Nokia Lumia 520 is the top selling Windows device in the world

We've often commented on how Nokia has really been sizzling hot in the lower end of the smartphone market. No surprise then, that the Nokia Lumia 520 is the highest selling Windows device on the planet. That includes other Windows Phone flavored handsets, Windows powered PCs and tablets. Microsoft itself has realized how important the Nokia Lumia 520 has become, not just for Windows Phone, but for the entire universe of Windows products. This is the impression that blogger Paul Therrott took away from the recent Microsoft company meeting.

The popularity of the Nokia Lumia 520, and it's twin T-Mobile branded Nokia Lumia 521, comes as a result of a low off-contract price (the latter recently was available for just $80 with a coupon code, off contract) and the features available on the model. Yes, there are certain things that the device cannot do because of its low-end specs, but that is more than made up by the things the phone can do. For an example of that, we can look at the recent GDR2 update. The Nokia Lumia 520 and Nokia Lumia 521 both offer FM radio reception after the update, but it will not have the new Glance Screen which includes an always on clock and the ability to wake the phone with two taps to the screen.

The Nokia Lumia 520 is equipped with a 4 inch screen with resolution of 480 x 800. A dual-core 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Plus is under the hood with 512MB of RAM aboard. The device offers 8GB of native storage and a 64GB capacity microSD slot is available. The 5MP camera on back does not offer flash, and there is no front-facing camera. In other words, the Nokia Lumia 520 is giving you a handset with 2011 specs. But for those who would rather not spend the money on a more expensive model, this device has proven to be a capable handset.

For Nokia and Microsoft, the big question is whether the Nokia Lumia line will continue to struggle with the high-end of the smartphone market where the Nokia Lumia 1020 currently sits. AT&T has already made a permanent $100 price cut to the subsidized price of the camera-centric unit, bringing the cost down to $199.99 with a signed two-year pact. This is the area of the market where Nokia and Microsoft have been concentrating their marketing dollars, but have not been able to get any traction so far. Will the upcomingNokia Lumia 1520 phablet, with improved specs thanks to the GDR3 update, light the spark for Windows Phone in the upper segment of the smartphone world?

A look at the specs of Nokia Lumia 520.

Can Blackberry survive??

In June 2012, when Blackberry delayed the launch of its Blackberry 10 OS, I had a thought in mind that it is too late.
Blackberry has always prided itself as a end to end solution provider, a maker of not only software and hardware products but also device security and management services that have helped enterprises to keep their data secure.
There was a time when Blackberry was class apart. It was always seen as a corporate centered company and it had a large customer base. Its messenger service called BBM was so popular that it was almost impossible to crack down its code for others who dreamt of creating a messenger service like BBM.
But as we all know, everybody has a dream run for a certain period of life, for blackberry its golden days are now over. The company which had once the potential of locking horns with giants like Apple, Samsung and Google is now crying even for its survival.
The company declared in August that it is available for sale.
The company has also planned to cut down 4500 jobs across the globe i.e. 40% of its workforce and has posted nearly 1 billion $ loss in recent quarter.
On september 23, fairfax financial made an offer to purchase blackberry for 4.7 billion $ or 9$ per share in cash. Fairfax already has a 10% stake in the company.
The question is: Can Blackberry survive?..Well, I doubt it.
In today's fast changing world, one has to keep itself updated to stay in competition but blackberry never learnt a lesson. It always advertised itself as a company that is focused on corporate employees. Companies like Samsung and google are the best examples of keeping themselves updated with time. They have brought so much innovation in their products through the years that it has now become impossible for a company like blackberry to even think of surpassing them. Blackberry woke up but it was already late. BB10 OS came at a time when market was already flooded with Android and iOS powered devices and people just cant leave them. So , when BB10 came in market, despite its awesomeness, it did not manage to win hearts.Also, its BBM application is now no longer an alien thing, applications like whatsapp have filled the gap for android iOS users who used to feel jealous of people using BBM. Company is posting  more and more loss after every quarter. None of their strategies are working. Recently, they thought of introducing their popular BBM service to iOS and Android but on the day of release, it leaked online creating a fuss and blackberry had to postpone its launch. The question here is: A company which focuses so much on security is now seeing such a low day that its major release gets leaked?? Clearly the passion for work is missing in employees .

It is sometimes the nature of pioneers to think that the advantages that helped them achieve their leading positions will always be there. Companies that build successful business models using one set of assumptions tend to ignore upstarts and trends that run counter those assumptions, and thus wind up writing their own obituaries.

Yet that is the nature of the capitalist world--the "creative destruction" that economist Joseph Schumpeter hailed. It breathes life into new business, new models and new ideas. The downside is that is also destroys old ones, which is what we're seeing with BlackBerry today.

The Lunchbox Review: An exceptional breed

Rating: 4.5/5 stars (Four and half stars)

Star cast: Irrfan Khan, Nimrat Kaur, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Denzil Smith, Bharati Achrekar, Nakul Vaid, Lillete Dubey

Director: Ritesh Batra

What’s Good: The film is a cinematic delight filled with the right amounts of love and warmth.

What’s Bad: Nothing

Loo Break: Don’t even think of one.

Watch or Not?: Don't even think of missing this!!

Analysis: THE LUNCHBOX is a story of a beautiful relationship triggered by the wrong delivery of a lunchbox that's delivered daily within the bustling metropolis of Mumbai.

If you think that in the modern age of Email and Whatsapp, old-styled romance will not work, then you are perhaps wrong. It is the precision with which it is portrayed on screen that actually matters. When you see 'The lunchbox' you will fall in love for it. Illa(Nimrat Kaur) is a housewife who has been neglected by her husband and she make his favorite dishes for him so that he can somehow notice her. One fine day the lunchbox reaches to wrong destination i. e to Government officer Saajan Fernandez (Irrfan) and that is how this sweet romance starts.

On the edge of retiring, Saajan has no spice in is life and nothing to look forward to. He is soon to be replaced by a trainee played by Nawazuddin Siddiqui.

The letters exchanged through lunchbox changes his life and he begins to get drawn to a life filled with colors and liveliness. Director Ritesh batra has shown Mumbai in its true sense, the crowded Mumbai local trains, messy Government offices and always high on spirits Dabawallas who feed thousands of Mumbaikars daily.

Illa bares the marble of her boring marriage and suspects that her husband is having an extra-marital affair. The two actors share their memories with each other through letters and it looks so natural and sweet that you will actually feel happy at heart.

Saajan recounts to her, the memories of his past wife laughing over and over at same jokes of 'Yeh Zo Hai Zindagi' and recording them while he kept looking back at her reflection.

There is a hidden beauty in every shot. Even the supporting actors are at their best.

Nawaz plays Shaikh, the man who is to replace Saajan at work, a young man who chops vegetables on his files and always add weight in his lines by saying some random sayings of his mother. Let me tell you Nawaz is one of the finest actors ever produced on Indian soil. he delivers his performance with so ease that you will feel that he is actually saying the dialogues naturally and not before a camera.

Every time when he says 'Good morning sir, kaise hai ap?' , you will feel something at heart.

The voice of Bharati Achrekar as deshpandey aunty is also a delight although you will not be able to catch even a glimpse of her.

If I talk about performances, Irffan is a delight to watch and he do not want any introduction to prove himself. He slips into a character much older than him with so much ease.

He is terrific and somehow so charming in his role, that even as the retiring old man he will make your heart skip a beat.

Nirmat kaur is natural. She is not an eye-candy actress but she is someone who understands every shade of her character and her performance is top notch.

Nawaz as I have already told essays his role with keenness and brilliant at his work.He will make you fall in love with him by his work.

Direction: Director Ritesh Batra has done something which many film makers will not be able to achieve in years.He has make a simple story so convincing and natural that you will fall in love at first sight at the very first frame of the movie. The way he decided to end his movie at climax could not have been better. He leaves the decision to audiences and surprisingly you will come home with a positive head .

Last word: The lunchbox is a cinematic gem and a rare breed. I have watched the first show, you do not even think of missing it. People were literally clapping when the movie ended, that is the appreciation every director would think of.

A spine chilling and eye-wetting Rape story[MUST READ]

This is the story of Zahira, who was 13 years old when an unfortunate spine chilling rape incident happened to her. 

(She was visited by Team Tehelka, a leading news daily in INDIA.)

Wearing a green salwar-kurta, with her hair braided neatly, Zahira comes to meet team tehelka(a leading daily in INDIA) at a busy road in front of Lucknow Assembly. Carrying a bundle of books wrapped in an old plastic bag, she smiles enthusiastically on seeing the team In her smile, there is no hint of the horrific incident which took place one evening eight years ago when four men kidnapped her from an isolated road of a posh colony. Nobody could have imagined that the girl being dragged into the car would later be counted amongst one of the country’s most appalling gangrapes. Zahira was only 13-years-old when she was subjected to burns using cigarettes and wounded badly with the barrel of a gun.

Looking at Zahira now, on the face of it, one sees a strong person who is hoping to get justice. But the country’s legal system is testing her patience.

Zahira’s poor family had migrated from Assam decades ago. Except for Zahira, who speaks in a pure UP dialect, many of her family members cannot even speak Hindi fluently. It takes us 30 minutes to reach Zahira’s house. All this while, she is quiet. Then as if staring into nothingness, she says, “I want to study further and be a judge. Then I’ll pass the judgements quickly in cases of other such girls. I often think that it’s been so many years, why haven’t I received justice yet?” She wipes the tears that silently flow from the corners of her eyes and goes silent.

Unlike other victims, she doesn’t shout and cry narrating her tale. After the gangrape, the subsequent struggles with the police, judiciary and society, in addition to an economic and mental breakdown left the girl numb. But she still stands firm in her struggle for justice against the six politically connected men who barbarically raped her when she was 13.

The team is in the drawing room of her house along with her parents. Three policemen are relaxing in a tent outside the front door. Zahira’s father is a scrap dealer. To help the family out, Zahira also worked as a maid in some houses in Aashiana colony. On 2 May 2005, she was returning home from work in the evening along with her five-year old brother. As they reached the main road of the colony, four men came in a Santro car and dragged her inside.

Zahira recalls, “Before I could make sense of anything, they rolled the windows up and sped off. Initially there were just four men. Then at Nishatganj, two more joined in. The six of them tore my clothes. They were abusing me loudly and laughing. Then they started watching obscene videos on their mobiles. They made me watch it too, hit me and burnt me with cigarettes. They threw me on the floor beneath the back seat. They were all yelling loudly and took turns to scratch and pinch me. The more I begged and cried, the harder they slapped, punched and kicked me. They pulled at my hair and started plucking my nails. Then beating me, they raped me. They even had a gun and Gaurav Shukla and his friends hit me with the gun’s barrel. Then they inserted it inside my urinary tract and burned the area with cigarettes. I was bleeding profusely and was almost unconscious. Then I remember the car reached a farm house. They pulled me out and dragged me in that naked state to a room. They threw me on the bed and all of them were on me. They were gnawing and chewing every part of my body; beating, abusing, burning me. Then I heard Gaurav Shukla talk to someone on phone. He was saying, ‘If you’ve brought the girl, then kill her after the work is done.’ I knew they were going to kill me too. But they left me to die on the roadside.”

In the Aashiana gangrape case, six men were arrested, including Gaurav Shukla, Faizan, Asif Siddiqui, Bhartendu Misra, Saurabh Jain and Aman Bakshi. The lower court sentenced Faizan to life imprisonment while Bhartendu Misra and Aman Bakshi were sentenced to 10 years in prison. Since Asif Siddiqui and Saurabh Jain were below 18 years of age, the court declared them as juveniles. But soon after this, both of them died in separate road accidents. Faizan, Bhartendu and Aman are in jail and have appealed against the judgement in the high court. But the main accused in the case, Gaurav Shukla, is free even today. Gaurav is a relative of SP leader Arun Shankar Shukla who is going to contest the 2014 Lok Sabha elections from Unnao. A close associate of SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, Arun Shankar has a criminal background.

Madhu Garg, the UP head of Rashtriya Janvadi Mahila Sangathan, has been standing with Zahira and her family in their fight for justice for the past eight years. She says, “It is plainly a poor girl’s struggle against the political mafia of UP. With money and power, they have been dragging the case for the past eight years. Initially, they made every effort to prove the main accused Gaurav to be a juvenile. His school records were changed, a fake certificate of ChayaPublic School was prepared and they even attempted to seize his birth certificate from Lucknow Municipal Corporation. Then his lawyers proved him a juvenile in a forged case, and tried to use the same judgement in this case.”

She continues, “They have been pressurising Zahira’s family for so long; sometimes with money, sometimes with threats. Every time the lower court passes a judgement, they approach the higher courts to challenge it. For the past eight years, the case has become centred on proving Gaurav a juvenile. His lawyer is known to drag cases for decades. He openly asks Zahira’s father in the court, ‘how long will you fight?’ Zahira has been summoned 26 times to face direct interrogation. She has been interrogated only five times. The courage of Zahira and her father must be saluted as they have faced the torment for eight years and are still standing strong. If it is taking us so long to get justice even with all the pressure that media and our civil society has put, one can imagine what the plight of hundreds of other victims must be, who cannot even come out in the open to speak of the violence done to them.”

When asked about the punishment her perpetrators received, Zahira doesn’t respond. In his broken Hindi, her father replies, “You see, a woman has two separate holes for urine and menstruation to pass – the urinary tract and the vagina. When a barrel of a gun is inserted in your 13-year-old daughter in such a way that both the holes become one, and then the wound is burnt with cigarettes, what punishment would you demand for this? If your daughter returns home one night, her body burnt with cigarettes, slashed with blades, her nails plucked, and soaked in blood, what punishment would you ask for? No justice can ever reduce the pain. We die every day while Gaurav Shukla is free and married. No matter what they do, fill my house with treasures or shoot me, I won’t back off. Even if I have to sell everything for it, I’ll do it, but I’ll fight till the end.”

Salute to her!!..and shame that we are living in such a society.

--The story has been shared from Tehelka daily for purpose of awakening the society only, no other purpose has been served. Full credit goes to Team tehelka for visting Zahira and share her pain. Thank you.

Importance of Sex Education in Schools

For a very long time, the issue of sex education for young people, particularly in the Indian region but not exclusively so has remained a taboo. Although sex is a natural developmental process, many parents, cultures and societies frown at discussing sex with their adolescent children because it is perceived as a generational taboo.

With out  destroying the fabric of society, it is necessary to teach the teenagers the importance of sex education .Having sex is a primitive, intrinsic natural human tendency that emerges in all of us in different forms and at different times. One thing is certain: if we don’t educate our children on sex and sex-related issues, they would learn from other people or the mass media. Sex education is not only important as a developmental process in the life of a child, it arms the child with the tools to understand him or herself better in relation to the immediate environment and the threats that could emerge from such interaction. Sex education provides young people with the information they need to understand their bodies and gender roles in positive ways. It is about better understanding of humanity, our reproductive rights and developmental changes such as puberty, menopause, aging, that could be experienced in the course of one’s reproductive life.
Humans are curious animals and young people are exploratory as an expression of their intrinsic curiosity. Peer pressure and the media have enormous influence in the lives of the so called generation Y, and if we don’t teach them about sex, somehow they would learn and maybe learn in a way that may have devastating consequences. Some elements of the mass media - television, radio, magazines - are biased, ill informed and may not portray accurate reflection of reality. Sex education will serve as counter-insurgency to the war that has been declared against family values by mass media. Children are more likely to make better and more informed decisions when adequately educated, and parents will feel more confident knowing that their children are aware of the realities around their reproductive lives. Although most parents work hard to prevent their children from premature sexual relationships, the reality is that it still happens and could happen in spite of threats and intimidation. Educating the child on the importance of protection as part of safe sex routine may serve a higher purpose of preventing sexually transmitted infections.
There are a number of reasons why parents are reluctant to teach their children about sex. Prominent amongst the reason for families frowning at sex education include but not limited to the preservation of virginity, prevention of premarital sex, illegitimate pregnancy and abortion, religion and culture, as well as maintenance of family honor and dignity. Contrary to this assumption, a number of surveys have shown that girls who were not educated about sexuality, including changes during puberty are more likely to embark on sexual indiscretion and become pregnant in their teenage years than those who were educated about sex. Knowledge, they say is power, and this power when bestowed on adolescents could be the difference between an irrational decision and a well informed one.
Sex education should ideally start in the home where parents should engage their children as active participants in their development process. This education continues at school in a way that preserves the family values while embracing societal realities. Sex education that begins at school could have an untoward effect of these young children not understanding the position of their parents, leading to sexual licentiousness and catastrophic experimentation. The result is that these individuals may become pregnant or contract infectious diseases, and may never regain the will or opportunity to achieve their greatest potential. The social development of young people is a product of family and society partnership, where these children are active participants in their own lives. 

The debate continues in the western nations whether sexual education should at all be taught to young people and who as well as when should this ideally commence.

In India, to be specific, usually we say that teenage is from 13 to 19 years, but in my view it has come down to 9 years. Today's generation has become so fast and tech-savvy that kids have very easy access to porn sites and other filthy material with one click. At this age the curiosity to know more is natural.
Various Bollywood celebrities are coming forward with the help of art to support sex education in schools. One of the hot names now a days in Poonam Pandey. While others are always treating her wrong for unnecessarily raging the issue of sex education, I see it as a positive sign because we Indians on one hand say that sex education should not be taught , on the other hand , we always do that task which is treated wrong generally. Every thing happens every where behind the scenes. Sex is treated as a nightmare and a very big object to understand. Every thing has a positive and negative point of view. Poonam Pandey has come with her new movie 'Nasha' , there are others too like 'Murder', 'Jism' and many more. The positive side of these movies are their educational side.. We need to understand that these kind of movies are made so that people can get more and more about sex education and do not treat it as a nightmare.
 There is a staggering statistics that 25% of all girls and 16% of all boys will be victims of some type of sexual abuse or assault by the time they turn 18 years.
Children of the 21st century need more education on their bodies and body imagery, reproductive rights and birth control, sexually transmitted diseases, sexual abuse and high-risk sexual behaviors and other exploitative behaviors.
http://www.debate.org hosted a survey in which it was surveyed whether children should be given sex education in schools or not?..Here are the results.

You can analyse yourself after noticing the survey results. Time has come to wake up from the deep sleep and tell your kids about sex education.Until the society, both in advanced and developing nations make sex education a common public discourse and encourage families to embrace the idea, sexual abuse and exploitation will remain a common threat to our children. There are sexual perpetrators everywhere one turns, from big cities to small country towns. Taking a collective stand and educating our children on sex and related matters will go a long way in preventing some of the tragic exploitative sexual experiences that harm our children and threaten their humanity.

--refrences taken from http://www.tigweb.org. only for educational and informative purposes.

DEC16 Delhi Gang rape case:Rarest of rare. Who needs to change to STOP all this?

While starting to write this post, I am thinking where to start from??
If you are not an Indian, You must be wondering who these four people are?..Let me refresh your memories, these four men excluding other two are the biggest devils living in INDIA till date and the crime they have committed is the rarest of rare.

It was 16 Dec, 2012 chilling winter night, a 23 year old good looking girl was returning home with her friend after watching a movie. It was around 9 PM. They were not getting any means of transport to reach home. They were waiting patiently when a tourist bus stopped in front of them and offered them a lift. They got in to bus and sit like every other co-passenger. They were even given travel ticket to make them feel that everything is authentic and something is not fishy.
But soon four people sitting in the bus started passing dirty comments on the girl and in a while, they started touching the girl. When the boy opposed all this, he was hit in the head by an iron road, so he fell unconscious.
Meanwhile the other two sitting in the driver's cabin also came and 6 of them committed the rarest possible crime. They first raped the girl brutally and on the top of that, they inserted an iron road in her vagina which ruptured all her private parts and intestines. The girl was shouting for her life, begging to them as she was bleeding profusely but the devils never heard in the darkness of lust.They also inserted a candle in her vagina that went in to her stomach later on. Even this was not enough for those beasts and they threw away both the girl(naked) and boy from the moving bus in chilling winter night near a lonely area.
After 20 minutes ,Policemen came when someone covered her with clothes and informed the police. The girl was soon taken to hospital. She was so brave that she was still fighting like a warrior and her breathe was still ON.
Soon she was taken to Singapore for treatment but she died. She was not in a position to talk or respond to anything in the days she suffered or lived after the crime.

A rage got spread all over the country and people came in thousands to protest against the crime.Candle march were held for many days  as such a rape was the very first to be happened in INDIA, this was indeed rarest of the rare crime. All the politicians, Policemen, Common man , every one had only one common opinion: PAINFUL DEATH for all the bastards!!.

Soon all the accused were caught by Police and they were taken in judicial custody. They were given third degree torture by police in jail and a charge-sheet was immediately submitted for their trial in court. Meanwhile one accused committed suicide in jail itself by hanging himself in fear of daily third degree tortures while one other who was a juvenile(not categorized as adult in India as he was below 18 yrs of age at the time of crime)
was given 3 years of rigorous punishment in a reform home cum jail.
The remaining 4 have been given death penalty today ,13 September 2013. They are to be hanged till death by the orders of the honorable court, Government of India.
This day will be marked as justice day in India.

 The court, while pronouncing the judgment said that, "It cannot turn a blind eye on the rising cases of sexual assault against women," and that the incident shook the "collective conscience of the society". The court said the case fell under rarest of rare category.
"Need to send a message that it will not be tolerated." -The judge

Today somewhere in heaven, the holy soul(the victim girl) must be smiling by hearing this verdict. According to my opinion even this punishment is very less for these culprits.
They will not feel the pain which the girl felt, they will not feel the torture under which she went through for almost 4 days. Their execution should be held in public where firstly their private parts should be ripped off by a knife and then public should be allowed to throw stones on them. Finally they should be either hanged till death or a shower of bullets should be fired on them all in public. By doing this, they will at-least come to know what she went through that day. The reason I am supporting the public punishment is that everyone can feel the shiver in his body that such a crime will not be tolerated in this country so that any pervert could think thousand times before doing all this.
Meanwhile one of the victim's wife says "This is injustice. Court should have at-least thought what would happen to me and my child". I ask this lady a question "Your husband should have also thought that day what would happen with the girl, her future and her parents??..Did he think about all this??..NO??"..then why mercy? why?

Today my heart is heavy and there are tears in my eyes for the brave girl but at the same time I am relieved that the bastards got the punishment for what they did.

There are illiterate and uncivilized people also who say "'Girls are responsible for rapes because they wear small clothes thus inviting men to rape'".
I want to warn all these stupid people that their mind is uncivilized and they have no right to live among humans, rather they should shift themselves to forests or mountains.
A girl is also a human being and has full liberty to wear or speak like any other citizen of the country. Laws are equal for both men and women in every nation. Indian constitution gives full freedom to every citizen (men/women) to wear what they want, speak what they want to.The dirt is in your eyes if you think so. You need to learn to think and behave like gentlemen. If a girl likes to wear small clothes, it is her choice; you are not her boss to tell what she should wear and what looks sensible.

The need of the hour is to educate our child at small age in a right manner. Sex education should be made compulsory in schools thereby bridging the gaps between adolescence and adulthood. Basic defense training should be given to girls at school level and it should be made a part of curriculum. Parents also need to open up with their children by removing the generation gap factor and talk to their children in a friendly manner. They should behave like friends with them not like their bosses. The need is to educate the people in right direction and giving more powers to woman.

Remember men are existing in this world due to women. If there is no women, there is no men. Woman is to be respected, not raped.Finally I say Change your mentality, educate your children and give powers to your women and there will be no rape.

--RIP DAMINI/NIRBHAYA

-The country is with you. I am with you.

 

Has Apple really lost its shine or the mojo?

A company that defines innovation , that has always introduced some path breaking devices can be substituted with Apple. Apple is Jobs'vision, Jobs' hard work and Job's passion.
A man who has the ability to think out of the box, who can stand again & again after falling down, a man who can start his another company after being thrown out from his own company, a man who has always excelled in every sphere of life is called STEVE JOBS.

No body in the world knew what a smartphone is until Jobs showed his invention Apple iPhone to world in 2007. iPhone was the first smartphone ever introduced in the mobile market and too with a proper Operating system running on it. iPhone brought a mind boggling revolution in the history of mobiles and changed the way people used to look towards phones. It integrated the capabilities of a Music player, a computer and phone in one device  on a big screen (at that time)with a dedicated app store from where user could download apps related to different categories from one place. Let me tell you this was a totally new idea which no one ever thought. Before the invention of iPhone, there was NOKIA which was dominating the mobile market, it has also some cool phones which had the capability of being called a semi-smartphones. You could run a few apps on it but they were not integrated at one place, they were rather scattered and you had to google out every app that was pain in the head.
People flocked outside Apple stores to buy the unique device and soon the iPhone was a blockbuster hit through out the world. 
Mac OS, iPod, iPad all these products are only one man's vision; Mr. Steve Jobs.
iPod gave users the unique and best in class music experience  whereas iPad almost replaced the laptops. 

Steve Jobs was a true visionary. He paved the way for others to think beyond the usual stuff and try something new.
But a dark day came in the history of the world when We had to say good bye to the founder of Apple. The date was 5 Oct, 2011.
The last product which had Jobs stamp on it was iPhone 5. Though Tim  Cook introduced it but its blueprint was originally developed by Jobs only.
Apple's fortunes have died with the death of Jobs. However hard you try but it is almost impossible to find a true innovator like him who could lead apple.
Seriously speaking I am not at all impressed by Tim Cook as a leader who can lead such a visionary and innovative company. Tim cook may be good but the world is still addicted to Jobs's enigma, his passion and his leadership under which Apple has come such a long way.
Remember, when you set your standards very high , people expect you to stay at the top. The day you stop innovating, your happier days are gone. Same is the case happening with Apple right now, Jobs had that ability to introduce a new unique device every year, but Cook is becoming repetitive in his approach.  After Jobs death, Tim has introduced iPad mini, iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C. If one looks closely, iPhone 5S is nothing but a minor upgrade from iPhone5. Giving some more power to processor, camera and a bunch of small here and theres are not Apple's cup of tea. Apple used to be at a place where others used to follow it blindly but now a time has come where apple needs to follow others.
Google's android OS is giving a tough time to Apple.Also SAMSUNG, the biggest rival to APPLE right now has become what Apple used to be at Jobs time. I really salute the way SAMSUNG has become hero from zero. In 2007, Samsung used to be called as a company which makes home appliances but when Google introduced its Android OS, its fortunes started rolling and not to say they have brought out so much innovation in every device they release that it has now become difficult to beat them. Look at they way they bring new innovations to there devices, who thought you can call a person directly by putting your phone to ear, who thought you can force your phone to look at you, who thought you can give your phone air gestures i.e not even touching your phone in reality, and who thought you could use stylus on a capactive touch phone. Samsung's galaxy S series have become a pain in neck for Apple. Samsung's Galaxy S2, S3, S4, Note 2 , Note 3 are benchmark phones in terms of innovation. I need to assure you here that all these innovations are purely Samsung's own innovations which others are following now.
I feel ashamed to think that a company which Samsung followed in its earlier days is now forced to follow Samsung.

Tim Cook is neither good at marketing, nor at management and also innovation. 
Coming back to devices, iphone 5 C is nothing but duplicate copy of iPhone5 with a plastic case instead of aluminium. iPad mini is also a smaller version of bigger iPad which Jobs invented.
I want to ask one question?..What has Tim cook done after Jobs?
Answer according to me is 'NIL'. I will answer this question in positive the day Cook introduces a completely new device invented by him with out copying what Jobs has already left in the legacy.

Apple needs a strong personality  “There is a huge challenge and they are at the crossroads where Apple could become the next Microsoft.”

It’s still at the point where they might turn things around. They still have a strong brand. Investors have started moving away from Apple and if this continues, the day will not be far when Apple will become stagnant and will be seen as a local company rather than a luxurious brand.

R.I.P. Jobs...We will always miss you. :)

Can India ever make it to OSCARS?

India is a country where two things are considered the chief ingredients of entertainment, One is Cricket and the other one is Cinema. Since this post is about Cinema, so I will talk only about cinema .
India has given birth to legendary actors like Amitabh Bachchan, Dilip Kumar, Rajesh Khanna, Dev Anand, Pran Sahab, Rajendera Kumar, Dharmendra, Shah Rukh Khan, Aamir Khan, Salman Khan, Hirthik Roshan, Irffan Khan, Nawazuddin Siddiqui etc. All these actors are iconic and unmatchable. Each one of them has a unique style of acting that can keep anybody spell-bound for hours. Yes!! It is the same crazy India where people shout in theaters when Amitabh Bachchan takes an entry, It is the same India where girls go crazy even in dreams about Shahrukh Khan and Salman Khan, It is the same India where romance is substituted with Rajesh Khanna and Shahrukh. For your surprise I would like to tell you all readers that Shahrukh Khan is the most famous and most commercial actor in the world even above than Lenardo de caprio, Tom cruise, Tom Hanks, Nicolas Cage etc in terms of popularity.

The houses of these superstars have become tourist places for the people. Every sunday Amit ji comes out of the house at around 6:30 PM to meet people at his residence 'Jalsa'. People come in thousands just to see a glimpse of the actor.

I am not a person associated with film business but as a good audience, I always clap when I see a good movie and I always hate myself for wasting my money if the movie turns out to be bad.
According to me, a film is a director's  and writer's vision and spell bound performance of the actors in it. If the story is good and the performances are not good, the film will not work and vice versa. Here in this post, I am not doubting the talent of any actor or director but I would like to throw a light on the content of the movies and the way of filming them.
In the early 70 or 80s , the story of 90% of the films at that time used to be almost the same. Either of the hero or heroine does not belong to a good family and the other is rich. Then they fall in love with each other, either of the one's family member does not approve of this love and hence a rivalry starts. In the end either the villain dies or there is a mutual understanding between the two parties and there was always a happy ending to the love saga. Then there come an era of 90's and early 2000 where the same love stories were presented with a different angle but the theme was almost the same. The highlighting point is that Love stories have always been an integral part of our film making and that is being continued even till date. Every Friday movie lovers go to cinema halls in hope that this time they will not get depressed but more or less the scenario is still the same.

Even the film makers place a safe bet on love stories as they have gone deep into Indian roots, so they usually hesitate to experiment with different kind of cinema.
Then there come directors like Anurag Kashyap, Bejoy Nambiar, Debakar Benarjee and Zoya Akhtar who took it as a challenge and brought a whole new experience of cinema for the Indians. Their movies did not boast of big stars like SRK or Aamir but the content was so powerful and the actors(even they were not recognized faces in the beginning) were so convincing in their roles that audience accepted them with open arms.
Films like Dev D, Lootera, Udaan, Shanghai, Taare Zameen Par, 3 idiots, Chak de India, Paan Singh Tomar, Gangs of Wasseypur are the benchmark films in Indian Film industry which has proved that ultimately it is the content of the film which matters and Indian audience is hungry for a new kind of cinema. 
Every time  we see in Oscars, there are films submitted from all over the world of different genres but only a few of them are lucky to be awarded with the oscars.
The prime reason behind an indian film not being awarded Oscar till date is the one I stated above, but now the picture is changing. Actors like Irffan Khan have proved their mattle in both Bollywood and Hollywood and is working in offbeat films which are definitely oscar materials. Now his film 'Lunchbox' is being considered as a strong contender for OSCARS and I hope this time it will bring accolades to Indian Cinema.

The need of the hour is that we need more directors like Anurag Kashyap and Debakar, we need more actors like Irffan and Nawaz who are ready to work in different kind of films and more writers like Amol gupte who are ready to depict their off beat vision. Image of Indian Film industry is changing and I hope in coming years we will see an Indian movie winning Oscars every year or so.

How Trust and faith in the name of GOD is sold in INDIA

I am an Indian and I respect every aspect of India wholeheartedly. India is land where you can see diversity in every 50 km in terms of culture, language, colors, way of dressing etc.Sometimes, I feel proud that I am born in a country whose background is so diverse, whose history is filled with mythological facts, where rivers like Holy Ganga, Yamuna, Narmada and Brahmaputra flows, where every state has a mythological connection and are flocked with pilgrims round the clock. Thousands of tourists come every year to learn meditation, learn the path of eternal peace and harmony .
As an Indian,One should be proud that India has suffered a lot at the hands of mughal emperors  and Britishers, yet it is called the major super power in the world.
I admit that there is a lot of corruption here but one has to admit a fact that in-spite of corruption, no country can achieve a status that India has today post independence.
In this particular post , I will talk about how trust and faith is sold in India which is very depressing for me.India is a country where people are very much connected to spirituality. In every day to day task, they find a connection to the spiritual angle; if some thing goes bad , they have committed a crime unknowingly and they think some god is not happy on them, if some thing goes smoothly, they call it miracle of god.
Why do every one connect each and everything with GOD???

Does God not have any other work?? No, Seriously, believing in almighty is a different thing but overloading yourself in every frame of your life with that factor is not good.
Every new a day, a new superstition comes in market spread by some random guy and people start believing it for eg: if a cat crosses your path, it is considered worse,,,what the heck???...Tomorrow if i say some mouse or dog has crossed my path and I got ill , will you believe it?
Superstitions are something that have gone deep in to our society. some of the famous superstitions are:
1. Do not dust your house with a broom at night.
2. Do not use your scissors in the air.
3. Do not cut your nails/hair on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
4. If you see some snake in the house, it is considered as some ancestor and he has come to remind you that you have to donate clothes for him.
I have one question. God is same everywhere and we all know that, why the hell God punish only Indians if they do something wrong?...why will only god harm an Indian if he cut his hair on Tuesday. These are baseless rumors which keep on spreading and even educated people start believing them.
Now coming to another point, some people use this fact as their advantage and try to fool you and you even get easily fooled, they sell your trust and faith easily.
Every day I see some baba or saint(as they say themselves although they are not) behind the bars for some wrong reasons; somebody is caught raping a child, somebody is caught talking to terrorists or somebody is caught giving suparis for murders.I would not like to name anyone but I am giving some examples how people are cheated in the name of God.

There is a baba(he says he has a third eye, the fact is he has not a third eye rather a third-grade perosnality) who charges around 5000 Rs(75 US $) for attending his monthly programme(for one time) and when people tell him about their problems, the cure told to them is like this"Eat a samosa with green sauce, God is obstructing his kindness from there, so eat samosa and your sorrows will be gone", '' Why have you worn a white shirt, from tomorrow wear a black shirt, your sorrows will be gone''.
There is baba who gives elementary education in his gurukuls and also teaches students. He has thousands of followers but in the backyard he is easily playing with girls and if someone tries to raise his finger, he is either killed under mysterious circumstances or his mouth is shut . These people have strong connections in the ministery and every where, so if something goes wrong against them, no body can do harm to them. They make their people stand in general public who will stand and start praising baba so that people think that Baba is indeed very powerful.
I have one question "Do people not have minds??? Do they not think before giving hard earned 5000 Rs to a baba who advises you to eat a samosa in exchange of 5000 Rs".
Every day when I go to a temple, I see people pouring over liters of milk on the Sivalinga . The saddest part is that he milk goes wasted and goes directly in to sewage. Why cant people understand that God will be more happy if you help a needy person who is also a creation of God. I bet even God  would not like this wastage, he would rather prefer this food packet or any fruit to be donated to a poor and needy person who requires it more than the sewage. The point again I am referring here is Why and how people connect everything happening in their life to some mythological fact. Dont you all think it silly to think that if you waste 1 liter of milk daily on sivalinga, you will be showered with the blessings of Shiva.

We all are the creation of the almighty be it human beings, snakes, fishes, aunts etc. We are required to live in harmony with the nature by helping each other in some way. If today you have money, tomorrow you can be a beggar, it all depends on your destiny and deeds. So dont you think it is our duty to help those who are poorer than you today , and I bet God will be more than happy to see you doing that. Just imagine, how much blessings you will get; first the person you are helping will bless you and so is God.
People go on religious places, donate their hair and think that they have done a very holy job but I would like to open your eyes here. The hair which you  donate are collected in bags and then exported to other countries to earn money. So they are even doing business by selling your hair, the only difference is that you think it in a mythological way and they think it in a business sense.
We need to understand that all these pandits, astrologers are just selling your trust and faith in the name of God. They are just doing their business in which you serve as their customers who they deceive on  daily basis by giving you some random prediction. Think it this way- If a Astrologer starts telling everyone that your fate is good, how will he earn money???...He will shower a little praise for you to keep you happy but at the same time he will tell you to do some preventive measures like buying a gemstone, cloth or ornament etc so that your sorrows will be gone. Do you know even if they do not recommend you a shop for buying these things, yet they have connections all over the city and have fixed commissions. As soon as they get to know that you are sent by XYZ astrologer, their work is done. So, It is to be understood that all people are doing business to earn their living.

It is high time we stop all this non sense and start something new. God never says you to donate your hair or to stay hungry for him or any other non sense task. He only wants you to help yourself so that you can help others to maintain the harmony with nature. The superstitions are to be ripped off and a new start has to be initiated and I am hopeful that the coming generations will understand this fact and they will certainly raise questions about the authenticity of these baseless superstitions.


Remember, there is a supreme soul that is controlling all the creatures in this world. For him, we are just human beings, we have divided ourselves as Hindu, Muslim, Sikh or Christian by our own. So be it Shiva or prophet or Jesus, the supreme soul is one and will always be the same. 

The Truth behind killing of Mahatma Gandhi- The man behind his Assassination(Nathuram Godse)

These are few parts of that speech given by of Nathuram Godse in the court:

          “All my readings and thinking led me to believe it was my first duty to serve Hinduism and Hindus both as a patriot and as a world citizen. To secure the freedom and to safeguard the just interests of some thirty crores (300 million) of Hindus would automatically constitute the freedom and the well being of all India, one fifth of human race. This conviction led me naturally to devote myself to the Hindu Sanghtanist ideology and program, which alone, I came to believe, could win and preserve the national independence of Hindustan, my Motherland, and enable her to render true service to humanity as well.

Since the year 1920, that is, after the demise of Lokamanya Tilak, Gandhiji’s influence in the Congress first increased and then became supreme. His activities for public awakening were phenomenal in their intensity and were reinforced by the slogan of truth and non-violence, which he paraded ostentatiously before the country. No sensible or enlightened person could object to those slogans. In fact there is nothing new or original in them. They are implicit in every constitutional public movement. But it is nothing but a mere dream if you imagine that the bulk of mankind is, or can ever become, capable of scrupulous adherence to these lofty principles in its normal life from day to day. In fact, honor, duty and love of one’s own kith and kin and country might often compel us to disregard non-violence and to use force. I could never conceive that an armed resistance to an aggression is unjust. I would consider it a religious and moral duty to resist and, if possible, to overpower such an enemy by use of force. [In the Ramayana] Rama killed Ravana in a tumultuous fight and relieved Sita. [In the Mahabharata], Krishna killed Kansa to end his wickedness; and Arjuna had to fight and slay quite a number of his friends and relations including the revered Bhishma because the latter was on the side of the aggressor. It is my firm belief that in dubbing Rama, Krishna and Arjuna as guilty of violence, the Mahatma betrayed a total ignorance of the springs of human action.

            In more recent history, it was the heroic fight put up by Chhatrapati Shivaji that first checked and eventually destroyed the Muslim tyranny in India. It was absolutely essentially for Shivaji to overpower and kill an aggressive Afzal Khan, failing which he would have lost his own life. In condemning history’s towering warriors like Shivaji, Rana Pratap and Guru Gobind Singh as misguided patriots, Gandhiji has merely exposed his self-conceit. He was, paradoxical, as it may appear a violent pacifist who brought untold calamities on the country in the name of truth and non-violence, while Rana Pratap, Shivaji and the Guru will remain enshrined in the hearts of their countrymen forever for the freedom they brought to them.

             The accumulating provocation of thirty-two years, culminating in his last pro-Muslim fast, at last goaded me to the conclusion that the existence of Gandhi should be brought to an end immediately. Gandhi had done very well in South Africa to uphold the rights and well being of the Indian community there. But when he finally returned to India he developed a subjective mentality under which he alone was to be the final judge of what was right or wrong. If the country wanted his leadership, it had to accept his infallibility; if it did not, he would stand aloof from the Congress and carry on his own way. Against such an attitude there can be no halfway house. Either Congress had to surrender its will to his and had to be content with playing second fiddle to all his eccentricity, whimsicality, metaphysics and primitive vision, or it had to carry on without him. He alone was the Judge of everyone and everything; he was the master brain guiding the civil disobedience movement; no other could know the technique of that movement. He alone knew when to begin and when to withdraw it. The movement might succeed or fail, it might bring untold disaster and political reverses but that could make no difference to the Mahatma’s infallibility. ‘A Satyagrahi can never fail’ was his formula for declaring his own infallibility and nobody except himself knew what a Satyagrahi is.

            The Congress, which had boasted of its nationalism and socialism, secretly accepted Pakistan literally at the point of the bayonet and abjectly surrendered to Jinnah. India was vivisected and one-third of the Indian Territory became foreign land to us from August 15, 1947. This is what Gandhi had achieved after thirty years of undisputed dictatorship and this is what Congress party calls ‘freedom’ and ‘peaceful transfer of power’. The Hindu-Muslim unity bubble was finally burst and a theocratic state was established with the consent of Nehru and his crowd and they have called ‘freedom won by them with sacrifice’ – whose sacrifice? When top leaders of Congress, with the consent of Gandhi, divided and tore the country – which we consider a deity of worship – my mind was filled with direful anger.

            One of the conditions imposed by Gandhi for his breaking of the fast unto death related to the mosques in Delhi occupied by the Hindu refugees. But when Hindus in Pakistan were subjected to violent attacks he did not so much as utter a single word to protest and censure the Pakistan Government or the Muslims concerned. Gandhi was shrewd enough to know that while undertaking a fast unto death, had he imposed for its break some condition on the Muslims in Pakistan, there would have been found hardly any Muslims who could have shown some grief if the fast had ended in his death. It was for this reason that he purposely avoided imposing any condition on the Muslims. He was fully aware of from the experience that Jinnah was not at all perturbed or influenced by his fast and the Muslim League hardly attached any value to the inner voice of Gandhi.

             Gandhi is being referred to as the Father of the Nation. But if that is so, he had failed his paternal duty inasmuch as he has acted very treacherously to the nation by his consenting to the partitioning of it. I stoutly maintain that Gandhi has failed in his duty. He has proved to be the Father of Pakistan. His inner-voice, his spiritual power and his doctrine of non-violence of which so much is made of, all crumbled before Jinnah’s iron will and proved to be powerless.

             I do say that my shots were fired at the person whose policy and action had brought rack and ruin and destruction to millions of Hindus. There was no legal machinery by which such an offender could be brought to book and for this reason I fired those fatal shots.

             I now stand before the court to accept the full share of my responsibility for what I have done and the judge would, of course, pass against me such orders of sentence as may be considered proper. But I would like to add that I do not desire any mercy to be shown to me, nor do I wish that anyone else should beg for mercy on my behalf. My confidence about the moral side of my action has not been shaken even by the criticism leveled against it on all sides. I have no doubt that honest writers of history will weigh my act and find the true value thereof some day in future.”

- NATHURAM GODSE

Thanks to http://truthofmahatmagandhi.blogspot.in blog. Shared only for informative purposes.