It's all in name..

So I visited Mumbai a few days back and all over the place I could see only two names, Veer Mata Jeejabai and Chhatrapati Shivaji.

We Indians have hardly created anything new that is beneficial to the public. For everything good that the Britishers gave us, we try to make it our own by naming it after a local politician or after Gandhi. So Connought  Place gets renamed as Rajiv Chowk, Victoria Terminus changes to Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus , King George Medical College changes to Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj Medical College and so on. Doesn't it show our impotence that we don't have the capability of doing something new? What purpose are we achieving after renaming these public places. Not only that, for everything new that is done, our governments seem to be at a serious disadvantage with respect to names. I want to know what is the contribution of Rajiv Gandhi and how is he greater when compared to the likes of  Lal Bahadur Shastri or Sardar Patel. Aren't we insulting the heroes of our history by not giving them their dues? Why is every new scheme named after Gandhi and not after a Bhagat Singh or a Sarojini Naidu ? 

Mumbai goes a step ahead. For them Maratha pride begins and ends with the family of Chhatrapati Shivaji. Mumbai owes a lot to the Parsi community who have made a significant contribution in making it the financial capital of the country. Or say, the Muslims who have made so much contribution to the art and culture esp. the Bollywood. But since it is ruled practically by maratha goons, every important place will be named after the only significant maratha leader the state of Maharashtra has produced. 

Aren't we depriving the new generation of Indian history by ignoring so many important people. In Lucknow a medical institute is named after Sanjay Gandhi... SANJAY GANDHI!!!! I wonder who is more shameless, the politicians who dare to name it, or we who accept it without any protest. 

The Britishers came to this country and have given us a legacy of their own. It makes sense when we are doing something to reverse the harmful effects of British Rule in our country, but why tamper with something good that they have given us.
We have countless Bharat Ratna awardess, soldiers who won Param Vir Chakra, actors who gave everything for their art, writers who brought about revolution through pen and thanks to License Raj, a few but highly effective industrialists who made significant contributions to the Indian society. But we'll name an obscure lane/crossing after them and forget their contribution. We'll erase the good work done by foreigners and do whatever it takes to achieve petty political gains.
Can we show a little more respect to our own history?

Fixing in IPL

I read a lot of stuff about the whole fixing thing in IPL, that the recent Chennai vs Bangalore match was fixed and it was a deliberate no-ball by Vinay Kumar R.P. Singh to Sir Ravindra Jadeja etc. etc. I don't buy that argument. Because it does not seem likely that match fixing can take place at such a huge scale. 90 foreign players from 7 different countries are participating in this tournament. Add to it an infinite number of sponsors, idiotic actors and corporate houses (who don't know an iota about cricket) and the support staff of cricket teams who assemble together just for a couple of months to run an entertainment show. It will take just one person to come out in the open and make a confession about what is going on in a team or in a match. We all saw what furore Hansie Cronje created by his admission. The stakes are way too high for a team to fix a match and get caught. The whole tournament will lose its credibility, not to mention the players, the captain and the coaches. It might be possible to do spot fixing involving a couple of players or so but to do it on the scale of a match is quite difficult, if not impossible. And the losses would be immense. Also, I like to believe that players like Sachin, Ponting, Muralitharan would not stoop to such low levels. I know that heroes like Hansie Cronje  and Azhar have betrayed this confidence once and no player is holier than thou. But there are people I look up to, and my heart does not like to accept these things unless proven otherwise. 

As it is it appears more like a daily soap these days. There is too much repetition, too much unnecessary drama, excessive dancing and of course there are ubiquitous sponsors and actors. I have never been a fan of IPL but once in a while you get to see the brilliance of Sachin Tendulkar, an old sparkling shot from Adam Gilchrist, that magnificent pull shot from Ricky Ponting, an occasional deceiving ball from Muralitharan that reminds of old times. I close the television or change the channel when these players are no longer in action. IPL for me is just about seeing my old heroes in action. Rest all is cheap ostentation. 

These days...

I go through my old photographs, some old chats with friends, old posts on blogspot, sometimes talk to old friends without whom the life seemed impossible, visit those places which constituted my world, everything brings back a flood of memories...
And I look at myself... I find only a shadow of what I was..
Something is gone... which will never come back