Living Diagonally In My Parallel World!

Anguish of The Useless Common Man We take pride in saying that we have lost two prime ministers to terrorism. When are we going to stop highlighting our failures as our bravery? It is more than 48 hours since the attack on Mumbai is over. I am still coming to accept the fact that my country is under attack is real. It is a sick feeling to know that a handful of persons between the ages of 20-25 can hold a country to ransom. Not being in India made me feel hopelessly insecure for all my dear ones. And watching the Indian news channels heightens the helplessness even more. I am just trying to put my anguish on paper as the news starts coming as to why the elite National Security Guards (NSG's) took so long to begin their action. Here is a sequence of events as they appeared in almost all the Indian newspapers - 9.30 pm The terrorists struck Mumbai. CM Vilasrao Deshmukh was in Kerala. He was reached and briefed about the attacks on prime locations of the city. 10.15 pm Deshmukh grasp...

There are some songs which we like a lot. Sometimes there is just one line in the song that instant appeals. Many times we feel that old songs had good lyrics, but there are some "new" songs too with good lyrics and the feel is not restricted to romance. यही वो जगह है - यह रात फिर न आएगी This is one of the songs that I had first heard when I was a kid. Though I failed to understand the meaning then, the tune and the sax remained with me. Some years went by, I had almost forgotten it and then I heard it again a few years back on TV when it was sung by Abhijeet as a tribute to Asha Bhosle. Incidentally, as a kid I had always wished that TV should only play songs. There was only one channel in those days and it had songs played in a half hour slot on Thursday nights only! It may sound preposterous but that was the situation in the socialist India of those times! After so many years the wish to have an exclusive channel for music was fulfilled but now the music channels ...

YES, I am आठवी पास! I got 9 out of 10 correct. Click on the picture if you too want to take the quiz.

Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR) EVERY bank in India has to maintain at the close of business every day, a minimum proportion of their net demand and time liabilities as liquid assets in the form of cash, gold and un-encumbered approved securities. The ratio of liquid assets to demand and time liabilities is known as Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR). In simple words, it is the percentage of total deposits banks have to invest in government bonds and other approved securities. A SLR bond also qualifies for the portfolio maintained by banks to meet the liquidity requirement. RBI in November cut the SLR for banks by one percentage point and it now stands at 24%. What is the difference between SLR and CRR? What SLR does is it restricts the bank’s leverage in pumping more money into the economy. On the other hand, CRR, or cash reserve ratio, is the portion of deposits that the banks have to maintain with the RBI. Higher the ratio, the lower is the amount that banks will be able to use for len...

The gross domestic product (GDP) is one the primary indicators used to gauge the health of a country's economy. It represents the total value of all goods and services produced over a specific time period. Usually, GDP is expressed as a comparison to the previous quarter or year. For example, if the year-to-year GDP is up 1%, this is thought to mean that the economy has grown by 1% over the last year. Calculating the GDP is pretty complicated but on a very simplistic level calculation can be done in one of two ways: Either by adding up what everyone earned in a year (income approach), or By adding up what everyone spent (expenditure method). Logically, both measures should arrive at roughly the same total. The income approach, which is sometimes referred to as GDP(I), is calculated by adding up total compensation to employees, gross profits for incorporated and non incorporated firms, and taxes less any subsidies. The expenditure method is the more common approach and is calculated...

What is Repo Rate? The repo rate is simply the annualised interest rate at which banks borrow money from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) over a short term. This is generally seen as a way of tiding over a short-term liquidity crunch that is experienced by banks. Repo technically stands for the word repurchase agreement . Most banks generally have a certain amount of government bonds or securities in their possession. When banks are in need for money they borrow money from the RBI using these government bonds or securities as a collateral. There is however the assurance that the bank will recover these later when the borrowed money is returned. The cost of this transaction takes the form of the repo rate. The repo rate is dependent on factors such as the credit worthiness of the borrower, how liquid the collateral is and the rates of other money market instruments. What is reverse repo? The word reverse repo generally accompanies most definitions of repo and is generally considered t...

These are not in any particular sequence आ गले लग जा - तेरा मुझसे है पहले का नाता कोई आँधी - तेरे बिना जिंदगीसे कोई शिकवा तो नही आँधी - इस मोडसे जाते हैं अभिमान - तेरी बिंदिया रे अभिमान - अब तो है तुमसे आपकी कसम - ज़िन्दगी के सफरमें अखियोंके झरोखोंसे - अखियोंके झरोखोंसे बालिका बधू - बड़े अच्छे लगते हैं बड़े दिलवाला - कही ना जा बड़े दिलवाला - तुझमें क्या है दीवाने बड़े दिलवाला - जीवन के दिन भंवर - रंग ले आयेंगे भंवर - आखें मिलायेंगे चोर पुलिस - तुमसे मिलके ज़िन्दगी दीवार - I am fallin' in love with a stranger घर - आपकी आंखोंमें कुछ घर - आजकल पाव ज़मिपर नही पड़ते घर - तेरे बिना जिया जाए ना हरजाई - तेरे लिए पलकोंकी झालर बुनू हवस - तेरी गलियोंमें इजाज़त - मेरा कुछ सामन इजाज़त - कतरा कतरा मिलती है इजाज़त - छोटी सी कहानीसे जब we met - तुमसे ही जब we met - ये इश्क हाय जब we met - नगाडा नगाडा जब we met - मौजा ही मौजा Johnny गद्दार - move your body जीवा - रोज़ रोज़ आंखों तले जीवा - दिल ...

A very good article from the 2nd November 2008 Sunday Times of India by Gurcharan Das. Among all the things that are going wrong, here is sign that says - यही तो हिंदुस्तान ज़िंदा है! Kudos to the Indian Government for thinking about such a scheme. The health scenario for the poor will improve dramatically if this scheme is really implemented properly. Nothing causes as much anxiety in a family as when someone falls sick. Nearly 65% of India’s poor get into debt and 1% fall below the poverty line each year because of illness, according to National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) 2004. The answer, of course, is health insurance, but only 6% of India’s workers have it. Free public hospitals are not an option as two out of five doctors are absent, and there is a 50% chance of receiving the wrong treatment, according Jishnu Das and Jeffrey Hammer’s study. This tragic state of affairs is, however, set to change dramatically with Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) , a visionary national ...