Tribute to Dada--- Sourav Ganguly

"Bhule toe nahi may Sourav Ganguly" the famous ad when Sourav Ganguly was not in the team. A typical bengali guy with specs asking whole India this question when he was left out of the team after confrontation with Greg Chappell. Now on 10th of Nov 2008 when he got retired all cricket fan are saying Dada tumko nahi bhul payenge. You have brought smiles innumerable times to Indian masses. Sometimes you have won us matches single handedly & your captainship was incomparably marvelous.
Undoubtedly Dada was one of the best batsman in One day cricket. In one day cricket he matched Sachin's calibre. Even in test matches he was the pillar of middle order. His batting average never dropped below 40 that itself tells the high calibre of this man. After his test debut at Lords with a maiden test hundred Dada never looked back. With a maiden century he shut many critic's mouth who was doubting his inclusion in that England tour. Dada didn't stop with a maiden hundred, he followed it up at Edgbaston with one more ton. It was England summer with jumpers on but Dada was going hot which I am sure had made many English men to take it off. I was as usual was glued to TV seeing a maestro at work specially offside of the wicket. No surprise that Rahul admired him calling God of offside.
Who can forget that innings in Dhaka against Pakistan in final match, who can forget his towering long sixes ask Nicky Boje who has taken micky out of him. Then comes the captainship on this same day 10th Nov 2000. The team was in tatters even the great Sachin refused the captainship. In midst of the tumoil their comes a Dada, whom I say a charismatic personality. Looks are deceiving this man took bulls by horn & changed the style of Indian cricket. Agreat revamp came we started winning matches fromverge of defeat. He inculcated aggression, fire, passion in the team. Earlier for a greater part of 90's India used to depend on Sachin Tendulkar but not now there are Yuvrajs, Sehwags, Gambhirs.
Pinnacle moment of his captaincy came when he was able to take India's team to World Cup final in South Africa. It was like relaunching of Coke to India after its exit 1988. Here it happened after 22 years when India found themselve in World Cup final. Its a relaunch & we call it now Team India. Then onwards if we look into last 5 years India in most of the occasions played good cricket apart from 2007 World cup under Greg Chappell coaching & man management. Talking about man management can we find better person than Dada, yes I know Dhoni seems one step ahead but lets not forget Dhoni is just new to captainship he has tp prove a lot or reach Dada's stature as Captain. Sourav's man management was exemplory. Talk about Harbhajan, backed him to the core. Yuvraj Singh, nurtured under his captainship. Sehwag one of disastrous opener in world cricket in both forms of game. He was made as a Test opener by Sourav & see his statistics now. Master stroke was when Dravid was struggling with his form & India was looking for all rounder to make valuable contribution in middle order. Dada was realizing that & he made Dravid as a wicket keeper who was quite decent into it. Slowly Dravid came back to his best & wall was saved from breaking & India had some valuable wins that time.
Now when Dada has retired we can say India team is one of the best & lot of credit can be given to Dada for it. He must have told Dhoni the Obamaism- Yes We Can Win World Cup.
Salute to Dada. We will never forget you. You are the flavour of Indian cricket & it will be always cherished by all cricket fans.

Kolkata Calling....!

Today evening I am going to Kolkata. Its been a longtime I visited the city of Joy, almost one & half years. So very excited about my visit. Meeting relatives & friends are one of the main reason of excitement but overall the enigma of Kolkata always been a big influence on me & I like visiting that place again & again. As they say you can love kolkata, You can hate kolkata but simply you cannot ignore Kolkata. So true! This city has an amazing aura.
Then food buff like me- In bengali I call it- Khaddo Rosik has some more reason to love the place. So Khaddo rosik like me are always excited to be in Kolkata & taste all those different types of fish, Mughlai & chinese preperations. Who can forget the famous rolls of Haji. Biryanis of Aminia. Also the road side Alur chop & phuluri wallas. Its a favourite time evening snacks with Muri. Yes calories & fats are in abundance in these foods but our body can give us levy to have these slow poisons once in a while especially during vacation. Sweets- The Bengalis & sweets are colonial cousins. Tasty Rosogollas, Milk cakes are delicious there. Last but not the least Himsagar mangos, I simply love it.
Kolkata calling, where are you man? Yaa yaa am coming!

Bangaliana!

Today on a Sunday evening with tea cup in my hand & seeing the wet outside, its been raining heavily for last of couple of days, a word- Bangaliana came to my mind. Just started unwinding my thoughts.
My upbringing is in a Bengali family outside west bengal. The culture & traditions of Bangla are all there & followed in our household. Its been very interesting whenever we as a Probashi Bengali (Bengali staying outside West Bengal) get together to celebrate Bengali festival & creating a niche amongst all the communities. Also its intriguing from childhood to visit Kolkata & see the life there, which is very different then other cities. If I have to define in a single word what does it mean to being a Bengali, it is Bangaliana!
It means Literature cognizance...
It means Philosophical outlook...
It means food for thought nea thought for food actually...
It means Tea Connoisseur...
Bengali means celebrating Durga Puja which is uncomparable..
It means craziness for Hilsa Fish...
Bengali means passion for football...
Bengali means Mohan Bagan Vs East Bengal match...
Also it means Argentina Vs Brazil match....
Bengali means sipping tea in a Khuri (Earthen pots)...
Bengali means pronouncing words of English forcefully...
It means discussing politics with a zeal besides the street..
Bengali means 24 x 7 in festive mood...
Bengali means Sunday morning in a fish market...
Bengali means discussing day to day activities of Sourav Ganguly in a newspaper...
Bengali means reciting poems of Rabindranath Tagore....
Bengali means enjoying weekend at a Book festival...
It means eat out at Chinese Restro once in a month atleast.....
Bengali means calling spade a spade...
Bengali means finding at least one singing talent in a family...
Bengali means mothers standing outside the school gate with Daab (Coconut Water) after exam...
Bengali means gifting sweets to friends & family without any specific reason or so....
Bengali means relishing Himsagar Mango in a Hot Summer....
All the above are the ingredients of Bangaliana. Am sure many people had seen this. Also many had become a part of it at some point of their life & found it intriguing.

Ruler- The Rajasthan Royals

Rajasthan Royals the underdogs before the start of IPL has shown their team spirit with a thoroughly professional approach to clinch the inaugural IPL title. Their hallaa bol has certainly amazed the some of the highly rated teams & choked their opponents in most of the matches. They are the deserving winners of the IPL.

The Asnodkars, Pathans, Watsons has shown that balanced approach fetch dividends. It is their shear power packed performace with bat with intelligent shot selections made them class apart of others. Yes there were other good perfomances by players of other teams like Gambhir, Abhishek Nair, Shikhar Dhawan, Goni, Solanke, Shukla etc but Rajasthan Royals have bunch of youngsters who has performed consistently. Their mentor Shane Warne was a Pied Piper. Not to forget the contribution of South African Captain Greame Smith & Pakistan gutsy wicket keeper Kamran Akmal.

Shane Warne the Captain & coach of Rajasthan Royals has shown for once & all that why he was rated so higly in Australia for his cricketing acumen apart from his spin bowling skills. Shane was in contention for captaining the baggy green cap after Steve Waughs retirement, though at the end it was his off field skills has denied him the job. He has that aura & magnetisn in The Rajasthan Royals team was prominently visible on field.

So it was the Royal spin wizard Shane Warne & his young bunch of exuberant talented cricketers ruled the roost in IPL. They are the deserving champions.

Bangla- Sweeter Than Sweetest Language (Ishhh...)

Bangla is a arguably the sweetest language of all the languages spoken in India. I am hearing for years that Bangla is so sweet, sometimes I wonder which are those sentences or words which has created such a niche amonst all the languages spoken all over India. Let me take a detailed view on it.

Aami tomake bhalo bashi.... This sentence has always have a strong effect in teenagers. I remember when I am in school friends use to ask me often whether this is the way "I Love U" is translated in Bangla. I wondered whether this sentence is so strong that is going to make a great effect to propose a bengali girl only or it has a hysteric effect in proposing other girls too.

Then "Ogo Suncho"...This is a typical sentence used in most of the bengali household by better half to call his/her other better half.

Ki Korchish....This is a typical way most of the time whenever I met my close non bengali family friend enquired about me.

Also the Bengalis eat everything & don't drink anything is a point of attraction. Jol khabo, Juice kheachi etc.

Then who can forget Ishhh.... This word has that aura which specially girls love it. She doesnt need to be bengali for it. Then who can forget Devdas where Paro was in love with this word apart from Devdas.

One reason may be because most of the words in Bangla ends with a tone of "O" & the way bengali delivers most of the words with soothing tone of "O" like Jabo, Khabo, Sobo, Ki korcho, kota bajlo...

Also the bengali is a uncomplicated language & someway related with Hindi. Our National Anthem is also in Bengali & from the childhood everybody is singing in the morning assembly. So the fascination for the Bangla language gets inculcated from the childhood.

Bankim Chandra's Vande Mataram is also in Bengali. Our national anthem written by Rabindra nath Tagore & Bankim Chandra's Vande Mataram has significant effect in popularising bengali language in every household of India.

It is the soothing effect of Bangla language with its ancient richness by popularising it into masses by Rabindra Nath Tagore, Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Michael Madhusudan Dutta, Bankim Chandra, Nazrul Islam, Sarat Chandra has given Bengali language a boost & created interest amongst all.

Competitiveness & fun!

Couple of days back I went to see a match between Mumbai Indian & Rajasthan Royals in D.Y Patil Stadium at Nerul, Navi Mumbai. First time went to see an IPL match. Amazed to see a stadium was full of crowd on a weekday that too not for an International match, its a city match. Colorful atmosphere all around with a DJ buzzing on a full throttle. People came with Drums & trumpet's, it was like a festival time. With artificial lights blazing at its best & a lush green ground, really gives an awesome atmosphere. Not to forget the cheer leaders who are on their toes always to look for an opportunity to shake their bellies like Shakira & some moves which are not to far from Madhuri's dancing skills to match the theme songs of IPL teams whenever sixes or fours been hit by their own franchisee team. On a broader sense the cheerleaders are well awerse in their dancing skills & certainly added a flavor which crowd were throughly enjoying.

This T20 format definitely revolutionizing the way cricket is beenplayed & its certainly an entertainment prospect with action & thrill component. I feel Cricket crazy Indian public deserve it. Already acceptance in general public can be seen by the way almost all the matches were played in front of sold out crowd.

Also want to add that though people are moved by this format due to its compactness & added flavors but the quality of cricket also need to be compliment as it is of a high class. That is actually proved in the first match itself when Mc Cullum hit a mind boggling century with a terrific hitting of power & class. Also the young upcoming players of India also getting chance to play with a proven performers is definitely going to prove worthwhile in near future.

I am really moved by seeing the IPL match due to its competitiveness, thrill, fun & festivity.

Bhajji- The Culprit

Verdict is out that Bhajji has committed a gruesome behavior of hitting a fellow player from the national team & has been banned for 11 IPL matches. The man with a 10 years experience of playing International cricket has erupted to a possible banter of a novice cricketer.
Harbhajan's hysteric moment of madness has fetch him with a big trouble when a couple of months back everybody has supported him against that racial abuse case in Australia.
This type of behavior should not be tolerated because this guys have an iconic status & they should act responsibly. Actually its a shame for all of us. Just when IPL is showing the power of Indian cricket, this episode has a spoilsport & created a bitter taste.
IPL has shown a right precedence by giving him a ban of 11 matches & this type of nasty activity should never be tolerated. Any sports should be played with a positive spirit. This is high time when our sportsmen understand that they should behave responsibly.

IPL- A major success

The IPL extravaganza at its peak. Boy! it has become a mother of all prime time entertainment. Clock ticks at 8 O' Clock everybody is getting glued into TV to watch cricket- Prime time entertainment. All the hoopla! of IPL has lived up its expectation. This slam bang cricket is expected to make heavy impact as a global sports all over the world. After seeing the first match when Mc Cullum hit a blazing century & the crowd turnout at Chinnaswami Stadium at Bangalore, I feel this expectation of making it a global sports is going to be successful for sure. This is the tonic Cricket which required for a long time.
As far as the added flavor is concerned that is provided by none other than SRK. That guy has amazing enthusiasm for sports. I understand he is the owner of the franchisee so he need to be in the thick of things but to be a part of the cricket matches, promotions, almost every where related to Cricket these days, shows his commitment, not to forget he is a star in Bollywood & he has commitment for movies too.
With respect to actual cricket, I would say T20 has brought a totally different version of cricket. It seems hitting sixes are easier than making a child to take milk. Now opportunities are at galore for the young people who would want to be a cricket player.
For me IPL has brought lot of excitement & loving to watch players from different countries who are enjoying each others company. Surely this format is going to be sure shot success in future.

Puliya Adda

Adda is a word in Bengali which means gossiping. Puliya adda which I am refering here is very famous amongst my group of friends. Puliya adda used to be one of our prime need during our school & college days. Really cherishing for all of us even today. Even if it was exam days we used to make sure that we spend at least 1 hour in the evening to have our adda. The main members of our puliya group were myself, Parijat, Sutanu, Dipanjan, Anisur, Kaushik, Joydeep, Anup Kutty, Anup Mandal, Abhilash.
We used to enjoy a lot. The most number of jokes were thrown by Parijat with his own style of jumbling the words here & there. Shayaris some were mindless & some were romantic making the passion raised inside was also part of adda. Anup Mandal used to be financer for Samosas, Pakodas & Colas. So couple of hours of saucy adda with food & cola used to make the best of the day for us

Best part of our adda was never restricted only to girls. We used to discuss lot about Cricket, current affairs, politics etc.
As I am writing today, day before holi, the holi celebration at our defence colony just came infront of my eyes. We used to have unique way of celebrating amongst our friends is to tear away the clothes ( only the upper portion) starting with tearing away the pocket of theshirt. 3 hours of playing holi & going back home with your bare skin on a byke or a scooter does looked like an ancient man coming out of forest on his horse.

Puliya Adda had became our daily need of life. After playing at evening or coming back from Tuitions this was one of our main requirement. I must say that strenthen the bonding amongst our group of friends. Now all friends of our group are at different places but whenever we meet we used to discuss those good old days of puliya adda.

I must say our Puliya Adda group one of the famous group in the colony because all those loud laughters & due to its continuity at same place year after year.

Triumph Down Under

Scintillating performance by our Team India down under has brought all cheers to Indian public. When summer is just round the corner, when childrens are gearing up for exams, when corporates are working their best in financial year end & when traders of share markets are having tough time to understand the market scenario, this fantastic display by Team India is iceing on cake for everybody. Surely this month is great for Indian cricket as our under 19 team has brought the world cup & now our senoir teams has clinched the CB series by beating Australia neck & crop.

Indian teams performance is one of the best performance in 50 overs cricket after a long long time. It was again under the captainship of Dhoni who has lead our side to be T20 champions . This man has brought some good fortunes with his captainship. But as they say fortune favours the brave. Surely the way he handles his side in the series which is one of the fire brand series proves his braveness. Seems to be steady head on his shoulders with shrewd brain. He is a super cool guy. Always calm & composed man on field. He has batted with maturity. His allround performance has raised the level of other members of the side as well. It was collective performance of all the members of the side which enabled them to clinch the series.

Earlier in test series it was Kumble who has shown excellent captainship & able to raise the teams performance after the Sydney Test mayhem & winning the test match in Perth pitch where very few visiting teams have won any test against Aussies.

The same spirit continued in the CB series. It was a very young team. I have also doubted whether such a young team can match the Aussies fire brand cricket but our young brigade with a mentor- Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar has showed that Aussies are not invincible anymore. This new found aggresion in the team which has become the catalyst for Indias triumph down under. Earlier the T20 triumph has made this young bunch super confident that they can match with number one Australian side in all the departments of the game.

New found of this series definitely is Ishant Sharma. This lanky fast bowler has all the potential to be one of the top bowlers of the world in future if he keep himself fit. He bowls fast, also very accurate & stick to the basics. In onedayers all the bowlers has done preety good job. Harbhajan Singh also bowled well in some crucial junctures of the matches especially in both the finals & taken some important wickets in the series. His bowling & aggressiveness has tormented Aussie players & frustrated them hell of a lot. He has definitely given Oz players taste of their own medicine.
In batting the Sachin- The maestro has shown again why he is the best & showed his detracters that they are really very silly. Rohit Sharma has also emerged as a future of Indian cricket with Gautam Gambhir who has some what filled the absence of Sourav Ganguly from the team.

If I have to pick 3 main reasons for Indias victory of CB series are-
1) Dhonis excellent Captainship
2) Sachins spectacular batting in both the finals
3) Aggression & youthful exuberance of Indian Players
This Indias triumph down under will be remembered & cherished for long long time ahead.
Well done Team India!

IPL- Good Entertainment Prospect

Indian Premier League is making sensation all as auctioning of players are over. Concept is similar like English Premier League of Football or NBA. Humongous money has been lavishly dished out to players around the world. It shows how much money is flowing in Indian Air. Sometimes I think why then so many poors in this country, why those many illiterates & why most of the cities are failing to provide required infrastructure to common man round the year. Money is not getting routed through proper channels. Most of us will agree, this is because of uneven distribution of money but who cares. Coming back to IPL & its prospect in India. I find its good thing happening not only to Cricket but by an large to sports with Indian context. Its very good prospect as an entertainment, now we can go to watch 4 hours fun in a ground, sipping some mugs of beer, of course if they allow it. IPL will be successful in bringing in people to the stadium, anyway that is never a problem to fill up the stadium for cricket in India. I will be happy if Mom's & Mother in law's cut the crap of watching daily soaps & come to watch matches.
I wonder though whether it can increase the sentiment of public by an inch for the teams which are city teams when public sentiment always beats for the national team i.e Indian Cricket Team. We always wanted Indian team to win but this league will demand city based loyalty that is something difficult to inculcate in masses. If you bring even Mallika Sherawat to dance on Maiya Maiya before the match & Bipasha Basu to do Beedi Jalaile with winning team still it cannot generate that extra sentiment for localised matches like these. Yes, entertainment factor for spectators & even for T.V audience will be bubbling with high for sure after watching those girls dancing.

Biggest beneficiaries are cricket players & that too new joinies to international cricket like Ishant Sharma & Rohit Sharma. Lot of money has been spent to buy them. I think Boycott must be saying- My Mom also should join IPL, she can even smash sixes with a stick of rubab.

Our Oneday & T20 captain M.S Dhoni is the costliest player with 6 crores & he deserves to get that top value after all he was the captain of winning World T20 side & he seems to be a shrewd brain & street smart cricketer too. Seems a definite horse for a longer race. Good that an Indian has been bought with highest price though I believe biddings are too highly done just like Reliance Power IPO was too highly priced. Symmonds is 2nd with 5.4 crores deserves to be 2nd as he can be devastating T20 batsman. I feel Bhajji also agrees to it. Anyway bhajji will also get decent money.

One more interesting part can happen if the owners of the respective teams floats some shares to stock listings. That provision is there in IPL. That could be a happening stuff like buying some shares of Sourav's Kolkata or buying Sachin's Mumbai.

I look IPL as a good entertainment prospect for weekend. Real cricket is Test Cricket though. Skills & techniques & other critical aspects of cricket can be best watched in Test Cricket. Even 50 overs onedayers requires skills & adds the thrill. No doubt T20 also requires skills but it is more like Tukka & aara patta cricket even mediocre players have some chance there.

Strongly believes that some new & different things should always keep on happening. IPL may help in globalization of cricket too which is lacking presently. So I support IPL in a broader sense except the amount of money flown around. Wishing IPL to be a grand Success.

No Barriers No Walls- Airtel Ad.

We have seen the latest advertisement of Airtel which is being telecasted these days.

I find the ad. very meaningful where two cross border kids meet up to play football between the barriers, the partition created by man between two land, scenically from both sides land looks the same & both kids looks like human kid. It immediately brings the India- Pak istan border in mind.

Punch line is the best in the ad. Short, crisp & effective. It immediately makes me think that there are so many issues can be solved if we talk. So many issues kept pending due to none initiative by any of the parties involved.

I feel all the barriers are mental barriers, all the walls are self created by man. All of these lead to the path of destruction. Compromise is the word which is so undermine these days. Compromise can solve so many issues of global concern & even concern like family matters. But to compromise first step is to take the initiative of talking. If we don't talk barriers & walls are destined to form. Talking removes the smoke of confusion which is the starting point of fight. Don't we argue or fight with our near & dear ones sometimes but after a while we start talking, so it doesn't reach to level where barrier or walls get created.

Talking also removes the shyness. Yes, I remember those old days when I missed the caring of all those beautiful girls as I didn't talk to them due to my shyness.

Crux is talk for building relation, talk for mending gaps, talk for future growth, talk so that there is no war like situation, talk for happiness, talk for peace.

Life is a Playground

LIFE---Have we ever given a deep thought about this word?? This 4 letter word sums up whole journey of a man.

Four letters of "Life" is just like 4 phases of life journey- Childhood, teenage, grown up (Adult) & Old age. 4 phases are just like 4 corners of a playground. Playground because life throws up different situation reaction games, we have to play & pass it to move forward. Rule says phase of life starts with a childhood & finishes at old age. So play to win, play to be happy, play to fight with sorrows, play to satisfy your needs, play to make your family proud, most importantly play fairly to reach the final destination of 4th phase & become immortal.

Playground will arrange many games on different situations one has to come over it & move forward. We all might agree that whatever our age is now we faced many games in life & we have reached to the present after playing all those games. If we look back to those games actually we won those games that is why we reached the current place where are we now. Though that time we never realized that we won it.

Irony is nobody ideally likes to reach final destination of this playground. People are unsure about what will be next phase after "Life". Amazing part is we are living at present & want to remain happy still we keep rejoicing about our past, i.e. the spent phases & that gives us maximum happiness. We all want to go back to those spent phases, years of life. For some people want to back to those spent phases to acheive something differently or playing those games in a different way. Alas! that cannot happen in this playground, walls are strong between the phases, one cannot penetrate to go back to the earlier one. There I say Life is playing with us, just like when I see Sachin Tendulkar's mesmerizing batting, I feel I should go back to age of 10 & take the bat in my hand again & start playing cricket with dedication to play for my country one day just like Sachin.

This playground has different situation reaction games. The person who reacts properly, win the games & happily move forward phase after phase. Other way round individuals who fails to react to situation, life gives some more chances to them. If one can come over it then person can move ahead happily. These games are called as challenges of life.

Playground has so many games, the fun rides, logic is to play with positive attitude towards it, Don't we regularly use the phrase "Have positive attitude towards life". Have lot of fun in this ground. Also enjoy the greenery around it. Strive to reach the final destination of final phase happily, which is a final point of this playground & proudly say its a victory lap!

Preface

Today! I am starting with my own blog. I am always passionate about writing. I write those which attracts me emotionally & touches my heart. Now I am going to write in my blog all those things which attracts me & which is I am sure people will enjoy to read....Happy reading & stay in touch!