Villages of India- A trip to my home town & more...

Hi,

Let me say Sorry for the long delay to those who were waiting for this post ( I know some of you were, as site-meter tells me few people do visit this blog regularly).

Last couple of weeks were too busy, I went to my hometown 'Barghat' then went on for 3 days long residential training program and after that found my self loaded with so many projects, somehow all of them have a coinciding deadline. I am feeling busiest in last 4 years nowdays. Being busy was always a good feeling but somehow; nowadays I get a bit worried about completions. Anyways.. I was also feeling burdensome because of not posting on my blog. Believe me, I don’t know how much others read it, but its more of a self help activity for me, at least I feel relaxed and contented after making a Post.. so here it is...

As I still have lots of work pending I will put my experiences in bullets, else i would have framed it like a story, anyways...

Reaching Barghat:

Whenever I Go barghat, It reminds me of that "Swades" Movie's promo in which Shahrukh was shown coming first by plane, then by train, then by boat, then sharing a two wheeler... Its not that difficult to reach barghat (neerav & bhuvan would agree, as they have visited couple of times) but there is a huge differece between villages (small towns) like Barghat and the same like Baroli (near Indore) or Najafgarh (Near Delhi) or Badalpur (Near Mumbai).

India has two kinds of Villages, the one which are like a satellite to a big city or a metro city and the others like lost stars in a galaxy. Villages which are near to a big city are not actually villages, if the world allow me I will call them SAZ or SRZ (Special agricultural zones or Special rural Zones), which looks similar to a village but receives signals of Radio Mirchi, Have farm house of Virender Sehwag, seen Malls & Multiplexes and believes that Heroines in movies are not goddess but exists on the earth only.

I know its too challenging to improve all the villages of India, but Govt. must try & improve the small cities in those pockets so that nearby villagers can have a satellite connectivity to the urban world, keeping their rural identity & grace intact.

Working in my own garden:

It was a great experience, I remember my Father used to shape up our garden, I have helped him many a times, This time I tried it alone, It was a soul touching expeirence.

Sleeping on the open roof:

India ka Sabse Bada AC.. sleeping on the open roof, I couldn't do this for last so many years. When lying on the cot, you see endless spread of the sky and a big full moon accompanied by lovely natural breeze, you realize how comforting the nature can be.

Power Cut:

Barghat is in M.P., a pioneer state in terms of Power cut. It will be an injustice if I say Power cut is a part of life, Power cut is like your life partner. You are incomplete without it. No festival, wedding or any other occasion is complete without power cut, be it for a couple of mins only but power do take rest there.

New developments:

Now in Barghat you have ATM, any GSM sim can work on roaming, Paid internet facility is there, You can access broadband too, if you have a BSNL Landline or Reliance data-card ( I didn't have either). I have also seen lots of DTH dishes in barghat.

12*7 ATM:

One great thing I observed, that by mutual consent of all, the ATM shutter gets down at night, though they do not lock it, if somebody is in genuine need to access, he can open the shutters. I initially laughed at it, but realized later that they really value their facilities and electricity.

Thanks to PSUs:

though we crib a lot about PSUs in cities, but they are really doing a great job in rural India. No they do not provide better services there but the point is 'they provide services there' irrespective of profit or loss. BSNL has shown the people of rural India what mobile is, and now connecting people via broadband. SBI has established ATMs and Doordarshan still has got viewers.


Sapney aur Sitarey

To my surprise i found people readinf my blog, though they might not be regular or a follower but they do visit these pages.. really a great satisfier.

Genda phool:

Neha has really enjoyed this visit, she wore saari everyday, went to Mandir sat & sang bhajan's with ladies... all in all had a nice time.

An interesting incident happened on the last day when we were getting ready to leave. My Buaji came to our place. she must be around 90 years of age. Very old yet very talkative though she has trouble in hearing.

Neha feels very comfortable with her, as it reminds her of her daadi who is of similar age and nature. She was taking special care of buaji, suddenly she thought of entertaining her by making her listen some songs on I Pod and she connected ear plugs to buaji. Buaji was confused what is going to happen then my Jijaji has conveyed her that neha has sung & recorded some songs in her own voice and going to play it. Neha played 'Genda phool' and 'Aarti' from Delhi-6.

After this Buaji was too happy, this was visible on her face, and the praise for neha in her eyes. she kept on praising her, for her singing skills endlessly. I can not understand why past generations used to look for singing skills in their 'bahu' but I rfelt that it was like a proud possession for them.

I think its too much for now, will post again if any more incidents i can recall or re-feel...

Bye for now...

Luv

VT

Absense

Hi,

Last week i was on a trip to my native place and just after that got engaged in a residential training program.

Both the places i mentioned have limited (almost) no connectivity hence there are no post for a long time, have many thins to write about...

wait for some time will be back with a lot of new stories... some really interesting ones...

Luv
VT

A Beautiful Message

Hi,

Good Morning.. This morning I got up to the SMS beep of my Cell and received a Beautiful SMS from Manav. Manav is formally known as Ratnesh in this world. ( 'Manav' is the name given by me to him inspired by movie "Taal" in which Akshaye Khanna's Character was named "Manav". Ratnesh has many similarities with that Character). He is my school time buddy. He always come up with beautiful Thoughts, messages and poems.

I don't know what is the origin of these thoughts but he always has something amazing to share.

So, here is that beautiful Message which made me ponder a while in the morning...

"We die to finish school, die to start college then die to start working then die to marry then die to retire and finally while dying we realise that we forgot something... We forgot to Live."

Another beautiful Poem which he shared with me few years back, the first 4 lines of that poem are still imprinted in my mind... Really a masterpiece. I tried a lot to find out the author of these lines but couldn't find yet. Anyways.. who so ever is the author, must be a great man/woman.

The Lines are..

"Seekho Pahle pyar Ki Baaten...

Phir Karnaa Adhikaar Ki Baaten...

Kuchh Apne Bhi Sukh Dukh Kah Lo..

Roj Wahi Akhbaar ki Baaten..."

I Believe that above mentioned line describes "Emotional Intelligence" in full, You don't agree?? Ponder a while...

Bye for Now. :-)

Luv

VT

The "X" Effect...

Hi,

The "X" Effect, was the subject line of one of my mails, which I 'sent to all' in my Dept. It was the first mail which I sent to all, just after my transfer to Mumbai and my posting as "Training Manager".

I thought of sending an introductory mail about me, but the same formality was done by HR and I wanted to mail something more impact full.

I thought about a story which I read in Shiv Khera's 'You Can Win', though this story is very common and we all must have heard it somewhere or other. But I was not able to get any other story as this one was most relevant in mentioning 'importance of training' and its regular requirement. As usual to gain attention I popped up the subject line which is the title of this post and have added a couple of paragraphs in the end of the story.

I was skeptical whether my added paragraphs are making sense or not, as the mail was going to hit many Seniors mail boxes too. But finally I clicked on 'Send'.

I got few replys telling me that mail was good, excellent etc. Some of the known colleagues have called me up to convey the same too. But what makes this mail so special for me is that even after months, many of my colleagues who do not know me in person, come across and after formal introduction recall- "Oh so you are the one who has sent 'The X Effect', that mail has really touched me, you know that day i really did this...that..etc...after getting inspired by that mail"

The mail has nothing special for those who are enjoying their life and work, doing something they like to do and are still connected with their friends. But havimg these luxuries is really a Utopian dream in today's work life.

Pasting the content of the mail below, just checkout how the last couple of paragraphs have made people feel so touched...

Sapna, Ramesh, Steve, Meera, Matthew, Vikas and so many others in the organization complained of work pressure, unachievable targets, peer pressure, time management and loss of work life balance. Despite working hard, their performance was going down and impacting organization’s bottom line.Who is to blame for poor performance of employees and business? Ask line managers; they blame it on HR for poor hiring. Ask HR; they blame it on line managers for poor management skills. Ask me, I would say, the Axe???? Now you will ask what (the h*ll) an Axe has to do in performance management? Let me tell you a small story… Once upon a time, a very strong woodcutter asked for a job to a timber merchant, and he got it. The pay was good and so were the working conditions. For that reason, the woodcutter was determined to do his best. His boss gave him an axe and showed him the area where he was supposed to work. The first day, the woodcutter brought 18 trees “Congratulations,” the boss said. “Carry on that way!”.Very motivated with the boss’s words, the woodcutter tried harder the next day, but he could bring only 15 trees. The third day he tried even harder, but could bring 10 trees only. Day after day he was bringing less and less trees. “I must be losing my strength”, the woodcutter thought.He went to the boss and apologized, saying that he could not understand what was going on. “When was the last time you sharpened your Axe?” the boss asked.

“Sharpen??? I had no time to sharpen my Axe. I have been very busy trying to cut more trees for you.”Our lives are like that. We sometimes get so busy that we don't take time to "sharpen the axe." In today's world, it seems that everyone is busier than ever but less happy than ever. Why is that? Could it be that we have forgotten how to stay sharp? If we don't take time to sharpen the axe, we will become dull and lose our effectiveness.

This “Axe” includes some truly important things in life. E.G. taking time to pray, to read and study scripture or to listen to good music..

In Organization context “Sharpening the Axe” means revising your fundamental skills and learning the new ones. We at Training team will insure the best of the training inputs from our side, at the same time asking you to re look at the novel you bought six months back and didn’t read,

Visit the nearest music shop to search your favorite title of your college time.

Also reminding you to make calls to your old fellows whom you have missed to wish on their birthdays in last 5 very busy years…

Smile please, Have a nice time, It’s a good day today…

Luv...

VT

28th May...

Hi,

28th May, Its birthday of my sister Babli. But today on 28th May I am thinking a lot about 28th May 2008, exactly one year back, down the memory lane...

We were in Delhi. My sis has landed Delhi the same morning with her 2 kids, but the special guests to arrive were... "Neerav & Bhuvan".

Though after SVITS, I have seen them off and on, at regular (i think irregular) intervals but this was the first time after Indore I was catching them together. Bhuvan has returned to India from Singapore, only to catch the flight to Dubai for his new endeavor in career as an MBA. and Neerav has finally made it to India for good after spending around 2 years in UK.

I was excited to see them together, though They have arrived in the town already few days back, but were at Greater Noida, at Neerav's place. And the obvious reason we could not meet before was the 'great' geographical distance between Dwarka (My place) and G. Noida ( I think the name "Greater Noida was decided after ensuring that, this place is at a 'greater' distance from everything in this world..) They reached at the lunch time (2Hrs late than the pre-decided & pre-committed and thrice confirmed by Neerav's time). The reason for delay is a nice story but it has two different versions, each one comes from Bhuvan and Neerav respectively (or may be dis-respectively.. :-) )And they were supposed to leave the same evening, Bhuvan had to catch the Dubai flight and Neerav was leading to Chennai.

Neha was seeing Bhuvan first time. She was in her office and was to come back by lunch time. I and of course she too got really touched a lot when both these 'devars' touched her feet. We had lunch, gossiped a lot shared many memorable moments which we have missed in each others lives. Cut the b'day cake, had a high tea, and then came the parting time.

Just then Neerav took out his E-ticket and realised He has almost missed his flight. He mistook the flight timings and only 'pushpak vimaan' or a typical 'bollywood-movie-climax-driver' could have made him to catch the flight. Unfortunately I didn't have any of the two options so I gave him my Laptop to book another ticket. He got one for the next morning.

So we both went to drop Bhuvan to Indira Gandhi International Airport, and came back. The same night my sis & mom were leaving for their trip to Risikesh & Haridwar. I and Neerav had got few more hours to discuss (and re-discuss) our never ending discussions. After dinner we were sitting in my room and Neha was too lending an ear to our discussions which does not make much sense to her, when we keep on discussing about Horizon, Swarnajali, SVITS etc.

She was too kind to us. (she is always i think,... treating someone special without experiencing those moments which made them special is not so easy..) After two heavy meals on that high activity day, still she was sitting with us, and we didn't realized when she slept.. after a while once we realise we wound up the discussion.

Next morning I got the Neerav up (or i think vise-versa) and rushed to the Airport, we didn't want to miss another flight. I cam back and the routine life started.

It was just another day on calender, but i still remember that day. Nothing special happened, really nothing which was extra ordinary or out of this world. But still I recall that day today, perhaps because in today's 'capitalized' life spending a full day with 'friends and family' is as scarce as finding a person without a cellphone.

I thank All of them for that day...

Specially to Neha for understanding my special friends who all are kind of unusual too in their own ways (Positive ways) always.

(I always thank someone or other in my blog, may be its sound monotonous, bu to me its a great comfort, because I belong to those set of people who find it easy to write but very, very difficult to express it orally**.. Neha would certainly agree..)

** Though I am quite known as an Orator, but still I am quite silent on my personal feelings...

Isi baat par Ek sher Yaad aaya...

Meri aawaaz hi parda hai mere chehre ka...

Main hoon khaamosh jahan mujhko wahan se suniye .. By Nida Fazli

Bye for Now..

Luv...

VT

The Crackpot

Hi...

Long time, no posts, where were I???

Nothing special, was a little busy and was thinking on making a long post, but it seems as if work will keep me busy for a couple of more weeks and wont be able to script "My Best speech at IIPM" and some more "Horizon Episodes" pretty soon... But decided to mail some smaller posts regularly and to share some motivation stuff.

I know "The great Internet" and the routine "forward mails" have made a good yet unheard and unread material scarce, but still I got to tell you a really nice story which i feel is a bit less circulated on Internet. Please find the same pasted below.. I cant mention the credits as i really don't know the author of this masterpiece. (Not in terms of literary standards but in terms of message).

Think, dwell, ponder a while...

Will come back soon...

A Story For All . . .

A water bearer in China had two large pots, each hung on the ends of a pole which he carried across his neck. One of the pots had a crack in it, while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water. At the end of the long walk from the stream to the house, the cracked pot arrived only half full.

For a full two years this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water to his house. Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments, perfect for which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.

After 2 years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water bearer one day by the stream. I am ashamed of myself, and because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your house. The bearer said to the pot, Did you notice that there were flowers only on your side of the path, but not on the other pot's side that's because I have always known about your flaw, and I planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back, you've watered them. For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate the table. Without you being just the way you are, there would not be this beauty to grace the house.

Moral- Each of us has our own unique flaws. We're all cracked pots. But it's the cracks and flaws we each have that make our lives together so very interesting and rewarding. You've just got to take each person for what they are, and look for the good in them . . .

Thanks to Neha for sharing this story with me... :-)

Luv...

VT

"Against the Mission & Vision"

Well the correct title must be 'Against the Mission & Vision Statements". Actually at IIPM we had a subject called 'Business Policy'. Business Policy starts with the chapter - Mission & vision statement.

At IIPM they do not teach you the things in straight bookish way. (I agree many other institutes promote innovative learning techniques, but as I have been to IIPM only, I will talk about it only..) Most of the subjects are taught in an open atmosphere where you are allowed to develop your own point of view..

Our Professor while teaching Mission and vision, initiated a debate, whether these statements are really important in an organization or not?

Do organizations really follows these statements, or they frame one after they have achieved their monetary goals..?

The assignment given to us was a group task, we all were to take part in a debate over the importance of 'Mission & vision statements'. Another twist was - it will be decided by lottery system that which group will speak 'for' the topic & which will speak 'against' it. This lottery system to decide for/ against in a debate is a common practice at IIPM. I always hated it, but after joining corporate world i understood the importance of it.

In corporate world many a times you promote some thing which you do not like or believe in and vie versa. Those debates at IIPM has enabled us to look beyond our own liking and preferences. As being an assignment, those debate caries good % of marks and to prove your stand better (which you have not chosen but have got by luck) you really need to do a 360 degree analysis of the topic. At times we discovered really amazing yet unknown facts & views about the topics which seems to have a unanimous general opinion.

Personally i used to believe in the concept of 'Mission & Vision Statements' but as we got to work the other way round finally, i found my self in total distress.

We formed a team of three, we had a slot of 12 minutes to give (do) what ever we could speak, act, show, describe or even mock to convince the audience including our professor that there is no better (or worse) crap that having a mission & vision statement in an organization.

It was our 2nd & final year and we have learnt it quite well that our presentation must have a 'deadly' balance of content & spices. When i say deadly balance it means 60% masalaa and 40% content. But the challenge was 40% content requires 70% of the time available ( that's the most boring part of good content-always), so We had to create a masalaa which can be delivered in say 3 minutes but leaves a lasting impression (about 60% of the total impact of your presentation).

Following was the actual classification of composition:

1. Speaker A- Total Masalaa (Which was me)

2. Speaker B- Content+Masalaa - Examples of organizations who has bright mission statements but fail to follow even a bit of it. ( My god... that girl has raped (of course verbally.. you nuts) DTC (Delhi transport corporation) and Delhi Police, who says ..'pachass varshon se aapki sewa me' and 'with you for you, always' respectively)

3. Speaker C- was a content speaker totally speaking things which are available in books or on internet against mission statement.

So I had to deliver a masalaa speech of 3 mins which should be capable of blowing the audience. I loved (still love) to start a speech or a presentation which a couplet (sher -o-shayri-kavita etc.) I was skeptical whether it will be accepted or not, also i wanted to develop an Orator out of me who can give a good speech without using couplets & poetry. ( it was a useless challenge i had taken, but it had enabled me to use other stage techniques like pictures, tricks, games etc., but I still prefer my collection of couplets over to all those techniques, as I know that I can create a better impact out of it)

Anyways, I was in search of a deadly starting. i thought of many possible ones but was leading to some obvious kind of options which i really didn't want to take up. After so much of speculations I decided upon one, which was really an off beat attempt for me, at least I have never tried in that style till date, but I gave it a try and it served the purpose really well.

So here is the script of the drama I did.. I do not have a practice of writing speeches, i never do. It was the first and perhaps the last time when i did so, unfortunately i lost the real script but most of it is written on my mind, pasting it here directly from the cerebral records...

It was Monday morning , 30th of August 2004, Also co-incidental with Raksha Bandhan that year. We had our classes and it was the 2nd lecture, around 10.30 when we were supposed to come up with our presentation.

The first presentation was from the team speaking for the motion. Guys came, spoke, shouted and gone. (in today's world it is really boring to talk obvious things to people) Audience was expecting some out of the box masalaa.. (Who so ever has invented this phrase 'out of box' must have born before Galileo, as he used to believe that this world is like a box and not like a ball, but just imagine how would it sound if some one says..'out of ball idea..' just joking guys.. some loose talks.. lets go back to the topic)

I have no slides to show but our content speaker had, so first we set the LCD. Then I stood in the middle of the width of the room ( i hardly used podium, which was always there in an IIPM classroom), Looking at me people were not expecting masalaa as i was better known as content speaker.

I was standing with my hands and legs joined, both my elbows touching my body giving a slight hind of a feminine pose, I gave a smile to all of them, tuned my head to each one and peeped into their eyes. and said..

Good Evening...

(Shocking.. 'good evening' at 10.30 AM, some of the nerds looked at their watch and grinned giving an expression that says ' its equivalent of mass killing when you say good morning after 12, and good evening before 5 PM)

I repeated..

'Good Evening and thank you for this opportunity' ( My tone and style was mocking that of a lady, i continued..).

"If I shall go on to become Miss world today, I shall take over from Lisa onto my duties, with as much sincerity and dedication, to go on to become an ambassador of
peace, (pause)
goodwill, (pause)
harmony (pause)
and compassion, and trying to do full justice to our motto, 'Beauty with a purpose.' (pause)
Remember, people, I'll always be there for you,
thank you!"

(then i opened my hand mocked the action of wiping a tear from my left eye, moved from that position and stood few steps away and clapped 3 times and said...)

Good Morning Friends, this is Vishal Thakur, and that was (Pointing towards my previous position) queen of our hearts Aishvarya Rai
at Sun city, South Africa in 1994,
in the miss word contest,
in an answer to the question "what is your mission if you go on to become Miss World Today..?"

(the Pause this time went around 30 -45 seconds as audience were clapping...I wanted to say few words that how Aish had a so called mission and did nothing quotable towards it till then... but the audience's response has confirmed i need not elaborate it... I started again..)

This was an example of how people play with words or rather what could be the difference between words and the work.

Mission statements are often like statutory warning written on a packet of cigarettes "Cigarette smoking is injurious to health", everybody reads it but no body follows it..
I have said some more similar sentences further which i am not able to recall right now...
But the purpose was served and i had discovered a new Masalaa speaker with in me...

By for now..
Will share one more speech from IIPM...

Luv
VT