noRoot

The article was copied from google cache at:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ax28owIKAiFkJ%3Aaamjanata.com%2Fsailgate-the-party-that-wasnt%2F+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=in&client=firefox-a

Original article was at URL below:

http://aamjanata.com/sailgate-the-party-that-wasnt/

This article is not written by me. Please see note above.

Last evening, the excise department busted an illegal high sea wine and cheese party onboard the Belvedere yacht (MOR-IV-00256). The Police & Excise department impounded Belvedere yacht and booked army officer’s wife for organising the party. The alcohol being served on board was duty free. The yacht, Belvedere, is owned by Marine Solutions. Marine Solutions is owned by retired Major General S Dutta now working as senior VP with Reliance ADAG and his son Lt Col Gautam Dutta, who just happened to retire in time to escape an inquiry into  misappropriated funds, but more on that later. Said wife, Anju Dutta is the Managing Director.

There is an interwoven history of defense officials, illegal yacht dealings and laws broken with impunity. It is only when something comes to the attention of those beyond the circles of complicity that any issues arise.

This fancy yacht is among 36 of those 42 imported by Marine Solutions that haven’t been registered with the Maharashtra Maritime Board. You’d think this was a problem, only if you weren’t creative enough. Not being registered means no inspection and survey by the Maritime Board surveyor, no pesky accident and insurance payments, not even sales tax. RBYC has given moorings and anchorage without the mandatory registration, survey and inspection certificate and insurance papers.

Who are these people?

The real magic comes from being really lucky in who you were born to and who you know. Lt. Col Gautam Dutta started Marine solutions in 2001  - the same year he got posted to the Army Yachting Node tothe coveted posting in Mumbai, rescued from the boondocks somewhere. There were allegations that Gautam Dutta, whilst posted to AYN purchased LASERS (a class of boat, not what you’re wondering) from Army funds and pocketed the Commission from the foreign Firm (court martial offence and inquiry was suppressed by his father – Maj. Gen. [Retd] S Dutta) while Marine Solutions was used as a conduit for amassing illegal funds. This could have easily been verified by checking documents related with the sale, unfortunately, no such thing seems to have happened.

The name of Lt. Col. Gautam Dutta again surfaced in 2005 when Commodore A S Bajwa, then Honorary Secretary General of the YAI raised the alarm on misappropriation of government travel expense funds for the team participating in the international competition at Birmingham, Ireland – Enterprise worlds 2004. Expenses were claimed for transportation and accommodation not used, days more than the travel itinerary and such. An inquiry did happen this time against the entire team of 3 service personnel and 4 civilians. Civilian authorities were to deal with civilian culprits, while service personnel would be referred to the Army. Dutta (Junior) was the only Serviceman to be implicated. But surprise! His case remained with civilian authorities.

In the meanwhile Dutta senior, a retired Major General intimidated those conducting the investigations. Captain Sarin received a phone call from Sutta senior confronting him over investigations related with Gautam Dutta, which he duly reported to the Chief of Naval Staff in a letter. In the meanwhile, Tajinder Singh (yes, same one of COAS panga fame), then GOC was busy protecting the son of his friend (and local guardian for his daughter while she studied in Mumbai) by silencing Col Shekhar, then OC AYN, when he complained about financial irregularities by Lt. Col. Gautam Dutta. In other news, YAI Secretary General Rear Admiral Monty Khanna, a school mate of Lt. Col. Gautam Dutta from Sanawar, wrote to to Sports Minister with details of the investigation and listed. Miraculously, while the report clearly lists irregularities, no criminal action was ever initiated or even mentioned for Lt Col Gautam Dutta. The big punishment Gautam Dutta got was termination of his membership in the YAI – which obviously wouldn’t happen if he were found innocent.

However, when things started heating up on further misappropriation of funds and non-submission of bills and documents from trips of the Indian yachting team for Laser class training and events to Slovenia Italy and France in March and April 2005, Gautam Dutta resigned from the Army in 2006, effectively going out of reach of their prosecution capabilities. In related news, Lt. Col Gautam Dutta made an inexplicable donation of 15 lakh odd rupees to the YAI, which is listed on their website publicly. An astonishing amount for his pay grade. Also a feat unprecedented and never repeated for him. Was that a guilty conscience, or a refund of some misappropriated funds by other means or simply a feeling of generosity that came fast and faded even faster? Does this absolve him of his scammed amounts? It is beyond my understanding to know.

It is clear that there is a complete racket operating with impunity and only when it encounters people from outside its range of operations is there any problem which can sometimes have unexpected side effects. For example the CISF, Uran Police or in this case, the excise department.

There was a scare at JNPT this January – US Nationals on MB Godiva were detained – Henry Schacht, Nitin Nayar and Joseph Landy with 3 Indians  – Nitin Malhan, Prashant Kumar and Ajay Candade. CISF seized luxury yacht MB Godiva at JNPT when it didn’t have the mandatory survey report from Maharashtra Maritime Board and valid Inspection Certificate required for all vessels to land at the restricted JNPT jetty. MB Godiva is chartered by Yacht Charter India, a sister concern of Marine Solutions.

Earlier on 11 November 2011, Uran police had raided a rave party on ISOLA barge which is owned by Marine Solutions and chartered by Yacht Charter India. This illegal service barge converted into a luxury floating hotel ISOLA anchored off MORA village, Uran hosted a party for big MNC and corporates who travel from Gateway of India in a luxury yacht for late night party at the restricted Mora Jetty, Uran without valid permission from Police, Port Trust and MMB.  ISOLA continues to operate blatantly flouting all coastal regulations without any permissions and safety precautions.

Coming back to the news of this article, so the Belvedere came to the attention of the Excise department for the illegal high seas wine and cheese party organized by Mrs. Anju Dutta, who also happens to be the Managing Director of Marine Solutions. Surprise!!! A certain birdie (who needs to remain unnamed) mentioned overhearing employees of the yacht describing efforts of the owner in “managing” the media. It was understood that a certain journalist who happens to be a cousin of Anju Dutta would do some damage control in the Times of India. Voila!!! This morning, you have a story in the Times of India explaining how a prank call led to high drama over an illegal party.

Predictably, this report makes no mention of the name of the yacht in question or any people involved, and calls the tip off a prank call, even as it later mentions the seizure of “a total of two bottles of wine, two of whisky and a crate of beer” I suppose they manifested out of thin air.

From another little birdie who knew some of the goings on, I hear that a total stock of alcohol on Belvedere yacht was 5 Moet a Chandon Champagne, 3 Satori Di Verona Processo sparkling wines, 3 Sauvigon Blanc-Nine Hills White wines, 3 Shiraz Golden Miles Red wines, 3 Chivas Regal scotch, 4 Chopin Vodka, 4 Absolut blue Vodka, 3 Havana club rum, 1 Toroloco Blanco tequila, 1 Baileys Irish cream, 1 Hennessey VSOP Cognac, Corona, Carlsberg, Kingfisher, Fosters beer and 30 breezers but only 2 wines and beer was shown seized. When I spoke with the officer in question, he mentioned three bottles of wine and five bottles of beer. The times of India report mentions two of wine, two of whiskey, and a crate of beer. Very mysterious. However, the pictures from the party provide a fair idea of which version was true.

Yesterday, three employees were arrested – deckhand Khalid, sales exec Arun Ram & operator Farid. Today, Retd. Lt. Col. Gautam Dutta was arrested and all of them produced in court. Tomorrow, the inspector expects that the police officials may have a press conference. I hope Times of India now produces a criticism of how unreasonable it is to make such a big drama over a prank call.

Another birdie knows of a senior politician exerting pressure on some senior officers and he is very keen that this case not be filed or at least the damage be minimized. Anju Dutta should thank this person for not being arrested herself.

So, this is the story. The party that never was. Sailgate continues.

If you are compiling daemontools on ubuntu and you get:

<snip>

./compile subgetopt.c
./choose cl trywaitp haswaitp.h1 haswaitp.h2 > haswaitp.h
./compile wait_nohang.c
./compile wait_pid.c
./makelib unix.a alloc.o alloc_re.o buffer.o buffer_0.o buffer_1.o \
	buffer_2.o buffer_get.o buffer_put.o buffer_read.o buffer_write.o \
	coe.o env.o error.o error_str.o fd_copy.o fd_move.o fifo.o lock_ex.o \
	lock_exnb.o ndelay_off.o ndelay_on.o open_append.o open_read.o \
	open_trunc.o open_write.o openreadclose.o pathexec_env.o \
	pathexec_run.o prot.o readclose.o seek_set.o sgetopt.o sig.o \
	sig_block.o sig_catch.o sig_pause.o stralloc_cat.o stralloc_catb.o \
	stralloc_cats.o stralloc_eady.o stralloc_opyb.o stralloc_opys.o \
	stralloc_pend.o strerr_die.o strerr_sys.o subgetopt.o wait_nohang.o \
	wait_pid.o
./load envdir unix.a byte.a
collect2: ld terminated with signal 11 [Segmentation fault]
/usr/bin/ld: make: *** [envdir] Error 1
Copying commands into ./command...
cp: cannot stat `compile/svscan': No such file or directory

</snip>

OR you are trying to compile ucspi-tcp and you get an error like one below:

<snip>

./compile str_start.c
./compile uint16_pack.c
./compile uint16_unpack.c
./compile uint32_pack.c
./compile uint32_unpack.c
./makelib byte.a byte_chr.o byte_copy.o byte_cr.o \
	byte_diff.o byte_rchr.o byte_zero.o case_diffb.o \
	case_diffs.o fmt_ulong.o ip4_fmt.o ip4_scan.o scan_ulong.o \
	str_chr.o str_diff.o str_len.o str_start.o uint16_pack.o \
	uint16_unpack.o uint32_pack.o uint32_unpack.o
( ( ./compile trylsock.c && \
	./load trylsock -lsocket -lnsl ) >/dev/null 2>&1 \
	&& echo -lsocket -lnsl || exit 0 ) > socket.lib
rm -f trylsock.o trylsock
./load tcpserver rules.o remoteinfo.o timeoutconn.o cdb.a \
	dns.a time.a unix.a byte.a  `cat socket.lib`
collect2: ld terminated with signal 11 [Segmentation fault]
/usr/bin/ld: make: *** [tcpserver] Error 1

Edit src/error.h in daemontools or error.h in ucspi-tcp and remove the line

extern int errno;

replace it with

#include <errno.h>

and recompile it.

Recently I was trying to install Ubuntu on IBM BladeCenter MT 8677. With Ubuntu 8.04 (32 bit desktop version) I faced a strange problem. After the boot was complete it died as X failed to start and I ended up with blank screen. This problem is not there with Ubuntu Linux 7.04.

So next I tried Ubuntu 8.10 64 bit server edition. It started with graphical installation but died and continued with text mode. It detected most hardware along with Broadcom network interfaces and SCSI hard disks. Partitioning and formatting done successfully. Base system, kernel and rest of the system install also sailed smoothly.

Basically the system install was a breeze compared to graphic mode on desktop it is a lot faster.

As of now, the system is working without any problems. I will update this post if I face any problems.

There are at least two modules needed to make Symfony’s routing work: these are mod_deflate and mod_rewrite. If you have mod_rewrite installed and every configuration in place along with .htaccess, routing will still not work beyond default module and default action of your application.

The application simply will not embed script name (controller name), as a result the routing will fail. So it is important to have both of these modules enabled in apache.

Today I tried installing Symfony plugin dbFusionChartsPlugin but the install failed with following errors.

>> pear      symfony/dbFusionChartPlugin requires package
>> pear      "symfony/dbFusionChartPlugin" (version >= 0.8.1, version <=
>> pear      1.1.0, excluded versions: 1.1.0), downloaded version is 0.0.4
>> pear      No valid packages found

So I downloaded the package file dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4.tgz and untarred it. I tried peeping into code and found that the creator has created .tgz with a faulty package file. When I tried to package it again, I got an error:

$ pear package
Unable to open package.xml
Cannot package, errors in package file

Which I fixed by moving package-dbFusionChartPlugin.xml to package.xml file.

Next I tried again to package the plugin. This time I got different errors:

$ pear package
Error: <contents> can only contain <dir>, contains <file>.
Use <dir name="/"> as the first dir element
Parsing of package.xml from file "package.xml" failed
Cannot package, errors in package file

The content section is not populated with exact directory structure. So I fixed it by adding it to package.xml file and tried to package it again. pear reported few more errors:

Notice: Uninitialized string offset:  0 in PEAR/PackageFile/v2/Validator.php on line 1087
Error: Channel validator error: field "date" - invalid release date "[automatic]"
Error: Channel validator error: field "name" - package name "[automatic]" is invalid

After fixing all those errors I packaged the plugin again into .tgz file and executed command:

$ pear package

This time it packaged the plugin without any problems. Next I installed this plugin and everything went smoothly. The installation command was:

$ php symfony plugin-install /absolute/path/to/plugin/dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4.tgz

This package.xml file I used after fixing errors.

Summary

Download plugin package file dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4.tgz and untar it.

tar xzf dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4.tgzdbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4

It will create a new directory called dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4 containing all plugin files.

Change to directory

$ cd dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4

Remove package-dbFusionChartPlugin.xml file

$ rm package-dbFusionChartPlugin.xml

Download this package.xml file and place it in dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4 directory

Package the plugin again using command while in directory dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4

$ pear package

This will create dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4.tgz in dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4 directory.

Change to your project directory and install plugin using command:

$ php symfony plugin-install /path/to/new/dbFusionChartPlugin-0.0.4.tgz

And you are good to go.

I was searching for the opening score of this beautiful Tv series named भारत एक खोज (Discovery of India), directed by Shyam Benegal. The series is based on the book called Discovery of India written by Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru.

Somebody uploaded the audio of this opening score on Internet (which you can download from here too) but there is no info on where Mr Shyam Benegal have taken the shlokas from. So here it is.

The opening score (title song) starts with a sanskrit shloka from सूक्तम् (sooktam)129, मण्डलम् (mandalam)10, अष्टकम् (ashtakam) 8 in ऋग्वेद संहिता (Rigved sanhita). It is from नासदीय सूक्तम् (Nasadeeya sooktam).

This is the first shloka in sookta. It goes like this:

नासंदासीन्नौ सदासीत् तदानीं नासीद्रजो नो व्योमा परो यत्।
किमावरीव: कुह कस्य शर्मन्नम्भ: किमासीद्रहनं गभीरम्।।१।।

Thereafter the chorus starts with the meaning in hindi.

The ending score is a sanskrit shloka from सूक्तम् (sooktam) 121, मण्डलम् (mandalam) 10, अष्टकम् (ashtakam) 8 in ऋग्वेद संहिता (Rigved sanhita). It is from the सूक्तम् (sooktam) called हिरण्यगर्भ: सूक्तम् (Hiranyagarbha sooktam).

The ending score is first shloka from हिरण्यगर्भ: सूक्तम which goes like this:

ૐ हिरण्यगर्भ: समवर्तताग्रे भूतस्य जात: पतिरेक आसीत्।
स दाधार पृथिवीं द्यामुतेमां कस्मै देवाय हविषा विधेम।।१।।

Thereafter the chorus starts with the meaning in hindi.

Here is the complete version of opening score.

नासंदासीन्नौ सदासीत् तदानीं नासीद्रजो नो व्योमा परो यत्।
किमावरीव: कुह कस्य शर्मन्नम्भ: किमासीऱ्दहनं गभीरम्।।१।।

सृष्टी से पहले सत नहीं था, असत भी नहीं
Srishtee se pehle sat nahin thaa, asat bhi nahin
(Before creation there was no truth, or untruth)
अंतरीक्ष भी नहीं, आकाश भीं नहीं था
Antariksh bhi nahin, akash bhin nahin thaa
(no universe, not even the sky)
छिपा था क्या, कहां, किसने ढका था
chhipaa thaa kyaa, kahaan, kisne dhakaa thaa
(What was hidden, where, who hid it)
उस पल तो, अगम, अटल जल भी कहां था
us pal to, agam, atal jal bhi kahaan thaa
(At that time there was no water)

सृष्टी का कौन है कर्ता
Srishtee kaa kaun hai kartaa
(who is the creator of nature)
कर्ता है वा अकर्ता
Kartaa hai vaa akartaa
(is he a creator or distroyer)
ऊंचें आकाश मे रहता
Oonche aakash mein rahtaa
(Who stays up there in the sky )
सदा अध्यक्ष बना रहता
Sada adhyaksh banaa rahtaa
(who is in charge)
वहीं सचमुच मे जानता.. या नहीं भी जानता
Wahin sachmuch mein jaantaa..Yaa nahin bhi jaanataa
(He truly must know everything.. or maybe not!)
है किसी को नहीं पता, नहीं पता
Hai kisi ko nahin pataa, nahin pataa,
(no one knows..no one knows)
नहीं है पता, नहीं है पता
Nahin hai pataa, nahin hai pataa
(no one knows..no one knows)

Complete version of ending score.

ૐ हिरण्यगर्भ: समवर्तताग्रे भूतस्य जात: पतिरेक आसीत्।
स दाधार पृथिवीं द्यामुतेमां कस्मै देवाय हविषा विधेम।।१।।

वह था हिरण्यगर्भ सृष्टीसे पहले विद्यमान
Weh tha hiranyagarbh srishti se pehle vidyamaan
(he was born out of the depths..before creation)
वही तो सारे भूतजात का स्वामी महान
Wahi to saare bhoot jaat ka swami mahaan
(he is the lord of all life)
जो है अस्तित्वमान धरती आसमान धारण कर
jo hai astitvamaana dharti aasmaan dhaaran kar
(the one who is there over land and sky)
ऐसे किस देवता की उपासना करें हम हवि दे कर
Aise kis devta ki upasana karein hum havi dekar
(who is this god whom we pray with offerings)

जिसके बल पर तेजोमय है अंबर
Jis ke bal par tejomay hai ambar
(He on whose strength the sky is lit)
पृथ्वी हरीभरी स्थापित स्थिर
Prithvi hari bhari sthapit sthir
(and the earth lies green and stable)
स्वर्ग और सूरज भी स्थिर
Swarg aur sooraj bhi sthir
(the heavens and the sun stay stable)
ऐसे किस देवता की उपसना करे हम हवि दे कर
Aise kis devta ki upasana karein hum havi dekar
(who is this god whom we pray with offerings)
गर्भ मे अपने अग्नी धारण कर पैदा कर
Garbh mein apne agni dhaaran kar paida kar
(Who holds fire in own womb and gives birth)

व्यापा था जल इधर उधर निचे उपर
Vyapa tha jal idhar udhar neeche upar
(who controls here, there and everywhere)
जगा जो देवो का एकमेव प्राण बनकर
Jagaa jo devo ka ekameva praan banker
(who rose by becoming life of gods)
ऐसे किस देवता की उपसना करे हम हवि दे कर
Aise kis devta ki upasana karein hum avi dekar
(who is this god who we pray to ?)

ओ स्ृष्टी निर्माता स्वर्ग रचयिता पुर्वज रक्षा कर
O Srishti nirmata swarg rachiyata purvaj raksha kar
(creator of creation, the heavens and who looked after our ancestors)
सत्य धर्म पालक अतुल जल नियामक रक्षा कर
Satya dharma palak atul jal niyamak raksha kar
(who keeps the truth, justice and the essence of life)
फैली है दिशायें बाहू जैसी उसकी सब में सब पर
Phaili hain dishayen bahu jaisi uski sab mein sab par
(whose hands seem to stretch over all there is )
ऐसे ही देवता की उपसना करे हम हवि दे कर
Aise hi devta ki upasana kare hum havi dekar
(this is the god who we pray to, with offerings)
ऐसे ही देवता की उपसना करे हम हवि दे कर
Aise hi devta ki upasana kare hum havi dekar
(this is the god who we pray to, with offerings)

On 29th of September when me, Manoj and Amol set out to visit Gurdongmar lake, our reservations were not confirmed. But hoping for the best we reached the railway station. Surprisingly we got all tickets confirmed and I thought it is a victory over Mr. Murphy’s intentions. But I was clueless about his /real/ intentions. His law that says, ‘It always takes longer to get there than to get back’ applied to us. Train got 8 hours late because of the riots in Siliguri and New-Jalpaiguri and we reached there at 1630 Hrs.

The town was still under imposed curfew. After lot of searching we found rickshaws to take us to Bus Stand. From there we were to get bus as no other means of travel was available. But no matter which way you ride, its uphill and against wind. Buses were not running and we had to wait till 1800 Hrs for the curfew to be relaxed. Fortunately soon after, the curfew was relaxed and we found a taxi to take us to Gangtok.

Just out of the city limits of Siliguri, we saw a wild elephant standing beside road like a car neatly parked by law abiding citizen. After Rumtek, almost till Gangtok the travel was along Teesta River. Even in the darkness of the night, sound of Teesta seemed like an angry river roaring.

We reached Gangtok at 2345 Hrs. The city shops and restaurants were all closed (they close at 2300 Hrs) which left us without food, hungry. Thankfully the guest house we booked was OK even though they did not serve food.

Next morning before starting for Lachen, learning from previous night’s experience, we had heavy breakfast and made sure that we had enough food with us. Double checked that the vehicle is in really good condition, driver has a license, and fuel tank is full etc. so that nothing can possibly go wrong.

At 1000 Hrs we started our journey to Lachen, which is on the way to Gurdongmar Lake. All the time we traveled along Teesta. Breathtakingly high cliffs along the ridge and the green cover over it made me forget everything else. The journey was awe inspiring. The landscape was fascinating, which left me becharmed.

We reached Lachen at 1745 Hrs. The guest house there was clean and good for a town like Lachen. It is a small town, about 125 Km from Gangtok at an altitude of 9750 feet. The town is abundantly gifted by nature. The words fall short to describe its beauty.

We stayed in a guest house overnight and started early in the morning for Gurdongmar lake which was another 50 Km drive from Lachen. Soon after we started for the last leg of journey to Gurdongmar, the green cover over the ridges started disappearing. Mountain tops were snow covered, hills and hillocks were barren. The plateau is much similar to that of Leh and Ladakh.

After 4-5 hours of driving we reached Gurdongmar lake. Water in Gurdongmar Lake is crystal clear and calm. This lake is considered sacred and many pilgrims pay religious visits here. It is probably the highest in Sikkim situated at an altitude of 17,200 feet (5170m). The mountains around were untouched, covered with snow which was whiter than white. Nothing can be compared with that whiteness, not even “Rin ki chamkar”.

A kilometer’s run up there for a photograph demonstrated me the real and literal meaning the phrase “dizzying heights”, that it’s not the dizziness because of vertigo but it’s the dizziness that one feels because of lack of oxygen.

Gurdongmar is a distorted name of original name Guru Dongmar. 17th Jat Regiment and 247th Medical Regiment has built a “Sarv Dharam Sthal” on lake-shore. After spending an hour and half there we turned back to Lachen.

Fatigued us were drowsy in the return journey. We reached Lachen at around 1500 Hrs. After having lunch, we started again for Gangtok at around 1630 Hrs.

We barely drove for an hour from Lachen and it was dark already. Though it was cold, we all were happy that everything went as planned without any problems. But little did we know about Mr Murphy’s intentions. All of us but the driver were sleeping. That’s when Murphy’s quirks kicked in again. Despite all the checks on vehicle, it started giving us trouble.

Once again we realized yet another Murphy’s law which says “If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which something can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way, unprepared for, will promptly develop”. No matter how well kept the vehicle is, a leak will develop and it did. The fuel supply line developed leaks and started taking air. As a result of which we had to stop every 2-3 kilometers and manually pump the fuel in.

We knew that, left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse. So we stopped at Chungthang. After spending one and a half hour there, driver fixed the leak.. or at least that is what we thought.

Evidently, soon enough we realized the corollary of Murphy’s Law, that says, “It will be impossible to fix the fifth fault, without breaking the fix on one or more of the others”, applied to us. The new leak was now developed in a small washer near the engine. I never understood why the vehicle only breaks down at the least convenient time! When a vehicle breaks down and it is a small repair, the mechanic is at least 100 Km away.

So we continued with same exercise again and on top of all this, it started raining. Rains made some patches of road worse. This slowed us to a great deal. As if all this was not enough, soon we reached to a bend where an army tow-truck was trying to tow another broken loaded truck on those narrow curved roads. Knowing that the largest vehicle always has the right of way, we followed the tow-truck that now formed a caravan behind it.

Finally we reached Gangtok at around 0100 Hrs. Yet again we knew that we were not to find any food. But thanks to our experience, we bought enough food before we started from Gangtok that saved us from sleeping empty stomach. We stayed in the same guest house in Gangtok.

Next day we woke up late as a result of fatigue from last night. Gathered ourselves and started back for Siliguri at 1200 Hrs. On our way back too, there was a landslide which forced us to take a diversion of about 3Km through jungle. The traffic jam at this diversion (in jungle) and slippery ground set us back by an hour. We entered Siliguri at 1900 Hrs. Here too we hit slow moving traffic.

The later you are running, the slower the people in front of you, and on any accessible side are going to drive. But somehow our taxi driver managed to drop us at New-Jalpaiguri railway station at 1950 Hrs. We had train at 2010 Hrs. After paying the taxi we realized the gravity of the situation that we have only 200 Rs collectively, we needed food and nearest ATM was in town, at least 5 Km away. We managed the show with the available money and reached Kolkata next morning. Though, we reached 2 hours late, we were only happy that Murphy failed its own law as it took longer to come back than it took to reach there.

Now when I look back, the height of mountains makes me think how small and helpless we are in front of nature when standing amidst mountain ranges. But on the other hand, roads made in those ranges by BRO, Sikkimese people and army that is guarding border in adverse conditions reminds me that faith and diligence can make seemingly impossible things easy.

Hence, I can’t abstain myself from recommending that one must visit Sikkim, this masterpiece of the creator, at least once in lifetime.

Recently I got chance to watch this movie with a bizarre name. A movie with good theme though. The movie shows complicated lives of characters. Characters those can be found in any metro.. hiding their chaotic lives from public.

Xen, a saloon owner who can read thoughts of his customers while giving them haircut, reads minds of Rage, Tanya, Mr. Mittal and Nikita to find that all of them hide their lives, preserving self by pretending everything is fine.

Its disheartening to see such incidences actually happening around. Curiosity takes its toll as one dig beneath the surface to know the well guarded secrets of people’s lives. Knowing the truth is painful at times for the truth is complex and saddening. Most truths are so naked that people feel sorry for them and cover them up, at least a little bit.

The movie looses its grip on some places and becomes sluggish. Rahul Bose irritates in his first entry with his loud acting. Rehaan Engineer’s underplay is used beautifully. Koel Purie’s bewildering behaviour shown in movie keeps one dazed until the mystery unfolds in the end. In all, a good try by Rahul Bose.

Its 03:55 Am. A shiver ran through me as soon as entered my balcony. Its cold outside. All I can hear is loud hum created by AC units running in almost all the flats in adjacent tower. These 2 tiny bats are still trying to catch a pray or perhaps they are out for morning walk.. err.. morning fly. Sombody in the next lane leaving town with bags packed. Don’t know what this silly birdie singin’ for. Nobody else seem to be awake at this hour and a lot of time still to cockcrow.

Rain, it’s here once again.. Rain that washes dust off the trees and houses. Rain that washes layers of patches off the tar road. Rain that washes false feeling of good work done by road contractors.Rain that washes pretense of civic authorities that all is well.

Rain that washes belief of poor that the roof won’t drip this season. Rain that washes confidence of rich that house won’t seep this rain. Rain that washes hope of farmers that it will be enough this year.

Rain that washes our apathy towards nature by cleaning polluted air. Rain that washes lethargy and boredom off the minds. Rain that washes stains of our laziness off the vehicles. Rain that washes make-up off the pretty looking faces exposing reality ;).

Rain that leaves people and animals marooned without food and shelter. Rain that takes lives. Rain that reinstate life. Rain that shows almighty power of nature. Rain, it’s here once again..