investments which at present would not be feasible.

On the left of India lies the oil rich Burma, but that too being China friendly doesn’t do the situation any good. Even if they do agree there is a problem of Bangladesh flexing its muscles to stop India from getting the crude? Even though an agreement of $125 mn been offered as transit fees were made as an offer, Bangladesh is keener on being China friendly. China on he other hand is on its way to creating a string of pearls all alon from Nepal to Pakistan and back to china.This would be major blow to India ‘s chances of being the Asian supremacy.Anyhow right now with the U.S. nuclear deal being signed chances are there that India might just get to sniff oil after all.

PARADIGM SHIFT -IPL

Shifting of the IPL could be one big factor which could decide the winner of this years cricket bonanza. Starting from the 18^th the IPL has been shifted to South Africa which had successfully held the T20 world cup. The new venues could create problems for the teams heavily dependent on local talent. For example Rajasthan Royals could this time find it quite difficult to retain their championship crown. A quick look at their team and we could see the obvious. Lots of huge heavers and agricultural stroke players, but except a few like Smith and Watson we don’t find any quality striking prowess in their ranks. You have Yousuf Pathan the find of last year’s IPL. But how successful would he be on pitches are not entirely bating friendly. As we found out in the T20 in Africa. The score of 160 is said to be a competitive score over here. Instead of in India in which 160 is hardly competitive. The pitches here are bouncy with swing taking place in Durban which is closer to sea. In the nights it becomes impossible to score on. How the local Indian players who re fed on flat tracks over here in India, only time will tell.

The team to look out in this edition are Chennai with Dhoni at the helm and quality players like Hussey, A Morkel,Ntini,Hayden,Oram,it seems that Dhoni is all set to take home the country gold. Apart from these players the others to look for are David Warner,Owais Shah, Flintoff,Peitersen,Tyron Henderson and others alike. However its been strange that not many teams have concentrated on their bowling department. I think they are happier to do away with their bits and pieces bowlers who can stop the flow of runs and give them their bonus wickets. Shaun tait has been a fresh entry.Players like Johan botha ,Brett jeeves etc have not been considered seriously. Of course the change in the venue comes as a big surprise to everyone, but you got to have the right balance.

The other important matter to look into is that the Indian Board is going to lose a lot in the stadium rights and revenue.However the major chunk of their revenues comes from Television rights and sponsorships,but still its loss for them and India.The younger brigade would find it tough to adjust to the African conditions of pace and bounce although we are sure that the organizers would do enough to ensure flate decks.However even if the decks are juicy and responsive it is an excellent opportunity for the selectors to pick good quality stroke players who can adjust to the home and away conditions as well.Another thing is that over here in India lots of our bowling talent gets murdered even before it has a chance to get into the international arena.However it is a great opportunity for our local bowlers who might find ti helpful to bowl on such responsive condtions.

Whatever might be the case we are sure to enjoy it as many people are actually looking forward to it.With success of the first edition ,this time with the entry of English players into the setup things are certainly looking rosy ahead.

The 2nd Test IND VS NZ

The 4^th day of the India versus NewZealand series saw for the first time in years India’s fighting spirit abroad. Usually the Indians aren’t like this .While not in the sub continent even against lower rung bowling attacks India wilts under pressure.Not so in this case India’s dogged performance lead by the old warhorse Dravid, showed that the famed Indian batting lineup still has the fight in it to claw back in the situation. Not only Dravid the manner in which Gambhir controlled his natural instincts for the team showcased how well the team is right now jelling with each other. At one point of time Gambhir hadn’t scored a run in more than six overs on the trot still he had the temperament to stay cool and not give his wicket away till the end of the day. His concentration levels were really very high. With him coming last evening and staying unbeaten till today evening showed that he has evolved as batsman .That too when the tails of Kiwis were up and running. With both Martin and O’Brien firing on all cylinders he had the patience to stay there and fight it out. Quite unlike his captain who in the end of the day gifted his wicket away to Patel with an expansive shot. However people might argue that it’s the way Sehwag plays .But I like to add that there is little more maturity required over there as he was the captain of the Indian cricket green top and really testing Indians on the turf they are more unfamiliar with, instead of providing with dead flat tracks which is like fodder to canon.

However we might be happy with what the team has achieved so far but there is one problem that we have sought out very fast. And that is we are too dependent on our old war horses. If we look at the series apart from Gambhir no one has played any crucial knock or played a long innings. WE are very good when we know that we can attack but while it comes to scrapping our way out we tend to falter.Yuvraj,Sehwag ,Dhoni can be very good for a flashy fifty but that is not Test Cricket. The essence of test cricket is the ability to pace our innings according to situation demands. That is why Australia is so very good at Test Cricket. If we see they have players like Clarke,Hussey,Katich who can pace their innings beautifully to win their games.

Our gennext has a lot to learn from our senior pros when it comes to Test cricket. The time is short because it will feel a sudden void when all of your defence mechanism has run out. And you have warriors without a back up support. Either all will kill or get killed that is where we are headed.team.

Although we still have a day in hand and anything can happen on the last day wearing wicket .But at least our wheels did not fall off at the finish line, This would be great moral wicket if we can pull off a draw in the last day, The kiwi captain would have to do a lot of rethinking for the last game. Given the situation he is in for the last game I think the ground staff would have to help him out here by providing him with a

The race is on :EPL

V/s

As Saturday came to an end we are about to see a scrappy,dappy race till the end of the Barclays English Premier league. With Manu going down to Liverpool in a crucial tie at Fulham, chances of Liverpool catching on the league champions this time around looks very much obvious. With Liverpool captain Steve Gerrad in the form of his life Sir Alex has to do more than just strategize to get this done and dusted. The down slide started from the home game against Liverpool. The Nemanja Vidic error gave Liverpool the much needed space to get the goal and then dominate the entire game with utmost arrogance. They thrashed the world champions like they were some 3^rd division clubs. This is where Liverpool has improved in the past .Earlier after securing the lead they used to sit back and defend the game out. Actually Manu were a wee bit surprised with the new found attacking vigor that Rafa has instilled in their players. That was seen when they defeated the Spanish side Real Madrid in their champions league tie. They absolutely routed the Spanish runner up team. The combination between Torres and Gerrad has been working very well for the reds. The team it seems has started to amalgamate and they are true like true champions. Their defense led by English defender Carrragher has been very well organized and their wing attacks have also started to find precision. This time around however they are not relying on pumping long balls into the box and more importantly are not relying solely on Gerrard to find them those crucial goals.

However there are certain flaws that might just stop them from getting their hands on that coveted trophy that they have so long desired. First of all is Chelsea threat .Under Guus Hinddik they have found the organization threat they so lacked during the Scolari era. Their attacks are now more purposeful with less unforced errors Chelsea are a team to watch out for during the title race. This will be more clarified during their champion’s league clash. However Rafa is known to be an expert at winning tournaments, but this time around can Gerrard really stop the Chelsea juggernaut, let’s see.

The second threat is Manu itself. Although they are wounded for now but they still stand a very good chance as they have their flaws not that late in the season. With the return of Vidic they will find their feet back .With Ferguson he knows how to win in these crucial situations because he is really a veteran and nobody knows it better to win this league than the old guy himself.

The third threat for them is the flaws within. Firstly they rely too much on the crankshaft mechanism of Steve Gerard and Torres very much. Teams might just play and dirty and might just make them drop two points which in Liverpool’s case would be disastrous. Secondly except for Torres nobody in the Liverpool ranks are innovative in their attacks which might just make the opponents think less. The opposing teams simply have just one mantra against Liverpool, stop Torres and block Gerrard things would be smooth later on. Although this is easier said than done this would require a lot from teams to stop these two world class players.

KIWI SHUT INDIAN TIGER ROAR

The Indians had come to NZ with the hope of burying their past demons. Sadly Indians could not keep up with their champion image and displayed a brilliant example of how to play cricket invidually.Clearly Vettori had given a brilliant opportunity for the Indians to draw first blood in this NZ tour by sending the Indians to bat first .The reason I am saying this is because the grounds were small and with big hitters in the Indian batting lineup I was expecting a score of about 200.Moreover the kiwis had to bat under the lights and in the windy conditions which was a definite plus point to the Indians while defending the score.

However as a tradition India never starts a tour on a happy note.Same was the case the Indians came to the field as they had already won the match.True they got off to a flying start with Sehwag clearing the MCG inner circle(NZ boundary) four times before trying a Nadal like smash through midwicket only failing this time.Credits to the young O Brien for having a big heart.Then it was Yuvraj,I think its time somebody told him that he cannot sweep a part time spinner leave alone a Vettori.After which Rohit as usual came with lot of flair pushing a ball to six and then again trying to clear the ropes and scooping it in the air.Yusuf was batting like in the nets that is with gay abandon.With already hitting three sixes he again tried to flat bat the ball out of the ground only this time N McCullum was smart this time giving it huge air time and landing it almost out of the playing area.Pathan tried to heave it from outside over long-on ,only to find Oram at long-on doing a Voges.The only positive was even after 96/6 India had Raina a man who has truly come of age and score a brilliant 61 unbeaten to lead India to 162.

With the Kiwis needing 163 Ishant struck first taking out Jesse Ryder and a near shout for Guptill.He was equally supported by Zak on the other end with a brilliant spell of controlled aggressive fast bowling.But only the score was too small for the small grounds and McCullum showing immense maturity to guide NZ to victory alongwith comeback man Oram.Although Indians were outplayed in this game I do like to stress a point here that India is going to get back.Mark my words kiwis Sehwag and Yuvraj are going to hammer the kiwi bowling next T20. NZ doesn’t have enough teeth in their bowling attack to really stop Indians ,it was Indians who gave away the match instead of the other way around.

One more thing I would like to comment on is the ridiculously small grounds.The ICC should maintain some standards which every country should follow .I think the optimum ground size should be 90m radius in which I think spinners can really bowl without sending in rockets at the batsmen legs.Anyhow lets wait and watch as Indians make a mockery of the kiwi bowling next T20.

ALL IN DAYS WORK

THINGS YOU HEAR FROM AN INTERVIEWER WHICH SUGGEST YOU ARE NOT SELECTED

1.What is your name?(AS if you had written your name in chinese on the CV)
2.What is your family background?(After asking this he looks away to ponder about the next question)
3.Why do you not want to continue in the field you graduated in?(He hasnot heard about recession)
4.Who is the son of the first king of Scotland to have set foot on India first?(If you dont answer which you probably won't he will give you a lecture on Indian tradition and how he had answered the when he was asked the same in his first Interview)
5.Why do you want to join us?(As if works there not for the money but due to his interest in the particular field and donates half the money to company's welfare fund).
6.What will you do if you are not selected?(Yeah you got it you are definitely not selected)
7.Tell me something that is not in your resume.(This is probably asked because there is already nothing in your resume)
8.Why did your academic records went on a downward slide after you joined college?(As if doesnt know what happens in a college or is a definite college dropout)
9.Where do you see yourself 10 years from here?(By now you probably know you are not going to get selected hence tell me you see urself as his boss and will fire him first for conducting silly interviews)
10.What if another company better suited for you gives you a better salary?(He is telling you please look for another company fast)

INDIA'S TOUR OF NEW ZEALAND

India is about to leave for New Zealand in order to erase all the bad demons they had kept in within himself for years.The Kiwis have always been a difficult opponent not surprisingly India have never won a test series there for last 45 years.But I think all that is about to change as India is now under a captain who believes that they can do it.It would be a tough task for Dhoni and his men as the conditions are not much in favor of the visiting team.But I still think missed a trick here.

For the tests I am predicting a 2-0 victory margin in favor of India.Given that India has their Awesome Threesome with Sachin,Laxman and Dravid in the batting department and of course with the coming of age of Zaheer and an equally impressive Ishant under his wings ,India has got their combinations right for the Tests.Of course I still think a fit Sree would have been a better choice because of his deadly swinger's that he possess on the Kiwi wickets he could be a handful.

A look at the Indian one day team and one finds that India still doesn't possess a quality medium pacers.Compare that with the NZ who have the dibbly dobbly bowlers who can hit the seam and get wickets at regular intervals.The likes of Elliot,Styris,Guptill may not be stars but as a unit they can be lethal.As we had seen their recent trips to Australia and England.India should know that this is not subcontinent wickets where a slow Yuvraj can stem the flow of runs and get important breakthroughs.The grounds in NZ are small and with the likes of Fulton ,McCullum and Co. clearing Yuvraj out of the grounds wont be a difficult task.As for T20 I would suggest an Uthtapa would have been much better than the out of sorts Rohit.Although I am very much interested to see how he deals with the foreign conditions as I believe he likes the ball coming onto his bat and is in the same league as laxman.

And lastly about India's colours it was refreshing to see that the BCCI decided change the Kit.I think with the money that the BCCi possess we must follow the Australian model of having a different for each home away and T20.Anyhow alls well if you perform on the field.So best of luck Men in Dark BLue.