Nitin writes...

प्रकाशवाटा

2010-12-07T16:14:00.002+05:30

वाचलेले पुस्तक - प्रकाशवाटा

काही पुस्तके वाचल्यानंतर आनंदाची जाणीव होते, काही अस्वस्थ करून जातात.... आणि काही आपल्याल्या लज्जित करून सोडतात ... प्रकाशवाटा हे शेवटच्या प्रकारातले पुस्तक ... बाबा आमटेंच्या 'लहान' मुलाचे - डॉ. प्रकाश आमटे यांचं आत्मचरित्र. ... हेमलकशा या ठिकाणी मानवी (आणि प्राणी) जीवन सुखद करताना आलेले अनुभव थक्क करून टाकणारे आहेत.

१९७३ साली हेमलकशाला लोकबिरादरी प्रकल्प सुरू झाला तेव्हा तिथले माडिया गोंड आदिवासी भूक, रोगराई, अंधश्रद्धा यांच्या विळख्यात सापडले होते. त्या जंगलापलीकडचं जग त्यांना माहीत नव्हतं. आज मात्र तिथे सुसज्ज रुग्णालय आहे, शाळा आहे. तिथली मुलं शिकून डॉक्टर, वकील होतात. वैद्यकीय उपचारांअभावी होणार्‍या मृत्यूंचं प्रमाण अत्यल्प आहे. या 'अंधाराकडून उजेडाकडे' झालेल्या प्रवासाचे संपूर्ण श्रेय लोकबिरादरी प्रकल्पाच्या विलक्षण प्रयत्नांना आहे. डॉ. प्रकाश आमटे, डॉ. मंदा आमटे, विलास मनोहर, जगन मचकले, दादा पांचाळ, गोपाळ फडणीस, रेणुका मनोहर आणि आता दिगंत, अनघा व अनिकेत या सार्‍यांच्या जबरदस्त इच्छाशक्तीची, दुर्दम्य जिद्दीची कहाणी म्हणजे 'प्रकाशवाटा' ..

बिजली, सडक, पानी अशा पायाभूत सुविधा उपलब्ध नसणा-या भामरागडच्या जंगलात जाऊन पोहोचणं, हाच शहरवासीयांसाठी एक अनुभव ठरे. मग तिथं राहणं, तर मनातही येणं अशक्य. निबीड अरण्य, आपली स्वत:ची अनवट भाषा बोलणारे माडिया गोंड जातीचे आदिवासी आणि सोबतीला असंख्य वन्य प्राणी. किर्र जंगलामुळे संध्याकाळी चार-साडेचारपासूनच अंधारून येई आणि सहा वाजले की काळोखाचं साम्राज्य सुरू होई. वीज-टेलिफोन वगैरे गोष्टी केवळ कल्पनेतल्या. पण १९७३ मध्ये बाबांनी तिथं लोकबिरादरी प्रकल्प सुरू केला आणि २५ वर्षांच्या प्रकाशनं तिथं जाऊन राहण्याचा निर्णय घेतला. सुदैवानं त्यांच्या डॉक्टर पत्नी मंदाकिनी याही त्याच्याबरोबर होत्या. तिथपासून सुरू होऊन दोनवर्शापुर्वी मिळालेल्या 'रॅमन मॅगसेसे' पुरस्कारांपर्यंतच्या प्रवासाची कहाणी म्हणजे 'प्रकाशवाटा'. या दाम्पत्यानं हेमलकसा आणि भामरागड परिसरातल्या लोकांनाच आपलसं करून घेतलं असं नाही, तर त्या परिसरातल्या प्राणीमात्रांशीही आगळाच ऋणानुबंध साधला... हे सारं करताना सामोरं येत गेली ती सरकारी अनास्था आणि प्रशासनातील कोरडेपणा. पण या दाम्पत्यानं त्या सर्व प्रसंगांशी केलेला सामना हा छोट्या छोट्या प्रसंगातून पुढे येत जातो आणि आमटे कुटुंबियांचं मोठेपण हे अधोरेखित होत जातं.

पुस्तकाबद्दल अधिक माहिती - http://mr.upakram.org/node/१८६९

हेमलकसा प्रोजेक्टला online मदत पाठविण्यासाठी आणि अधिक माहितीसाठी डॉ. विकास आमटे यांना लिहिण्यासाठी anandwan[at]gmail.com

http://lokbiradariprakalp.org/contribution.html

Nitin Mutha

F-415, CD Sceanic Acres, Near Tata Showroom, Fatorda, Madgaon, Goa, Pin 403602 (http://maps.google.com)

Phone +91 9158900766

गांधीगिरी - दिवस सातवा (भाग ३)

2010-09-21T13:40:00.006+05:30

भाग १

भाग २

सविनय सत्याग्रहाचा अजून एक (निष्फळ?) दिवस. आजचा दिवस रवीने काळा बुरखा घालून निषेध करायचा ठरवला होता.

माझा प्रश्न - असल्या प्रतिकात्मक निषेधातून काही साध्य होइल का?

रवीचे उत्तर - गेल्या सात दिवसात काहीच प्रतिसाद न मिळल्यामूळे आजचा वेगळा निषेध. आणि शेवटी आणिबाणीचा उपाय (उपोषण) आहेच की... आणि त्यामधून काहीच नाही मिळाले तरी उन्हाचा त्रास वाचतो हा काय कमी फायदा?

जवळपास ६ वर्तमानपत्रांशी संपर्क करुनही एकाने देखील बातमी दिली नाही की अधिक माहितीदेखिल करून घेन्याचा प्रयत्न केला नाही. राजकारण्यांच्या साध्या देखव्यांचा (*) गाजावाजा करण्या-या पत्रकारांना सामान्यांच्या

लढाईकडे लक्ष द्यायला वेळ नाही वाटतं.

सातवा दिवस

काळा बुरखा घालून रवी

रवीला पाठिंबादेणारे हितचिंतक.

(*) - माझा राग राजकारणी लोकांवर नसून पत्रकारांवर आहे. खालील बातम्या प्रसरीत करणारे याकडे लक्ष देतील काय

कूलरच्या थंड हवेत चार तासांचे उपोषण करणारे करुणानिधी (वेळ - सकाळी नाष्टा ते दुपारचे जेवण)

रिकामे प्लास्टिकचे टमरेल उचलण्याची जाहिरात करण्याच्या यूगात पत्रकारांकडून काही अपेक्षा ठेवणे हेच चूक आहे.

या सगळ्या गूंत्यात रविचे आणि त्याच्या परिवाराचे काय हा प्रश्न अजूनही अनुत्तरीतच ...... बोथट (की मेलेल्या) संवेदनावाले शिक्षणसम्राट या कडे लक्ष देतील काय.

गांधीगिरी - दिवस पाचवा (भाग २)

2010-09-17T12:03:00.004+05:30

भाग १

माझी आणि रवीची भेट वेगळ्याच कारणामुळे झाली. त्याच्या आधीच त्याचे हात construction business मध्ये डी वाय पाटील संस्थेमधे पोळले होते (जे मला नंतर कळाले).

त्याच्या मूलीच्या जन्माच्यावेळेला त्याने केलेल्या SSY च्या शिबीरातून मिळालेल्या संकल्पनांमुळे आणि स्वःताच्या कल्पकतेमुळे त्याच्या मुलीला त्याने वयाच्या दुस-या वर्षीच वाचायला शिकवले होते. आज सात वर्षांची राजेश्वरी १५०० पेक्षा जास्त spellings सांगते, १०० वर देशांचे नाव-राजधानी-झेंडा सांगू शकते, आणि चौथीमधल्या मूलांच्याबरोबरीने गणिते सोडवते. हे सगळं हसत खेळत कसं शिकवावं यावर तो लहान मूलांसाठी एक activity group (school) चालवतो. माझ्या मुलीसाठी शाळा शोधत असतांना माझी आणि त्याची भेट झाली. शाळा बघितल्याबरोबर माझ्या लक्षात आले की हे पाणी वेगळंच आहे. काही मुले स्व:ताहुन वाचत होती, काही गणिते सोडवित होती काही चक्क झोपली देखील होती. शिक्षिका (जान्हवी - रवीची पत्नी) मूलांना अडचणी आहेत त्यांचाबरोबरोबर बोलून त्यांना समजावत होत्या. His school's principal is - WE DON'T TEACH, WE HELP KIDS LEARN. आज त्याच्या शाळेच्या ६ शाखा पश्चिम महाराष्ट्रात कार्य़्ररत आहेत (आणि लवकरच मूंबईत देखील चालू होणार आहे).

शाळेमधून मिळण्या-या उत्पन्नामधून त्याने पुरवठादारांची देणी परत करण्याचा प्रयत्न केला, पण त्याला खूप वेळ लागत होता. पूरवठादार थांबयला तयार नव्हते. म्हणुन गेल्या पाच दिवसांपासून त्याने हा सत्याग्रहाचा मार्ग अवलंबलाय. कोर्ट-कचेरी करण्यात आणि परीणामी वेळ, पैसा वाया घालवण्यात त्याला स्व्यारस्य नाहीये आणि त्यामूळे होणारी डी वाय पाटील संस्थेची बदनामी देखील टाळायची आहे. आजच त्याच्याशी सहज बोलतांना तो म्हणाला - मी लहान मूलांना घडवण्याचे काम करतोय आणि मी उभारलेल्या ईमारतीमध्ये मोठ्या विद्यार्थ्यांना शिकवन्याचे काम चालू आहे. (हे सुद्धा कोर्टात न जाण्याचे एक कारण असू शकेल).

रवी आणि जान्हवी (त्यांच्या सत्याग्रह पोस्टर सह)

डी वाय पाटील इंजीनियरींग कॊलेज समोर (आंबी-तळेगाव)

छोटी राजेश्वरी - तिच्या तंबूमधे अभ्यास करतांना

गांधीगिरी - दिवस तिसरा

2010-09-16T10:26:00.008+05:30

सविनय सत्याग्रह (आणि बेमुदत उपोषण)

रवी सीताराम पाटील - वय पस्तीशीच्या आसपास. एक ध्येयवेडा युवक. सचॊटीने काम करणारा बांधकाम करणारा व्यवसायिक (sounds Oxymoron - but true).

चार वर्षापुर्वी (२००६) रवीने पद्मश्री डॊ डी वाय पाटील - शेतकी (Agricultural) महाविद्यालयाचे बांधकामाचे contract घेवून काम करायला सुरुवात केली. दोन वर्षानंतर (२००८) काम पूर्ण झाल्यावर कामाचा मोबदला म्हणून बाकी असलेले ३२.५ लाख रुपयांचे बिल मागयला सूरवात केली. आजतागायत काहीच मिळत नाही हे बघुन रवीवर असल्येल्या विश्वासामुळे इतके दिवस थांबलेल्या पूरवठादारांचाही धीर आता संपत आलाय. त्याच्या पत्नीला त्रास आणि धमक्यांचे फोन यायला लागल्यावर आणि डी वाय पाटील संस्थेकडून आश्वासनाशिवाय काहीच हाती लागत नाही हे बघितल्यावर आता त्याने सविनय सत्याग्रहाचे हत्यार उपसले आहे.

रवी, त्याची पत्नी (जान्हवी) आणि छॊटी राजेश्वरी हे सगळं कूटूंब मागच्या दोन दिवसांपासून डी वाय पाटील महाविद्यालय - आंबी (तळेगांव, पूणे) येथे गेले सहा दिवस सकाळी १० ते संध्याकाळी ५ पर्यंत दारात उन्हा/

पावसात उभं आहे. त्याच्या निवेदनाची प्रत मा. राज्यपाल डी वाय पाटील (त्रिपूरा), मा. ग्रहमंत्री (महाराष्ट्र), पोलीस महासंचालक (मुंबई), पूणे ग्रामिण पोलीस यांनाही देण्यात आली आहे. जर काहीच प्रतिसाद मिळाला नाही तर २९ सप्टेंबरपासून बेमुदत आमरण उपोषण करण्याचाही त्याने इशारा दिला आहे. महाविद्यालयाचे विद्यार्थी तसेच येणारेजाणारे थबकून त्यांना आवर्जून भेटतात. काही धीर देतात तर काहीजण चेष्टाही करतात.

हे सगळं बघून आणि रवीला भेटून मला काही प्रश्न पडलेत.

१. आजच्या ’बळी तो कान पिळी’ च्या युगात हे आंदोलन कितपत यशस्वी होईल.

२. गेंड्याची कातडी असलेले शिक्षणसम्राट बदलतील का?

३. जर रवीचे काही बरेवाईट झाले तर त्याला जबाबदार कोण? आणि त्याच्या कूटुंबाचे काय? (BTW, जान्हवीचा आपल्या पतीसोबत उभे रहाण्याचा निर्णय सर्वस्वी तिचाच आहे)

Is this type of protest (& Gandhian values) relevant today ?

Shri Ramchandra kripalu

2010-07-23T11:11:00.000+05:30

न-पूस्तके

2010-06-24T11:29:00.003+05:30

हे वाचून एक न वाचायच्या पुस्तकांची यादी बनवायाला घेतलीये... मदत करा

१. बाकी शुन्य - कमलेश वालावलकर

२. तेरुओ आणि काही दुरपर्यंत - गौरी देशपांडे

३. नातिचरामि - मेघना पेठे

४. शाळा - मिलिंद बोकील

५. एक झाड दोन पक्षी - विश्राम बेडेकर

काही उतारे - पुलं

2009-12-02T23:48:00.000+05:30

लोकशाही : एक सखोल चिंतन (पुलं)

..... ’लोकशाही म्हणजे लोकांनी चालवलेले लोकांचे आणि लोकांच्यासाठी असलेले - म्हणजे थोडक्यात आपल्यासाठी नसून लोकांसाठी असलेले सरकार - लिंकन (थोडा फेरफार करून. अधिक माहितीसाठी काही वाचण्याची गरज नाही)

इसापनीतीत एक गोष्ट आहे. बेडकांना एकदा वाटते, आपल्याला राजा हवा. वास्तविक त्यांना राजाची आवश्यकता का भासवी, कोण जाणे. भासली खरी. शेवटी देवाने ओंडका फेकला. बेडकांनी आठ दिवसात त्याच्यावर नाचायला सूरुवात केली - तेंव्हा देवाने अधिक कडक राजा हवा म्हणून बगळा पाठवला. पूर्वीचे चैनी राजे प्रजेच्या खर्चात विहार करीत, ते सोडून ह्या बाहेरुन शूभ्र दिसण्या-या राजाने, प्रजेचा चक्क आहारच करायला सूरुवात केली. बेडकांनी हाही राजा परतवला आणि आपल्यातून राजा निवडायचे ठरविले. तो अजूनपर्यंत निवडला गेला की नाही ते कळत नाही. आरडाओरडा मात्र चालोतो. दर पावसाळ्यात त्यांच्या सभा होतात. गळ्याचे गोळे फूगवून वृद्धदुर्दर भाषणे करतात. वर्षभर पून्हा काही ऎकू येत नाही. बहूधा मंडूकशाही सुरू झाली असावी वर्षातून एकदा निवडणूका देखील होत असाव्यात. ...................... खिल्ली

एका गांधी टोपीचा प्रवास
.... आजचा तरूण हे असलेच काही काही पाहात वाढला. धर्मातीत राज्यातल्या आकाशवाणीवर सकाळच्या वेळी ’देवा तुझ्याशिवाय आम्हाला आधार नाही’ ह्या अर्थाचे टाहो ऎकत आला. त्याच्य ऎन उमेदीच्या वर्षात भाषावार प्रांतरचनेचे वाद त्याने पाहिले. भाषिक द्वेषाची परिसीमा पाहिली. ज्या समाजाला शिक्षणाची दारे बंद होती, त्या समाजातून नवा सुशिक्षित वर्ग जन्माला आला. त्याने आपल्या पददलित समजाचे अंतरंग उघडे करून दाखवायला सूरुवात केली. त्यातुन क्षोभचे दर्शन घडू लागले. ....
.... हल्लीच्या पिढीला आदराची भावना नाही हे म्हणतांना ज्याच्याविषयी आदर बाळगावा अशी उभ्या देशातील किती माणसे त्यांना दाखवता येतील ? आमच्या विज्ञानविभागाचे प्रमूख सत्यसाईबाबांच्या मागून जाताना दिसतात आणि माणसाचे भविष्य माणसनेच घडवायचे आहे हे सांगण्या-यासमाजवादी तत्वज्ञानाचा घोष करणारे पूढारी मंत्रिपद मिळावे म्हणून गणपतिबाप्पाला सकडे घालतात.....
... एका बाजूला ३५ - ३५ मजल्यांच्या हवेल्या उठत असलेल्या तो पाहातो त्याबरोबर झोपडपट्ट्या वाढतांना त्याला दिसतात. लोकनेत्यांचे उच्चार आणि आचार यात त्याल ताळमेळ दिसत नाही. मग त्याचा संताप उफाळून येतो. तो नविन कवीच्या कवितांमधुन कधी निराशेचा, कधी वैतागाचा सूर घेवून बाहेर पडतो तर कधी विध्वंसाची भाषा करीत येतो. तरूण मनाच्या ह्या अस्वस्थतेने वडीलपिढी अस्वस्थ न होत, त्यांना बेजबाबदारपणाणे नावे ठेवतांना आढळते. प्रत्येक काळात पिढ्यांतली दरी असते. पण गेल्या काही वर्षात ती अधिकच भयान होवू लागली आहे. हल्लीच्या पिढीला मुल्यांची कदरच नाही हे म्हणणे कोडगेपणाचे आहे. चांगली मूल्ये जतन करण्यासाठी आयुष्याचा होम केलेली माणसेच त्यांना दिसली नाहीत. .... ... खिल्ली

झाडे वाचवा

2009-08-10T15:29:00.005+05:30

झाडे लावा - झाडे वाचवा

काही प्रभावी ads

Toilet paper dispenser - दररोज बदलले जाणारे चित्र
-

Customer complaint - 9503056525

2009-07-22T10:56:00.001+05:30

Dear Nodal Officer,

I purchased airtel connection 3 weeks before from following address. The phone number is 9503056525

Bharti Airtel Limited, Vega Centre, A-Building, Shankarseth Road, Next to Income Tax Office, Swargate, Pune - 411 037

This SIM worked only for two days and then stopped working. When contacted with customer care, it was informed that this is due to failed to verify the address.

1. I really doubt that there is any agent who is doing the address verification as we have 5 more SIMs on the same company account on the same address working fine.

2. After several phone calls to customer care, another story was informed that due to migration of some circles the new activation is on hold till 17^th July

3. From past three days our company coordinator is visiting the customer relationship center (almost 20 Kms from our office) and getting the reply that it will be done in 2/3 days time

4. From yesterday I’m following this with Ms. Lovelen (9860548595) of Vega center for this. Answers I get is very funny and does not go with the company of the repute of Airtel.

a. Yesterday (22^nd July) I was told that it will be start on today (i.e. 23^rd July). Its still not working

b. In morning (1030 hrs) when I called Ms. Lovelen again to check on the status I get the answer that she was just reached office and whe will call back ‘whenever’ get time.

c. Irritated by these type of responses, I asked for the name / number of supervisor - the most surprising answer is there is no boss for me. I’m not answerable to any one.

And I though Mr. Sunil Mittal was running the show at Airtel.

I therefore looking forward to few basic clarifications

1. Who is the real boss at Bharti Airtel - Your customers, Mr. Mittal or Ms Lovelen

2. When will the customer care executives of Airtel will become sincere

3. And if you can – when will my phone start.

I’m putting copy of this on my blog so that many other can get an advance warning. You can check the same here http://nitinmutha.blogspot.com/

Dejected customer

Nitin

-----------------------------------------
Nitin Mutha
Manager - R & D
Protective Packaging Division
The Supreme Industries Ltd.
Ser # 137/138, 3rd Floor, Astral Court
Near Gaikwad Petrol Pump, Marutrao Gaikwad Nagar.
Aundh Pune 411 007. Maharashtra
Phone +91-20-25890538

Mobile +91-95030 56525 / 9970150953
Email Nitin_Mutha@supreme.co.in
Website http://www.supreme.co.in

जी ए

2009-05-10T19:06:00.004+05:30

कधी तरी (कुसुमगुंजा)
अनुभव कोणाला चुकले नाहीत. पण त्यांचे रुपांतर जर आठवणीत झाले तर मात्र आणखी एक बंधन जखडलेलेच. म्हणून आत्ताच फार वाटते, या दैनंदिन आयष्याचे मलीन वस्त्र फेकून द्यावे व वेळ आहे तोच निसटावे. जाताना दोन-चार व्यक्तींचा निरोप घ्यावा. पण नको. नेमका त्यांचाच तर निरोप नको. नाहीतर जायच्या वेळीच एकाद-दुसरा शब्द स्पष्ट व्हायचा. मुद्दाम काळजीपूर्वक लपवून ठेवलेल्या भावना प्रकट व्हायच्या आणि आणखी एक पाश भोवती पडायचा. तेव्हा नको. त्या भावनांना शब्द नको. उत्कटतेला वाचा नको. भरल्या खोलीतून मागून हळूच जावे, त्याप्रमाणे बाहेर पडावे व निघून जावे. त्यांना नकळत, पण त्यांना आठवत त्यांच्याविषयीच्या भावना घेऊन, त्या पण मूक ठेवून

माणसे: अरभाट आणि चिल्लर
सत्याचा नेहमीच विजय होतॊ - आज ना उद्या ! हे सुत्र कधीच खोटे ठरवता येत नाही, कारण त्यातली मेख आहे ती आज ना उद्या या शब्दात ! माणसाचे आयुष्या टीचभर व काळ अनंत आहे. शतकानुशतके गेली तरी पुन्हा कोडगेपणाने हसत ’आज ना उद्या’ असे म्हणत स्वतःचा आब राखता येतो. पण माणसाची माती देखील नष्ट होऊन जाते आणि तो सत्याच्या विजय-परभवच्या पलीकडे गेलेला असतॊ. म्हणजे एखाद्या दरिद्री माणसच्या हातावर कागदाचा तुकडा ठेवून त्याला ’यावर लिहिलेली प्रचंड रक्कम दोनशे लक्ष वर्षे आठ महिने एकोणतीस दिवसांनंतर तुझ्या मालकीची होईल, व तुझे दरिद्र्य नष्ट होईल’ असे सांगण्यासरखे आहे.
देव संकटकाळी मदतीला धावतो, भक्तांना तारतो, ही देखील असलीच सवंग वाक्ये. काकराज, तुम्हीच सांगितले ना की सारे परमेश्वराच्या इच्छेप्रमाणे होते? म्हणजे आमचे रक्षण करण्याची त्याला ईच्छा झालीच तर कुठे तो आमचे रक्षण करणार ! संकटे निर्माण करणारा तोच, त्यांतून तारणारा तोच, आणि तशी इच्छा झाली नाही की नष्ट करणार तोच ! त्याच्या इच्छेची वाट पाहत युगे जातील व त्याच्या मदतीची गरजच रहाणार नाही. व्रत-वैकल्ये, जपजाप्य, नवस, भजन, पूजन असल्या उपायांनी त्याच्या मनात आपल्याला अनुकूल अशी इच्छा निर्माण करता येईल, इतका का तॊ बोटचेपा आहे ? असली माणसे आम्हांला खडोगणती माहीत आहेत. पण परमेश्वर देखील तसाच ? छ्ट, त्यावर विश्वास ठेवणे मुढांना अशक्यच आहे. उप्परवालेके घर में देर है, लेकिन अंधेर नहीं !, वा, काय सुरेख अनुप्रास जुळले आहेत ! पण देर तरी का असावा ? ते घर म्हणजे आम्ही दररोज पाहतो तसली कचेरी आहे की काय ? अंधार नाही, प्रकाश आहे का ? चांगली गोष्ट आहे. पण दिवे जळत आहेत म्हणून तत्परतेने काम चालू आहे, असा अर्थ होत नाही. आमच्या कच्ये-यांत रात्रीच काय, दिवसा देखील दिवे जळत असतात. पण बहूधा तेथे कुणीच नसते, किंवा रेकॊर्ड रुमच्या वातवरणात रमीचा डाव, अगर ओली पार्टी चाललेली असते. सगळीकडे नुसते वायदे, आणि वसूल न होणारी उधारी !

माणसे: अरभाट आणि चिल्लर
- आधी शिक्षा, नंतर निर्णय हे तूला चमत्कारीक वाटले, अँलिस, कारण तू अजून कोवळी आहेस. आणखी थोड्या वर्षांनी तुला तसे वाटणार नाही. आपल्या आयष्यात तसल्याच गोष्टी अनेकदा घडतात. नंतर दूर कूठे तरी आपल्या सगळ्या कृत्यांचा, कर्माचा हिशोब होतो. निदाण शहाणे तरी तसे सांगत असतात. पण त्याआधीच जगताजगता आपली शिक्षा सुरू झालेली असते

तो आणि ती

2009-03-28T15:24:00.002+05:30

तो- काय खाऊ या?

ती- काहीही चालेल.
तो- पावभाजी आणि व्हेज पुलाव खाऊ या?
ती- शी केव्हढी ऑईली असते. मला पिंपल्स येतात.
तो- मग नुस्तंच चहा-ब्रेड सँडविच?
ती- मला इथं मरणाची भूक लागलीये, अन तू मला चहा-ब्रेड देणार?
तो- मग तूच सांग काय खायचं?
ती- काहीही चालेल..!! ..

तो- मग आता आपण काय करू या?
ती- काहीही. तुच ठरव.
तो- पिक्चर बघू या मस्त? बरेच दिवस झलेत?
ती- नको. वेस्ट ऑफ टाईम!
तो- मग बागेत चल, बॅडमिंटन खेळू या.
ती- डोकं फिरलंय का? बाहेर ऊन बघ किती ते..
तो- मग कॉफीशॉपमध्ये तरी जाऊ या.
ती- नको. पुर्ण दिवस झोप येत नाही कॉफी प्याल्यावर.
तो- मग तुच सांग, काय करू या?
ती- काहीही. तुच ठरव..!! ..

तो- जाऊ दे. सरळ घरीच जाऊ या झालं.
ती- काहीही. तुच ठरव. तो- बसनं जाऊ या?
ती- शी केवढी गर्दी. अन कसकसले वास येतात त्या बसमध्ये.
तो- ठीके.. टॅक्सीने जाऊ या मग. ती- पैसे जास्त झालेत का? एवढ्याशा अंतरासाठी टॅक्सी?
तो- ठीक. चल मग, चालतच जाऊ.
ती- किती दुष्ट तु? रिकाम्या पोटी मला चालायला लावतोस?
तो- ठीक. मग आधी जेवू या?
ती- व्हाटेव्हर! तो- काय खाऊ या?
ती- तुच ठरव॥!!

विरह

2009-02-03T20:52:00.002+05:30

संदिप खरे - नसतेस घरी तू जेंव्हा
नसतेस घरी तू जेव्हा..
जीव तुटका तुटका होतो
जगण्याचे वीरती धागे
संसार फाटका होतो

नभ फाटून वीज पडावी
कल्लोळ तसा ओढवतो
ही धरा दिशाहीन होते
अन्‌ चंद्र पोरका होतो

येतात उन्हे दाराशी
हिरमुसून जाती मागे
खिडकिशी थबकुन वारा
तव गंधावाचून जातो

तव मिठीत विरघळणाऱ्या
मज स्मरती लाघववेळा
श्वासावीण ह्रुदय अडावे
मी तसाच अगतीक होतो

तू सांग सखे मज काय
मी सांगू या घरदारा ?
समईचा जीव उदास
माझ्यासह मिणमिण मिटतो

ना अजून झालो मोठा
ना स्वतंत्र अजुनी झालो
तुजवाचून उमगत जाते
तुजवाचून जन्मच अडतो !

संदिप खरे - कसे सरतील सये

कसे सरतील सये, माझ्यावीना दिस तुझे

सरताना आणि सांग सलतील ना?

गुलाबाचे फुल दोन्, रोज रात्री डोळ्यावर

मुसुमुसु पाणी सांग भरतील ना?

पावसाच्या धारा धारा, मोजताना दिस सारा

रितेरिते मन तुझे उरे, ओठभर हसे हसे

उरातून वेडेपिसे, खोल खोल कोण आंत झुरे

आता जरा अळीमिळी, तुझी माझी व्यथा निळी

सोसताना सुखावून हसशील ना?

गुलाबाचे फुल दोन्,रोज रात्री डोळ्यावर

मुसुमुसु पाणी सांग भरतील ना?

कोण तुझ्या सौधातून्, उभे असे सामसूम

चिडीचूप सुनसान दिवा, आता सांज ढळेलच

आणि पुन्हा छळेलच, नभातून गोरा चांदवा

चांदण्यांचे कोटी कण, आठवांचे ओले सण

रोज रोज नीजभर भरतील ना?

गुलाबाचे फुल दोन्,रोज रात्री डोळ्यावर

मुसुमुसु पाणी सांग भरतील ना?

इथे दूर देशी, माझ्या सुन्या खिडकीच्यापाशी

झडे सर कांचभर तडा, तुच तुच तुझ्या तुझ्या

तुझी तुझी तुझे तुझे, सारा सारा तुझा तुझा सडा

पडे माझ्या वाटेतून, आणि मग काट्यातून

जातांनाही पायभर मखमल ना?

गुलाबाचे फुल दोन्,रोज रात्री डोळ्यावर

मुसुमुसु पाणी सांग भरतील ना?

आता नाही बोलायाचे, जरा जरा जगायाचे

माळूनीया अबोलीची फुले, देहभर हलू देत

वीजेवर डुलू देत, तुझ्या माझ्या विरहाचे झुले

जरा घन झुरू दे ना, वारा गुदमरू दे ना

तेंव्हा मग धरासारी भिजवेल ना?

गुलाबाचे फुल दोन्,रोज रात्री डोळ्यावर

मुसुमुसु पाणी सांग भरतील ना?

मन - ३ कविता

2009-02-03T20:42:00.003+05:30

सुधीर मोघे - मन मनास उमगत नाही

मन मनास उमगत नाही
आधार कसा शोधावा !
स्वप्नातिल पदर धुक्याचा
हातास कसा लागावा?

मन थेंबांचे आकाश
लाटांनी सावरलेले
मन नक्षत्रांचे रान
अवकाशी अवघडलेले
मन गरगरते आवर्त
मन रानभूल, मन चकवा

मन काळोखाची गुंफा
मन तेजाचे राऊळ
मन सैतानाचा हात
मन देवाचे पाऊल
दुबळ्या गळक्या झोळीत
हा सूर्य कसा झेलावा ?

चेहरा-मोहरा ह्याचा
कुणि कधी पाहिला नाही
धनि अस्तित्वाचा तरिही
ह्याच्याविण दुसरा नाही
ह्या अनोळखी नात्याचा
कुणि कसा भरवसा द्यावा ?

बहिणाबाई - मन वढाय वढाय
मन वढाय वढाय
उभ्या पीकातलं ढोर
किती हाकला हाकला
फिरी येतं पिकांवर

मन मोकाट मोकाट
त्याले ठायी ठायी वाटा
जशा वार्यानं चालल्या
पानावर्हल्यारे लाटा

मन लहरी लहरी
त्याले हाती धरे कोन?
उंडारलं उंडारलं
जसं वारा वाहादन

मन जह्यरी जह्यरी
याचं न्यारं रे तंतर
आरे, इचू, साप बरा
त्याले उतारे मंतर!

मन पाखरू पाखरू
त्याची काय सांगू मात?
आता व्हतं भुईवर
गेलं गेलं आभायात

मन चप्पय चप्पय
त्याले नही जरा धीर
तठे व्हयीसनी ईज
आलं आलं धर्तीवर

मन एवढं एवढं
जसा खाकसचा दाना
मन केवढं केवढं?
आभायात बी मायेना

देवा, कसं देलं मन
आसं नही दुनियात!
आसा कसा रे तू योगी
काय तुझी करामत!

देवा, आसं कसं मन?
आसं कसं रे घडलं
कुठे जागेपनी तूले
असं सपनं पडलं!

संदिप खरे - मन तळ्‌यात मळ्‌यात

मन तळ्‌यात मळ्‌यात
जाईच्या कळ्‌यात

मन नाजुकशी मोतीमाळ
तुझ्या नाजुकश्या गळ्‌यात

ऊरी चाहुलींचे मृगजळ
वाजे पाचोळा उगी कशात

इथे वाऱ्याला सांगत गाणी
माझे राणी
आणि झुळुक तुझ्या मनात

भिडू लागे रात अंगालागी
तुझ्या नखाची कर नभात

माझ्या नयनी नक्षत्रतारा
आणि चांद तुझ्या डोळ्‌यात...

राष्ट्रध्वज - शासकीय ईंग्रजी - कोणी अर्थ सांगता का ?

2009-01-31T13:20:00.004+05:30

प्रजासत्ताक दिनाच्या दिवशी सगळीकडे अभिमाणाने फ़डकणारे झेंडे दुस-याच दिवशी पायदळी येतात.

यावर सरकारी धोरण काय हे शोधल्यानंतर गृहमंत्रालयाच्या पानावर हे हाती लागले. यावरुन सरकारी धोरण झेंड्याबाबतही गुळमुळीतच आहे आणि शासकीय इंग्रजीदेखील शासकीय मराठीइतकीच धेडगुजरी याचा प्रत्यय आला. उदाहरणादाखल खालील २ - ३ परिच्छेद बघा

१.the Flag made of paper may be waved by public on occasions of important national, cultural and sports events. However, such paper Flags should not be discarded or thrown on the ground after the event. As far as possible, it should be disposed of in private consistent with the dignity of the Flag

dignity of the Flag म्हणजे काय ते मात्र गुलदस्त्यातच

२. when the Flag is in a damaged or soiled condition, it shall be destroyed as a whole in private, preferably by burning or by any other method consistent with the dignity of the Flag.

पुन्हा तेच - dignity of the Flag

३. हा परिच्छेद दुस-या देशांच्या झेंड्याबरोबर भारताचा झेंडा कसा फडकवावा याबद्दल आहे
In case flags are to be flown in a closed, i.e., complete circle, the National Flag shall mark the beginning of the circle and the flags of other countries should proceed in a clockwise manner until the last flag is placed next to the National Flag.

"beginning" of the circle कसे शोधायचे. जर समजा मधे जागा ठेऊन किंवा अजुन एक ध्वज शेवटी लावुन marking करावे तर ते ही नाही. कारण यातच पुढे लिहिले आहे की

It is not necessary to use separate National Flags to mark the beginning and the end of the
circle of flags. The National Flag shall also be included in its alphabetical order in such a closed circle.

ऑडॅसिटी ऑफ होप - बराक ओबामा

2009-01-21T15:02:00.000+05:30

अमेरिकेचे नवनिर्वाचित राष्ट्राध्यक्ष बराक ओबामा यांनी लिहिलेल्या ‘ऑडॅसिटी ऑफ होप’ या ग्रंथाचा मराठी अनुवाद पुण्यातील अमेय प्रकाशनातर्फे लवकरच प्रकाशित होत आहे. पुस्तकातील काही अंश-

Prologue

IT’S BEEN ALMOST ten years since I first ran for political office. I was thirty-five at the time, four years out of law school, recently married, and generally impatient with life. A seat in the Illinois legislature had opened up, and several friends suggested that I run, thinking that my work as a civil rights lawyer, and contacts from my days as a community organizer, would make me a viable candidate. After discussing it with my wife, I entered the race and proceeded to do what every first-time candidate does: I talked to anyone who would listen. I went to block club meetings and church socials, beauty shops and barbershops. If two guys were standing on a corner, I would cross the street to hand them campaign literature. And everywhere I went, I’d get some version of the same two questions.
“Where’d you get that funny name?”
And then: “You seem like a nice enough guy. Why do you want to go into something dirty and nasty like politics?”
I was familiar with the question, a variant on the questions asked of me years earlier, when I’d first arrived in Chicago to work in low-income neighborhoods. It signaled a cynicism not simply with politics but with the very notion of a public life, a cynicism that—at least in the South Side neighborhoods I sought to represent—had been nourished by a generation of broken promises. In response, I would usually smile and nod and say that I understood the skepticism, but that there was—and always had been—another tradition to politics, a tradition that stretched from the days of the country’s founding to the glory of the civil rights movement, a tradition based on the simple idea that we have a stake in one another, and that what binds us together is greater than what drives us apart, and that if enough people believe in the truth of that proposition and act on it, then we might not solve every problem, but we can get something meaningful done.
It was a pretty convincing speech, I thought. And although I’m not sure that the people who heard me deliver it were similarly impressed, enough of them appreciated my earnestness and youthful swagger that I made it to the Illinois legislature.
SIX YEARS LATER, when I decided to run for the United States Senate, I wasn’t so sure of myself.
By all appearances, my choice of careers seemed to have worked out. After two terms during which I labored in the minority, Democrats had gained control of the state senate, and I had subsequently passed a slew of bills, from reforms of the Illinois death penalty system to an expansion of the state’s health program for kids. I had continued to teach at the University of Chicago Law School, a job I enjoyed, and was frequently invited to speak around town. I had preserved my independence, my good name, and
Rip by XmosRips
my marriage, all of which, statistically speaking, had been placed at risk the moment I set foot in the state capital.
But the years had also taken their toll. Some of it was just a function of my getting older, I suppose, for if you are paying attention, each successive year will make you more intimately acquainted with all of your flaws—the blind spots, the recurring habits of thought that may be genetic or may be environmental, but that will almost certainly worsen with time, as surely as the hitch in your walk turns to pain in your hip. In me, one of those flaws had proven to be a chronic restlessness; an inability to appreciate, no matter how well things were going, those blessings that were right there in front of me. It’s a flaw that is endemic to modern life, I think—endemic, too, in the American character—and one that is nowhere more evident than in the field of politics. Whether politics actually encourages the trait or simply attracts those who possess it is unclear. Someone once said that every man is trying to either live up to his father’s expectations or make up for his father’s mistakes, and I suppose that may explain my particular malady as well as anything else.
In any event, it was as a consequence of that restlessness that I decided to challenge a sitting Democratic incumbent for his congressional seat in the 2000 election cycle. It was an ill-considered race, and I lost badly—the sort of drubbing that awakens you to the fact that life is not obliged to work out as you’d planned. A year and a half later, the scars of that loss sufficiently healed, I had lunch with a media consultant who had been encouraging me for some time to run for statewide office. As it happened, the lunch was scheduled for late September 2001.
“You realize, don’t you, that the political dynamics have changed,” he said as he picked at his salad.
“What do you mean?” I asked, knowing full well what he meant. We both looked down at the newspaper beside him. There, on the front page, was Osama bin Laden.
“Hell of a thing, isn’t it?” he said, shaking his head. “Really bad luck. You can’t change your name, of course. Voters are suspicious of that kind of thing. Maybe if you were at the start of your career, you know, you could use a nickname or something. But now…” His voice trailed off and he shrugged apologetically before signaling the waiter to bring us the check.
I suspected he was right, and that realization ate away at me. For the first time in my career, I began to experience the envy of seeing younger politicians succeed where I had failed, moving into higher offices, getting more things done. The pleasures of politics—the adrenaline of debate, the animal warmth of shaking hands and plunging into a crowd—began to pale against the meaner tasks of the job: the begging for money, the long drives home after the banquet had run two hours longer than scheduled, the bad food and stale air and clipped phone conversations with a wife who had stuck by me so far but was pretty fed up with raising our children alone and was beginning to question my priorities. Even the legislative work, the policy making that had gotten me to run in the first place, began to feel too incremental, too removed from the larger battles—over taxes, security, health care, and jobs—that were being waged on a national stage. I began to harbor doubts about the path I had chosen; I began feeling the way I imagine an actor or athlete must feel when, after years of commitment to a particular dream,
Rip by XmosRips
after years of waiting tables between auditions or scratching out hits in the minor leagues, he realizes that he’s gone just about as far as talent or fortune will take him. The dream will not happen, and he now faces the choice of accepting this fact like a grownup and moving on to more sensible pursuits, or refusing the truth and ending up bitter, quarrelsome, and slightly pathetic.
DENIAL, ANGER, bargaining, despair—I’m not sure I went through all the stages prescribed by the experts. At some point, though, I arrived at acceptance—of my limits, and, in a way, my mortality. I refocused on my work in the state senate and took satisfaction from the reforms and initiatives that my position afforded. I spent more time at home, and watched my daughters grow, and properly cherished my wife, and thought about my long-term financial obligations. I exercised, and read novels, and came to appreciate how the earth rotated around the sun and the seasons came and went without any particular exertions on my part.
And it was this acceptance, I think, that allowed me to come up with the thoroughly cockeyed idea of running for the United States Senate. An up-or-out strategy was how I described it to my wife, one last shot to test out my ideas before I settled into a calmer, more stable, and better-paying existence. And she—perhaps more out of pity than conviction—agreed to this one last race, though she also suggested that given the orderly life she preferred for our family, I shouldn’t necessarily count on her vote.
I let her take comfort in the long odds against me. The Republican incumbent, Peter Fitzgerald, had spent $19 million of his personal wealth to unseat the previous senator, Carol Moseley Braun. He wasn’t widely popular; in fact he didn’t really seem to enjoy politics all that much. But he still had unlimited money in his family, as well as a genuine integrity that had earned him grudging respect from the voters.
For a time Carol Moseley Braun reappeared, back from an ambassadorship in New Zealand and with thoughts of trying to reclaim her old seat; her possible candidacy put my own plans on hold. When she decided to run for the presidency instead, everyone else started looking at the Senate race. By the time Fitzgerald announced he would not seek reelection, I was staring at six primary opponents, including the sitting state comptroller; a businessman worth hundreds of millions of dollars; Chicago Mayor Richard Daley’s former chief of staff; and a black, female health-care professional who the smart money assumed would split the black vote and doom whatever slim chances I’d had in the first place.
I didn’t care. Freed from worry by low expectations, my credibility bolstered by several helpful endorsements, I threw myself into the race with an energy and joy that I’d thought I had lost. I hired four staffers, all of them smart, in their twenties or early thirties, and suitably cheap. We found a small office, printed letterhead, installed phone lines and several computers. Four or five hours a day, I called major Democratic donors and tried to get my calls returned. I held press conferences to which nobody came. We signed up for the annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade and were assigned the parade’s very last slot, so my ten volunteers and I found ourselves marching just a few paces ahead of the city’s sanitation trucks, waving to the few stragglers who remained on the route while workers swept up garbage and peeled green shamrock stickers off the lampposts.
Rip by XmosRips
Mostly, though, I just traveled, often driving alone, first from ward to ward in Chicago, then from county to county and town to town, eventually up and down the state, past miles and miles of cornfields and beanfields and train tracks and silos. It wasn’t an efficient process. Without the machinery of the state’s Democratic Party organization, without any real mailing list or Internet operation, I had to rely on friends or acquaintances to open their houses to whoever might come, or to arrange for my visit to their church, union hall, bridge group, or Rotary Club. Sometimes, after several hours of driving, I would find just two or three people waiting for me around a kitchen table. I would have to assure the hosts that the turnout was fine and compliment them on the refreshments they’d prepared. Sometimes I would sit through a church service and the pastor would forget to recognize me, or the head of the union local would let me speak to his members just before announcing that the union had decided to endorse someone else.
But whether I was meeting with two people or fifty, whether I was in one of the well-shaded, stately homes of the North Shore, a walk-up apartment on the West Side, or a farmhouse outside Bloomington, whether people were friendly, indifferent, or occasionally hostile, I tried my best to keep my mouth shut and hear what they had to say. I listened to people talk about their jobs, their businesses, the local school; their anger at Bush and their anger at Democrats; their dogs, their back pain, their war service, and the things they remembered from childhood. Some had well-developed theories to explain the loss of manufacturing jobs or the high cost of health care. Some recited what they had heard on Rush Limbaugh or NPR. But most of them were too busy with work or their kids to pay much attention to politics, and they spoke instead of what they saw before them: a plant closed, a promotion, a high heating bill, a parent in a nursing home, a child’s first step.
No blinding insights emerged from these months of conversation. If anything, what struck me was just how modest people’s hopes were, and how much of what they believed seemed to hold constant across race, region, religion, and class. Most of them thought that anybody willing to work should be able to find a job that paid a living wage. They figured that people shouldn’t have to file for bankruptcy because they got sick. They believed that every child should have a genuinely good education—that it shouldn’t just be a bunch of talk—and that those same children should be able to go to college even if their parents weren’t rich. They wanted to be safe, from criminals and from terrorists; they wanted clean air, clean water, and time with their kids. And when they got old, they wanted to be able to retire with some dignity and respect.
That was about it. It wasn’t much. And although they understood that how they did in life depended mostly on their own efforts—although they didn’t expect government to solve all their problems, and certainly didn’t like seeing their tax dollars wasted—they figured that government should help.
I told them that they were right: government couldn’t solve all their problems. But with a slight change in priorities we could make sure every child had a decent shot at life and meet the challenges we faced as a nation. More often than not, folks would nod in agreement and ask how they could get involved. And by the time I was back on the road, with a map on the passenger’s seat, on my way to my next stop, I knew once again just why I’d gone into politics.
Rip by XmosRips
I felt like working harder than I’d ever worked in my life.
THIS BOOK GROWS directly out of those conversations on the campaign trail. Not only did my encounters with voters confirm the fundamental decency of the American people, they also reminded me that at the core of the American experience are a set of ideals that continue to stir our collective conscience; a common set of values that bind us together despite our differences; a running thread of hope that makes our improbable experiment in democracy work. These values and ideals find expression not just in the marble slabs of monuments or in the recitation of history books. They remain alive in the hearts and minds of most Americans—and can inspire us to pride, duty, and sacrifice.
I recognize the risks of talking this way. In an era of globalization and dizzying technological change, cutthroat politics and unremitting culture wars, we don’t even seem to possess a shared language with which to discuss our ideals, much less the tools to arrive at some rough consensus about how, as a nation, we might work together to bring those ideals about. Most of us are wise to the ways of admen, pollsters, speechwriters, and pundits. We know how high-flying words can be deployed in the service of cynical aims, and how the noblest sentiments can be subverted in the name of power, expedience, greed, or intolerance. Even the standard high school history textbook notes the degree to which, from its very inception, the reality of American life has strayed from its myths. In such a climate, any assertion of shared ideals or common values might seem hopelessly naïve, if not downright dangerous—an attempt to gloss over serious differences in policy and performance or, worse, a means of muffling the complaints of those who feel ill served by our current institutional arrangements.
My argument, however, is that we have no choice. You don’t need a poll to know that the vast majority of Americans—Republican, Democrat, and independent—are weary of the dead zone that politics has become, in which narrow interests vie for advantage and ideological minorities seek to impose their own versions of absolute truth. Whether we’re from red states or blue states, we feel in our gut the lack of honesty, rigor, and common sense in our policy debates, and dislike what appears to be a continuous menu of false or cramped choices. Religious or secular, black, white, or brown, we sense—correctly—that the nation’s most significant challenges are being ignored, and that if we don’t change course soon, we may be the first generation in a very long time that leaves behind a weaker and more fractured America than the one we inherited. Perhaps more than any other time in our recent history, we need a new kind of politics, one that can excavate and build upon those shared understandings that pull us together as Americans.
That’s the topic of this book: how we might begin the process of changing our politics and our civic life. This isn’t to say that I know exactly how to do it. I don’t. Although I discuss in each chapter a number of our most pressing policy challenges, and suggest in broad strokes the path I believe we should follow, my treatment of the issues is often partial and incomplete. I offer no unifying theory of American government, nor do these
Rip by XmosRips
pages provide a manifesto for action, complete with charts and graphs, timetables and ten-point plans.
Instead what I offer is something more modest: personal reflections on those values and ideals that have led me to public life, some thoughts on the ways that our current political discourse unnecessarily divides us, and my own best assessment—based on my experience as a senator and lawyer, husband and father, Christian and skeptic—of the ways we can ground our politics in the notion of a common good.
Let me be more specific about how the book is organized. Chapter One takes stock of our recent political history and tries to explain some of the sources for today’s bitter partisanship. In Chapter Two, I discuss those common values that might serve as the foundation for a new political consensus. Chapter Three explores the Constitution not just as a source of individual rights, but also as a means of organizing a democratic conversation around our collective future. In Chapter Four, I try to convey some of the institutional forces—money, media, interest groups, and the legislative process—that stifle even the best-intentioned politician. And in the remaining five chapters, I suggest how we might move beyond our divisions to effectively tackle concrete problems: the growing economic insecurity of many American families, the racial and religious tensions within the body politic, and the transnational threats—from terrorism to pandemic—that gather beyond our shores.
I suspect that some readers may find my presentation of these issues to be insufficiently balanced. To this accusation, I stand guilty as charged. I am a Democrat, after all; my views on most topics correspond more closely to the editorial pages of the New York Times than those of the Wall Street Journal. I am angry about policies that consistently favor the wealthy and powerful over average Americans, and insist that government has an important role in opening up opportunity to all. I believe in evolution, scientific inquiry, and global warming; I believe in free speech, whether politically correct or politically incorrect, and I am suspicious of using government to impose anybody’s religious beliefs—including my own—on nonbelievers. Furthermore, I am a prisoner of my own biography: I can’t help but view the American experience through the lens of a black man of mixed heritage, forever mindful of how generations of people who looked like me were subjugated and stigmatized, and the subtle and not so subtle ways that race and class continue to shape our lives.
But that is not all that I am. I also think my party can be smug, detached, and dogmatic at times. I believe in the free market, competition, and entrepreneurship, and think no small number of government programs don’t work as advertised. I wish the country had fewer lawyers and more engineers. I think America has more often been a force for good than for ill in the world; I carry few illusions about our enemies, and revere the courage and competence of our military. I reject a politics that is based solely on racial identity, gender identity, sexual orientation, or victimhood generally. I think much of what ails the inner city involves a breakdown in culture that will not be cured by money alone, and that our values and spiritual life matter at least as much as our GDP.
Undoubtedly, some of these views will get me in trouble. I am new enough on the national political scene that I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views. As such, I am bound to disappoint some, if not all, of them. Which perhaps indicates a second, more intimate theme to this book—
Rip by XmosRips
namely, how I, or anybody in public office, can avoid the pitfalls of fame, the hunger to please, the fear of loss, and thereby retain that kernel of truth, that singular voice within each of us that reminds us of our deepest commitments.
Recently, one of the reporters covering Capitol Hill stopped me on the way to my office and mentioned that she had enjoyed reading my first book. “I wonder,” she said, “if you can be that interesting in the next one you write.” By which she meant, I wonder if you can be honest now that you are a U.S. senator.
I wonder, too, sometimes. I hope writing this book helps me answer the question.

।।श्री रामचन्द्र ॥

2009-01-02T13:04:00.005+05:30

श्री रामचन्द्र
श्रीरामचन्द्र कृपालु भज मन हरण भवभय दारुणम् .
नवकञ्ज लोचन कञ्ज मुखकर कञ्जपद कञ्जारुणम् .. १..

कंदर्प अगणित अमित छबि नव नील नीरज सुन्दरम् .
पटपीत मानहुं तड़ित रुचि सुचि नौमि जनक सुतावरम् .. २..

भजु दीन बन्धु दिनेश दानव दैत्यवंशनिकन्दनम् .
रघुनन्द आनंदकंद कोशल चन्द दशरथ नन्दनम् .. ३..

सिर मुकुट कुण्डल तिलक चारु उदार अङ्ग विभूषणम् .
आजानुभुज सर चापधर सङ्ग्राम जित खरदूषणम् .. ४..

इति वदति तुलसीदास शङ्कर शेष मुनि मनरञ्जनम् .
मम हृदयकञ्ज निवास कुरु कामादिखलदलगञ्जनम् .. ५..

Get this widget

Track details

eSnips Social DNA

2008 - Top 10 Scientific Achievements

2008-12-20T11:59:00.003+05:30

With the year 2008 wrapping up to an end, a list of top ten scientific breakthroughs of 2008 have been listed by the 'Science' Journal.

Topping the list is the research on cellular reprogramming, a method that produces "made-to-order" cell lines by reprogramming cells from ill patients.

"Our top choice, cellular reprogramming, opened a new field of biology almost overnight and holds out hope of life-saving medical advances," said deputy news editor Robert Coontz.

The other top nine achievements are :

Exoplanets : Using a special telescope techniques, for the first time the astronomers were able to directly observe planets orbiting other stars.

Expanding the catalog of cancer genes: Researchers have been able to sequence genes from two deadliest cancer cells, pancreatic cancer and glioblastoma. They turned up dozens of mutations that remove the brakes on cell division and send the cell down the path to cancer.

New mystery materials: An entirely new second family of high-temperature superconductors were discovered. These materials consisted of iron compounds instead of copper-and-oxygen-compounds.

Watching Proteins At work: It was a pleasant suprise for the Biochemists to watch proteins bind to their targets, switch a cell’s metabolic state and contribute to a tissue’s properties.

Toward renewable energy on demand: Inorder to store excess energy generated from part-time sources like wind and solar power, researchers have found a new promising tool using a cobalt-phosphorus catalyst.

The video embryo: In 2008, researchers observed in unprecedented detail the dance of cells in a developing embryo, recording and analyzing movies that trace the movements of the roughly 16,000 cells that make up the zebrafish embryo by the end of its first day of development.

"Good" fat, illuminated: Scientists have been able to morph "good" brown fat, which burns "bad" white fat to generate heat for the body, into muscle and vice versa. This has led to a new approach to treat obesity .

Calculating the weight of the World: Physicists have been successful in calculating the mass of proton and Neutron from the standard model which describes most of the visible universe’s particles and their interactions.

Faster, cheaper genome sequencing: Researchers have been able to report a sequencing technology that is much cheaper and speedier. The technique can be applied from woolly mammoths to human cancer patients.

The latest areas of interest for the year 2009 includes plants genomics, the elusive Higgs boson, speciation genes, ocean acidification, and neuroscience in court.

-- http://www.sciencemag.org/btoy2008/

मौत तू एक कविता हॆ

2008-12-20T11:40:00.000+05:30

मौत तू एक कविता हॆ
मुझसे एक कविता का वादा हॆ मिलेगी मुझको
डूबती नब्जोंमें जब दर्द को नींद आने लगे
जर्द सा चेहरा लेकर जव चांद उफ़क तक पहुंचे
दिन अभी पानी में हो, रात किनारे के करीब
ना अंधेरा ना उजाला हो, ना अभी रात ना दिन
जिस्म जब खत्म हो और रुह को जब सांस आये
मुझसे एक कविता का वादा हॆ मिलेगी मुझको…

आनंद

कविता

2008-12-04T11:25:00.001+05:30

स्वप्नाची समाप्ती
स्नेहहीन ज्योतीपरी
मंद होई शुक्रतारा
काळ्या मेघखंडास त्या
किनारती निळ्या धारा

स्वप्नासम एक एक
तारा विरे आकाशात
खिरे रात्र कणकण
प्रकाशाच्या सागरात

काढ सखे, गळ्यातील
तुझे चांदण्याचे हात
क्षितीजाच्या पलिकडे
उभे दिवसाचे दूत

रातपाखरांचा आर्त
नाद नच कानी पडे
संपवुनी भावगीत
झोपलेले रातकिडे

पहाटेचे गार वारे
चोरट्याने जगावर
येती, पाय वाजतात
वाळलेल्या पानांवर

शांती आणि विषण्ण्ता
दाटलेली दिशांतून
गजबज जगवील
जग घटकेने दोन!

जमू लागलेले दव
गवताच्या पातीवर
भासते भू तारकांच्या
आसवांनी ओलसर

काढ सखे, गळ्यातील
तुझे चांदण्याचे हात
क्षितीजाच्या पलिकडे
उभे दिवसाचे दूत

प्राजक्ताच्या पावलाशी
पडे दूर पुष्परास
वाऱ्यावर वाहती हे
त्याचे दाटलेले श्वास

ध्येय, प्रेम, आशा यांची
होतसे का कधी पूर्ती
वेड्यापरी पूजतो या
आम्ही भंगणाऱ्या मूर्ती!

खळ्यामध्ये बांधलेले
बैल होवोनिया जागे
गळ्यातील घुंगुरांचा
नाद कानी येऊ लागे

आकृतींना दूरच्या त्या
येऊ लागे रूपरंग
हालचाल कुजबूज
होऊ लागे जागोजाग

काढ सखे, गळ्यातील
तुझे चांदण्याचे हात
क्षितीजाच्या पलिकडे
उभे दिवसाचे दूत

होते म्हणू स्वप्न एक
एक रात्र पाहिलेले
होते म्हणू वेड एक
एक रात्र राहिलेले

प्रकाशाच्या पावलांची
चाहूल ये कानावर
ध्वज त्याचे कनकाचे
लागतील गडावर

ओततील आग जगी
दूत त्याचे लक्षावधी
उजेडात दिसू वेडे
आणि ठरू अपराधी
- कुसुमाग्रज (’विशाखा’)

ह्या कवितेमधील सगळ्यात जास्त वेड लावणाऱ्या ओळी म्हणजे --
काढ सखे, गळ्यातील तुझे चांदण्याचे हात
क्षितीजाच्या पलिकडे उभे दिवसाचे दूत
सगळी कविता म्हणजे कॅनव्हासवर एखादं रोमँटिक चित्र उतरल्यासारखी आहे ना ?
-----------------------------------------------------
नास्तिक
एक खराखुरा नास्तिक जेंव्हा देवळाबाहेर थांबतो
तेंव्हा खरंतर गाभाऱ्यातच भर पडत असते
की कोणीतरी आपल्यापुरत्या सत्याशी का होईना
पण प्रामाणिकपणे चिकटून राहिल्याच्या पुण्याची….

एक खराखुरा नास्तिक जेंव्हा देवळाबाहेर थांबतो
तेंव्हा शक्यता होते निर्माण की
देवाने आपला आळस झटकून देवळाबाहेर येण्याची….

एक खराखुरा नास्तिक जेंव्हा देवळाबाहेर थांबतो
तेंव्हा कोऱ्या नजरेने पाहत राहतो
सभोवतालच्या हालचाली, भाविकांच्या नजरा
कोणीतरी स्वतःचेच ओझे स्वतःच्याच पायावर
सांभाळत असल्याचे समाधान लाभते देवालाच….

म्हणून तर एक खराखुरा नास्तिक जेंव्हा देवळाबाहेर थांबतो
तेंव्हा देवाला एक भक्त कमी मिळत असेल कदाचित,
पण मिळते अखंड समाधान, एक सहकारी लाभल्याचे!!....

देऊळ बंद झाल्यावर एक मस्त आळस देउन
बाहेर ताटकळलेल्या नास्तिकाशी गप्पा मारता मारता
देव म्हणतो, दर्शन देत जा अधून मधून....
तुमचा विश्वास नसेल आमच्यावर;
पण आमचा आहे ना!!!!!....

एक खराखुरा नास्तिक जेंव्हा देवळाबाहेर थांबतो
कंटाळलेल्या देवाला मोठ्या मिन्नतवारीने परत पाठवतो देवळात
तेंव्हा कुठे अनंत वर्षे घेऊ शकतो आपण दर्शन
अस्तिकत्वाच्या भरजरी शालीत गुदमरलेल्या देवाचे......
एक खराखुरा नास्तिक जेंव्हा देवळाबाहेर थांबतो........
- संदीप खरे

Response !

2008-11-28T11:35:00.002+05:30

My boss in Holland called up to inquire if everything was OK. I don't know how to answer. I can be selfish and say none of my family and friend's hurt.
But someone is killed...
Someone is hurt...
Someone is sitting at gun point...
Someone will be dead in moment...
It's not ok...
I don't know how to react .. someone has suggestion?

निरोप : जी ए

2008-11-26T17:21:00.000+05:30

सीमा ओलांडून पलीकडे जाण्याची वेळ येत आहे. पण मला नेण्यासाठी पताका लावलेला रथ येणार नाही. मी जात असता तुतारी निनादावी अगर मला येताना पाहून चौघडे वाजू लागावेत असे काही भव्य मी निर्माण केले नाही. मी लावलेल्या रोपट्यांचे आकाशस्पर्शी देवदार झाले नाहीत, की माझ्या शब्दांनी दिव्यत्वाशी नाते जोडणारे महाकाव्य निर्माण झाले नाही. येथे माझ्यासाठी महाद्वार उघडले जाणार नाही. माझा साराच प्रवास धुळीतून अनवाणी पावलांनी झाला आहे. परंतु माझ्यासाठी लहान दिंडी उघडणाऱ्या द्वारपालांनो, मी हीन-दीन दरिद्री होऊन तुमच्याकडे आलो नाही, ही गोष्ट ध्यानात असू द्या. सर्वत्र पसरलेल्या जळजळीत सूर्यप्रकाशात, क्षणभर तरी का होईना, मी माझा स्वतःचा एक लहान तारा पाहिला आहे. समुद्रात बुडालेल्या द्वारकेची एक गोकुळसरी मी क्षणभर त्याच्या सुवर्णवैभवात पाहिली आहे. येत असताना माझे हात रिकामे दिसले तरी ते रिते नाहीत. त्यांच्या बोटांना मारव्याचा वास लागला आहे. त्यांनी भरवलेला घास घेताना काही अगदी लहान मुलांना फार आनंद झाला आहे. लाल डोळ्यांचा एक पक्षी त्यांच्यावर फार प्रेमाने आणि विश्वासाने उतरला आहे. मी एक क्षुद्र याचक म्हणून येथे येत नाही. मी माझ्या पायभार खेड्यासाठी विनादैन्य येथे पाऊल टाकत आहे.

म्हणून द्वारपालांनो, माझ्यासाठी दिंडी उघडताना तुमच्या वागण्यात थोडी नम्रता असू दे. तुमच्या शब्दात थोडा आदर दिसू दे. कारण धुळीने भरलेल्या अनवाणी पण रोख पावलांनी मी येथे येत आहे. आता मी निघालो आहे म्हणून हे कालपुरुषा, तू मला स्वच्छ निरंजन मनाने निरोप दे. तू माझ्यापासून खूप हिरावून घेतलेस. माझ्या आशा, माझी स्वप्ने, माझी आवडती माणसे तू माझ्याकडून लुबाडून घेतलीस, आणि मला निर्दयपणे दरिद्री केलेस. त्यामुळे मी तुझ्यावर अनेकदा संतापलो, द्वेषाने जळत राहिलो हे खरे आहे. पण त्याचा कसलाही सल आता मनात ठेवू नकोस. आता निघण्याच्या क्षणी तर माझ्या मनात कसलेच वैषम्य उरले नाही. शिवाय पूर्वी देखील मी उगाचच तुझा द्वेष केला, ही जाणीव आता मला झाली आहे. मला जे सुख मिळाले ते तुझा माझ्यावर विशेष लोभ होता म्हणून नव्हे, त्याचप्रमाणे ज्या यातना मला भोगाव्या लागल्या त्या देखील तुझा माझ्यावर राग होता म्हणून नव्हे. मी तुझ्यासमोर असाहाय्य होतो, पण तू देखील एका अविरतपणे फिरणाऱ्या चक्राला बांधलेला असल्यामुळे असाहाय्य होतास. त्या त्या गोष्टी तू घडविल्या नाहीस, त्या गोष्टी तुझ्याकडून घडवल्या गेल्या. दर क्षणाला अनंत बुडबुडे नष्ट होतात, त्यामुळे प्रवाहात काही रितेपणा येत नाही.

तर एक विशेष ध्यानात घे. जीवन इतके अनंतरुप आहे की अगदी संपूर्णपणे माझ्यासारखेच आयुष्य असलेला माणूस पूर्वी कधी झाला नाही व पुन्हा कधी होणार नाही. त्या दृष्टीने प्रत्येक सामान्य माणूस देखील अद्वितीय असतो. मी गेल्यानंतर एक अव्दितीय भावविश्व पूर्णपणे विरुन जाणार आहे. ते पुन्हा कधी जन्मणार नाही. तेव्हा त्याला निरोप देताना तुझा मनात आता कसलीही कसर ठेवू नकोस. मी येथून कोठे जाणार ते मला माहीत नाही. मी कदाचित शून्यातून शून्य होऊन जाईल किंवा इथल्यापेक्षा जास्त अर्थपूर्ण आणि सुसंगत अशा ठिकाणी जाईन. त्या ठिकाणी एक तर तुला येता येणार नाही किंवा तू आलास काय, नाही आलास काय, याला 'आला वारा गेला वारा' यापेक्षा जास्त अर्थ आणि साफल्य असणार नाही. मी पुन्हा या वाटेने कधी येणार नाही. म्हणजे ही आपली शेवटची भेट आहे.

काही झाले तरी माझ्या आयुष्यभर तू सांगाती सहप्रवास केलास. आता आपले मार्ग निराळे होत आहेत. अशा या अंतिम क्षणी तू मला मुक्त मनाने निरोप दे. कारण आता मी निघालो आहे. मला स्वच्छ निरंजन मनाने निरोप दे.

कुसुमगुंजा

Tale of two cities - Delhi and Mumbai

2008-11-17T18:04:00.000+05:30

From INDIA UNBOUND by GURCHARAN DAS

On returning to India we decided to settle in Delhi rather than Bombay. It made sense for to settle there because, in my new career as a writer, I needed to be near libraries, editors and think tanks. Delhi has plenty of these, unlike Bombay, which is primarily a commercial city. If one is not making business deals, I felt, there is no fun in living in Bombay. However, my wife hated Delhi. She said it had no soul, and that its street life was aggressive.

They say that the measure of a civilization is how it treats its women. Since coming to Delhi I have met many women who long for Bombay. My wife explains that Bombay gives women dignity. If Bombay respects women, Delhi looks on them as sex objects. In Bombay, she can take a taxi at midnight; in Delhi, a girl cannot walk freely on street in the evening. It seems that it takes more than education to bring civilization.

Bombay has this civilization quality, I think, because of it origin as a city of commerce. Mentesquieu wrote in his Spirit of the Laws that “it is almost a general rule that wherever manners are gentle, there is commerce; and wherever there is a commerce, manners are gentle” He felt that commerce diverted people away from brutal wars and bloodshed. A few years later, Samuel Richard added that “commerce makes him who was so proud and haughty, suddenly turn supple, bending and serviceable. Through commerce, man learns to deliberate, to be honest, to acquire manners, to be prudent and reserved in talk and action.” Commerce, they say, encourages bourgeois virtues of thrift, hard-work, self-reliance and self-discipline. My experience with businessmen – Marwaris, Jains, and Gujrati Banias – is that they posses these qualities in abundance, particularly virtue of restraint.

The first rule of business is that unless both the buyer and seller are happy, the business transaction is not stable. If the buyer drives too hard a bargain, or is the seller’s goods are less than promised, the transaction fails. Thus, businesspeople learn interdependence. Both the buyer and the seller have to be satisfied, an this promotes a positive-sum game. People in the business also understand the importance of “growth.” They learn to believe that there is enough to go around and thus creates an “abundance mentality.”

The origins of Delhi are feudal and monarchical. Because of hierarchical manner of bureaucratic society, Delhi regards life as a zero-sum-game. The pyramid gets smaller as you move u. There can only one Prime Minister. Not everyone can be secretary. If you have to win, someone has to lose. Instead of becoming interdependent as a buyer and seller, you learn to put people down (in Delhi). Transactions in Delhi – as in Washington D.C. – depends on influence and patronage, and it matters less what you know than whom you know. Person from Person, Delhi people are better fed, better clothed, and better off. It is a middle-class city with higher per-capita income. However, it is not a very pleasant city. The Delhi resident wears his bad manners on his shirtsleeves…..

Innovation - Demystified

2008-11-12T15:37:00.007+05:30

Chapter 1. The myth of epiphany

An Excellent Article by Scott Berkun (from Myths of Innovation)

The myth of epiphany

While waiting in the lobby of Google's main building, I snuck into the back of a tour group heading inside. These outsiders, a mix of executives and business managers, had the giddy looks of kids in a candy factory—their twinkling eyes lost in Google's efforts to make a creative workplace. My clandestine activities unnoticed, we strolled together under the high ceilings and bright-colored open spaces designed to encourage inventiveness. No room or walkway was free of beanbag chairs, Ping-Pong tables, laptops, and Nerf toys, and we saw an endless clutter of shared games, brain-teasing puzzles, and customized tech gadgetry. The vibe was a happy blend of MIT's Media lab, the Fortune 500, and an eccentrically architected private library, with young, smart, smiley people lingering just about everywhere. To those innocents on the tour, perhaps scarred survivors of cubicle careers, the sights at Google were mystical—a working wonderland. And their newfound Google buzz was the perfect cover for me to tag along, observing their responses to this particular approach to the world of ideas (see Figure 1-1).

Figure 1-1. One of the creative interiors of Google's main campus in Mountain View, California.

The tour offered fun facts about life at Google, like the free organic lunches in the cafeteria and power outlets for laptops in curious places (stairwells, for example), expenses taken to ensure Googlers are free, at all times, to find their best ideas. While I wondered whether Beethoven or Hemingway, great minds noted for thriving on conflict, could survive such a nurturing environment without going postal, my attention was drawn to questions from the tourists. A young professional woman, barely containing her embarrassment, asked, "Where is the search engine? Are we going to see it?" to which only half the group laughed. (There is no singular "engine"—only endless dull bays of server computers running the search-engine software.)

The second question, though spoken in private, struck home. A thirty-something man turned to his tour buddy, leaning in close to whisper. I strained at the limits of trying to hear without looking like I was eavesdropping. He pointed to the young programmers in the distance, and then, behind a cupped hand, he wondered, "I see them talking and typing, but when do they come up with their ideas?" His buddy stood tall and looked around, as if to discover something he'd missed: a secret passageway, epiphany machines, or perhaps a circle of black-robed geniuses casting idea spells. Finding nothing, he shrugged. They sighed, the tour moved on, and I escaped to consider my observations.

The question of where ideas come from is on the mind of anyone visiting a research lab, an artist's workshop, or an inventor's studio. It's the secret we hope to see—the magic that happens when new things are born. Even in environments geared for creativity like Google, staffed with the best and brightest, the elusive nature of ideas leaves us restless. We want creativity to be like opening a soda can or taking a bite of a sandwich: mechanical things that are easy to observe. Yet, simultaneously, we hold ideas to be special and imagine that their creation demands something beyond what we see every day. The result is that tours of amazing places, even with full access to creators themselves, never convince us that we've seen the real thing. We still believe in our hearts there are top-secret rooms behind motion-sensor security systems or bank-vault doors with ideas, tended by their shaman-like keepers, stacked up like bars of wizardly gold.

For centuries before Google, MIT, and IDEO, modern hotbeds of innovation, we struggled to explain any kind of creation, from the universe itself to the multitudes of ideas around us. While we can make atomic bombs and dry-clean silk ties, we still don't have satisfying answers for simple questions like: Where do songs come from? Is there an infinite variety of possible kinds of cheese? How did Shakespeare and Stephen King invent so much, while we're satisfied watching sitcom reruns? Our popular answers have been unconvincing, enabling misleading, fantasy-laden myths to grow strong.

One grand myth is the story of Isaac Newton and the discovery of gravity. As it's often told, Newton was sitting under a tree, an apple fell on his head, and the idea of gravity was born. It's entertaining more than truthful, turning the mystery of ideas into something innocent, obvious, and comfortable. Instead of hard work, personal risk, and sacrifice, the myth suggests that great ideas come to people who are lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time. The catalyst of the story isn't even a person: it's the sad, nameless, suicidal apple.

It's disputed whether Newton ever observed an apple fall. He certainly was never struck by one, unless there's secret evidence of fraternity food fights while he was studying in Cambridge. Even if the apple incident took place, the telling of the story discounts Newton's 20 years of work to explain gravity, the feat that earned him the attention of the world. Newton did not discover gravity, just as Columbus didn't discover America: the Egyptian pyramids and Roman coliseums prove that people knew the workings of gravity well before Newton. Instead, he explained, through math, how gravity works; while this contribution is certainly important, it's not the same as discovery.

The best possible truth to take from the apple myth is that Newton was a deeply curious man who spent time observing things in the world. He watched the stars in the sky and studied how light moved through air, all as part of his scientific work to understand the world. It was no accident that he studied gravity. Even if the myth were true and he did see an apple fall, he made so many other observations from ordinary things that his thinking couldn't have been solely inspired by fruity accidents in the park. Yet, that's the lesson we're encouraged to take.

Newton's apple myth is a story of epiphany or "a sudden manifestation of the essence or meaning of something,"^[*] and in the mythology of innovation, epiphanies serve an important purpose. The word has religious origins, and its first use meant that all insight came by divine power, as in "My epiphany from God can save the village!" This isn't surprising, as most early theologians,^[] including Christians, defined God as the sole creative force in the universe. As a rule, people believed that if it's creative, it's divine, but if it's derivative, it's human. Had you asked the first maker of the wheel^[] for an autograph, he'd be offended that you'd want his name on his work, instead of his god's (one wonders what he'd think of Mr. Goodyear and his eponymous tires). ^[§]

^[*] This approximates the third entry in Merriam-Webster's online listing. The first two are religious in nature: http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/epiphany.

^[] Robert S. Albert and Mark A. Runco, "A History of Research on Creativity," in Handbook of Creativity, ed. Robert J. Sternberg (Cambridge University Press, 1998), 16–20.

^[] The wheel's prehistoric origins are a misnomer. The first wheels used for any practical purpose are believed to be about 5,000 years old. Start with http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventions/wheel.htm.

^[§] The rubber tire was once a big innovation, and the history of Goodyear is a surprisingly good read: http://www.goodyear.com/corporate/history/history_overview.html.

Today, we use epiphany without awareness of its heavy-duty heritage, as in, "I had an epiphany for organizing my sock drawer!" While the religious connotations are forgotten, the implications remain: we're hinting that we don't know where the idea came from and aren't willing to take credit for it. Even the language, that an idea comes to us, or that we have to find ideas, puts them outside us, like ghosts or spirits, beyond our control. This way of thinking is helpful when we want to dissuade our guilt for blank sheets of paper where love letters, business plans, and novels are supposed to be, but it does little to improve whatever creative talents we have.

The Greeks were so committed to ideas as supernatural forces that they created an entire group of goddesses, not one but nine, to represent creative power. These nine goddesses, or muses, were the recipients of prayers from writers, engineers, and musicians. Even the great minds of the time, like Socrates and Plato, built shrines and visited temples dedicated to their particular muse (or for those who hedged their bets, muses). Right now, under our very secular noses, we honor these beliefs in our language, as words like museum (place for the muse) and amusement (inspiration by the muse) bear the Greek heritage of ideas as superhuman forces.

When amazing innovations arise and change the world today, the first stories about them mirror the myths from the past. Putting accuracy aside in favor of echoing the epiphany myth, reporters and readers first move to tales of magic moments. Tim Berners-Lee, the man who invented the World Wide Web, explained:

Journalists have always asked me what the crucial idea was or what the singular event was that allowed the Web to exist one day when it hadn't before. They are frustrated when I tell them there was no Eureka moment. It was not like the legendary apple falling on Newton's head to demonstrate the concept of gravity…it was a process of accretion (growth by gradual addition). ^[||]

^[||] Tim Berners-Lee, Weaving the Web (HarperCollins, 1999).

No matter how many times he relayed the dedicated hours of debate over the Web's design, and the various proposals and iterations of its development, it's the myth of magic that journalists and readers desperately want to recreate.

When the founders of the eBay Corporation ^[#] began, they struggled for attention and publicity from the media. Their true story, that the founders desired to create a perfect market economy where individuals could freely trade with each other, was too academic to interest reporters. It was only when they invented a quasi-love story—about how the founder created the company so his fiancée could trade PEZ dispensers—that they got the press coverage they wanted. The truer story of market economies wasn't as palatable as a tale of muse-like inspiration between lovers. The PEZ story was one of the most popular company inception stories told during the late 1990s, and it continues to be told despite confessions from the founders. Myths are often more satisfying to us than the truth, which explains their longevity and resistance to facts: we want to believe that they're true. This begs the question: is shaping the truth into the form of an epiphany myth a kind of lie, or is it just smart PR?

^[#] Adam Cohen, The Perfect Store: Inside eBay (Little, Brown and Company, 2003).

Even the tale of Newton's apple owes its mythic status to the journalists of the day. Voltaire and other popular 18th-century writers spread the story in their essays and letters. An eager public, happy to hear the ancient notion of ideas as magic, endorsed and embellished the story (e.g., the apple's trajectory moved over time, from being observed in the distance to landing at his feet to eventually striking Newton's head in a telling by Disraeli ^[**] decades later). While it is true that by dramatizing Newton's work, Voltaire helped popularize Newton's ideas, two centuries later, little of Newton's process is remembered: myths always serve promotion more than education. Anyone wishing to innovate must seek better sources and can easily start by examining the history of any idea.

^[**] Isaac Disraeli, Curiosities of Literature: With a View of the Life and Writings of the Author (Widdleton, 1872).

1. Ideas never stand alone

The computer keyboard I'm typing on now involves dozens of ideas and inventions. It's comprised of the typewriter, electricity, plastics, written language, operating systems, circuits, USB connectors, and binary data. If you eliminated any of these things from the history of the universe, the keyboard in front of me (as well as the book in front of you) would disappear. The keyboard, like all innovations, is a combination of things that existed before. The combination might be novel, or used in an original way, but the materials and ideas all existed in some form somewhere before the first keyboard was made. Similar games can be played with cell phones (telephones, computers, and radio waves), fluorescent lights (electric power, advanced glass moldings, and some basic chemistry), and GPS navigation (space flight, high-speed networks, atomic clocks). Any seemingly grand idea can be divided into an infinite series of smaller, previously known ideas.

Similar patterns exist in the work of innovation itself. For most, there is no singular magic moment; instead, there are many smaller insights accumulated over time. The Internet required nearly 40 years of innovations in electronics, networking, and packet-switching software before it even approximated the system Tim Berners-Lee used to create the World Wide Web. ^[] The refrigerator, the laser, and the dishwasher were disasters as products for decades before enough of the barriers—cultural and technological—were eliminated, each through insights of various kinds, to make them into true business innovations. Big thoughts are fun to romanticize, but it's many small insights coming together that bring big ideas into the world.

^[] See the Internet Timeline: http://www.pbs.org/opb/nerds2.0.1/timeline/.

However, it's often not until people try their own hands at innovation or entrepreneurship that they see past the romance and recognize the challenges for what they are. It's easy to read shallow, mythologized accounts of what Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison, or Jeff Bezos did, and make the mistake of mimicking their behavior in an entirely different set of circumstances (or with comparatively modest intellects). The myths are so strong that it's a surprise to many to learn that having one big idea isn't enough to succeed. Instead of wanting to innovate, a process demanding hard work and many ideas, most want to have innovated. The myth of epiphany tempts us to believe that the magic moment is the grand catalyst; however, all evidence points to its more supportive role.

The best way to think about epiphany is to imagine working on a jigsaw puzzle. When you put the last piece into place, is there anything special about that last piece or what you were wearing when you put it in? The only reason that last piece is significant is because of the other pieces you'd already put into place. If you jumbled up the pieces a second time, any one of them could turn out to be the last, magical piece. Epiphany works the same way: it's not the apple or the magic moment that matters much, it's the work before and after (see Figure 1-2).

The magic feeling at the moment of insight, when the last piece falls into place, comes for two reasons. The first reason is that it's the reward for many hours (or years) of investment coming together. In comparison to the simple action of fitting the puzzle piece into place, we feel the larger collective payoff of hundreds of pieces worth of work. The second reason is that innovative work isn't as predictable as jigsaw puzzles, so there's no way to know when the moment of insight will come: it's a surprise. Like hiking up a strange mountain through cold, heavy fog, you never know how much further you have to go to reach the top. When suddenly the air clears and you're at the summit, it's overwhelming. You hoped it was coming, but you couldn't be certain when or if it would happen, and the emotional payoff is hard to match (explaining both why people climb mountains as well as why they invent new things).

Figure 1-2. Epiphany is the moment when the last piece of work fits into place. However, the last piece isn't any more magical than the others, and has no magic without its connection to the other pieces.

Gordon Gould, the primary inventor of the Laser, had this to say about his own epiphany:

In the middle of one Saturday night…the whole thing…suddenly popped into my head and I saw how to build the laser…but that flash of insight required the 20 years of work I had done in physics and optics to put all of the bricks of that invention in there.

Any major innovation or insight can be seen in this way. It's simply the final piece of a complex puzzle falling into place. But unlike a puzzle, the universe of ideas can be combined in an infinite number of ways, so part of the challenge of innovation is coming up with the problem to solve, not just its solution. The pieces used to innovate one day can be reused and reapplied to innovate again, only to solve a different problem.

The other great legend of innovation and epiphany is the tale of Archimedes' Eureka. As the story goes, the great inventor Archimedes was asked by his king to detect whether a gift was made of false gold. One day, Archimedes took a bath, and on observing the displacement of water as he stepped in, he recognized a new way to look at the problem: by knowing an object's volume and weight, he could compute its density. He ran naked into the streets yelling "Eureka!"—I have found it—and perhaps scandalizing confused onlookers into curious thoughts about what exactly he had been looking for.

The part of the story that's overlooked, like Newton's apple tale, is that Archimedes spent significant time trying and failing to find solutions to the problem before he took the bath. The history is sketchy at best, but I suspect he took the bath as stress relief from the various pressures of innovation. ^[] Unlike Google employees, or the staff at MIT, he didn't have friends with Nerf weapons or sand volleyball courts to blow off steam. So, as is common in myths of epiphany, we are told where he was when the last piece fell into place, but nothing about how the other pieces got there.

^[] The most well-known version of the Eureka story comes in the form of a legend in Vitruvius' Ten Books of Architecture (Dover, 1960), 253–255. Of note is that this book is the first pattern language of design in Western history, documenting the Roman architecture techniques of Vitruvius' time.

In Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's book, Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention, ^[§§] he studied the thought processes of nearly 100 creative people, from artists to scientists, including notables like Robertson Davies, Stephen Jay Gould, Don Norman, Linus Pauling, Jonas Salk, Ravi Shankar, and Edward O. Wilson. Instead of doing clinical research with probes and brain scans, he focused instead on the innovators' individual insights. He wanted to understand their perceptions of innovation, unfiltered by the often stifling and occasionally self-defeating rigors of hard science.

^[§§] Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention (HarperPerennial, 1997).

One goal was to understand epiphany and how it happens; through his research, he observed a common pattern. Epiphany had three parts, roughly described as early, insight, and after. ^[||||] During the early period, hours or days are spent understanding the problem and immersing oneself in the domain. An innovator might ask questions like: "What else in the world is like this?" and "Who has solved a problem similar to mine?" learning everything he can and exploring the world of related ideas. And then there is a period of incubation in which the knowledge is digested, leading to experiments and rough attempts at solutions. Sometimes there are long pauses during incubation when progress stalls and confidence wanes, an experience the Greeks would have called "losing the muse."

^[||||] Csikszentmihalyi describes epiphany in five phases, but I've simplified it to three for the purposes of this chapter.

The big insights, if they happen, occur during the depths of incubation: it's possible these pauses are minds catching up with everything they've observed. Csikszentmihalyi explains that deep quiet periods, time spent doing unrelated things, often helps new ideas surface. Csikszentmihalyi wrote, "Cognitive accounts of what happens during incubation assume…that some kind of information processing keeps going on even when we are not aware of it, even while we are asleep." Our subconscious minds play large roles in creative thinking: they may be the sources for the unexplained insights we romanticize. When a promising idea surfaces out of the subconscious and rises into our active minds, it can feel like it came from somewhere else because we weren't aware of our subconscious thoughts while we were mowing the lawn.

The best lesson from the myths of Newton and Archimedes is to work passionately but to take breaks. Sitting under trees and relaxing in baths lets the mind wander and frees the subconscious to do work on our behalf. Freeman Dyson, a world-class physicist and author, agrees, "I think it's very important to be idle…people who keep themselves busy all the time are generally not creative. So I am not ashamed of being idle." This isn't to justify surfing instead of studying: it's only when activities are done as breaks that the change of activity pays off. Some workaholic innovators tweak this by working on multiple projects at the same time, effectively using work on one project as a break from the other. Edison, Darwin, da Vinci, Michelangelo, and van Gogh all regularly switched between different projects, occasionally in different fields, possibly accelerating an exchange of ideas and seeding their minds for new insights.

One of the truths of both Newton's apple tale and Archimedes' bathtub is that triggers for breakthroughs can come from ordinary places. There is research that creative people more easily make connections between unrelated ideas. Richard Fennyman curiously observed students spinning plates in the Cornell University cafeteria and eventually related the mathematics of this behavior to an unsolved problem in quantum physics, earning him the Nobel Prize. Picasso found a trashed bicycle and rearranged its seat and handlebars, converting it into a masterpiece sculpture of a bull. The idea of observation as the key to insight, rather than IQ scores or intellectual prowess, is best captured by something da Vinci, whose famous technological inventions were inspired by observing nature, wrote hundreds of years ago:

Stand still and watch the patterns, which by pure chance have been generated: Stains on the wall, or the ashes in a fireplace, or the clouds in the sky, or the gravel on the beach or other things. If you look at them carefully you might discover miraculous inventions.

In psychology books, the talent for taking two unrelated concepts and finding connections between them is called associative ability. In his book Creativity in Science: Change, Logic, Genius, and Zeitgeist, Dean Simonton points out that "persons with low associative barriers may think to connect ideas or concepts that have very little basis in past experience or that cannot easily be traced logically." ^[##] Read that last sentence again: it's indistinguishable from various definitions of insanity. The tightrope between being strange and being creative is too narrow to walk without occasionally landing on both sides, explaining why so many great minds are lampooned as eccentrics. Their willingness to try seemingly illogical ideas or to make connections others struggle to see invariably leads to judgment (and perhaps putting some truth to stereotypes of mad scientists and unpredictable artists). Developing new ideas requires questions and approaches that most people won't understand initially, which leaves many true innovators at risk of becoming lonely, misunderstood characters.

^[##] Dean Keith Simonton, Creativity in Science: Chance, Logic, Genius, and Zeitgeist (Cambridge University Press, 2004).

1.1. Beyond epiphany

If we had a list of the most amazing breakthrough insights that would change the world in the next decade, hard work would follow them all. No grand innovation in history has escaped the long hours required to take an insight and work it into a form useful to the world. It's one thing to imagine world peace or the Internet, something Vannevar Bush did in 1945 in a paper titled "As We May Think," ^[***] but it's another to break down the idea into parts that can be built, or even attempted.

^[***] Bush's paper is a recommended read. It goes beyond visionary hyperbole and breaks down a vision into smaller, practical problems (a hint for today's visionaries): http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/194507/bush.

Csikszentmihalyi describes this part of innovation, the elaboration of an idea into function, as "…the one that takes up the most time and involves the hardest work." Scientists need to not only make discoveries, but to provide enough research to prove to others that the discoveries are valid. Newton was far from the first to consider gravity, but he was the only person able to complete the years of work. Star Trek, a television program in the '60s, had the idea for cell phones, but it took decades for technology to be developed and refined to the point where such a thing could be practical (and, of course, many of Star Trek's sci-fi ideas have yet to be realized). Not to mention the services and businesses that are needed to make the devices available affordably to consumers around the world. The big ideas are a small part of the process of true innovation.

The most useful way to think of epiphany is as an occasional bonus of working on tough problems. Most innovations come without epiphanies, and when powerful moments do happen, little knowledge is granted for how to find the next one. Even in the myths, Newton had one apple and Archimedes had one Eureka. To focus on the magic moments is to miss the point. The goal isn't the magic moment: it's the end result of a useful innovation. Ted Hoff, the inventor of the first microprocessor (Intel's 4004), explained, "…If you're always waiting for that wonderful breakthrough, it's probably never going to happen. Instead, what you have to do is keep working on things. If you find something that looks good, follow through with it."^[] Nearly every major innovation of the 20th century took place without claims of epiphany. The World Wide Web, the web browser, the computer mouse, and the search engine—four pivotal developments in the history of business and technology—all involved long sequences of innovation, experimentation, and discovery. They demanded contributions from dozens of different individuals and organizations, and took years (if not decades) to reach fruition. The makers of Mosaic and Netscape, the first popular web browsers, didn't invent them from nothing. There had been various forms of hypertext browsers for decades, and they applied some of those ideas to the new context of the Internet. The founders of Google did not invent the search engine—they were years late for that honor. As the founders at Amazon.com, the most well-known survivor of the late-90s Internet boom, explain, "There wasn't this sense of 'My God. We've invented this incredible thing that nobody else has seen before, and it'll just take over.'" ^[] Instead they, like most innovators, recognized a set of opportunities—scientific, technological, or entrepreneurial—and set about capitalizing on them.

^[] Kenneth A. Brown, Inventors at Work: Interviews with 16 Notable American Inventors (Microsoft Press, 1988).

^[] Paul Barton-Davis, quoted in Robert Spector, Amazon.com: Get Big Fast (HarperBusiness, 2000), 48.

Peter Drucker, in Innovation and Entrepreneurship, ^[§§§] offers advice for anyone in any pursuit awaiting the muse:

^[§§§] Peter Drucker, Innovation and Entrepreneurship (Collins, 1993).

Successful entrepreneurs do not wait until "the Muse kisses them" and gives them a "bright idea": they go to work. Altogether they do not look for the "biggie," the innovation that will "revolutionize the industry," create a "billion-dollar business" or "make one rich over-night." Those entrepreneurs who start out with the idea that they'll make it big—and in a hurry—can be guaranteed failure. They are almost bound to do the wrong things. An innovation that looks very big may turn out to be nothing but technical virtuosity, and innovation with modest intellectual pretensions; a McDonald's, for instance, may turn into gigantic, highly profitable businesses.

The same can be said for any successful scientist, technologist, or innovator. It's the ability to see a problem clearly, combined with the talent to solve it, that matters. Both of those tasks are generally defined, however unglamorously, as work. Epiphany, for all its graces, is largely irrelevant because it can't be controlled. Even if there existed an epiphany genie, granting big ideas to worthy innovators, they would still have piles of rather ordinary work to do to actualize those ideas. It is an achievement to find a great idea, but it is a greater one to successfully use it to improve the world.

Paulo Coelho: Ten Short Stories

2008-11-08T11:26:00.002+05:30

1. The disciple approached his master: "For years I have been seeking illumination," he said. "I feel that I am close to achieving it. I need to know what the next step is." "How do you support yourself?" the master asked. "I haven't yet learned how to support myself; my parents help me out. But that is only a detail." "Your next step is to look directly at the sun for half a minute," said the master. And the disciple obeyed. When the half-minute was over, the master asked
him to describe the field that surrounded them. "I can't see it. The sun has affeced my vision," the disciple said. "A man who seeks only the light, while shirking his responsibilities, will never find illumination. And one who keep his eyes fixed upon the sun ends up blind," was the
master's comment.

2. The disciple said to his master: "I have spent most of the day thinking about things I should not be thinking about, desiring things I should not desire and making plans I should not be making." The master invited the disciple to take a walk with him through the forest behind
his house. Along the way, he pointed to a plant, and asked the disciple if he knew its name. "Belladonna," said the disciple. "It can kill anyone who eats its leaves." "But it cannot kill anyone who simply observes it," said the master."Likewise, negative desires can cause no evil if you do not allow yourself to be seduced by them."

3. A 32 year old patient sought out the therapist, Richard Crowley. "I cannot stop sucking my thumb," he complained. "Don't be too concerned about that," Crowley told him. "But suck on a different finger each day." The patient tried to do as instructed. But each time he brought his hand to his mouth, he had to make a conscious choice as to which finger should be the object of his attention that day. Before the week was over, the habit was cured. "When a vice becomes a habit, it is difficult to deal with," Richard Crowley says. "But when it requires of us that we develop new attitudes, make new decisions and choices, we become aware that it is not worth the effort."

4. An explorer, a white man, anxious to reach his destination in the heart of Africa, promised an extra payment to his bearers if they would make greater speed. For several days, the bearers moved along at a faster pace. One afternoon, though, they all suddenly put down their burden and sat on the ground. No matter how much money they were offered, they refused to move on. When the explorer finally asked why they were behaving as they were, he was given the following answer: "We have been moving along at such a fast pace that we no longer know what we are doing (for money). Now we have to wait until our soul catches up with us."

5. Do not always try to be consistent. Saint Paul, after all, said, "The wisdom of the world is madness in the eyes of God." To be consistent is always to wear a tie that matches one's socks. It is to have the same opinions tomorrow as one has today. And the movement of the planet? Where is it? So long as you do no harm to another, change your opinion once in a while. Contradict yourself without being embarrassed. This is your right. It doesn't matter what others think -- because that's what they will think, in any case. So, relax. Let the universe move about. Discover the joy of surprising yourself. "God selected the crazy things on the earth so as
to embarrass the wise men," said Saint Paul.

6. Saint Anton was living in the desert when a young man approached him. "Father, I sold everything I owned, and gave the proceeds to the poor. I kept only a few things that could help me to survive out here. I would like you to show me the path to salvation." Saint Anton asked
that the lad sell the few things that he had kept, and -- with the money -- buy some meat in the city. When he returned, he was to strap the meat to his body. The young man did as he was instructed. As he was returning, he was attacked by dogs and falcons who wanted the meat.
"I'm back," said the young man, showing the father his wounded body and his tattered clothing. "Those who embark in a new direction and want to keep a bit of the old life, wind up lacerated by their own past," said the saint.

7. When the wanderer was ten years old, his mother insisted that he take a course in physical education. One of the activities required him to jump from a bridge into a river. Early in the course, he was paralyzed by fear. Each day, he stood last in line, and suffered every time one of those in front made his jump -- because it would shortly be his turn. One day, the instructor -- noticing his fear -- made him take the first jump. Although he was still frightened, it was over so
quickly that the fright was replaced by courage. The master says: "Often, we can afford to take our time. But there are occasions when we must roll up our sleeves and resolve a situation. In such cases, there is nothing worse than delay."

8. The wanderer is at the feast of Saint John, with its tents, archery contests and country food. Suddenly, a clown begins to mimic his gestures. People laugh, and the wanderer laughs, as well, and invites the clown to have coffee with him. "Commit to life!" says the clown. "If you are alive, you have to shake your arms, jump around, make noise, laugh and talk to people. Because life is exactly the opposite of death. "To die is to remain forever in the same position. If you are too quiet, you are not living."

9. There is an Australian legend about a shaman who was walking with his three sisters when they met the most famous warrior of the time. "I want to marry one of these beautiful girls," the warrior said. "If one of them marries, the other two will suffer, said the shaman. "I am looking for a tribe that allow its men to have three wives." For years, they walked the entire Australian continent without finding such a tribe. "At least one of us could have been happy," said one of the sisters when they were old, and sick of walking.
"I was wrong," said the shaman. "But now it's too late." And he turned the three sisters into blocks of stone, so that all who passed by would understand that one person's happiness does not mean others must be sad.

10. "Who is the best swordsman?" asked a warrior of his master. "Go to the field near the monastery," his master answered. "There is a rock there. I want you to insult the rock." "But why would I do that?" the disciple asked. "The rock will not respond." "Well, then attack it with your sword," the master said. "I won't do that, either," the disciple answered. "My sword would break. And if I attack the rock with my hands, I'll injure my fingers and have no impact on it. That wasn't what I asked. Who is the best swordsman?" "The best is the one who is like the rock," said his master. "Without unsheathing a sword, it demonstrates that no one can conquer it."

ठाकरे की Thackeray - २

2008-10-25T10:15:00.004+05:30

रेल्वेच्या परीक्षेसाठी आलेल्या परप्रांतीय उमेदवारांना मुंबईत मारहाण केली गेली. या उमेदवारांची काय चूक होती? नोकरीच्या आशेने ते जेथे बोलवले तेथे आले होते.
जर मराठी वृत्तपत्रांत खरोखरच जाहिरात आली नसेल तर चूक असलीच तर ती रेल्वे बोर्डाचीच होती. या उमेदवारांची त्यात काय चूक होती? रेल्वे बोर्डाच्या यासाठी जबाबदार असलेल्या अधिकाऱ्याला गाठून जाब विचारण्याऐवजी या उमेदवारांनाच मारहाण करणे सुसंस्कृत (sorry, राज ठाकरे आणि त्यांच्या सेनेकडून सुसंस्कृतपणाची अपेक्षा जरा जास्तच आहे) माणसाला लज्जास्पद नाही का? विचार करा, असाच प्रकार आपल्या मुलाबाबत परप्रांतात झाला तर? आपल्याच बस जाळणे म्हणजे मराठी माणसाचेच नुकसान नाही का? http://www.mumbaimirror.com/net/mmpaper.aspx?page=article&sectid=15&contentid=2008102220081022034449255edf6f445
त्या दिवशी बांद्रे न्यायालयात ज्यांच्या केस होत्या त्यांचे किती हाल झाले ते त्यांनाच माहीत! इतरांनाही इस्पितळात जाता/नेता न आल्याने, महत्त्वाच्या कामाला बाहेर न पडता आल्याने कितीकांना गैरसोय सहन करावी लागली. राष्ट्रीय संपत्तीचे जाळपोळीने किती नुकसान झाले! कामाचे तास किती वाया गेले! पण ’राज’ सैनिकांना त्याचे काय? त्यांचा या कश्यासीही काही घेणे देणे नाही.

आजकाल या दंगलखोरांची एक नविनच जमात तयार झालीय. कालच माझ्या आत्याशी बोलत असताना दोन आठवड्यापुर्वी झालेल्या दंगलीबद्द्ल चर्चा चालू होती. त्यावेळी तिने जे काही सांगितले त्यावर विश्वास ठेवणे खरच खुप कठीण आहे. आत्यचा देवपूर (धुळे) मधील दुकानाशेजरील दोन दुकाने फक्त लूटण्यासाठी फोडण्यात आली. संपुर्ण दुकान लुटून खाली झाल्यानंतर पेटवून देण्यात आले. मुंबईतील दंग्यानंतर असे काही झाल्याचे ऎकिवात आले नसले तरी झाले नसेलच असे नाही

to be contd ....

Black and White

2008-10-24T15:19:00.003+05:30

This poem was nominated for the best poem for 2005. (Don't know if it is true but the poem is what matters)

Written by an African kid –

“When I born, I black.

When I grow up, I black.

When I go in sun, I black.

When I scared, I black.

When I sick, I black.

And when I die, I still black.

And you white fella …

When you born, you pink.

When you grow up, you white.

When you go in sun, you red.

When you cold, you blue.

When you scared, you yellow.

When you sick, you green.

And when you die, you grey …

And you calling me colored ??”

ठाकरे की Thackeray !

2008-10-23T14:58:00.005+05:30

मराठी माणसाच्या अस्मितेसाठी पेटुन ऊठया-या (की फक्त लोकांना पेटवण्या-या) राज ठाकरेंना खरोखरच मराठी भाषेविशयी, मराठी माणसांविषयी प्रेम आहे का
१. राज ठाकरे स्वतःचे नाव इंग्रजी भाषेत Thackeray असे का लिहीतात ? खरेतर ठाकरे हे इंग्रजीत लिहीतांना Thakare or Thakre असे लिहायला हवे. पण आंग्ल भाषेतून शिकल्येल्या राज यांना हे कधीच जाणवले नसनार कारण की त्यांच्या लेखी ठाकरे is similar to William Makepeace Thackeray, the author of Vanity Fair. Not only does Thackeray use the anglicised spelling, he even pronounces it like the English author, who, as far as I know, was not a Marathi manoos.
२. भाषेकडून आता दुस-या मुद्याकडे वळू.
अ. राज यांचा बचाव करन-या वकीलांमधे एक वकील ऊत्तर भारतीय (भैय्या) आहे. आता एका दिवसासाठी परिक्षेसा्ठी येणा-या विद्यार्थ्यांना देखिल पिटाळूण लावण्या-या ’राज’सैनिकांची अखिलेश चौबेंवर का मेहेर नजर?
ब. राज यांची मूले Bombay Scottish School मध्ये शिकलीत. कृपया लक्ष द्या: Bombay; Mumbai नव्हे. त्यावेळी त्यांना Bombay चे Mumbai करण्यात काय अडचण होती
क. जनतेत प्रक्षोभक भाषणे देणारे राज ठाकरे कोर्टात गप्प का (read source: in.rediff.com/news/2008/oct/21raj10.htm)? त्यांना आपले विचार कोर्टाला पटवून द्यावेशे नाही वाटले?

to be continued

Forgiveness: by Tao

2008-10-23T10:28:00.000+05:30

One day, the sage gave the disciple an empty sack and a basket of potatoes. "Think of all the people who have done or said something against you in the recent past, especially those you cannot forgive.

For each of them, inscribe the name on a potato and put it in the sack."

The disciple came up quite a few names, and soon his sack was heavy with potatoes.

"Carry the sack with you wherever you go for a week," said the sage. "We'll talk after that."

At first, the disciple thought nothing of it. Carrying the sack was not particularly difficult. But after a while, it became more of a burden. It sometimes got in the way, and it seemed to require more effort to carry as time went on, even though its weight remained the same.

After a few days, the sack began to smell. The carved potatoes gave off a ripe odor. Not only were they increasingly inconvenient to carry around, they were also becoming rather unpleasant.

Finally, the week was over. The sage summoned the disciple. "Any thoughts about all this?"

"Yes, Master," the disciple replied. "When we are unable to forgive others, we carry negative feelings with us everywhere, much like these potatoes. That negativity becomes a burden to us and, after a while, it festers."

"Yes, that is exactly what happens when one holds a grudge. So, how can we lighten the load?"

"We must strive to forgive."

"Forgiving someone is the equivalent of removing the corresponding potato from the sack. How many of your transgressors are you able to forgive?"

"I've thought about it quite a bit, Master," the disciple said. "It required much effort, but I have decided to forgive all of them."

"Very well, we can remove all the potatoes. Were there any more people who transgressed against you this last week?"

The disciple thought for a while and admitted there were. Then he felt panic when he realized his empty sack was about to get filled up again.

"Master," he asked, "if we continue like this, wouldn't there always be potatoes in the sack week after week?"

"Yes, as long as people speak or act against you in some way, you will always have potatoes."

"But Master, we can never control what others do. So what good is the Tao in this case?"

"We're not at the realm of the Tao yet. Everything we have talked about so far is the conventional approach to forgiveness. It is the same thing that many philosophies and most religions preach - we must constantly strive to forgive, for it is an important virtue. This is not the Tao because there is no striving in the Tao."

"Then what is the Tao, Master?"

"You can figure it out. If the potatoes are negative feelings, then what is the sack?"

"The sack is... That which allows me to hold on to the negativity. It is something within us that makes us dwell on feeling offended.... Ah, it is my inflated sense of self-importance. "

"And what will happen if you let go of it?"

"Then... The things that people do or say against me no longer seem like such a major issue."

"In that case, you won't have any names to inscribe on potatoes. That means no more weight to carry around, and no more bad smells.

The Tao of forgiveness is the conscious decision to not just to remove some potatoes... But to relinquish the entire sack."

तीन कविता - कुसुमाग्रज

2008-10-21T15:50:00.007+05:30

॥ प्रेम ॥
प्रेम कुणावर करावं
कुणावरही करावं

कारण प्रेम आहे
माणसाच्या संस्कृतीचा सारांश
त्याच्या इतिहासाचा निष्कर्ष
आणि भविष्यकाळातील
त्याच्या अभ्युदयाची आशा
एकमेव !

॥ नाते ॥
नात्यास आपुल्या नाव देऊ नकोस काही ।
सा-याच चांदण्याची जगतास जाण नाही ॥

व्यवहार कोविंदांचा होईल रोष होवो ।
व्याख्येतूनच त्यांची प्रद्ण्या वाहात जाई ॥

ना तालराग यांच्या बंधात बांधलेला ।
स्वरमेघ मंजूळांचा बरसे दिशात दाही ॥

गावातल्या दिव्यांना पथ तो कसा पुसावा ।
मंझिलकी जयाची तारांगणात राही ॥

॥ स्मृती ॥
नवलाख तळपती दीप विजेचे येथ
उतरली तारकादळे जणू नगरात
परि स्मरते आणिक करते व्याकुल केंव्हा
त्या माजघरातील मंद दिव्याची वात

वा-यावर येथील रातराणी ही धुंद
टाकता उसासे चरणचाल हो मंद
परि स्मरतो आणिक करतो व्याकुल केंव्हा
त्या परसामधला एकच तो निशिगंध

हेलावे भवती सागर येथ अफाट
तीरावर श्रीमंत इमारतींचाच थाट
परि स्मरतो आणिक करतो व्याकुल केंव्हा
तो नदीकिनारा अन भंगला घाट

बेहोष चढे जलशांना येथिल रंग
रुणझुणता नुपुर जीव बने निःसंग
परि स्मरतो आणिक करतो व्याकुल केंव्हा
तू आर्त मला ऎकविलास जो अभंग

लावण्यवतींचा लालस येथ निवास
मदिरेत माणकपरी तरारे फेस
परि स्मरती आणिक करती व्याकुल केंव्हा
ते उदास डोळे त्यातिल करुण विलास