Brrrr...Bombay biting!

In 2008, the year I left Bombay - during my first stint, it recorded possibly the coldest day in those years when the mercury fell to as low as 8.5 degree Celsius in February that year. It was and still is the most coldest weather I have experienced in Bombay.

(image source: www.thenewskick.com)

With Madras as home for the next seven years, cold was unheard of, as the most minimum Madras records in December - January are 'late teeny' or 'early twenty' degree temperatures. It is balmy and even salubrious, but never cold.Further, being born, bred and buttered in Madras, I have never experienced 'cold' climate.

Bombay, for me, has also been mostly like that, except for a few occasions like 2008. I could adjust to the Bombay climate because it was almost like Madras. So when someone asks me, "Can't you bear even this?", my answer would be, "No, because I am not used at all to this!"

The last two weeks have seen me hark back to those days in February '08, when Bombay literally froze, more so in the mornings. Even now, the mornings seem to be relatively colder (no, not 'cooler') than the evenings. I find some discomfort in venturing for my regular 5 am walk in shorts with the cold omnipresent. It is like standing in front of a heavy tonnage air-conditioner at full blast.

My body can handle a good deal of heat (Thanks to Madras' heat and humidity), but cold is something I cannot bear beyond a limit. The first thing I do every single day in office is go and request for a 'toning down" of the air conditioner. Thrice in the last two weeks, I had to take short breaks during meetings since the air conditioner was pounding and I found it unbearable to sit inside.

However, natural chill is something my body tries to adjust better to than those created by the air conditioners.

I don't know how long this weather is going to stay or whether it will peter off now but return, as it did in 2008. If it does, it is going to be another round of shivers and "good night, sleep tight!'.

Price cuts on iPhones - do you feel cheated?

Apple's iPhone 5s was launched in India in November 2013 at a starting price of Rs. 53,500 for the 16GB model.  Back in September 2015, Apple launched the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus. Generally when a new model gets launched, the previous versions tend to get a price slash.

(image source: www.pcadvisor.co.uk)

Accordingly, coinciding with the launch of the iPhone 6s, the iPhone 5s received its first price cut and was officially made available at Rs. 35,000 for the 16GB variant, and Rs.40,000 for the 32GB variant.

Certain online portals were offering the iPhone 5s 16GB at lesser rates during the September-October 2015 festive season.

With the latest price cut, iPhone 5s prices officially start at Rs 24,999 (for the 16 GB variant), with a few online retailers even offering it at around Rs.19,500!

Thus the price has been brought down to less than half in just three months!

Apple had introduced the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus at Rs 62,000 – Rs 92,000 (depending on the variant). This week Apple cut the price of the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus by up to 16% within just two months after their India launch. The price of the iPhone 6s 16 GB model, which was introduced at Rs 62,000 on October 16, 2015, has fallen by 11-16% and now starts from Rs 52,000.

The price cuts are applicable across all variants – 16 GB, 64 GB and 128 GB.  

Thus the iPhone 5s costs among the lowest in the world in India, though the rupee is depreciating and our import duties continue to be substantial. The iPhone 5s is the best-selling iPhone in India, apparently accounting for almost half of the iPhone sales in the country. However, Apple accounts for only 1% of market share.

That’s mainly (if you ask me, only) due to price — despite its price cuts, the iPhone 5s is still several times more expensive than entry-level phones.

The point of discussion remains as to what would a person who bought an iPhone 5s for around Rs.45,000 a couple of months back feel today at its retail price of around Rs.20,000? Disappointed? Cheated? A bit of both? I remember that in August 2011, Japanese carmaker Honda cut the price of its hatchback Jazz by Rs.1.6 lac on a single day - it was available at a starting price of Rs.5.5 lac - down from Rs.7.1 lac a day before!  

Pricing is an important factor in making a gadget attractive. Apple has (in)famously been very strong armed about pricing and this largesse makes you wonder at the margins they were making earlier! In a capitalist world, there is no one way to go about pricing and expecting a dole is not right. Yes, no businessman is a philanthropist. But I just have this to say - never buy a gadget, however fancy it may be, on the day or the month of its launch in today's world. Unless you are a leave-your-brains-behind-at-home fanboy!

'Free basics' vs 'Net neutrality'

The last few days have seen full page ads from Facebook on the concept of 'free basics', screaming in support of the concept and hinting that people in support of the concept of 'net neutrality' have either not understood the concept of 'free basics' or are trying to thwart the attempt of people in underprivileged segments of the society / far flung areas of the country from accessing the internet.

Before we pit the two against each other, we need to delve into what the two concepts mean.

What is 'net neutrality'?

(image source: www.edumovlive.com)

Net neutrality is a principle that says Internet service providers (ISPs) should treat all traffic (from any website) on their networks equally. They should neither block nor slow the access to any website or content on the Web.

What is 'free basics'?

(image source: www.androidcentral.com)

Free basics was earlier a work in progress concept called Internet.org. After the Indian prime minister visited Facebook's headquarters this year, the same was rechristened as 'free basics'. It is apparently a platform that helps Indian developers to make their services and websites available free of cost to those who cannot afford internet access.

What is the problem?

While the concept of 'net neutrality' is that the internet should be as it is now - free and unfettered, without any preference / discriminatory approach to certain websites or applications, the concept of 'free basics' seeks to make access to those websites or apps that are not partners, only after collecting a fee. Under free basics, access, or more importantly, 'free' access, is limited only to certain partner websites / portions of websites and applications ('apps'). It is like watching TV channels of your choice - free and paid. Thus, the paying websites, in a way, would pay for the free websites to be carried on an ISP.

Earlier, there was a project called Airtel Zero launched by Airtel where websites such as Flipkart were partners. On Internet.org, websites like Cleartrip were partners. These websites then pulled out after public outcry against such grouping. The issue is that larger companies may not have qualms in joining the free basics project since they have deeper pockets, but the smaller ones would have to shell out beyond their means to stay relevant. Many companies use internet for their existence this will prove to be a burden for them.  

The issue is that an ISP will become like a Direct to home (DTH) TV services provider - you may have to access a particular site only on a particular ISP and perhaps not get to access a website on a particular ISP at all. Now, that could be unnerving, even hair-splitting for users, isn't it?

Though the intentions of the free basics appear to be noble, what is to be kept in mind is that no businessman is a philanthropist.

The ball is in the telecom regulator Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's (TRAI) court. It has placed the paper for discussion on its website till December 31, 2015. At present, Reliance is offering Free basics, which TRAI has asked to shut down. Let us see how the battle unfolds. The decision on free basics vs net neutrality would be on whose side TRAI is on.

Do you have two dustbins at your home?

Yes. This is indeed a very pertinent question. Why?

Read on..

All of us have dustbins at our homes. Throughout the day we dump trash - plastic, metal, paper, vegetable peels, food leftovers, dust and the like. What happens after you dump your trash? Have you given a thought about it? Every morning, you keep your trash can outside and the trash collector comes, takes yours in his big bin and moves them to a still larger trash can.

(image source: www.technocrazed.com)

Then a smaller trash van comes and takes it to a larger trash van. Finally, this trash is then dumped to landfills / dumpsites at the outskirts of the city. Basically it is dumped onto the ground. In most cases it is burnt, leaving rise to toxic fumes in the air. Further, when new garbage is collected, it again gets dumped on top of the old garbage. There is no solid waste management plan that is consistently followed. Hence what happens is that all garbage gets mixed and dumped together - solid, semi solid, liquid, perishable, non-perishable etc. 

However, there are recycling units which employ persons to segregate the plastic / metal from the trash, which is recycled. But very little of the trash is recycled because of the arduous task of segregating the perishable and non-perishable trash. Further, where can you find persons to work at these dumpsites? Generally, it is the poor street urchins who do this job. Imagine urchins toiling for hours amidst the toxic fumes looking for cola cans and water bottles among piles and piles of stench-filled trash!

Do we give a thought as to what this could cause to the environment - land, water and air? What is the easiest thing that we can co to help ameliorate the situation? Simple. Segregate the waste. For over seven years now, I have been doing this and have made my family members also do this.

(image source: www.mamas-spot.com)

I have two trash cans at home - one green in color and another of a varied color. I throw the perishable waste in the green trash can and the non-perishable waste in the other trash can. The frequency of sending the cans outside for collection reduces. 

Solid non-perishable waste like plastic, metal etc. is retained for a longer period at home in the closed trash can if it does not emit any bad smell whereas the perishable waste is sent out at shorter intervals depending on what I dump. Sometimes, the non-perishable waste gets collected for even 10 days at a stretch if it does not emit any bad odour / stench. For example, an empty plastic / aluminum foil cover that contained chips / biscuits can be retained for a longer period than an aluminum cover that had a ready-to-eat food product, which has to be disposed immediately. 

The moot point is even if you want to dispose it at more frequent intervals, you can segregate and dispose perishable and non-perishable trash.

Once the trash collection person comes, you can tell him which is perishable trash and which is not. Generally, for identification purpose, the non-perishable trash can which he has is red in colour and the perishable trash can is green in colour. This ensures effective solid waste management in a better manner.

This is a simple switch which we all can make. Will you?

Drag racing on Saturday nights

I used to bring my TVS Wego scooter to office earlier. But a truck and a car came close to kissing my scooter around three months back and there was fatal accident involving a couple on the Santacruz Chembur Link Road (SCLR), which made me change to my car for good. Plus advice from friends and family. After all, life is important than speedy access to home, isn't it?

(image source: wwwmotorcycleclassics.com)

However, old habits die hard and since I was required to work this Saturday, I thought I might take the two wheeler to work for that one day as there might not be much traffic. And I did.

Work got over by 7:30 pm and I was on my way back. On the main road of the Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC), suddenly, out of the blue, two motorcycles sped past me, one almost taking a cut in front of me. They went and stopped a few metres ahead. Two men in each motorcycle. The riders revving up the throttle as if at a race. I then realised - they were indeed at a race. They were racing against each other. The only issue was that they were racing in the middle of a thoroughfare used by the public.

When I rode past them, seemingly oblivious of their presence, they came once again from behind and sped past me. Then from nowhere came two more riders and the speeding started. Now, I could not race with them as that was not what I wanted. I wanted to avoid them. So I stopped my scooter and took out my phone and started potting around aimlessly, waiting for them to leave. And leave they did, to my relief. I was glad that I did not have a lady pillion rider with me or else things could have gone worse. Many riders pass comments at fellow public and indulge in teasing. They sometimes get physical too.

What were these people doing?

They were indulging in an 'illegal' sport called drag racing. What is drag racing? Well drag racing is an unofficial race between cars and cars or bikes and bikes which is played out all over the world. It is mostly illegal and played out at places with limited police presence. Hollywood movies like Biker Boyz, Torque and the Fast and the Furious series have glorified these unofficial racing stunts to such an extent that these have caught onto youths in our cities. However, in some countries, drag racing is legal.

But in India, the drag races that happen are street races and are not legal. For instance, in Madras, it happens on the Beach road near the Marina, Elliots Beach road at Besant Nagar and the ubiquitous East Coast Road (ECR). In the wee hours of the night / dawn, it happens on other major roads too. The Madras-Bangalore Highway (NH4), is another example. I have heard that it happens at the Worli Seaface, Carter Road, Bandra in Mumbai and on the Pune Expressway. I am sure there are other places too, like I found out at BKC.

No wonder, with the BKC almost empty on Saturdays, the biker boys have a free run. These races are done for paltry bets and are used to show the prowess of the racers on the road. Many times, rich kids also use these races to show off. With bikes becoming more powerful and superbikes being imported, availability is no more an issue.

The issue with drag racing in India is that it happens with common public on the roads and at such speeds, someone can get hurt, sometimes even fatally. There have been any cases where innocent bystanders walking on the roads or waiting for public transport have got hurt due to the antics of these people. Many vehicles go haywire during such races and cause accidents. Sometimes parked vehicles bear the brunt. Many a time, the racers are drunk and intoxicated with paan. This makes your presence on such roads even more risky. You could get maimed for life!

It is difficult for the police to monitor as these people have a network and they do it where they want. It is well co-ordinated. it is frightening to be on roads while these races happen - you can consider yourself lucky if you were present and nothing happened to you. It all happens in a flash. With a lot of vroom and noise, these vehicles power on the roads with excited youth seeking some cheap thrills. They power ahead as if they are flying on German Autobahns.

The issue I am concerned with is not the lives of these racers. It is the unsuspecting public that use the thoroughfares. I am afraid that law enforcement cannot do much about this. As public, we need to take precaution.

I don't think my Wego will go beyond Chembur. Anymore.

Seven-day work week!

"No days off - I am a workaholic."

Wale, American rapper (born 1984)

"I'm a workaholic, so I ignore the signs of fatigue and just keep going and going, and then conk out when I get home. It can be pretty stressful"

- Keke Palmer, actress

“I don’t think I am a workaholic. I prefer to keep busy. It is better than the alternative.”

- Sebastian Coe, British politician (born 1965)

"I've always been a workaholic. I reckon, on average, I've had less than one day a year off in my working career."

- Ken Livingstone, British politician (born 1945)

“I’m not a workaholic, but I was a bit manic, I have to confess.”

- Gavin Rossdale , English musician (born 1965)

This has been a seven-day work week for me! 'Emergent' and 'urgent' tasks always tend to come on Friday evenings. I thought everything was over when I left office at 7:30 pm yesterday. Another emergency announced itself at 10 pm in the night! When I entered the ramparts of my office today, I felt like a 'doctor on call', just in time to save lives!

I did something which I have not done for a long time in my life - pack lunch for myself! I have made stuff for others and packed boxes, but for me, I think this should be after quite some time. If I remember correctly, I haven't brought a tiffin box for myself to office since 2001 when I was a Company Secretary in Kothari Petrochemicals Limited, Madras!

Well, there is always a redux, isn't it!

The plus point of coming to office on holidays is that apart from the relaxed atmosphere, there is silence. Productivity is up if there is no noise. You can actually hear the sound of silence on a Sunday! However, the flip side is that it can actually get eerie after a point of time!

There is virtually no activity outside. Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC in short) being a central business district, 

- teems with life from Mondays to Fridays, 

- shows mild signs of life on Saturdays (till afternoons), 

- but is completely dead on Sundays! 

Even the security staff in office are down - perhaps by 60%? Or is it 80%? The rare honk of a car, a taxi, and the sound of that one auto passing through the road - that's it! A few birds flying around for company! I feel like Will Smith in 'I am Legend' (2007) - the last man on earth! 

Hello, I am alone here! Can someone say a 'hi' to me? Please?

I only have music for company. I hope I get to leave before the sun goes down in the horizon - a night alone could be ever eerier!

Thankfully, email and internet are on - generally a shutdown is scheduled on weekends. Small mercies!

60 plus hours this week in office! And this is at the back of my head - tomorrow is Monday! I might as well doze off in office than go home just to take bath and change my clothes!

Sigh!

Am I burnt out? Perhaps not yet! Bring on Monday!

Bajirao Mastani

A chancy departmental get-together led me to see the Hindi movie Bajirao Mastani on the first day of its release. With a colleague from Lucknow helpfully translating the dialogues, watching the movie was an indulgent experience.

(image source www.99hdfilms.com)

I am not a 'fan' of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's movies - I don't watch many Hindi movies, anyway - I feel them very pretentious (read 'Black', 'Khamoshi' [Silence]), over the top, hollow (read 'Saawariya' [My love]) and an assault on the senses ('Devdas'). I could barely make through his most celebrated movie, 'Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam' [I have given my heart, darling], and that too was possible because of Ajay Devgan's underplay. Skeptical though as I was and due to the lack of other popular choices, we had to settle for this movie.

The best part of the experience was that unlike his other movies, this was not over the top. True, his signature colourful dances, opulent sets, magnificent settings and the like were there, but it did not mug my eyes. The background music was very adequate and aided the movie, though the same could not be said about the songs - none of them stayed with me after I left the cinema.

The basic premise of the story is the love between Baji Rao Peshwa, a Hindu chieftain of the Martha Dynasty and Mastani, a Muslim princess of Bundelkhand. What happens when a married chieftain falls in love with another woman and that too of another religion and the social acceptance or lack of it is the crux of the movie. The first half had a lot of ingredients going for it whereas I was put off by the complete lack of plot in the second half.

Battle scenes in movies have become increasingly video-game like and with the 300, 300 - The rise of an empire and our own Baahubali setting a benchmark - blood, blood and more blood. Bajirao Mastani starts with battle scenes but the blood is considerably less evident on screen, which is welcome. Perhaps being  a love story has its benefits in not showing much gore on screen. But the cinematography, by Sudeep Chatterjee, is top notch, though certain 'long' shots could have been done better. The romantic scenes are tastefully picturised, with the moon, rain and the twilight playing their roles well.

The performances? Well, the protagonist, Ranveer Singh (as Bajirao) has his shortcomings, but has tried to do a neat job. One of the scenes where he says that he doesn't just lust for Mastani, but is in love with her is standout. Priyanka Chopra as Kashi, the suffering wife of the chieftain has come up with a subtle performance - her tears are also not very melodramatic, which was very welcome, for a change. There is a scene where she tells Bajirao that she would have gladly given her life for him, but not her pride, where she shines. And another, where she says that she waits for him for 8 months in a year to be with him for 4 months, you can visualize the pain in the character. I am a sucker for doe eyes and Deepika Padukone (as Mastani) has them. But if you are able to look beyond those, she just stays there, plain and simple. Sorry, I couldn't feel much sympathy for her - no emotion. Not much to note in terms of emotive performance. However, all the three lead actors have gone through strenuous schedules - whether it is poetic dialogues (I thank my colleague again) dances or sword fights. The dialogues between Bajirao and Mastani seem to be the stuff Hollywood repartees are made of - the first sentence seems to be spoken only to get the repartee! Sample this:

"Our hearts beat together" - Bajirao

"...and they stop together as well" - Mastani

Tanvi Azmi as Radhabai, the mother of Bajirao has come up with a very good job of a person who cannot give up on her ego, though it could come in the way of her son's life. Her rigid non-acceptance of Mastani as a wife of Bajirao stems from the fact that she is a Muslim; she seems to be flaccid to the fact that her son has fallen in love with a woman other than his wife - particularly where the wife is doting and caring of him and whose world only revolves around him - in the first place. There is one scene where she shows sympathy for her (first) daughter-in-law but it is very cursory and seems to be injected suddenly.

However, the movie does not provide an answer as to whether it is a historical film or a romance. Bhansali does provide the mandatory disclaimer that it is not historically accurate at the beginning of the film. As I mentioned before, the plot just goes haywire in the second half - there just seems to be no story at all. This is a movie based on legends and it perhaps stays to true to one of them. I am afraid, it does not live up to the potential it had.

At around 160 minutes, its movie is a tad long but perhaps because of a few unwanted dance sequences. It is not tedious to sit through, through.

But for all the hard work and the pluses cited above, I would recommend a 'one-time' watch.

The beep song and vulgarity in lyrics of film songs

Recently, in Tamil Nadu, a song by actor Simbu and by music composer Anirudh has caught on like wildfire, for the wrong reasons. The reason was that there were a lot of beeps used in the song indicating profanity in language - in the lyrics. Due to so much profanity / vulgarity in the lyrics, the song had almost only beeps (cleverly used where you can comprehend the words), thus gaining notoriety as a 'beep song'!  While the actor has said that it was a private recording, the composer has stated that he has not composed the song. Nonetheless, both are facing a lot of flak for this song.

(image source: www.pledgie.org)

As is the norm, vulgarity in lyrics of songs, particularly film songs revolves in the explaining a sexual act or shaming the female anatomy with weird, retrograde words and blaming women as the one reason for everything that is gone wrong with a man's life. Vulgar, obscene, squirmy, queasy, objectionable, suggestive, titillating - by whatever name you call, these lyrics are regular part of film songs.

I  love music (I have even written a post on how to enjoy music), but I am not a big fan of lyrics. I listen to songs from a lot of languages - language is not a bar for me - and even in the languages I know, I do not pay much attention to the lyrics as for me, music overrides anything else. Hence I do not have a chance to rate the lyrics. There are few which I do try to dissect, but, as again, really few.

Some songs - whatever period they belong to - are so lyrically cheap and suggestive that it is impossible to listen to them once you grasp the meaning, however good the tune is. I can reel out songs which are of a bygone era too where lyrics did border on profanity and tastelessness.

What are the reasons for such lyrics?

I think that the primary reason is that women lyric / dialogue writers are virtually absent / very few in number. I doubt whether women would indulge in writing songs that regularly demean themselves. I am sure if there are an increasing  number of women writing lyrics for songs, such obscenity will not creep in, atleast not at this rate.

Secondly, there is this reasoning among movie makers and distributors that most movies are for the mass audience and the front benchers are to be titillated. Well the issue I have with this reasoning is that obscenity droops to such levels that this actually acts as an intoxicant to such people. With visuals that border on soft-porn, They go around with an air of cheap superiority and objectify women. Crimes against women are also a reason because of these.

Thirdly, when you are new to the industry, in this dog-eat-dog word and cutthroat competition, you as a lyricist are not established and need to give in to the demands of the producer / director. If you are an established lyricist, then you can take a moral stand that "I will not write this or that". But, it is certainly not possible because if you refuse, there is another person to take your place. Lyricists are not creatively challenged; I have heard songs with really beautiful lyrics. It is just that they are forced to toe a line due to commercial interests.

Fourthly, lyrics mirror a society. I can vouch for a fact that in the last three-four years in Tamil cinema atleast, there have been a slew of songs containing lyrics on liquor bars and men failing in love and women being reasons. So much that I would just puke on hearing a mandatory dance bar song in a movie. Once a song becomes a hit, then the same template is followed in every movie, till it goes out of fashion. The increasing number of liquor bars and being the biggest contributor to the State Government's exchequer is a factor. It is almost like the Government was a lot more people to hit the bars and drink, so that it can earn more revenue. This lifestyle - people spending increasing time in bars - has resulted in lyricists writing the 'mandatory' item song set in a bar. It is a cheap tactic that works, till it works.

The fifth but major reason I see is that there is not much of a reaction to these types of lyrics. Yes, there are protests here and there but by and large it remains muted. Perhaps, if such songs are rejected by the audience, it could push the lyricists to write better. Sometimes, families encourage children to perform to such songs and .........well, what else is there to say? With everything being accessible to children, what is needed is proper oversight.

Words are intrinsic to the soul of a song; they in fact are the character of a song. I personally squirm and sometimes, gasp at raunchy and sexist lyrics because they do that to me. Very embarrassing. But, there is no way forward. We can lament and just move on.

A defence offered is if you don't like it, don't hear it. Well fair enough, but if something is public then it does impact a larger population.

Have you noticed the lyrics of some western songs, particularly rap - Nicy Minaj, Eminem etc.? Listened to 'Cockiness' from 'Rude Boy' by Rihanna? Do so and you know what I mean. The Hindi song 'Choli ke peeche' would seem an angel in comparison!

Sigh!