If I were a baby again

This post has been published by me as a part of the Blog-a-Ton 4; the fourth edition of the online marathon of Bloggers; where we decide and we write. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton.

Hi! I am back with another post this time for Blog-a-ton 4. This time the topic is "If I were a baby again" suggested by Daisy Blue. First time I saw the topic, I was wondering why would anyone want to become a baby again after years of tedious struggle to grow up. If I were a baby again, I would be still as naughty as I was when I was a baby, probably I would raise the level as I would now be pampered by more people than at that time. So, I am penning typing some warnings, requests, etc. 

1. First of all Kavita Aunty you have to take care of my teeth. I don't want broken teeth again. You better treat me as your 3rd Kid.
2. Shilpa Aunty main aapke godi me gandi harqate karoo toh maaf karna. 
3. And Vipul Uncle, I am sorry but I will never miss playing tabla in your head.
4. Shipi Chachi Aap mere favorite chachi ho. Aap aur Gary Chaachu roz mere saath khelne aana.
5. Rakib Uncle, Please shave daily, your beard hurts.
6. Hashan Kai, I please take out some time to play with me. 
7. Ashwini Didi, you are very sweet. Do visit me time to time. Please stay away from my cheeks.
8. Kothal Barta, Main har time aapki godi gandi karoonga. Natak mut karna.
9. Jitu Khura, I won't come to you. Sorry!!!
10. Monuj Borta,  aapuni ghura hobo laagibo.
11. Pixel Khuri, I will be pulling your hairs, so beware.
12. Sid Bhaiyya Get me toys and sweets and I like your hat, please come with it every time you visit me.
13. Daisy you be my best buddy. 
14. Mani Aunty, You are a good story teller. Every day, you have to tell me a story. Moi jaanu aapuni aahibo.
15. As I grow up a little, Lakshmi Uncle please teach me how to read and write. Also tell aunty about it.
16. After that Mani Aunty will have to teach me how to write 55 Fiction. 
17. Ramesh Uncle please visit me often. I get very happy to see your smiling face. And tell me your wonderful anecdotes.
18. Noyon Khura, I will sleep in your belly. Don't say no.
19. Anupam Barta, you have to teach me how to draw.
20. Dhiman Kaku, I know you will get me sweets.

I wanted to say some more. Par zyaada kahoonga, toh pehle hi log bhaag jaayenge.

Oops I forgot someone. Ambi Please give me some of your wisdom as I grow. Specially the first 7 years.

P.S.  I hope my family supports me getting baby again. 

The fellow Blog-a-Tonics who took part in this Blog-a-Ton and links to their respective posts can be checked here. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton.

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The Indian Dream

This post has been published by me as a part of the Blog-a-Ton 3; the third edition of the online marathon of Bloggers; where we decide and we write. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton.

I have been trying to write for quite a few days about this topic, but EM DON. Nothing comes to my mind that I think worth writing. After much thought, I came to the conclusion that the dream of an Indian cannot be separated from the Great Indian Dream. I tried to focus on my dreams but here also EM DON. What are my dreams? Oh, my God! I don't have any dream. Not that I m totally blank. Like all Indians I want to see India at the top of the world. I want India to be free from poverty and corruption. I want to see uniform development in India, but I don't know how to achieve this.So, I went out to discover this. Together with my friends, we sat for a brainstorming session. We named it "The Indian Dream Project". We thought about organising a Short Fiction Writing Contest for School children. This will give an insight about what our future generations think.

You won't believe but the results were fantastic. The stories reflected that the future is in safe hands, as they don't only want a beautiful India, but a beautiful and peaceful world. I never knew that short fiction could be used that effectively. I am inspired. Now, I have a robust dream. I will spend  some time each day for this dream.

And Thank You IP for giving such a good idea for Blog-a-ton 3.

The fellow Blog-a-Tonics who took part in this Blog-a-Ton and links to their respective posts can be checked here. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton.

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Teachers: Aaj Kal

This post has been published by me as a part of the Blog-a-Ton 2, the second edition of the online marathon of Bloggers; where we decide and we write. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton

The topic this month is "Teachers: Aaj Kal". It is a bilingual topic, English and Hindi. So, those who are completely ignorant about Hindi, I am presenting a short description of the topic. The words aaj means today and kal means the days bracketing today. So, Kal can mean both yesterday and tomorrow. But, Aaj Kal when used together can also mean "Nowadays". It is very confusing. But thankfully Blog-a-ton Founder Marshal Vipul Grover has explicitly said that the topic should mean "Teachers: Yesterday and Today". But, Yesterday means History and Today means current afairs here. So, no doubts should be there about the meaning of the topic.

Well, to start with I must say that the topic is very confusing as From where we start. So, I am trying to put everything that I have about teachers in my mind including my 18 years of experience with them and the legends.

In India, we had the gurukuls as the earliest schools. The gurukuls were like the boarding schools where students had to stay, work and study. Since royal families did not work so they went with servants who also studied with them, so the teachers were supposed to be partial to them, but if they did not they might face consequences depending upon the king. In general teachers were good and loved their students. But, there were cases of dandaoing the students also. Dronacharya asked for the thumb of Ekalavya as fees.

Then I am coming directly to time of my Dad, when Freedom struggle was still a part of current affairs. Well, my dad says that he doesn't remember any of his teachers. But, I suppose he wants me not to cribb him. So, I asked my mom about her teachers. She said she had good teachers as well as bad teachers. But she spared me the details about the bad teachers but told about the good teachers. She was one of the youngest in her school since then childrens were sent to school at an older age. So, she was being loved by all students and teachers alike. The teachers used to bring various fruits that were being produced in their homestead farms and bring it to schools for students. Well, nowadays teachers are not that well positioned to afford it so no comparisons in this point. Headmasters used to go to temples before exams. And it included even the rationalist teachers which was quite a thing to do. Because, they did want to leave any stone unturned for good results.

My mom had a chemistry teacher who used to give English tuitions, sometimes even for free, because Chemistry was not the problem for students, it was the English medium that was used to write answers which was difficult. He definitely had great analytical skills. Nowadays, the analytical skills are quite ignored in Teacher's Training. This skills are very necesaary to understand the problems a student might face.

Now, I come to my experiences. I had rather a mixed bag of experience. Earliest, I rememeber my Class I Dey Mam. I have a dedicated a post to her in one of my blogs. She was very strict but she also loved us like her own children. Then there was another teacher we had when we were in Class VI who got confused and taught us Animal Kingdom and Plant Kingdom in the same level as Class XI because she was teaching that to Class XI in the first period and to us in the second period. It was not the only thing that we remember about her. She used to be a moral police being a hot siren herself. Then there were the Hindi Teachers. If the Hindi Teacher was a Lady Teacher she always was good to us. She used to treat us like young adults and give us intellectual talks about Hindi Literature. This had a very positive effec on us. I will not comment on the male Hindi Teachers as they were typical in all the KVs. Then we had an English Teacher who loved all students who did good in English. She cared only about English Subject and thought that only intelligent students can do better in English. She loved me but she loved my brother more because he was better.

After school I was in College, St. Anthony's College. If School taught me good things then College taught me how to enjoy those. The USP of our College was the environment. We would spend our off ours in College, even in Sundays we were found in the College. It was great fun. Marks had less weightage then talent in our times. It was the teachers who were responsible for good result of the college. The College provided all the things a teacher might need and the teachers were supposed to deliver the results. So, we had a one on one realtionship with most of our teachers. Most teachers knew us by name and knew our positive and negative traits. They were like friends. Sometimes, after exam when we were depressed, a teacher will come and try to console us and they even offered us smoke with tea. Well, I never smoked in front of them but it was definitely a gesture that I remember. Sometimes I even attended Mass Comm. Classes because I was interested in it. This was another feature in our college. You could attend other department classes in off classes or with your departmental heads permission. Ever More Better Ever, the motto of our college has often been maintained.

There was a Physics Teacher named James Blah. We used to call him James Bond 007. Not because of his name only. He was a bond in the true sense. He never used to bring any notes with him and start with the last point where he left in the last class and it seemed to come out naturally. We used to think that he must have knows this by heart this after all this years of service as a Teacher. But, once after finishing his course he asked if we had problem in other parts of the subject. We told and he taught us those topics in equally good manner. And if this was not enough he even taught us Maths and the Chemistry students said that he even taught them Chemistry. Now, that is called clear concepts.

Then I went for MCA in Jorhat Engineering College, Jorhat. JEC as we call it. Now, it is a well known fact that the art of dandaoing is thrust in the teachers of Engineering College. Although, I had a very awful experience, there were some funny experiences also. Once the University dandaoed us. The teacher who used to teach us felt that he was also dandoed so he took the question paper added some 100 questions to it and made the list of probable question and gave it to us. All of us passed with good marks. We came to know about it only later on after we left the college. The list of probables also improved our concepts because knowing all 1oo + qusetions well enough is a tough thing to achieve. JEC did made me a different person. The wide variety of backgrounds of students had a positive effect in me.

I have a new set of teachers. This are my friends in the Gym. There is no instructor in my Gym. So, the veterans take their time out and teach you how to do each exercise. And they do it for free.

I guess I have written more than enough and bloggers are not supposed to write long posts. It is against rules, so I stop.

P.S.- I won't say how was I as a Teacher.

The fellow Blog-a-Tonics who took part in this Blog-a-Ton are Vipul, Rajalakshmi, Dhiman, Ranee[1], [2], [3] , Avada, Indian Pundit, Sojo, Aneet, Aativas, Sid, Pra, Ajinkya, Lakshmi, Govind, Shilpa, Bharathi, Shankar, Mytuppence, Azad, Pawan, Pankaja, Saimanohar, Guria, Shruti, Vishnu,Nasrajan and Richa. Click on their respective names to read their posts on Teachers : Aaj Kal. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton.

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I write better in Bamboo Lounge. Be our friend.

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Change

I spent my starting years in Shillong, the beautiful hillstation, and it is marketed as Scotland of the East by the Tourism Ministry. My hometown being Jorhat, I used to visit it during our winter vacations when we were kids. But, for the last six years of my stay I could not visit Jorhat. So, when I permanently transferred to Jorhat, I was expecting a great deal of change and was nervous as how would I face it. A total change of lifestyle. I would have to lose all my friends with whom I grew, the places where I loafed around and be what I was, everything.

When I reached Jorhat, there was nothing of that sort. Jorhat was the same as 6 years before. Same roads, same trees, same birds, same shops although a few shops have cropped in but the no. was insignificant. On one hand, I was comfortable with the familiarty but I was also sad that nothing changed when Shillong changed a lot in between.

It has been 6 years from then. A lot has changed since then, but I never expected many of those. First of those is that Mobile Phones is now an integral part of our lives. Reliance erected Mobile Phone Towers in 1993 but never started operations underestimating Jorhat's Market. But it also effected people who had invested in the pager business but never took off thinking that after mobile comes no one will use pager. All's well that ends well. Now, that Mobile Phone came a whole lot of things change.

Another thing that changed was the religious inclinations of the people. Now, saying anything about it is politically incorrect. But, being politically incorrect is what I am all about. I like controversies. I am not sure whether people are more religious or is it something else. Earlier there was only Durga Puja which grandly celebrated in this area. But, we have many of those nowadays. This year there were 13 Ganesh Puja Pandals, whereas earlier there was only 1 pandal by the Central Puja Commitee which controls all other puja committees. And that is also a recent development. There are many Chhat Puja Commitees. Moharram is also celebrated in an equally grand scale with big tazia processions and each tazia being very glamarous. And Weeklong Akhanda Bhagawat Paaths which does not have any season and so many Naamghars mushroomed in the recent years and virtually half of the year we hear the sound of this Bhagawat Paaths. Sometimes, three Naamghars next to each other organize these paaths in such a way that when one ends other starts so when we keep listening this for three consecutive years we lose our minds. And strangely they are organized during exam time.

Another thing that changed in these years is Bihu. When I was kid, Bihu used to be a 3 or 4 day celebration during Assamese New Year. And we used the hate the timing because our Annual exams overlapped those days. But, nowadays we find that Bihu Functions are organized for three months. Till July we might come across Bihu Functions. Strange!

Now, I don't know if this change is good or bad for us.

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Jinnah

(* Statutory Warning : The contents of this post might be controversial. Read at your own risk. Although you have all the right to read this post, but that does not give you the right to burn my effigy and show disrespect to me or my picture or any other form representing me. Any adverse reaction displayed is punishable by law. *)

Md. Ali Jinnah (محمد علی جناح), the most controversial figure in Asia in the last century and a great statesman who is blamed singly for changing the history, geography, civics, economics, in short, Social Science of the continent. Even if he was not responsible, getting credit for such a big thing also needs a major personality.

Anyway, we will never be able to know what actually happened during partition, who was right or who was wrong and saying anything may lead to severe consequences. Because, for the past 62 years there has been a political conspiracy in both India and Pakistan to brainwash the young minds against the other country. Both the countries blame each other for various things that happened before and after partition, and it is taught as a part of syllabus in schools. But, we cannot blame a single side. As Sidhu says, "You cannot clap with one hand my friend!".

Now, lets look at the points that I gathered from the internet:

1. He was a very moderate personality.
2. He was against separate electorates for Hindu and Muslim at first.
3. At one point he even left politics and went to London. This was when Gandhi supported Khilafat movement. He said what is India's independence has to do with dethroning of the Caliph of Turkey. Gandhi did this to gain Muslim support.
4. He proposed a two nation theory wherein two nations would exist withing the same geographical boundaries. I feel that needed a quite a vision even to understand, and it was superbly great idea. His idea of an united India included Pakistan.
5. "When Jawaharlal Nehru made his famous statement that there is nobody who can stop the Constituent Assembly from enhancing the powers of the centre and we do not believe in grouping, it became untenable for Jinnah to accept the Cabinet Mission Plan. It was at that point that you begin to see a movement for a Pakistan as a sovereign state. " Ayesha Jalal says.
6. Between 1940 and 1946, Jinnah gained electoral support and was open for negotiations. However, he was snubbed by Congress leaders whose actions were either illogical (Gandhi) or tactless (Nehru). They wanted to rule India as a unit; Jinnah wanted a federation
7. When all the major congress leaders were in Jail for 10-15 years, Jinnah and his Muslim league was strategically progressing towards the Independence. Although, their strategy was very different from Congress.
8. He was a great negotiator.
9. He was a great businessman.
10. He was very strong willed.
11. He professed that Islam preaches democracy.

Now, you can interpret in any way you can want, I won't do that for you. Sorry.

Present Situation: Pakistan is an Islamic Republic, free from communal tensions. India is a democratic country where communal tensions is still a problem. There are several groups of terrorists in India who are demanding separate states. Jaswant Singh has been sacked from BJP over phone for writing a Book on Jinnah.

And I recommend this Blog Post for further reading:

1. Let's Build Pakistan
2. The BJP fascination with Jinnah - not surprising

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This Independence Day Ad

Very creative Ad

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Reality Shows go wilder

When reality shows started, they were mostly talent hunt shows. The winner used to win with mere talent. Then someone introduced the voting system and the contestent who made the most money had an upper hand. But, soon reality shows started where conventional talent was not much of a case but plotting and planning was the talent. Then another reality show started where only scandalous candidates were considered. And they had to reveal dark secrets of their lives. And our very own Rakhi Sawant converted her marriage into a reality show and gosh it was a big hit.

Now, last month Reuters reported that a Turkish TV station Kanal T is starting a new reality show where spiritual guides from the four faiths will try to convert certified atheists. The prize for converts will be pilgrimage to a holy site of their chosen religion (Mecca, Vatican, Jerusalem, Tibet). Well, looking at the religious competion in Mid-East, this show can be a popular show.

I hope to see more and more wildly creative reality shows in future.

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Just Another Blog

Hallo People, I have decided to start another blog as if there were not enough problem that I had. I don't have time to write in my other blogs, then why this blog? I don't know myself. I just felt that I should start a blog and I started it. That's it. So, welcome to my blog. Hope it has a greater life. And interesting too!

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