Beijing Olympics 2008

Don’t drink and drive please

Indian media

I try to play catch up with what’s happening in India by reading Indian News Magazines and Zee News (the only Indian channel we get via Comcast in New Jersey).

Zee News is a cheap and worthless channel full of stupid advertisements but more on that later in some other article.

Yesterday, there was a news about an incidence in Bhagalpur, Bihar. This town was made famous in the early eighties when police poured acid into the eyes of some undertrials.

Few days back, a woman in Bhagalpur had her gold chain snatched from her. She gave a cry and two passers-by ran after the thief. They caught him. The mob gathered. He was tied hand and foot and beaten by the crowd.

The police came. They joined in the beating and took the man and tied him by a chain to their motor-cycle and dragged him, till the chain broke.

This was videotaped and was broadcasted on National Television. This is nothing but cheap and attention seeking tactic of getting audiences. As a national broadcaster, your duty is to inform people about what happened, express outrage and ask for justice. Showing such videos is outright wrong. They should learn a way to tell story without offending sensitive audiences. The least they can do is to watch how CNN covered aftermath of 9/11.

I agree that the thief has committed a crime but it is not the duty of Police to punish him. This right still remains with court in so called Democratic India.

Shame to the police officers who performed this heinous act and shame on the Indian media. Please stop using suffering of a poor man as marketing ploy, to get attention and to stop them from changing channels.

Beat This

Narayana Murthy and fuss over National Anthem

It all started with an Infosys programm at its Mysore campus in which the President Kalam was the chief guest. On the occasion, the Infosys authorities played an instrumental version of the National Anthem instead of it being sung.

When asked to explain the reason behind the decision, Murthy gave his own reasons, unaware that his comment could lead to a huge debate in the public domain. “We have a lot of foreigners. We didn’t want them to be embarrassed, when they are silent and others are singing. So this was fine,” he said.

I don’t understand what embarrassment foreigners feel by listening to their host-country’s national anthem. Isn’t that the whole idea of being in a foreign land? To learn, understand and respect the host country. And how long does a national anthem lasts, all of 52 seconds.

I don’t know with this attitude, how good president Narayana Murthy would be.

Wow Campaign

When Microsoft came up with Vista, they launched the Wow Campaign and reportedly spent more than $500 millon on it. It’s no secret that people are not buying Vista yet.
Apple decided to pinch Microsoft with their own Wow campaign. Picture says the thousand words.
Microsoft Wow Ad

Apple Wow Ad

India has another billionaire

However, Hasan Ali is a decent businessman who does not prefer to bloat about his $8 billion wealth. Good work Finance Ministry.
We trust on you to give us more billionaires.