We live in a nation,

Where Pizza reaches home faster than

Ambulance, police or fire brigade.

Where you get car loan @ 5%

and education loan @ 12% interest.

Where rice is Rs 40/- per kg

but sim card is free of cost.

Where the footwear, we wear, are sold in AC showrooms,

but vegetables, that we eat, are sold on the footpaths.

Where everybody wants to be famous but

nobody wants to follow the path to be famous.

Where we make lemon juices with artificial flavours

and dish wash liquids with real lemon.

Where people are standing at tea stalls reading an article about child labour from a newspaper and say, “yaar bachhonse kaam karvane wale ko to phansi par chadha dena chahiye” and then they shout ” Oye chhotu 2 chaii laao…..”.

I’m sure all of us have gone through that, starting a blog…”dude, its gonna rock…ill update it everyday….itl be funny…it will be what ever i think it will be…blah..blah.” and well 4 posts later and a 100 visitors later which by now has dwindled to about 3 or 4 per day…you start to realize…hmm.. i think its been a while!

well anways no more excuses….here’s what happened so far…and ill keep it short.

travelled a lot, met a lot of friends, family…quit my job…(yeah!) and switched homes…

not bad for 4 months eh.?!

well here’s to whatever comes next…clink!

I remembered that feeling when I saw an old 800 driven proudly by its owner the other day. My first car was an 800. More specifically a Maruti Suzuki 800 MPFI 5 Speed – Golden Brown….at that point I really thought it was worth it’s weight in gold.

I still remember the way the car drove, the way the 796 cc engine struggles if there are more than 2 people in the car as if it were  saying to me – ‘this car is for you and you only – what the heck are you doing bringing all these people on board’

The car was tiny, more akin to a an over sized matchbox. But it got me from one place to the next efficiently and without trouble. If you remember your 800 or if you are driving one, you will notice that most of variants have bad gear boxes, forget the straight lines to change the gears, this didn’t work that way. It’s as if the gear has a mind of its own. Allow me to explain: for most cars the shift from second gear to third is a up-right and above straight line. But to an 800 its a slant line straight across – sheer thrill . No lag in speed during gear changes, no problem getting through traffic because it was so tiny, fun fast and zippy.

The car gave me a good two years until it was sold. I always wonder whether I will see it again. But wherever it is I hope it knows I miss it and would jump at a chance to own it again.

To the 800 – I will always miss that car.

There’s something happening here
What it is ain’t exactly clear
There’s a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware

I think it’s time we stop, children, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down

There’s battle lines being drawn
Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind

I think it’s time we stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down

What a field-day for the heat
A thousand people in the street
Singing songs and carrying signs
Mostly say, hooray for our side

It’s time we stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down

Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you’re always afraid
You step out of line, the man come and take you away

We better stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Stop, now, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Stop, children, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down

-Buffalo Springfield

Amazing!

Source: Dilbert

Analysts had been expecting a new round of job cuts at Motorola, after 6,700 employee departures in 2008, as the economic downturn and a slump in demand for mobile phones add more pressure on a company that had already been losing market share to rivals like Nokia .

Motorola said on Wednesday that the latest move brings its cost cuts to $1.5 billion for 2009 — $700 million in new savings on top of a previously announced plan for $800 million in expense cuts.

Read here for more details.

In another incident of the worsening global recession Nortel Networks Corp, North America’s biggest maker of telephone equipment, filed for bankruptcy protection in Wilmington, Delaware, amid the global credit crunch and declining sales.

Nortel, based in Toronto, had more than $1 billion in assets and debt, according to today’s Chapter 11 filing of its US subsidiary. The company said that several Canadian affiliates will also seek court protection.

Canadian investor Gavin Graham recalls the time when Nortel Networks Corp. was so big, with a market value of almost $250 billion, that fund managers had to own shares just to keep up with the benchmark index.

“You were pilloried if you didn’t own the stock,” said Graham, who helps oversee more than $30 billion as director of investments at Bank of Montreal Asset Management in Toronto. “Nowadays, I try not to embarrass people by asking who still owns Nortel.”

Nortel, North America’s biggest maker of telephone equipment, in business for 113 years, filed for bankruptcy protection today, capping one of the greatest corporate collapses in Canadian history. The stock fell 69 percent to 12 cents by 4:15 p.m. in trading today on the Toronto Stock Exchange, for a market value of C$60 million ($48 million).

At its peak in 2000, Nortel had annual revenue of $28 billion and employed about 93,000 people in more than 150 countries. The stock traded as high as C$1,245, adjusting for stock splits, for a market value of C$366 billion, making it the biggest company in Canada. The shares quadrupled in 1999 on expectations the Toronto-based phone equipment maker would benefit from the surge in demand for Internet-based technology.

Nortel accounted for 37 percent of the Toronto Stock Exchange 300 Composite Index, as it was called then. That created a problem for Canadian mutual fund managers, since Canadian law bars mutual funds from holding more than 10 percent of assets in any one stock.

Source:  Bloomberg

See also a timeline of events in the company here.

In reaction to Raju’s revelations, the stock was hammered by investors and it is down over 60 per cent.

Raju said that he feared takeover due to poor finance performance. Coming clean on financial irregularities, he said that the company had Rs 1,230 crore worth of understated liability as of September 30.

Raju also revealed that he tried to fill fictitious assets with Maytas deal.

Source: NDTV

Here are some excerpts from his letter to SEBI:

a. Inflated (non-existent) cash and bank balances of 50.40 billion rupees ($1.04 billion) (as against 53.61 billion reflected in the books).

b. An accrued interest of 3.76 billion rupees which is non-existent.

c. An understated liability of 12.30 billion rupees on account of funds arranged by me.

d. An overstated debtors position of 4.90 billion rupees (as against 26.51 billion reflected in the books)”

“The aborted Maytas acquisition deal was the last attempt to fill the fictitious assets with real ones. Maytas’ investors were convinced that this is a good divestment opportunity and a strategic fit. Once Satyam’s problem was solved, it was hoped that Maytas’ payments can be delayed. But that was not to be. “

“neither me, nor the Managing Director took even one rupee/dollar from the company and have not benefitted in financial terms on account of the inflated results.”

Read the complete letter here:  Reuters

Here is the complete timeline of events.

As of this moment Satyam Shares crashed 71% to Rs 51 on the BSE.

First off, apologies are in order. I haven’t updated my blog in what seems like ages and truthfully it’s not that I have been lazy.. its just that I have been taking a much needed break from my computer, my work, my routine… not that blogging is a routine but booting up a PC does seem like one!

But now I am back to the grind, the work, the traffic, the mess, the chaos… so rest assured all my frustrations will be manifested pretty regularly in this blog…apart from the other stuff of course.

Thanks to all my readers who have read my blog so far, I hope you keep coming back and bring more people with you…I ll do my best to keep this as random as possible.

So what have I been upto..as I said I was on vacation but while I was on this much needed hiatus…I have noticed that a lot of new events have taken place, but yet little has changed.

No new headway with Pakistan despite the world (except China & Brazil) being on our side, security is still bad despite the recent bombings in Assam, Chidambaram is our new Home Minister but yet you do feel the same vulnerability;  Traffic is bad everywhere despite new flyovers; pollution has gotten worse despite stricter regulatory norms in place, economy is still bad despite BPO’s hiring sprees; sport still struggles in India despite new impetus provided by our boxing and shooting stars…

the same things get repeated all over again…things move so slowly and it frustrates me…the common man!

I need visionaries, i need people to inspire me, I need someone to look up to in my country…I need hope!

While I may sound pessimistic about things.. I do however keep myself happy by enjoying the the little things …

Watching India beat England for example…or SA beating AUS.. A good book (Arvind Adiga’s – White tiger…which I promise Ill review in my future posts)…Formula 1, Driving on a well laid road (which is a rarity in most cities), a bag of potato chips, drinking beer, watching House MD or Big Bang Theory…

ahh the simple things…

So with this lack of contribution of mine to my country Id like to propose the following poll..

No matter what your answers are…have a great 360 odd days ahead!