Skip to main content

Posts

Anecdotes of ..... Gobind Ballabh Pant ji

Govind Ballabh Pant ji was clearly a man of many great qualities and public service to the nation. However, he was very traditional in his views of women. ...........The first day all went well and at dusk we reached the village where we were to spend the night. The villagers, always hospitable, insisted on supplementing the evening meal we had brought with us. Later, when it was time to retire, I found that the little village schoolhouse had been swept and cleaned and all our bedding rolls laid out side by side. For some reason I had expected a place of my own to sleep in. Seeing consternation on my face, which I could not hide, one of my colleagues explained gently that this was how it was going to be throughout the campaign, but I must not mind, they would all take care of me. .......Ranjit and I had agreed that we should phone each other whenever possible and give news of how our respective campaigns were progressing. I phoned the second evening. “Everything is going very well,” I ...
Post a Comment
Read more
Recent posts

The World Moves on

The World moves on. It does so very quickly. I guess it should be that way. But one hopes that it lingers a bit on a few little things. Just a bit. Longer than a blink. Shorter than a wee sigh. What are these little things one may ask?  Not just the sun and the moon and the stars and the flowers underneath.  But also the glint in a brat's eye.  The withering sadness of a lighthouse, a beacon of hope, really,  The desolation of a white sheet of paper when words fail you  The deafening silence when a heart goes crack in two. The melancholy of an eternal optimist. The World moves on quickly,  Perhaps for the best.  
Post a Comment
Read more

Us or Me

For our Leadership & Accountability Class, we had to read a chapter of Ian McEwan's book "Enduring Love". In true McEwan style, this paragraph was captivating - "I didn't know, nor have i ever discovered, who let go first. I'm not prepared to accept that it was me. But everyone claims not to have been first. What is certain is that if we had not broken ranks, our collective weight would have brought the balloon to earth .. But as Ive said, there was no team, there was no plan, no agreement to be broekn. No failure. So can we accept that it was right, everyman for himself? Were we all happy afterward that this was a reasonable course? We never had that comfort, for there was a deeper covenant, ancient and automatic, written in our nature. Cooperation - the basis of our earliest hunting successes, the force behind our evolving  capacity for language, the glue of our social cohesion. Our misery in the aftermath was proof that we knew we had failed ourselves....
Post a Comment
Read more

Where Has It All Gone?

There are some books you grow too old for. And then, there are books that you are never too old for. I unabashedly enjoy reading and re-reading L M Montgomery's classic, no not Anne of Green Gables, but Emily of New Moon. Dont get me wrong, I was/am a devoted fan of the entire Anne of Green Gables series and practically devoured all 5 books. But Emily of New Moon has a special place. I still remember exactly when I finished reading it - St Catz library, Oxford, an afternoon in November 2003, in my 20s! - I shut the book, traipsed down the spiral staircase, literally skipping here and there and promising myself that I shall be like Emily in terms of retaining my childish passion for life for ever and ever. Old promises have a way of coming back and biting you. Where has it all gone? It all reminded me of the Old English poem, The Wanderer, that my Olde English professor made us memorize. My memory does not do justice to the entire peom, but i remember the most poignant which I have...
1 comment
Read more

Old Wrongs

How do you you right old wrongs? There havent been many, fortunately. But the few gnaw, bit by bit, inch by inch, at your peace of mind. They linger and fester. Mock at you. They shant be silenced till you have the courage to go back and right the wrong. Even if the other person(s) has moved on and can scarce remember what you are talking about. I am feeling reckless today. One of my biggest and oldest wrongs was when I refused to walk to the medical shop to fetch my sister pain killers when she was in agony. This was when I was in 6th grade. They say children can be cruel. But I was no child. It cannot be explained away. I still am frightened about my capacity then to be cruel. I have never apologized to my sister. But I have, ever since, tried to never let my sister down. But an apology is long overdue. I am sorry.
3 comments
Read more

Hank Paulson

spoke at Burden Auditorium an hour ago. The ex Secretary of the Treasury of USA spoke about leadership, ethics and his decisions during the global meltdown. He also spoke about his most important skill he picked up at HBS ( he was class of 79 if I remember correctly, and was from my section!)  was the ability to convince and influence people through oral communication. Which isnt very different from what I thought would be the most important skill I need to learn before I am out of here.
Post a Comment
Read more

Who Reads the Papers

I needed a dose of humor over the weekend, and who else do i turn to but Yes, Minister, in my opinion, the finest jewel of British comedy. Saw the episode where MP Jim Hacker tells about who reads the papers as below - Hacker:  Don't tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads the papers: the  Daily Mirror  is read by people who think they run the country;  The Guardian  is read by people who think they ought to run the country;  The Times  is read by people who actually do run the country; the  Daily Mail  is read by the wives of the people who run the country; the  Financial Times  is read by people who own the country;  The Morning Star  is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country; and  The Daily Telegraph  is read by people who think it is. Sir Humphrey:  Prime Minister, what about the people who read  The Sun ? Bernard:   Sun  readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big t@*s
Post a Comment
Read more

Its -11 degrees Celsius

...outside but weather.com tells me that it feels like -22deg Celsius thanks to the howling beastly wind. This is the coldest weather I have ever lived in and its quite weird. Cant wait for the snow storms In February. There is ice on my Vicotrian semi-bay window panes. I am prep-ing for an unprep-able final tomorrow in a warm bed and thinking of all the books I can devour after I am done with awful phase of B-school. 
Post a Comment
Read more

Snippets of Wisdom

from our LEAD class -  "Nothing is worse than procrastination.. It's better to make decisions quickly and be right seven out of ten times than to waste time trying to achieve the perfect solution. To stick one's neck out and do the right thing is obviously best. But the second best is to take action, make a mistake and learn from your action. To take no action is the only unacceptable behaviour for ABB managers" - Percy Barnevick (Europe's answer to America's Jack Welch
Post a Comment
Read more

Quest for Inner Ring

CS Lewis's very relevant take on corruption -  To nine out of ten of you the choice which could lead to scoundrelism will come, when it does come, in no very dramatic colors. Obviously bad men, obviously threatening or bribing, will almost certainly not appear. Over a drink or a cup of coffee, disguised as a triviality and sandwiched between two jokes, from the lips of a man, or woman, whom you have recently been getting to know rather better and whom you hope to know better still-just at the moment when you are most anxious not to appear crude, or naif, or a prig-the hint will come. It will be the hint of something which is not quite in accordance with the technical rules of fair play: something which the public, the ignorant, romantic public, would never understand: something which even the outsiders in your own profession are apt to make a fuss about: but something, says your new friend, which "we"-and at the word "we" you try not to blush for mere pleasure-s...
Post a Comment
Read more

A Thoughtprovoking Discussion

In our LEAD class, we were made to read a bunch of 10 year and 20 year memoirs of the HBS Class of 1976. The ensuing discussion in class was thought provoking. We went on to desribe our personal take on 'what is success'. It was an almost touching experience to hear how my very accomplished classmates measure success. And let me tell you it wasn't just coming to HBS or getting awards.  One said his immigrant grandfather taught him that true success can be measured by how many people attend your funeral. Because when you die, people don't owe you anything, except for respect. Another said, success cannot be achieved if you pursue success. Instead if you pursue happiness, success will follow.  Yet another said that maybe success is not just about yourself and is actually about striving for the success of others. I wont go into mine, because I think anybody who reads my older posts can pretty much get a sense of it. In fact, someone had written my thoughts better than I h...
1 comment
Read more