Hey all,

Long time. No see. Sorry, I had been busy a few weeks. Well to start with I suffered from kidney stone for a week. Boy! it hurts. It really does. Has any1 of u suffered from that, i mean stones. Really, it was one of the worst pain. But somehow I took a leave from my work for a week and got to drinking water and I mean I was drinking gallons (yeah, i am exagerating) but I was drinking water that was what I was doing, lots of it. Anyway, things r okay now.

After that the next two weeks I was loaded with work, it was literally raining works in my office. During the two weeks, there were days when i worked 18 hrs shift. Well, i had to. You know why cause when we have no work (which we know beforehand), we got no work. So it’s like this. We got to compensate.

Anyhow, after that the next one week my mom was not feeling well (no, not swine flu, thank god). She was admitted to the hospital for a week. Well, medical expenses have really shot up for me in the month passed. Anyhow, she is doing okay now. Not yet fully recovered but better than before.

So guys i have been kind of occupied but hope to start blogging (whatever itsie-bitsy that I do) again. Thinking that you might have missed me. Well, I did miss you all. Reading your blogs and stuff. Anyhow, hope the sun keeps shining on me. Wish me luck. And do check my new post, will be dotting some thoughts on something.

Bye for now. Happy Blogging.

Read this article in some webpage. Was ecstatic about it and wanted to share. It’s about Mumbai realty market……

Here it goes……


More than half the houses built in six major cities over the last two years are lying unsold, estimates a leading real estate research agency.

Just about 3.86 lakh homes out of the 8.21 lakh built in the last two years in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (Mumbai, Thane and Navi Mumbai), National Capital Region (Delhi, Faridabad, Gurgaon, Noida, Greater Noida and Ghaziabad ), Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad and Pune found buyers, says a report by the Mumbai-based Liases Foras. The agency surveyed 5,810 new residential projects in these cities in December and January.

The 53 per cent unsold inventory (4.35 lakh homes) translates into no takers for 50 crore sq ft of a total 94 crore sq ft of living space. Pankaj Kapoor, CEO of Liases Foras, said the inventory of unsold houses across cities has doubled over the past year. In Mumbai, it has increased nearly five times between 2006 and 2009 ? from 1.68 lakh sq ft to 8.08 lakh sq ft.

Kapoor attributed the absence of buyers to the mismatch between prices and affordibility. According to the report, prices started to go up in 2006, when supply was limited. Over the next two years, they shot through the roof as money poured into real estate firms from IPOs, FDI and cash-laden investors. Stocks piled up as developers shifted focus from selling homes to getting financial valuations done to attract more investment.

This, Kapoor said, is evident from the fact that Chennai, which has a conservative realty market with little involvement of equity players, has only 42 per cent unsold flats ¿ less than Mumbai and Delhi and the IT hubs of Bangalore, Pune and Hyderabad, where over 50 per cent of the stock remains unsold.

The supply glut, and the fact that investors and private equity firms are largely out of the realty market, signals good times for buyers, the report says. Firms like DLF have announced price cuts ranging from 18 per cent (Chennai) to 30 per cent (Bangalore).

"Battling mounting debts, developers are left with little option but to find end-users to sell their flats. The gap between affordability and pricing is narrowing," Kapoor said.


So, looking at the thing it seems like the current hype created by the homebuilders is unrealistic. I feel the prices of the home should come down in the near future. Hope, this happens real soon. The realty sector of Mumbai must get a reality check. Well, you might suppose why am I concerned. Well, I want to buy a home. Yaar, settle hona hai ;). Anyways, there has been unprecedented rise in the prices. I hope government takes note of it and do something on their behalf. Also, dear bloggers, please forward this message about the realty sector in Mumbai for potential buyers, your friend or relatives anyone that things are looking gloomy, so bargain with the builder. You might get a better price. Anyways, take care and happy blogging all. Pranky signing off this blog.

Hasta la vista, baby.

Just yesterday I was reading Manoj’s Blog on Chetan Bhagat and he seemed too ecstatic about him and I suppose have high hopes from him. Well, I’m not questioning his (Chetan’s) caliber, but for me Manoj seemed to go a bit overboard about him. (Sorry, no offense Manoj, this is just my views). Manoj said in his blog that “he is the future”. Really, I mean, he is a good writer and maybe even an orator (I haven’t heard his speeches though) but when it comes to movie it’s a different ballgame my friend.

If somebody is a good writer doesn’t mean that he will be a good filmmaker, does it? And I think vice-versa is true too. For me, Mani Sir is the best of the lot in filmmakers. He has a passion for movies and if you are a regular follower of his movies you might have noticed that he always shoots his movies in India. Instead of venturing to foreign locations for shooting, the talented filmmaker tries to find locations in India, where the stories are normally set. Now, I don’t think that Mani Sir, even though is a good filmmaker, will make an  excellent writer. He might have to take help of a ghost writer I suppose.

Anyhow, back to Bhagat, well, I read only two of his books, Five Points and ON@CC and I felt Five Points surely takes the point. I too am dying to see it be made in a movie. Only I suppose this time he chooses a better director for the movie.

On the book ON@CC. When I started reading it, it kind of went well but then in the midst of it I felt that the story was losing direction. Having read Five Points, I had hoped something better, unfortunately, this book didn’t live up to its expectations. But it did prove a point though that people are not what they seem to be and most people show their strengths and weaknesses when there is a crisis.

As for the Movie Hello! I suppose, maybe it was more to do with the director than Chetan Bhagat I suppose. Atul Agnihotri wasn’t able to put forth the story in the way it was said in the book. Also, if you ask my opinion, every actor in the movie sucked real bad except for Sharman Joshi and Gul Panag. Suresh Menon was intolerable. However, I really used to dig and still do his antics in “Indian Laughter Challenge”. Does anybody remember “Ratan Reimburse”. The character was too good. Suresh Menon is a great actor but he (or rather the character) annoyed me.

Anyhow, Manoj, still, saying it again friend, no offense. Just my views.

Well, just so everyone know, I’m a physics grad from some college in Mumbai. Well, frankly I had always liked science and particularly physics. Maybe it was due to one of my teachers that I got interested in physics in particular. He had good knowledge and knew how to explain things in a way that we understood.

I never aced in anything but things came naturally to me. I mean, I was no mugger (except I did mugging in my final year grad) but I was considered a bright student by my peers. I never did sleepless nights during my exams. Rather I don’t even remember mugging much for my exams. I used to fare bad in my languages (particularly hindi and marathi), history, and geography b’coz that required mugging up.

I liked math and science. I had this dream of becoming a scientist. You know, you used to watch those movies or cartoons wherein a scientist is working in his lab creating some mechanical toy, robot or maybe some chemical. Well, I had a dream of becoming one and having my own laboratory. But in college I suppose the dream died out with my grades being not up to the mark to get admission in better college and not getting proper guidance. But somehow I graduated in physics, it was mostly through mugging this time, basically was not clear about most of the concepts (it might be b’coz of me bunking most classes I suppose).

Anyhow, after completing my grad in physics what am I doing? Well, I’m into some company doing bussiness documentation for a US client (Don’t ask me what that is). You might be thinking how the hell did I land here. Well, after completing my grad I was waitin for my results and then I saw this ad in the paper which proclaimed good salary with training and even undergraduates can apply. I applied, got selected, and got into working. And I’m sort of stuck with this. I’ve got loan on my head now, so I can’t even leave the job and actually don’t seem to see any scope in pursuing a career in physics. I’ll have to do further studies for that, maybe MSc but with current finances I don’t think that will be possible b’coz science is a full-time subject. At least pure science you don’t have part-time stuff. I know some might say “Where there is a will, there is a way.” I suppose my WILL isn’t that strong then.

Also some other things in my life have taken precedence over physics but for the love of the Pure Science, I still go through some websites dedicated to physics and read some articles, keeps me fascinated. Anyhow sorry for rambling so much. It had been so long since I blogged.

This is Pranky signing off.

Bye.

Today I was reading one of my Ilander friends Manoj Kumar Nair’s blog where he went on talking about few things ranging from electricity being sold in Rwanda to YUVA. Well, he said it in a good way. But if you ask me what was depicted in Yuva and for that matter Nayak (Anil Kapoor Starer) was quite inspiring no doubt, but I think things like that happen mostly in movies. I am not being pessimist or anything, but changes overnight happen only in movies.

Youths of this country mostly have bright ideas about ways to help India become a great country to recon with. But for that we need great leaders, not politicians and India is run by politicians, not leaders today. Most of my friends and colleagues feel India will do best in a Presidential rule. I too sometimes feel looking at the state of rot the country is or for that matter city of Mumbai is. I might sound like I have lost hope on the system. But if you ask me, I really don’t know that myself.

If you tell me to lead, sorry, I don’t think I can carry the burden because I have a few or rather many responsibilities to my family and I really can’t ignore that. I believe being a leader or getting into politics (as depicted in Nayak) is a full-time job. It’s not that I am afraid to do it, but I have certain responsibilities, which I don’t want to elaborate over here, which I can’t overlook. I would really be the one to support a person, who is ready to lead with a great vision.

About your point of view on “Electricity is sold here“. Well, I live in Mumbai’s suburb area. and I feel with Reliance taking over the most useful commodity electricity from government, the days are not long when we will have the pre-paid system for electricity in place. Reliance is on a spree of hiking tariff, which I think is pretty unreasonable. The rationale as given by Reliance is that the usage has increased and they don’t have enough production. What I want to ask them is why the hell did they give permission or provided electricity to the upcoming malls and towers when they knew they didn’t had the infrastructure for producing more units. Another reason given by Reliance is that the fuel cost has increased. Hello!!!!……it was $160 a barrel crude 3 to 4 months back, now it is hovering around 60, where the hell has the fuel cost increased? Reliance is only out there to make money. It doesn’t even want a fair play and was stopping Tata to enter into the foray of retail power distribution and wanted to keep the monopoly. Anyways, sorry for ranting so much. It’s just my frustration regarding Reliance taking away my hard earned money and I don’t find any political party taking a stand against this. It’s only Marathi Manus and such trivial things which political parties go after.

Well there are many issues in India, which I can only talk about, and I was only talking about Mumbai. I know you might say, “Koi Country perfect nahin hota, usse perfect banana padta hai” But with the current condition of our country, it is surely a daunting task. I might help you, but I’m really sorry I can’t lead you. So, fellow Ilanders do you think you have it in you???

PS: I love my country with my whole heart.

Hey have you heard of the new reality show “Rakhi Ka Swayamvar“? Okay, I know you all did. Well, after all she is a very well known and maybe even loved (or whatever) celebrity. And now you hear she is wanting to get married and that too on TV?????? She is on a nationwide search for her perfect husband. Now let me ask is she a perfect wife to begin with?

Now, I really feel the reality TV has gone to the dogs. Just imagine (yeah, Imagine — the channel which is hosting the show) the mockery of saath-pheras. I really want to know how many of you really think she is doing this so-called reality show to find her Perfect Husband???

Well, as most of you know, she had a boyfriend, Abhishek, right? So why didn’t she get married to him? What happened? What went wrong? Well, if you ask me, my gut feeling tells me they both used each other, well Abhishek might have rather over-used her, but she used him too I feel. I don’t have specifically anything against (or for that matter “for”) Rakhi Sawant. I just don’t seem to like her a bit. I find her to be too arrogant, outspoken, abrasive. You see, I like girls who have confidence but not one with attitude and that’s precisely what she has. Anyway, it’s her life, let her lead it the way she likes and may god bless her.

so, again, who’s going for the Swayamvar? Any takers??????

Today I was reading one of my blog friend Sameera's earlier
blog, "Disease of the Generation". I can't
but second Sameera's thought on this. I
was actually surprised at her highlighting the fact that women in our
generation have become "less tolerant" now since they have become financially independent,
because whenever I used to say the same thing to some of my female colleagues/friends,
they gave me the glare, saying "male chauvinist". So, it's great to hear my opinions being
voiced by a species of a fairer sex (no offense Sameera).

I also want to prove that I'm not a chauvinist by accepting
the fact what Sameera said about men still being trapped in the dark ages. It's like they think their wife is something they
own, a commodity, and treat them like one.
Actually we males do make fun of our male friends if somehow we came to
know they are doing house chores for their wife (joru ka gulaam), but one has
to understand that it's just a joke and one has to take it that way. Also, as Sameera said, compatibility is what
plays the key role in keeping the marriage alive. One has to remember "if not for his/her flaws,
he/she might have gotten a better deal".

Also, I would like to add that I have a female friend of
mine who got married and had an annulment just months after her marriage. I have heard her side of the story and feel her
hubby is to be blamed. I won't get into
the details over here on why she went in for annulment but I really felt sorry
for her. You might think I am favoring my
friend but she presented me with some evidence which proved her to be
right. Now she is scarred for life and
she says she is better off single. And
you know what guys, looking at her and a similar case I had seen, I'm having
second thoughts on marriage. I know marriage
is a great institution, but who wants to live in an institution? Sorry, jokes apart, I really get shivers now
thinking about getting married. Hope I might
muster up courage someday to enter into the institution.

Sorry guys, I think this is one of my blogs where I rambled
too much, but would like to know your views.
Let me know your views.

PS: Thanks Sameera
for your blog, it really inspired me to pen this down. Happy Blogging.

India, Asia’s 4th most corrupt nation

April 10, 2009

Corruption has gripped countries across the
world. India is no execption. Many bribery and corruption scandals have
tarnished India’s image over the years. Across Asia, several countries
still see rampant corruption at all levels exposing the nexus between
political parties and corporate houses.

India, with a score* of 7.21 on the
corruption index, is the fourth most corrupt nation in Asia, according
to a survey by the Political and Economic Risk Consultancy (PERC).

Companies have cited excessive
regulation and high levels of corruption as a major constraint to doing
business in India. Corruption takes the form of bribery, kickbacks from
deals and tax evasion in India. It continues to be a major concern,
especially in government procurement of telecommunications, power, and
defence deals, the study states.

Frankly, friends, I just read the above news on Rediff today and was not really amazed but ashamed and I got me thinking, “Am I really proud to be Indian?”. Frankly, I really don’t know. I know some might say no country is perfect, we got to make it perfect. Okay, I believe it, but at least there should be chance to make it perfect and everytime I find myself dejected at the kind of things happening in India. Some might say, why i don’t take the initiative, but I really don’t know where to start. I have tried putting sense in people about rules at certain places, be it a queue for bus, et cetera, but everytime I found myself being the laughing stock.

What my feel is “Might is Right” in India. So, can anyone really tell me what I should be proud of as an INDIAN???