In fact, the transitions throughout the article work beautifully. Well done, Dipankar!DeHaan selects the principals of each school herself. She has promised to bear all administrative costs for the rest of her life. She has pledged her $4.3 million home to Christel House after her death."I feel blessed to be able to make a difference in the lives of so many children," she says. "The childhood I had was tough."Tough does not convey half the story. DeHaan was born in Germany at the height of Nazi power. While Hitler was stomping all over Europe, her father, a German soldier, was killed in an American bombing raid.DeHaan was raised in the ruins of post-War Germany by her mother. "My mother was my inspiration: I have learnt so much from her," she says.Even though they were living in a time of need, "there was always place at the table. The neighbourhood children would often share our food." DeHaan says her mother never let her feel they were deprived.And this, DeHaan says, is what brought her to what she does today. She had always wanted to help people, but it was an epiphanic trip to a children's home in Mexico in 1998 that made her realise how to.
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| DIPANKAR PAUL MAKING A PRESENTATION WHILE AT COMMITS. |
Sixteen years ago he was part of a crack team in Kashmir sent to rescue women taken by the Lashkar-e-Toiba as sex slaves.
He recounts killing two terrorists. The third fell face up. “I thought he was dead, but he fired,” he says. “The shot went through my abdomen, my intestines spilled out and my spine broke. I knew I would never walk again. Yet, I shot him dead.” He refused to be evacuated till the encounter was over, sustaining himself on self-administered intravenous drips. He was later awarded the Kirti Chakra.
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| COURAGE PERSONIFIED: Major-General S.K. Razdan |
The general has a demanding career, he often returns by 8:30 p.m. “Fortunately, the Army preferred to see the skills I have instead of the disability,” he says. He is now assistant chief of the Integrated Defence Staff. His speciality is counterinsurgency.
At work, the biggest challenge is to perform like others; he hates sympathy. “I am lucky I have not received help I didn’t want,” he says. The Vishisht Seva Medal he received last year is testimony to his professionalism.
Razdan’s day starts early; he does his ablutions without help, then exercises. The self-designed regime includes push-ups, stretches and a session on a self-made pulley-operated gym. In the sunny front yard, Razdan demonstrates his exercises, pulling off his sweatshirt to reveal enviable biceps.
At this moment, his wife, Manju, steps out. “Arrey, what are you doing? Are you Salman Khan?” she says, taking in the scene. “Salman Khan, wow, let me have a glimpse, too,” giggles a neighbour from the balcony upstairs. Manju is in a hurry; she has to run several chores. Razdan reluctantly puts back his shirt. “I will take her to the bank and then we will continue,” he says. He wheels himself to the car shed and shifts without assistance from wheelchair to the driver’s seat. “It is important to know driving,” says Manju. “If I could, I wouldn’t be so dependent on him.”
Preview A petition before the Supreme Courts shows the rot within. It is not just the 2G Spectrum but the entire Republic of India that seems to be up for sale, with the dealers being a group of powerful telemarketers — corporate houses, lobbyists, bureaucrats and journalists |
2G Spectrum Scam Four transcripts that were submitted to the SC along with a total of eight recordings in May 2009 covering the cabinet formation, DMK politics and who'd get telecom portfolio |
2G Spectrum Scam The conversations with M.Karunanidhi's daughter M. Kanimozhi about keeping Dayanidhi Maran out from negotiations with the Congress and to get the telecom portfolio for A. Raja |
2G Spectrum Scam In these Radia wants Sanghvi to tell the Congress not to negotiate with Dayanidhi Maran. He tells her that while he has been meeting Rahul and can't "get into Sonia in the short term" he would "try and get through to Ahmed" |
2G Spectrum Scam Audio Recordings of conversations with the likes of Ratan Tata, Ranjan Bhattacharya, Barkha Dutt, Shankar Aiyar, Sunil Arora, etc. Also read:
'It should be clear that the real story is about the collusion of business and politics' For the most level-headed response to what some are now referring to as "Radigate", read Salil Tripathi's column in Mint. Excerpts:
Read Tripathi's column in its entirety here: "Over the thin red line". Media students — and not a few journalists — can learn much about journalism and journalistic values by reading this piece. "Not so long ago, inside newsrooms, we'd describe these stories as 'plants'. Today, these stories sometimes go under the garb of 'breaking news'." Indrajit Gupta, the editor of Forbes India, writing on his blog, says it's the self-imposed need to hurtle from one sensational story to another that puts journalists at the mercy of spin doctors and lobbyists. An excerpt: |
I was alerted to this gem of a book by a review in The Hindu Literary Review earlier this month. Referring to it as "a stylish, cultural landmark communicating one man's passion to a larger audience", reviewer Suresh Menon wrote:Sebastian's essays make erudition accessible, as he discusses the French philosopher Diderot, C.S. Lewis, Amar Chitra Katha, Shakespeare & Co and other bookshops, Umberto Eco, antiquarian books, the first editions of J.D. Salinger's novels, Nabokov, book thieves, collectors and much more with an easy familiarity. And all this is done without once showing off, which is an achievement in itself.
I totally agree with the writer. But sometimes we are so bored or jobless that we change our status message very often. And if you ask me why anyone would want to read your status message, I would say if they did not want to, then they would not be on that social networking site in the first place. It is a good pastime for some.
As for this one particular point in the article — “Facebook can also be a mecca for passive-aggressive behavior. ‘Suddenly, things you wouldn’t say out loud in conversation are OK to say because you’re sitting behind a computer screen,’ says Kimberly Kaye, 26, an arts writer in New York. She was surprised when friends who had politely discussed health-care reform over dinner later grew much more antagonistic when they continued the argument online.” — I have been thinking so much about it lately because two of my friends actually spoke to me over instant messaging on Facebook only to “sort things out”, which they could have done in person. This is like a 'crutch' you use when you want to avoid confronting some unpleasant situations and I do not like it. :(
Just like the social media, people writing on social media never cease to come up with something new!
What I don't understand is that people actually have the option of hiding their quiz results on Facebook. But they continue to publish them on their feeds. I’ve even posted a status message to that effect :)
We don’t even realise the nuisance till someone shows us the obvious. I simply loved the line "My question is this: If we didn't call each other on the phone every time we ate before, why do we need the alerts now?" How true! :)
I don't know about everyone else but when I sign into FB I love to scroll down my home page and read my friends' status messages. In my view people think uniquely and their status messages are little windows into their personalities. I like reading them no matter how zany they may be. :)
In the article, Elizabeth Bernstein says that relationships can be 'ruined' due to these status messages (I refer only to status messages here). I'd like to tell her that if relationships are indeed ruined because of status messages, then those relationships weren't important or strong enough in the first place. I'd like her to mull over that one. I've noticed that in Western countries, people seem to be mostly self-involved and don't care about what others are doing. I'm fine with that, it's their lives, yada yada yada. BUT... how can Bernstein generalise and say that such status messages are complete time-wasters for everyone? I'm sure feelings about status messages would differ from country to country.
And if Bernstein thinks they're useless why doesn't she just go the whole hog and ignore all of them? Honestly, it's not like FB doesn't function until you finish reading some status messages.
As a parting compliment I'd like to tell her to keep her generalisations to herself.
I completely agree with the author. Even though I'm not on Facebook, I can imagine how annoying those status messages can get after a while — considering I find them annoying on GTalk itself!
It's like everybody wants to desperately be a celebrity and look like they have a life. Frankly speaking, if someone really had a life, they wouldn't have that kind of time to spend on FB, updating their status.
It reminds me of that T-shirt slogan: Don't worry about what people think of you — because they aren't thinking of you!
I agree with Elizabeth Bernstein completely. I'll check myself before updating my Facebook status message from now on. :)
It's a really good piece. Simple English, yet effective. Thanks for a good weekend read. :)
The lines between our social and work lives have blurred and more of us are using social media such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter to keep up with friends, cultivate industry ties and find new jobs. But when does the information become too racy, too forbidden and too much?
Facebook, Orkut, etc. can be compelling time-wasters and a huge amount of fun. But blocking these sites is addressing the wrong problem and taking the easy way out.
What a company should be looking closely at is its performance metrics. If an employee is not doing his or her job, tackle that specifically and head on. That the employee was on Facebook when he should have been working isn’t as relevant as one may imagine. If it weren’t Facebook, it would be something else. Look at overall motivation and engagement with the work, look at whether there’s a supervision breakdown of work, and so on. Look at whether the right people are being hired for the job in the first place. What’s Facebook got to do with it?
When Hollywood comic Rob Schneider attacked Los Angeles Times critic Patrick Goldstein over his comedy Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo, he argued that Goldstein was unqualified because he had never won a Pulitzer Prize. Roger Ebert came to Goldstein’s defence against Schneider. He said he was a Pulitzer Prize-winner and “Your movie sucks.”
"I know critics are important, but do you know there are some 400 critics today? Every channel, there are two people discussing films when they don’t even understand film-making. You’re harming someone’s business, career; a producer could have put in all his life savings. It’s not fair. There has to be some kind of qualification before you become a critic."
For years until the early 2000s, a filmmaker would have to try really hard to get a kind, non-sarcastic word out of The Times of India’s critic Khalid Mohamed. After he shifted jobs, the newspaper went to the opposite extreme. It almost seems paranoid about offending filmmakers. Rarely does any film get below two stars.Or take the case of DNA. It has outsourced its film reviews to the owner of a trade magazine. He was replaced a couple of months ago with the owner of another trade magazine. A trade magazine essentially provides information about the business that movies do, upcoming launches, etcetera. Mainstream newspapers will not shut shop if the Hindi film industry stops advertising; trade magazines will. Also, a lifetime of tracking box office numbers does little for one’s ability to analyse a movie. At one stroke, both objectivity and competence are called into question by such an appointment.
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| Noyon Jyoti Parasara |
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| "You don't expect everyone to like a film. I loved Tere Bin Laden; some hated it. I hated Housefull; some loved it." |
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| "More often, people end up bashing a film, completely ignoring anything good in the film. Even RGV's Aag, which seems to be the epitome of trash for many, had good things about it." |
