Save our tigers - Really?

I had been reading lately and I am sure all of us our aware now that only 1411 tigers are left and we need to surely save them - after all its our national animal. We need to act and spread the awareness - thats ofcourse the first step. But, is that all? I see this message everywhere - internet, hoardings, television!
"Internet" is still a sophisticated thing in India and is used by the educated ones - do you think it would be used by the poachers or the villagers who knowingly or unknowingly harm this animal or even other animals? So, while blogging, facebook, twitter may like really spreading the word around but will it reach the right ears?
Are the poachers and hunters listening to these messages - and if in case they are will they become over cautious in committing this crime or identify it as a crime? May be the former - after all why would anybody be willing to give up money just for the sake of saving some wild animals!
May be we need to wake up the law makers, the forest securers, the illiterates who dont know what extinct means and most important the poachers - who earn bucks out of this cruel means. Not only this - the luxury resorts which have come up around these sanctuary need to be checked before it gets too late. Are we willing to take up this daunting task - fuel a change in the law or the enforcement of it or meet the villagers, educate them or form groups to get the culprits - something that really counts.
We really need to save the tigers - but this task surely needs more than a few words written here and there - it needs a more sincere effort for a more effective result.

Ahmedabad Diaries - the first reel

    Ahmedabad – the twin city of Gandhinagar which is the capital of Gujarat – the land of the Mahatma – I have a sojourn here - a short one (though which may actually seem long depending on my experience)

    I landed on the airport of Ahmedabad a few days back – the same day when Aamir Khan along with the other idiots landed on the very same airport! I overheard somebody saying that Aamir was coming from Kolkata to promote his film 3 idiots and then the lightening struck - this flight had come from Kolkata via Bangalore – so I was traveling with HIM in the very same flight for the whole 2 hrs!! I missed the opportunity again and it was too close a call – felt bad if I would have known this just 2 hrs ago, my experience would have been rich. I could have added having met Aamir too in person to the list, this would have been the second major one (that really mattered) after meeting (actually watching to be very correct) the Indian cricket team on the flight from Ranchi a few years ago.

       Anyway – this is my third trip to Ahmedabad and I could notice a substantial change – even in its air (after all the other two trips were made in the nasty summer months!). At last I had chosen a good time to come here – I just had to battle the enormous amount of dust which is an integral part of this city (just like 99.9% Indian cities), but the weather was on my side. Anyway Ahmedabad’s airport luckily and thankfully is still within the city unlike Blore or Hyd, so you could just catch any mode of transport to reach anywhere in the city say in max 30 mins – that's the beauty of not being a metro (apart from ofcourse not having a metro!).

      So after well-settling in the dream MBA institute here – I think it comes more in dreams and generally doesn't become a reality for most of the odd 3-lakh MBA aspirants every year! So it’s for people who not only dream big…but also can make the big dreams happen. To clarify, – there is no 2 month MBA crash course here, hence I have not come here to study in any course here, but to merely reside and become a mute spectator to all the activities here and also their coverage in the newspaper.

     A couple of days back I was talking to one of my very old friends and he suggested that I write a book like the many other MBA pass-outs from this institute and pen down my experiences here. But then I am not experiencing anything else here – except the daily grind of running a household while running behind a kid at the same time! And none of the MBA aspirants here have the time or energy (read the latest book which describes IIMA as a pressure cooker!) to share their experience with me – so what can I write, may be just a few not-so-significant or path-breaking thoughts. May be some of the thoughts can be categorized as having no value proposition and strategically misplaced – straight out of that part of the brain which has the most number of files archived – call it the junk folder…so as and when my RAM retrieves these from my hard drive – a blog follows. Too many jargons in a few lines?  may be it's the IIM air…More from me in Amdavad later…

A Hindi Number...

ये वही पहर है रात का -
जब चाँद है खामोश कि ये उसकी चांदनी है
या कहीं सहर की रौशनी का है आलम

कि अभी रात है बाकी मेरे सोने की जुस्तजू में
या कहीं पहली बांग कि राह देखता है कोई...

अब इंतज़ार है मेरे वक़्त के आने का.
कुछ और पल के बाद ही सही,
पर रुका हूँ एक सही शुरुआत की आरजू में.

Great Expectations...

Opportunities siezed or opportunities lost...
Just two options our life is made of ..
I sit back and relax
but thats not the way to live..
I ponder and brood now and then..
but thats not the thing to think of
I let time pass by as days and nights
but thats not the time they are really proud of
Need to run and catch a lane-a shorter one now..
That simply leads me fast to gain.

Years lost they say in dont know what..
It was as if you never lived after being born...
Living dreams that never impressed...
Of small moments only giving you joy
Where was the big deal that may have fetched
Where was the passion you should have followed
Where was the direction you should have identified

What did I do if I couldnt figure out
That just two options my life is made of..
Success achieved or failure received

Winds of Change

Walking down the known path..
I can stand up against the old winds..
Awaken to new worlds
Its unknowns are too deep to even ponder..

While I wait for my destiny to unfold..
Its too long a time to not walk
Life comes back in a full circle
Just that its a longer way to the start..

Let me slowly arise and be a part
Of the revolution which I couldnt bring..
I may not be at the front but I am somewhere
Not standing but moving back and forth

Its a unending race and am steady..
A small step and a big leap ..
I may be the one to start a new circle

For my daughter on Mother's day...

It was on the beautiful afternoon of July 16th 2007, that my daughter Myra chose to enter our lives. I could hear her cry in the OT and it was then that the nurse whispered it’s a baby girl. I thought, thank god I had thought of a girl’s name just a week before (Somehow we were not able to decide between Meisha and Myra). I was not the first one in the family to take her into my arms – in-fact one of the last ones as I joined her in the private ward after a couple of hours..and there I could see her neatly and nicely tucked in a white(with pink lining) cloth in the cradle..with eyes closed…so peaceful, angelic and godly. To be frank..a kind of aura which none of we adults have. It’s true that god resides in children.
First night with Myra was tough as we were by ourselves (ofcourse the efficient nurses were there to help)..call it lack of knowledge or probably first experience, we didn’t know what to expect..and here she was, no longer a silent infant, but screaming at the top of her voice…we were confused, tensed, tired and I was near to tears…nothing was able to calm her..My husband rushed for the nurse and like a true savior she handled Myra – I felt like an idiot, but I knew it was a long way to learn. It is strange but its love in the true sense that whenever Myra laughs or smiles its me who feels happy as though we are still chorded…all the other kinds or spheres of love look meaningless when compared to this divine feeling…

The five days in the hospital were ice breaking session for Myra with her family – the 'naankes' and 'daadkes' were proud and happy…everybody taking turns to take care of her as I was still weak after the surgery.

And then began one of the most important and talked about part of parenthood…giving up sleep at night. But somehow you feel so energetic as a mother that even when the clock struck the 24th hour to wake me up..I felt as if it was still middle of the day…and I could spare a few minutes having a cuddly talk with Myra..she seemed so tiny yet assertive as if telling her mom – “though I am little but I am the BOSS”

Her first smile, her first somersault…her first so many things - her giggles and the twinkle in her eyes..her first step..her first word and all her imaginative stories(the other day when we were driving on a flyover, she simply said “Mom we are going on a slide!”)..…My mother says she reminds her of me when I was a kid…good to be born again…wish she lives all the good moments of my life…and hers too….

Across the wall of IIMA

Recently I got the privelege to stay in the IIM-Ahmedabad campus. The temperature was bearly bearable with the mercury touching the awful 44 degree mark. But to adapt is human and that's what I also did. I have been staying in Bangalore for quite long now to be thoroughly spoiled by its weather. However much we complain about the rising temperature in the Silicon city, but we surely are lucky to be living here.

The IIMA not only boasts of the achievers getting the most sought for education and exposure in its MBA program - but it also has the state of the art campus. I first stepped into the area in the dim hours of evening and could surely see some street dwellers resting against its outer-wall. Surely, its not an uncommon site in India - we know there is a huge percent living below the poverty line. And then after all the homeless need a place to rest in the evening. I surely felt sad seeing their plight, but soon realised that these people just stay there always - even in the burning hours of afternoon.

The divide is so clear across the wall - There is the youth of our country getting ready for bigger jobs spending lakhs of rupees on the education in the finest Management institue of India. And so are there the children a few metres away - who just stay there not knowing if the heat wave will let them survive till the next day. While the one inside the campus worry if they will be able to get their dream job in finance or sales etc, there are those ouside who are still dreaming about a place to stay in or may be they have even stopped dreaming...