My Contemplation

One more holiday is what the corporate India is thinking on this republic day. Many must have applied for a leave on Monday so that they can enjoy a long weekend. Sat - Tuesday. This is true with almost all Indians (even I am not an exception) and for almost all the holidays or festivals in our country. Few years back I used to ask question why do we celebrate Republic day, I used to get some shocking response from people. I observed that majority never knew the answer. The reason is that during our childhood we mugged up the reason to write it in a history paper but never gave a thought on it or understood it. For those who don't know the importance of Republic day here is brief history why we celebrate 26th January as Republic day every year.

After Independence, we decided to govern ourselves. We prepared a constitution - Law determining the fundamental political principles of a government, a document which shows how the people of country will be governed. This constitution was approved on 26th November 1949 and came into force on January 26, 1950. With this India became a "Sovereign Democratic Republic."

Sovereign means "not controlled by outside forces, autonomous (controlled by the people)."

Democratic means "representing to or adapted for the benefit of the people at large (for the people)."

Republic means "a political system in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who can elect people to represent them (power of the people)."

The constitution says people of India shall be the real rulers of their country, and each citizen shall have right to "Justice, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity". There will be no King or Queen to rule the people.

And we started to govern ourselves.

So all those who still feels that this is a mere holiday for them, think about it again. Understand what it means and try to fight for your right - Justice, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity.

For this Republic Day I tried to write a verse, but I am very bad at words and writing poems. This is my first attempt so please accept my apology for not able to make it up to the mark. As I am proud of being an Indian I thought of writing something on it and would like to publish it on my blog.

I am proud to be an Indian

                                                                             - by Bhuvan

Chetan Bhagat one of the famous young author of 4 bestselling novels - "Five point someone", "One night at call center", "Three mistakes of my life" and recently published "2 states the story of my marriage" is in the middle of controversy after the release of bollywood movie 3 Idiots starring Aamir Khan, R. Madhavan, Sharman Joshi, Kareena Kapoor & Bomen Irani directed by Rajkumar Hirani and produced by Vidhu Vinod Chopra.

The movie 3 idiots is loosely based on novel Five point someone by Chetan Bhagat. If I go one year back when the star cast of movie went to IIM Bangalore to shoot for this movie since then I am hearing that this movie is based on the novel Five point someone by Chetan Bhagat. Five point someone was the biggest hit among the bestselling novels and majority of Indian crowd was really excited about the movie 3 Idiots as they had a impression of being based on the novel which they liked a lot. However today Chetan Bhagat is in middle of controversy as it is claimed by the crew of movie that Chetan Bhagat is trying to gain the publicity as movie is a big hit.

My view is that Chetan Bhagat is himself a big celebrity and he does not need any kind of publicity. His writing is enough to make him notable. His novels and articles written in TOI reveals his talent and is followed & respected by many young Indians. He has nothing to gain by getting into such kind of controversy. In fact he don't need any publicity; my personal belief is that more people in India know about Chetan Bhagat as a famous author than people who know Rajkumar Hirani as director. I found this example in my office itself - one of my colleague was aware that 3 Idiots is based on some novel by Chetan Bhagat but he was not knowing anything about Rajkumar Hirani even though he was hardcore follower of bollywood movies.

The coming year 2010 is really going to be strange for me. The reason that at start itself I got many surprises. We had a Christmas party this year in our office (this was probably the first time that I had a Christmas Party, 1st strange surprise) and we played a game in which I got a gift (an iron manufactured by Bajaj, I was really lucky to get that, 2nd strange surprise) and a message - "All your sorrows will vanish" (3rd strange message). I hope if I have any sorrows it get vanished this year. My luck never favored me in getting such gifts earlier, so indeed it was strange for me.

On 31st eve we had a another party in our office which was actually a party for all bevdaas. We had Whiskey and Vodka along with Fanta and Thums-up to welcome a new year 2010. All those who preferred hard drinks started their drink with small peck of Whiskey and later switched to their own choice of drinks i.e. few continued with pure (only) whiskey while some tried it with cold drink and other tried vodka. All non - alcoholic drinkers started with Fanta and Thums-up. I too was among non-alcoholic drinkers and had never tried alcohol in my life and reason was that I never felt the need of it. I was born & brought up in Gujarat (which is known as dry state) but I did my college in Pune where drinking alcohol is permissible. However I never touched alcohol during my two years of college in Pune (for some it must be very boring, but thats how I am). I used to go out with my friends many times and every time they offered me a drink but I never felt the need of having it and I used to accompany them by drinking cold drinks.

But don't know what was wrong with me on this 31st eve in my office when few of them offered me Vodka and I could not resist (the 4th strange shock). I tried to convince them and waited for cold drinks as it was out of my reach but I could hardly succeed in resisting myself. All my friends would be wondering why I could not resist as I used to during my college years. They will be shocked because I had never listened to them during college years on this matter, how could I get convinced by few corporate colleagues and friends. People usually gets more mature and strong as they grow up but for me it was completely different. People tend to start all these in college but I surpassing all of them started in corporate life.

But later when I gave a thought on it I came to know the actual reason for it. Let me clarify I just had a 30ml of Vodka and that too with a full glass of Fanta and so I was not going to fuddle. At the time when I agreed to have a small peck of Vodka, few old talks and promises with my friends were running in my mind. One of my friend promised me that one the day when I will start drinking he will stop drinking. Also I had a talk with another friend and she told me that unless you don't taste it you will never realize the fun or pleasure of drinking and this conversation started because at that time I was trying to help her to get rid of smoking habit. But I could hardly argue them as I had never tried alcohol and they always used to pitch in the discussion with this point. So when all these thoughts were running in my mind, one more thought leaped out of the queue and got the highest priority in my thinking process and it was: what am I going to loose or gain if I will have a small peck of Vodka. I was not going to loose anything but yes I can at least prove my point to her that there is no such extraordinary pleasure of having an alcohol and that I was true that there is no need of having it or help my  another friend to follow his promise and ask him to stop drinking.

I know my this move is not going to make any change in their life, but now at least I can strongly argue with them when any such point is raised. They will surely argue that drinking 30ml of Vodka with full of Fanta is not called drinking, but let me clarify that now I am not going to drink any more, this was my first and the last drink. Now its their turn to keep their promise, I have done my part.

I know no one will believe that only for this reason I boozed so I would like to clarify that among all those thoughts hovering in my mind one thought was in favor of tasting it "At least once in my life I should taste and feel it to know what it is?" And probably because so many different thoughts, few for my friends and few on getting an opportunity to taste it, I think I could not resist. The fact is I enjoyed the party, I enjoyed the stay of people when all were drinking and I enjoyed drinking as well (but yes it tastes like hell and I still hate boozing). Also nothing among these (fun, pleasure, people around me) would have changed if instead of Vodka + Fanta I would have had Fanta alone, the fun and the pleasure would still be the same and sometimes I even regret for that. With such as start of new year I can at least make sure that this year is really going to be strange for me.