I have this wonderful habit of dropping things when I eat and that day the soup cup was so fragile that I had to be extra careful that I should not drop it. I have to say about a few people I met during the breaks – Dinesh, my junior at MBA – absolutely creative guy who got a job in Oracle in the most bizarre way you can think of, left the job in 6 months to join Radio Mirchi because he felt Oracle was boring…

Felix Chandran – who did the creative stuff for TedX Chennai – Should I say more?

Smriti – consultant at Delloite US. She had come for a vacation and visited TedX

Rabi and Christian Fabre – CEO of Christian Fabre fashions – interesting personality.

Chinmayi – Singer, RJ, VJ and Enteepreneur. Had a good conversation with her about her business, reality shows, education etc. She has a company called Blue Elephant – a linguistics company – in simple words they do translation services. They also do translation services for Zoho.

Rama Vadakattu – works in eBay but with entrpreneurial spirit and a host of guys from Thoughtworks…

I was hoping for a good session after lunch because they had a good lunch and I didn’t want to sleep off…

Kavita Balliga

She started with these words ” I am not going to campaign for any NGO, any activism etc but I am going to share my story. Five years back the doctors broke the news to me” – I was like what news?

She had a type of Cancer and was given the date for death. What will you if you know your date of death? 90% of the people would lose heart, may be get religious, wait for the death day with utmost sadness. She was also shocked, didn’t know what to do but what she did afterwards was wonderful. She started learning guitar by herself, then went for formal music training, cooking, photography, she did whatever she could do…

She became a oprah singer, colloborated with AR Rahman for Passage and now teaches music in KM Music Conservatory of AR Rahman. Yes, she passed through the test of Cancer and she lives till now, positively. A inspiring and moving story ended with an oprah rendition of Laughing Aria. One statement of her stood in mind after her talk – ” my days with cancer and chemotherapy are the best days in my life”

N.Vittal

I think after the moving story – most of them were sad, few even shed some tears. But Vittal made everyone laugh and think at the same time. Mr. Vittal was part of the telecom and Internet revolution of India as a Chief Secretary in Ekectronics and Telecommunication Ministry and very widely known for his work as Chief Vigilance Commissioner.

His witty one-liners like

“Diabetes is like corruption. You can’t eliminate it but you can control it.”

“A consultant is one who borrows your watch for telling the time, and walks away with it!”

“Only two pathys kept me going over the years. Venkatachalapathy and Allopathy”

were hilarious but thought provoking. He seeded a thought in to our minds. He says the best warfare in the world is to nullify the strength of the enemy. The strength of those people who corrupt the system is money. He tried to open the minds of the people and asked them to think about ideas which will nullify the power of money..

Sathish Babu

I have been weary of bureaucrats all through my life. I believe that the inefficiency of the babus is hampering our country’s progress. Because they can’t be thrown out of power like the politicians. A corrupt bureaucrat is a bigger menace than a corrupt politician. But a few bureaucrats in India change the world around them fir the good. Some like TN Seshan are in limelight but a lot like Swaran Singh are hidden gems.

Sathish Babu is one such hidden gem. Now the director of Elcot, he explained how he and his team successfully implemented rural BPOs and backtoschool programs in Krishnagiri, one of the most backward and Naxal hit districts of Tamil Nadu

I can’t explain his achievements in a small article. The way they planned the BPOs, implement it in small abandoned buildings in Vilages and training the young unemployed youth. Tremendous achievement…

For getting educated youth, you need the children to go to school continously – to make it possible they have used technology and local actor fan clubs to track every child eligible for school education. He demonstrated the live tracking process. It was not design rich but I believe that’s one of the most useful applications ever made for the betterment of people.

Sathish Babu is positive about everything. He even alternate positive part of free tv scheme of the government. He says ut actually takes information to the poor people. I remebered the Superfreakonomics theory of TVs empowering Indian rural womenfolk..

He says “you can’t change India. If you think so you are a fool. You change whatever you can change in the domain you are operating. India will change by itself “… According to me his was the perfect TED Talk of TEDx Chennai…

Khurshed Batliwala – Art of Living

The last and the worst shocker of the day for me. I don’t understand the connection between Art of Living and TED… I am a non-believer and I hate life improvement classes. Who are they to say how I should live? I frame my rules,values and the way of living.,,

His talk was a perfect marketing pitch for art of living classes. In such talks you will have statistics which are hiked up and shown as more important than any other problem in the world. Then as a solution they will make everyone to do a simple meditation technique and then try to prove that way is the solution for your problems…

There are more people who die of poverty in this country than stress suicides. There are more people killed by terrorist attacks than suicides. The presentation was the richest as it was done in Mac but it was inappropriate and blasphemous for TED…

Jeeva Raghunath

After that dissapointment, I was waiting for someone who can change my mood. Who better than a children story teller. I think most of us would have forgotten the stories we hear and we make during childhood days. She rendered 3 stories with actions and she actually made every one as a child all over again. I just thought “how wonderful it is to be a child”

Satyabrata Dam

“I am damn jealous about this guy” - that was the live tweet I made when I was seeing the pictures he took. I love to travel, but I travel less. I took a vacation after 4 years… And it was the best 9 days I had. Every journey is a learning.

This guy was a traveller and he climbs mountains. He says he is trying to find new ways to kill himself. 22 years in Navy with 7 years as director of adventure sports in Navy now studying MBA at IIM A, a oceanologist, advisor to Irish Govt and an eternal traveller

I am not finding words to describe this guy. His life us scary, his photos were breathtaking and his talk was candid. Just visit his blog , you will understand what I am talking about…

Awesomeness Personified

TEDx Chennai was a fantastic experience for me. It actually gave me a inferiority complex. I thotht and still thinking whether I am living a monotonic life… I would not say it was life changing experience but it definitely inspired me to make some adjustments to my life. I will live better tomorrow than today…

So the answer to my question – I am going to stay in the same domain as I am and try to do my part perfectly. I have a small land in Tanjore, with which I am going to explore the opportunities of farming. I have decided to travel to one unexplored place (by me) every year and take my photography little bit seriously…

PS: Kudos to all the people who were behind TEDx Chennai. It was really a wonderful event..

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Disclaimer:

1. All views in the post are mine and written with an open mind.

2. I am not going to bore you with my bad photographs. Check the following link for wonderful photographs from Felix Chandran. ( another awesome guy I met in TedX Chennai)

http://picasaweb.google.com/felixchandran

I was travelling back from TedX event in IIT to my home. As it’s a long bus back, my thoughts were spinning around the people who I met, listened and interacted with. I had 3 questions in my mind

1. Should I quit my job and start agriculture, which I believe can be transformed in to an organized industry in India?

2. Should I quit my job and start travelling from North Pole to South Pole just like that haphazardly without any plan in mind? Mind you travelling is one of the many things I love

Or

3. Should I stay where I am and make small changes in my own domain with the simple powers I have and make a difference in the lives of the people I know?

The answer at the end of the series

TED is a short form for Technology Entertainment Design, a non-profit organization which has a sole aim of spreading new ideas in whatever domain you can think of. Recently TED came to India and the first conference held in Mysore was a huge success. Ok I don’t think people like me could have attended it because the ticket comes at a princely price of $2400 ( a lakh and odd). But you can see the videos for free online after two weeks of the event. The videos are a rage in Youtube – never miss those

For those people who can’t attend, there are independent TED events, licensed by TED foundation called the TedX. A set of volunteers from Chennai took the challenge of organizing and what a event it was….

I was personally inspired by the TED videos and when TedX was announced in Chennai. I was so sure that I am going to attend. I got the ticket from Joe, my friend who was also part of the organizing team (I paid for it guys). There were lot of people who were cribbing that Rs.1000 as costly but I knew the worth. I thought the organizers did it in order to restrict the number of people..

After a early rise on a Sunday morning ( that’s unusual for me. I usually open my eyes at around 10 on a Sunday) and a long slow bus ride (which I didn’t expect) reached the IC & SR Audi of IIT, Madras just on time for the breakfast. I savored the tasty pongal and Vada but missed the coffee (he he he). I should admit that I was thinking that it will not start on time…

With only few minutes delay ( events in Chennai get late by one hour usually), the event started with Kiruba Shankar, introducing TED and TedX. The first technical glitch came with the first video of Chris (TED Founder) which didn’t work. Kiruba was quickly rescued the situation joking on how they played it 20 times the day before.Sometimes Technology fails you even in a Technology event ( should I say windows failed you? )

Anil Srinivasan and Sikkil Gurucharan

It was apt to start the conference with music and that too a fusion of Western Harmony and Carnatic Music. Anil, a trained western classical pianist and Gurucharan, a Carnatic vocalist started their tryst of colloboration music 4 years back using Skype Chats. Now the duo is four fusion albums old and a number of awards.

Anil shared a few stories of how Sarangi became Piano and how western classical piece became “Kaatrinile Varum Geetham”. They dumped the talking after a few minutes and Anil’s piano started the talking, sorry stirring my soul… With Gurucharan’s voice blending, it was a morning filter coffee with the Cappucino twist. Slowly they moved on to “Aasai Mugam” by Bharathiar, which was soulful.

Anil felt the sounds were not good so they performed ” Naan yenna vilayattu Bommaiya” by Papanasam Sivan, which was ice cream topping for the morning. I was amazed the way western piano and Carnatic music blended. It was interesting to know that “Aasai Mugam” was written on Bharathi’s mother and Krishna. He wrote the poem after the picture of his mom was burnt in a fire.

P.S: The same western classical blend with Indian classical is what you hear in Ilaiyaraja’s music. For better understanding, listen to Thiruvasagam.

Krupa of Sukrupa

TED is about sharing the life experience of one and how they had made something in life. There is a very thin line of difference between sharing and pitching. Krupa along with her mother started an NGO Sukrupa which empowers woman slum dwellers to lead a better life through education and self employment.

Although her concept was great and idea was profound, the talk was more like a marketing pitch for her NGO rather than a Ted talk. I felt she could have put her experiences in a better way and that was the first shocker of the day.

Sharada Ramanathan

Sharada, an Independent Film maker and the director of “Srirangaram” – which won a host of international awards and was revered in famous film festivals.

Sharada’s talk was deep, thought provoking but extremely biased. I accept her thoughts about movies which have to go to the grass roots and create meaningful content but she tried to create a stir by criticizing the populist movies. It’s the same old argument of the so called “intelligent” film makers on the so called “masala” film makers. As a ardent movie buff, I believe all the type of movies can co-exist in an Eco system. The people of India are appreciative of any good movie which will enrich and entertain them. We usually compare our movies with Korean, French, Spanish and English language movies. I think all these movie ecosystems have all kinds of movies for the people to watch. Sharada’s accusation and statements were more like attention grabbing whereas it could have been a wonderful insight in to Indian Cinema.

GRK Reddy

The next shocker of the day. I can’t even remotely agree this was a TED Talk. I agree his life could have been a inspiring story of a bureaucrat becoming a businessman but it looked more like a simple sales pitch for Marg Swarnabhoomi. Don’t you agree the AR Rahman concert was the biggest marketing tactic to bring people to Swarnabhoomi and experience it? I can’t explain more as most of the crowd was disinterested in the talk.

Romulus Earl Whitaker

After a shocker comes the pleasant whiff of nature in Whitaker’s form. Romulus Earl Whitaker aka the Snake Man is a Herpetologist who was instrumental in creating the Snake Park in Chennai ( visit it once.. Your fear of snakes will fly away)

His talk was about how they are using technology and community development to develop the Agumbe Rain forest and conserve the King Cobra population in the area. King Cobra is a speciality of India and he explained the facets of Cobra with superb humour. His jab at Chennai ( Red Dog ) showed his love for Madras. Don’t worry Romulus, we don’t have a Raj Thackeray here

R.Madhavan

Madhavan’s talk was arguably the best talk of the day. An IITian, quit his job at ONGC and started farming Yes, he believes and works for making Agriculture as an Industry. His talk was so thought provoking and statistics were hard hitting

“If 80% of the population are in to agriculture why 40% of the children are mal-nutritioned”

“the agricultural universities never know the reality of the farmers and farmers do not even know there is an agricultural university. There are 100 prototype machines made every year in these universities bur never see the light of production”
Through his research he had identified 20 different parameters which can improve agriculture but he could explain only 5 major parameters due to time constraint.

His idea was simple. He says “it’s not about the amount of area used for agriculture matters but the productivity of the land is more important”. He also took a dig at the “Land Ceiling Act” which became a deteriorating factor for Indian Agriculture. Coming from the granary of India, Thanjavur, his talk created a whirlwind of emotions in my heart. I am not able to come out of it till this moment.

Abdul Kalam quoted about this guy ” we need a million Madhavans for India” … Yes we do need. With that thought we broke for lunch…

To be continued…

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The loss of Ashes for Australian Cricket Team coincided with the infamous ousting of Jaswant Singh from BJP, the second largest national party in India. Jaswant Singh was ousted because of writing a book about Mohammed Ali Jinnah.

The problems in Australian cricket team ( was the best cricket team in the world till Sunday) and BJP ( one of the most disciplined parties in India) are strikingly similar and shockingly it seems the problems will get worse.

As I see there are 3 major problems in both..
1. Replacement Crisis
2. Identity Crisis
3. Leadership Crisis

Replacement Crisis

Australian Cricket Team had the most formidable team till 2007. The best opening pair in the world, absolutely magnificent middle order, the best wicket keeper the cricket world would ever see and the most feared bowling attack. Post Ashes 2007, the chunk of this team retired from world cricket and suddenly there were no one to replace the best or the so called relacements could not even do 10% of what the greats were doing. I did not expect Cricket Australia to do such a blunder and there were one of the better managed sports bodies in the world.

BJP on the other hand were in power till 2004 with AB Vajpayee ( one of the better leaders) and was thrown off mainly because of the self-boasting India Shining campaign and Sonia Factor. The loss coincided with physical ailment of Vajpayee, which led to the ascent of LK Advani, who was perceived as hard core Hindu Nationalist. And 2009 elections clearly depicted the mind set of Indian People, which led LK Advani contemplating retirement. This inturn led to the replacement crisis which is burning in BJP now. The moderates like Arun Jaitley, Arun Shourie and Jaswant Singh critcising the leadership and the hard boiled extremists fighting for the leadership. We even saw Arun Jaitley watching IPL in SA rather participating in the central committee meeting of the party

Identity Crisis

The Australian team has always been perceived as arrogant professionals in playing cricket lately they have become naive childish unprofessional attitude which was evident in the IndiaSeries and Ashes. They have lost the arrogance and even they looked like small children when they tried to sledge.

BJP although an offshoot of RSS was looked as a party which pushes through development rather conservative during their regime. But during the 2009 Lok Sabha elections they took a step backwards by supporting Varun Gandhi’s stance and projecting Modi as a possible PM candidate. Although Modi has developed Gujarat, he is still looked as a Hindu extremist. BJP were in utter chaos because they didn’t know what they stand for.

Leadership Crisis

When a leader fails he takes the whole team down in the drain. Ricky Ponting till 2007 enjoyed the luxury of having the best team in hand and when he lost all of them his captaincy flaws were exposed. The strategic mistakes like bowling a part time spinner for England’s last pair in Cardiff and leaving out the spinner in the last test at oval were proved fatal. The bowling changes, team selections and fielding setups were awful which eventually led to their loss. I think it’s time to bring some young captain like Michael Clarke like what South Africa did a few years back. Although initially Graeme Smith lost string of matches, the team he has built looks like the Steve Waugh’s Australia in the making

BJP on the other hand were confused in their leadership projections during the 2009 elections. Even Advani’s comments during 26/11 crisis, personal attacks on Sonia and Manmohan left a bad taste. BJP never projected a single PM candidate and it proved fatal. Congress had the same problem after 1998. Sonia Gandhi taking the leadership, making Manmohan as PM ( thanks to APJ), infusing the youth in to the party, taking the elections with a single agenda of development – I think dynasty politics has helped both the party and the country.

Both Australia and BJP need to find a young leader who can put together the team back in to track. It will take a lot of failures, trial and errors but sticking to the old leadership will prove the ultimate decline of both. Australia should come back because they will provide the much needed spectacularity to cricket. BJP should come back in order to shun the rise of regional parties and communist parties, who are against the development of India.

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Internet has become part and parcel of our lives. That’s an age old statement. Google has become a part and parcel of our lives is the new statement. And it’s an under statement.

Elections in India are like festivals. The hoopla, money and the madness are intriguing and also interesting. This year is no difference but there is a huge swing by the political parties towards a new medium called “Internet”. From Google Ads to Tech Crunch, Advani is asking people to vote for a change. Shashi Tharoor with his Facebook page.

It’s all happening in India.You can call it Obama effect but i would say a pragmatic move because 42 Million new voters are going to vote this year and to woo young voters, you should be there where they are.

There are some nice initiatives from some private and public institutions to increase awareness of voting. Like the www.jaagore.com of Tata Group, www.empoweringindia.org by the Chief Election Commissoner of Tamilnadu along with Liberty Institute of India

But Google is doing what it can do the best, giving access to information. Google along with Hindustan Times has started a campaign called “Be an Informed Voter”, where you get real time aggregation of information from different news sites, election quotes and most importantly information about your constituency. They have most probably aggregated the news from the Indian Census and provide information like literacy rate, urbanisation, mortality rate, development etc., I tried my hand on Thanjavur (my consitutency). Check that out here

And you can personalise your page accordingly to get specific information about your constituency. A nice initiative from the Internet Giant.

Check out the Tech Crunch post on the same and for more information on Internet Marketing Initiatives of Indian Politicians check here ( an article by Gauvrav Mishra)

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