[I will try to occasionally post posts that I had posted in the past which might still be relevant today. Obviously the new label/category Post from the Past will reflect the best of Cutting the Chai]
Many Windows versions ago, I discovered that the mouse settings could also be modified for left handed users. Otherwise the world in its rightful righteousness ignored the needs of us lefties.
Click here for the complete post...
The headline may sound as sensational as if it was from one of the television news channels (who are a major source of worry for the K-queen Ekta Kapoor). Though any such possibility might seem remote now (but you never know the ways of war) an Edmundian, Nitya Anand Chepuri has conjured this idea in his novel Tarbela Damned - Pakistan Tamed.
I'm yet to read the book (will go looking for it today) but the plot does sound exciting, especially for a generation who have been brought up on the idea that our 'pesky' neighbour is the reason for all our ills. Two men who studied together in school - St. Edmund's Shillong - and then went on to IIT Madras. The Hindu, Rahul Sharma joins the RAW and the Jew, Solomon Rabban, migrates to Israel and joins the Mossad. The Irish Republican Army angle is due to the influence of an Irishman, Brother Manahan, who taught them in School (St. Edmund's is run by the Christian Brothers founded by Edmund Ignatius Rice at Waterford, Ireland). They join hands in pursuit of their mission, taming Pakistan.
There might be some parallels in the story line with the author's life who had studied in St. Edmunds before passing out from the Defence Services Public School and graduating from IIT Madras. He then went on to join the army. The reviews say that "there is no off-putting jingoism and no cold-bloodedness," which is indeed welcome for a novel with a title like Tarbela Damned - Pakistan Tamed.
Tarbela Dam, built across the river Indus, is Pakistan's largest dam and is therefore of vital importance for the country. And Pakistanis on hearing of an 'imminent danger' to it are understandably worried. Anand pointed me to a Pakistani military and strategic discussion forum, where some members took the plot of the novel for real and posted interesting reactions. Here are a few samples (unedited):* I can understand RAW and MOSSAD masterminding something but how does the Irish military come into this? Is this some troops in Afghanistan?
Anyway these dams need proper protection because RAW and MOSSAD can send mindcontrol zombies to do a suicide bombing on one of them. Dams are fragile and very hard to fix. I think its against the geneva convention to even bomb a damn during war.
* dams are not military targets, in war you are not meant to hit dams and if someone does then they will be nuked
* If the military stay in power then any such attack would be considered an act of war against pakistan. Doesn't matter who does it, Talibs or not, without dams pakistan would go down the drain. This is why we would ensure India goes down with us, meaning All nukes to indian and israeli cities. Also the factor of Indian nukes beng called a bluff, cause we're not sure if they can actually nuke us or not.
* Tell me a single time when the indian or israielies show honesty
* just imagine........
Bhakra Nangal Dam Damned, Bhangies tamed.
Ranjit Sagar Dam Damned, Bhangies tamed.
Gobind Sagar Dam Damned, Bhangies tamed.
Some comments were more realistic:* it was just a novel by an indian writer. The West, including Israel is not interested in de-stabilizing Pakistan.
Well, I learnt another thing from the thread. Indians are referred to as Bhangies across our western border - maybe due to the still prevalent caste system in our country.
Most well-meaning Indians do not want an instable western neighbour even though we might have fought many wars, the scars of which might take long to heal. Pakistan's stability is good for India. Being surrounded by so-called failed states is a precarious situation in today's volatile times. If India has to develop into a super power that it aspires to be, there has to be political stability and economic growth in all of South East Asia. Because the ground realities here are much different from what existed in the American continents.
You can find more details about the book here.[Tarbela Damned - Pakistan Tamed
By CN Anand
Published by Indialog Publications
198 pages
Rs 195]
For once the adholic in me was pleased to see an advertisement released by the Directorate of Audio Visual Publicity (DAVP) - who aren't exactly known for creativity in advertising. This ad was in typical DAVP style - unappealing. But the appeal was in what it said and not how it was expressed. Relased on behalf of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) it announced the establishment of India's National Do Not Call Registry.
I came to know of the abundant money in the Indian economy through telecallers, who would have even offered me a loan for the purchase of new chaddies. Now that I've changed my number and the new one hasn't reached the unscrupulous - but nevertheless enterprising - people out there. Now it's only my mobile service provider who irritates me with those midnight messages asking me to subscribe for a Himesh Reshammiya caller tone. Not a bad idea though, it might just act as a repellant for people who call me up at uncomfortable hours.
In an act of desperation, they had replaced human callers with recorded voices. "Darling..." the voice from the other end said. I was a little taken aback. No one calls me that and that too in a wannabe seductive tone. I disconnected on hearing the next few sentences, disappointed, it was just a recorded voice. My do-not-disturb requests to the service provider have till date gone unheeded.
Hope this National Do Not Call Registry will go some way in restoring my peace with my mobile phone. Here's what the ad said:
(The original - see image above - was in all caps and gawky fonts, I've changed the case and the rest is verbatim)Telephone users not wanting commercial calls/unwanted calls may now register request with their telephone operator
* For registering contact your telecom operator through phone-customer care-SAM-online-through letter
* Telecom operators have allotted specific numbers for registering your request through phone and SMS
* Telecom operators after verifying your request will intimate registration number within 10 days
* 45 days after registration no commercial calls/unwanted calls will come on your registered phone number
* Even after 45 days if you receive unwanted calls/SMS from telemarketers, you can lodge complaint with your telecom operator giving details from where call/SMS received along with phone number
* Telecom operator will register your complaint for taking suitable action
* No extra charge will be levied by telecom operator for availing this service
For more details visit: www.ndncregistry.gov.in
Though the process can tale up to 55 days (10+45), it might be worth the wait. But TRAI should try to cut down the processing time, in the US it is about 31 days, but that too in today's e-era seems too long a time.
In a blatant act of self-promotion if I were to highlight a blurb on the side panels of this blog, then this does sound good:
"We recommend this tea" - The Sunday Indian ExpressSince I don't intend to be very clamant about this, but at the same time being unable to hide my glee, I'm posting a post instead.
AD WISEJust a small correction, the ads featured on this blog date back not only to the 1940s but to the 19th century.
A lowdown on the top-ranking Indian blogs
CUTTING THE CHAI
(http://soumyadipc.blogspot.com)It's a pitch black screen with bright yellow strips and a silhouette of the Red Fort which fails to mitigate the starkness. Visually, the site rightfully reflects its contents. For, Cutting the Chai is an explosion, a riot of thought, videos and downloads, For Soumyadip, the creator, this blog is a tribute to Indian advertising talent: from the black-and-white prints of the 1940s to the recent controversial Amul underwear ad.
Though this blog has a large repository of amusing and entertaining ads, a running commentary on each picture makes the entire experience hilarious. The author fully exploits the blog platform by providing videos of each TV ad he picks. In some cases, ringtone downloads are also added so that the reader can hear his favourite jingle every time the phone rings. This Chai has other flavours as well: movie reviews, mobile phone releases, among others. We recommend this tea.
Many readers of this blog might not be interested in all the assorted rubbish that I post here; they might have a liking for only some specific kind of crap. Someone who looks forward to my comics post might not necessarily have a liking for sexy Indian ads (an unlikely likelihood though). Or why should I bother someone with a genuine interest in vintage Indian advertising with some shoddy film reviews. Therefore I decided to include feeds for categories (aka labels, tags) for choosy readers and that too in an easy drop down format.
The PurpleMoggy had quite sometime back put up a post about adding label feeds to your Blogger (then in beta) template. But since, my list of categories is a long one and following that hack will mean eating up a lot of space on the sidebars, I needed the categories feed listing to be sorted in a drop down format. But then things weren't that easy for me, a little googling didn't help much, therefore I set on the difficult terrain on my own (I understand very little of the codes) and came up with what you can see in the Subscribe section on the right panel.
Before I proceed to the hack let me give credit to another place where it is due. The great help Ramani and the first Blogger Beta hack. And do remember to keep a backup of your template, just in case things go wrong. I don't want anyone cursing me.
Log in to your Blogger account -> Go to Layout -> Add a Page Element -> Add the Label element to your blog
Edit HTML -> Click the Expand Widget Templates check box
And look for this code:<b:widget id='Label1' locked='false' title='Labels' type='Label'>
In case you have already added a label widget to your template, it will be named
<b:includable id='main'>
<b:if cond='data:title'>
<h2><data:title/></h2>
</b:if>
<div class='widget-content'>
<ul>
<b:loop values='data:labels' var='label'>
<li>
<b:if cond='data:blog.url == data:label.url'>
<data:label.name/>
<b:else/>
<a expr:href='data:label.url'><data:label.name/></a>
</b:if>
(<data:label.count/>)
</li>
</b:loop>
</ul>
<b:include name='quickedit'/>
</div>
</b:includable>
</b:widget><b:widget id='Label2' locked='false' title='Labels' type='Label'>
and in case you have multiple label widgets (like an additional tag cloud), it'll be this:<b:widget id='Label3' locked='false' title='Labels' type='Label'>
Not much of a difference, only the numeral in the widget id progresses (as no two widgets can share the same id).
Now replace the section in the code (above) in red, with this:<br/>
In case, you also want to display the number of posts under each label, replace the portions of code in bold with this instead of the one above:
<select onchange='location=this.options[this.selectedIndex].value;' style='width:145px'>
<option>Category feed</option>
<b:loop values='data:labels' var='label'>
<option expr:value='data:post.url + "/feeds/posts/default/-/" + data:label.name'><data:label.name/>
</option>
</b:loop>
</select><br/>
You can customise your drop down list by changing the text in
<select onchange='location=this.options[this.selectedIndex].value;' style='width:145px'>
<option>Category feed</option>
<b:loop values='data:labels' var='label'>
<option expr:value='data:post.url + "/feeds/posts/default/-/" + data:label.name'><data:label.name/>
(<data:label.count/>)
</option>
</b:loop>
</select><option>Category feed</option>
with<option>Your customised text</option>
Even the width of the drop down list can be changed to suit your template. The default in this isstyle='width:145px'
You may change the width specifications to say 120px or whatever or even remove this block of code altogether.
After you are done with your customisation bit, get a preview. Just to see if it is displaying right, check the functionality only on the live blog. It wouldn't work in preview given the relative nature of the paths.
You can also rename or unname the widget from the Page Elements page.
