Dude of the week.

This  dude of the week is literal.

We all know that Obama religiously works out everyday. It was but natural that Mr. L.K. Advani would follow suit.

Senior BJP leader LK Advani on Friday showed that he is fit to lead the country by trying his hand at dumbbells and weights at the new gymnasium developed by the civic body in Vadaj area in Ahmedabad.

Details follow :

He picked up two one-kg dumbbells and lifted them above his shoulders, both his hands up in the air. Advani also flexed his muscles with some shoulder crunches at the gymnasium. He then jogged to Pakistan, uprooted a hand pump and bashed up all Pakistani actors who were not in government jobs.

Well not the last line, but the rest is true. I have video proof.

I never expected Mr. Advani to be all about brawn. Maybe because I always thought he resembled Chacha Chaudhari (or is it just me ?). Now wouldn’t it be cool to have an election poster that says “Shri L.K. Advani’s brain works faster than a non-Hindu”.

(For people who do not yet see the obvious plagiarism of campaigning, have a look at a previous article here. Another recent speech of his read “India’s problems need Indian solutions” which bears an uncanny resemblance to an Obama speech)

The end of senseless politics.

Thankfully the senseless regional politics in Maharashtra is coming to a close sooner than expected :

No north Indian name for Maharashtrian road.

Wonder how long before they realize that Ram and Krishna are both ‘bhaiyyas’ and turn atheists ?

Quote of the day.

.. comes from the father of the youth from UP, lynched in a train in Mumbai, who was offered Rs. 2 L as compensation by the Maharashtra government :

Take Rs 20L, give me MNS chief.

To be honest, I woudn’t advocate such a thing too. That would just mean moving further away from a democracy.

A certain M.K. Gandhi had said “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind”. What if the people are already blinded ?

Open letter.

Rajdeep Sardesai writes in an open letter to Raj Thackeray pretty much what it is on everybody’s mind. Hope we get an answer :

When you started your party a few years ago, it had been pitched as a party committed to a “modern” Maharashtra. If that vision still stands, why don’t you take it forward in real terms? Why don’t you, for example, set up vocational courses and technical institutes for young Maharashtrians to make them competitive in the job market? Why not, for that matter, start English-speaking classes for Maharashtrian students to equip them for the demands of the new economy? If cultural identity is such a concern, why not launch a statewide campaign to promote Marathi art, theatre and cinema by financially supporting such ventures? If Mumbai’s collapsing infrastructure worries you, then target the politician-builder nexus first. And isn’t it also time we realized that Mumbai is not Maharashtra, that the long suffering Vidarbha and Marathwada farmer needs urgent attention? Why not use your political and financial muscle to start projects in rural Maharashtra instead of focusing your energies on Mumbai’s bright lights alone? An employment generation scheme in a Jalna or a Gadchiroli may not make the front pages, but it will have far greater value for securing Maharashtra’s future.

Jai Hind, Jai Maharashtra!

Methinks the answer is obvious : Because .. it is tougher.

Language Raj or Rahul Raj ?

Neither.

I am hoping everyone would have heard about Rahul Raj (and no, he is not Shahrukh Khan’s alter ego).

A youth from Bihar comes in to Mumbai at dawn, holds a bus at ransom in the morning and by noon is history, leaving behing a tale of politics and continued hatred, the end of which is nowhere in sight.

Sadly, almost no one has reacted as a responsible citizen.

The police are yet to disclose details of the incident, which could well be a deciding factor in the argument. Either way, if a passenger’s life was threatened, I would go with the Mumbai police here. They were not netting a butterfly here. This was an armed person they were dealing with.

Maharashtra Home Minister R.R.Patil made the famous ‘bullet for a bullet’ quote. And this, when he was in Sangli with hardly any details about the incident. Wonder why he did not apply his same logic all this time while the MNS was happily rampaging the streets of Mumbai.

Politicians from Bihar, weirdly united and most of whom are hailing Rahul Raj as a martyr, with even lesser details about the incident. Lalu Prasad Yadav calls it a murder and not an encounter, just because the police were not injured.

Mr Shivraj Patil, the Home Minister of India. It would be fair to say that a cute little kitten might scare me more than his words.

Lastly some people of Mumbai, who incidentally, also happen to be citizens of India. Very possibly as an indirect consequence to the recent incidents, a youth from UP was lynched in a train in Mumbai.

Whatever your opnion might be, I think across the board we can atleast agree that the recent incidents have brought out the worst in everyone.

And that terrorists are not born, we make them.

The joke’s on me !

A few lines from yesterday’s post read :

But a smart move to be in the news, considering the media is a sucker for anything related to Raj; including what he ate for dinner last night – chappati, vegetables, fruits and a cup of tea. I am rather disappointed that TOI did not report whether his digestive system processed the food well.

Today Swapnil P writes in about this article : Link

Thackeray chose to remain constipated all day rather than use the Indian loo.

and the joke’s on me now ! Never underestimate the media, especially Mumbai Mirror.

P.S. : I am sure there are still farmers committing suicide, Dalits being massacared and Christians being killed somewhere. What more, they don’t even have access to a loo !

Chandrayaan-1 !

Amidst all the violence, politics and nonsense that generally clutters the life of an average Indian, this is a moment we all need to be proud of. The launch of Chandrayaan-1, which by definition proves that there are more to follow !

Firstly, about the name; I have heard many variations (which includes one friend referring to it as Chandranarayan) but the right pronunciation is चंद्रयान-1 (Courtesy : Wikipedia).

So we are back to the good old times. Back to kids saying they wanted to become an astronaut; technically weird, since this was an unmanned mission (or maybe being a pilot didn’t seem too attractive courtesy Jet Airways).

Among its other minor achievements are a mention by Barack Obama, a discussion in the Ubuntu Forums (where people are learning about India) and of course, a mention in the Stanford Daily here (information by Raghu).

Chandrayaan-1 had a textbook launch (which lead to one wise person at RDB wonder if there was a textbook inside) but there are serious concerns that it might run into some trouble in space very soon :

Image via email from Tushar B.

But to be honest, I am doubly excited about our forthcoming manned mission to the moon, with the hope that we get to vote whom to pack off.

Yes and to follow the rich tradition of our mostly otherwise media, you can send in your wishes to the ISRO team who made all the Indians proud, by writing in the comments section below !! Let’s write to them and boost their morale !

P.S. : You can also send in your good wishes/messages in case your neighbour’s dog gave birth to a litter, your manager was caught cheating on his wife, India’s victory over Australia in the 2001 Kolkata test and any random occasion. Just like our news channels, I will make sure the concerned party reads it, even if it is a dog.

Chance pe dance ?

While a lot of bouquets and brickbats have been thrown at Raj Thackeray recently, this is something which stumped even me :

Raj’s act dangerous for Hindutva: Puri seer.

I did not get head or tail of his reasoning. But a smart move to be in the news, considering the media is a sucker for anything related to Raj; including what he ate for dinner last night – chappati, vegetables, fruits and a cup of tea. I am rather disappointed that TOI did not report whether his digestive system processed the food well.

All work and no play.

As it turns out, most Hindu organizations are going to have to work overtime. They have two project deadlines coming soon : As if MF Hussain returning wasn’t enough, the Government, in support of the Sethusamudram project has said that Lord Rama himself destroyed the Ram Setu after the war, according to one of the millions of versions of the Ramayana. (Considering how many versions of the Ramayana are present, I do wonder if typos while copying one version are counted as new ones.)

P.S. : Somehow, I found IBNLive’s title for this article a bit weird : Oh Lord! Now Govt says Ram destroyed Setu. I would have appreciated a Hey Ram instead of Of Lord ! I think this proves that Rajdeep Sardesai is a patron of the Congress as alleged by my dear friends (in the comments section, obviously) from the Mandir.