Raving Rambling

Heads have begun rolling following the Congress Working Committee meeting over the weekend. Shivraj Patil has quit – the first political fallout of the Mumbai terror attacks. And here in Maharashtra R.R. Patil has followed suit – following the dictates of his conscience it seems! I can’t figure out how a dumb idiot like him ever managed to make it to the post of State Home Minister. Would anyone with even an iota of sense make a comment like the one he made last week? Must have been inspired by Shahrukh Khan’s “Bade Bade Deshonmei aisi chotti chotti battein hothi rahathi hai” dialogue in some masala movie some years back. Dumb! Or maybe he is a palpable reflection of the mental faculties of our cabinet ministers. God Forbid! Well to come back to the point, is quitting or asking the person in charge of a ministry portfolio to move out the way to right wrongs? What struck me as funny was the fact that when a leader mentioned the words "the Navy's responsibility" defence min...

Last Sunday morning, at church the pastor made an observation that took me back in time to my college days. Ah the good old days! Well, not to digress, each August, our college hosts Malhar, an intercollegiate youth fest that is supposed to be a platform for highly talented college students to display their painting or sculpting or eating or other such sundry skills. But the major chunk of the jantha come for the rock shows and music concerts and other such stuff that Malhar is commonly associated with. Malhar hosts (or at least used to host) two personality contests. The main one is the Mr. and Miss Malhar contest which grills the poor sods who participate on various aspects of their (underdeveloped) personality. The other one, which is less complicated and usually more fun (for the audience that is) is basically about quick repartees and cheek. Try as I might, I can’t remember the name of this contest. Old age catching up maybe! Anyways, that particular year, a visually impaired cand...