2018 is gone and 2019 has arrived. Is it just change in calendar date or is there anything special about this transition from 31st December to 1st January? Actually it’s just not a simple transition but an important change! It’s time to take fresh perspective of life, the learning from the year gone by, the unfinished agenda of things that we have always wanted to pursue, the habits that we want to overcome, the virtues that we want to adopt etc! This also happens because with the change of year, all numbers concerning one’s life change – suddenly you are an year older, one year closer to superannuation, one year more of your married life, one year closer to your end age….! All this can be summed in few lines as below:

Life is too short

And there’s so much to be done;

One more year has gone

But a mint fresh one has come.

I may be older and a tad fatter

But certainly I possess more wisdom.

But unless I use this wisdom

To better something in today’s state

It will just be one more year gone by

With nothing written on a clean slate!!

This is dedicated to my old friend and a close blog follower because inspiration for this second bling on new year has come from him.

The time has come once again for us to bid adieu to an year coming to an end and welcome a mint fresh new year. For some it’s only change in calendar date, an occasion to celebrate and rejoice for some and making a firm resolution to make a fresh beginning for some. To each his own as no one can be really faulted. For many of us, 31st December is a busy quarter end warranting late sitting in office and preparing to go to work on the next day viz. 1st of January. Thus, for all such workaholics, it’s mere change in calendar date. Some of us need an excuse to party, howsoever flimsy that excuse may be! For all such people, welcoming a new year is much better than a flimsy excuse and hence partying into wee hours of the morning is a great option for them. A few of us take our lives very seriously and hence this is an occasion to reflect upon the year gone by and plan for the new year by making some firm resolutions. My experience is that most of these resolutions are thrown to winds in the very few days of the start of the new year.

Like each year, at this juncture 2019 looks to hold exciting possibilities. We expect more powerful India, strong Sensex, good monsoon, Cheaper petrol, metro rail network in major cities, general elections leading to stability of the country, cricket World Cup, stronger rupee, big Bollywood hits, celebrity gossips and what not!

Whichever category we may belong to (sleeping through the new year, celebrating or passing resolution types) and whatever be our big bets , let’s leave the baggage of burden on our minds, conscious and heart behind and nurture hopes, dreams and aspirations for a better 2019 on all counts!

Happy new year 2019 to all!

Today is 31st December, the last day of the year 2018. While the first day of new year is for making resolutions, conceiving new ideas, nurturing fresh hopes and aspirations the last day of the year is to reflect upon the learning from the year about to go. In that sense, year 2018 could go down in the annals of history as a tempestuous year. It was a year of accidents and fires (especially in Mumbai) and insufficient rains (large part of India is facing draught like situation and farmers’ suicides are increasing) and disenchantment with Modi and controversial issues like Ram Janmabhoomi, name changing spree ( Allahabad becoming Prayagraj) and Donald Trump and Imran Khan and Navjot Sidhu and towards the end even Rahul Gandhi. Who could have thought these kind of things happening in US with Trump at the helm and Modi’s supremacy being challenged by Rahul. This was also first time since 2006 when a non Khan starrer Bollywood movie was the top grosser, the honour going to Sanju starring Ranbir Kapoor. It was also the year of grand matrimonial alliances with Deepveer, Nick Priyanka, Isha Anand – tying knots. India under Virat Kohli continued its domination in all forms of cricket. Three grand ladies heading three important banks (Arundhati-SBI, Chanda- ICICI and Shikha- Axis) all moved on by the year end. RBI Government spat, Rafale deal, Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi kept media busy for all the wrong reasons.

By the above, 2018 should be considered a forgettable year, short of being fully disastrous. But our memories are short lived. Each year appears to us to be having coldest ever winter, hottest ever summer, heaviest ever rains, worst ever draught, strongest ever Indian team under Dhoni, best ever batsman in the world in Sachin, the most invincible Prime Minister ever in Narendra Modi, the best ever year for Shahrukh, the deadliest ever violence in Kashmir, the most serious divide amongst the communities and once the year sets into oblivion, we welcome the new year hoping for the best and forgetting the rest!

Recent farm debt waiver in the states of MP and Rajasthan has once again generated heated discussions on the prudence of such generosity by Governments using public money. In an interesting cartoon published in one of the dailies, a middle class person is shown carrying the weight of super rich (corporate borrowers), who are defaulters and absconders on one side and farmers, whose debt is written off, on the other. In normal day to day conversation also, we lament the plight of hard working and honest tax paying middle class. However, being a middle class myself, I have a slightly different view here, especially in respect of farm debt waiver.

Indian farmer is much disadvantaged vi’s-a-vi’s his counterparts in developed nations. His land holdings are small, making the scale of farming unviable. On top of it, very few farmers enjoy the luxury of perennial irrigation, a majority still depending on rains. On top of it, mechanisation of farming activity is again limited to affluent farmers and the cost of inputs is ever rising. A farmer barely manages to earn enough to sustain his family for two square meals. An illness or a social obligation forces him to take debt and sometimes whole lifetime goes in servicing debt. What’s the alternative available to a hardworking, debt laden, severely underprivileged farmer other than committing suicide, which we are seeing dime a dozen day after day. If as an election plank, once in 5 years their small debt (sometimes it’s not even in lakhs; it’s few thousands only) is waived, why make such a hue and cry? Farming is physically tough activity and reward for labour is severely disproportionate. Under the circumstances, we, living in the comforts of our plush city homes, should not discuss this over sumptuous meals, even if the move is considered to be politically motivated and an economic disaster!

Second perspective I just got from a very sharp writing that I came across in one of the WhatsApp groups of which I am also a member. This post said, ” Nothing wrong in middle class bearing the load. The middle class does not take risk. The people in this category have great paying capacity by saving lifelong out of lazy jobs. Saving is leakage in economy system – savings is a leakage in the economy of the circular flow model. -Keynes”.

As aforesaid, though a middle class myself and pretending to be working very hard under lot of stress and duress, with mega responsibilities, the words “saving lifelong out of lazy jobs” has shaken my core, inspiring me to write this blog.

If one is to be asked about the most well known or recalled brand, chances are that Coca Cola or Coke, as it is fondly known as, will appear very high on the list. The brand is iconic and the drink is much loved. Therefore, I was rather taken back to see the latest media ad of Coke released in US that was sent to me on WhatsApp by a friend of mine, who is very active on social media. The ad starts with concerns on obesity and that how more than 600 beverages produced by Coca Cola Company were contributing to this worldwide concern. It goes on to further say that even diet, zero calories, low sugar versions of these beverages were equally harmful and the only way out is to stop consuming these products. WhatsApp post also eulogised the Company for having such large heart to advertise its own funeral!

I smelt a rat and immediately searched google to ascertain the fact. Immediately, it could be inferred that there was a fake coke ad doing rounds in the social media that was a perverse edition of the original ad. The original ad indeed begins with the concerns on obesity and harmful effects of direct consumption of sugar but then goes on to highlighting all the measures taken by the company to reduce the negative effects. The ad highlights all the initiatives – zero sugar, diet version, smaller quantifies, reduction of sugar content in beverages, encouraging school children to have water and juices instead of beverages etc that Coke has undertaken to make the drink safer and more fun to have. The company is also supporting physical exercises initiatives.

Currently, an ad is doing rounds on FM that how we should avoid forwarding a forwarded message without verifying the contents and the ad ends with a tag line- ” let’s spread happiness on WhatsApp not rumours”. My respect for Coca Cola Company has gone up several notches for this awareness campaign where they actually run the risk of tapering sales! My salute to this iconic company and its brands for this initiative that shows the way to other large companies about social responsibility. Simultaneously, it reaffirms my belief that unless social media is used with responsibility its impact can be disastrous and bizarre. We all, the users of social media, must take it upon ourselves to forward a message only after checking its auntheticity as wrong information or knowledge spread across the society can be detrimental to the cause of society.

There are certain terms that are inherent to Christmas. Some of the more popular of these terms are:

(1) Midnight Mass- As I write this blog, devout catholics are starting to throng the churches in their respective parish or any popular church all over to participate in this special mass that is organised on the Christmas Eve. Churches look resplendent in colourful lights and other decorations that adorn them to celebrate the birth of Jesus, son of the God.

(2) Nativity- Though dictionary says that the term means the birth, it is especially associated with the birth of Jesus. As the folklore goes, Jesus was born to Virgin Mary in the Church of Nativity in the city of Bethlehem.

(3) Virgin Mary- Mother of Jesus and equally idolised, adored and worshipped. Jesus was born to virgin mother who conceived Jesus through Holy Spirit without the intervention of a human father.

(4) Noel – Another term used for Christmas, it is also used for Christmas Carols.

(5) Christmas tree – Evergreen fir tree has traditionally been used to decorate homes during Christmas. It’s symbolic of everlasting life with God for Christians. Though Fir tree is most popular, there has been tradition of using cherry or hawthorn trees also.

(6) Santa Claus – Santa Claus, also known as Saint Nicholas, Kris Kringle, Father Christmas, or simply Santa, is a legendary figure originating in Western Christian culture who is said to bring gifts to the homes of well-behaved children on Christmas Eve and the early morning hours of Christmas. A Christmas stocking is an empty sock or sock-shaped bag that is hung on Saint Nicholas Day so that Santa can fill it with small toys, candy, fruit, coins or other small gifts when he arrives. Some people even put their Christmas stocking by their bedposts so that Santa Claus can fill it with goodies when they are asleep, because St. Nicholas is a gift-giver.

(7) Christmas music – Christmas music comprises several genres like carols, jingles, hymns, nursery rhymes, instrumental etc. While Jingle bells is known by heart to every child, the songs like White Christmas, 12 days of Christmas, White Christmas are equally well known. 12 days of Christmas is representative of 12 days of celebration as January 6 is celebrated as the day of epiphany when 3 wise men visited baby Jesus.

Doesn’t the above all sound familiar? Isn’t the birth of Jesus as dramatic as the birth of Krishna inside Mathura Jail and all those miracles associated with his life! Christmas, Janmashtami, Gurupurab or Eid Milan un nabi are all celebration around birth of God, son of God or messenger of God and the spirit and fervour are same, though traditions and manner of celebration could be different!

Merry Christmas to all! May this Christmas bring lots of cheers and happiness to one and all!

Yesterday’s event in a way was reminiscent of my childhood and boyhood. My department had organised an internal cricket tournament aptly named CBO Cricket League (CCL) that had 4 teams. There were 3 matches in all – the first two were knockout matches and the winners of the two games were to clash for the trophy. Though all the four teams comprised my own people, yet I captained one of the teams. It was fun all the way, with spectators cheering all good shots, fielding efforts and catches. In all respects, it was a good break from the daily routine of office chores.

Though, it was all fun – the fun heightened by the likes of me, who were captaining the team, but were more of liability than asset to the team ( I for once neither batted nor bowled, dropped a catch and let ball got past me several times) and by other unfit seniors, yet when I reflect on the event, there were certain subtle lessons to be learnt from it. I sum these up as below:

(1) Competition brings out the best out of people. Those whom we consider ordinary, can surprise you when they are challenged in a competition.

(2) Hunger to win raises your capabilities by several notches and this was in evidence repeatedly yesterday.

(3) Team work builds camaraderie and suddenly individuals having unequal capabilities when put in a team, form a team that’s not an addition but multiplication of their individual capabilities.

(4) Morale of soldiers gets boosted when captain stands with the team. As one of my team members said, ” Your presence gives us energy and courage to give our best”. I stood their under the sun for good 2-3 hours, may not be contributing anything and having sore muscles and cramps at night, but it encouraged the team to give its best.

(5) Success after hard work gives lots of joy and readies the team members to give better to chase more successes.

So, it was not s Saturday wasted in playing a game of cricket; it turned out to be an important management workshop providing so much to learn along with great fun.

Continuing the spirit of Christmas, this blog deals with conferring of Sainthood on special persons in Christianity. Generally, there’s a waiting period up to 5 years after the death of the person. This is to allow time for emotions to die down. However, this wait period can be waived by Pope (Pope Benedict XVI set aside the waiting period for his predecessor, John Paul II). Once the five years are up or waiver is granted, the bishop of diocese where the person died can open investigation into the life of the person to establish whether the person lived his or her life with sufficient holiness. Evidence is gathered, including witness testimonies. If there’s sufficient evidence, then recommendation is sent to Pope and once the case is accepted for consideration, the individual can be called a “servant of God”.

A group ( called the congregation of the causes of saints) scrutinises the evidence of the candidate’s holiness and if congregation approves the case, it is passed to the Pope. If the Pope decides that the person had indeed lived a life of heroic virtue, the person can then be called “venerable”. The next stage, beatification, can be reached if a miracle can be attributed to prayers made to the individual after his/her death. These incidents of miracles need to be verified before acceptance. After beatification, the candidate is given the title “blessed”.

Canonisation is the final step in declaring a deceased person a saint. To reach this, a second miracle needs to be attributed to prayers made to the person ( for example, the second miracle in John Paul’s case was the reported “inexplicable recovery” of a Costa Rican woman from serious brain illness) .

Thus, it’s a very structured process – wait period to servant of god to venerable to blessed to saint. And while the above process of canonisation could be of theoretical interest to us earlier, the process assumed significance for us when our very own Mother Teresa was canonised as a Saint on 4th September 2016.

We have sadhus, fakirs, gyanis in religions other than Catholicism and they have their cult following, asanas, gaddis and mazars where thousands of devotees throng to pay their obeisance and offer prayers. However, in the absence of any structured process of establishing their holiness and attributing miracles to them, they are there in the minds and hearts of their followers but not on the World’s horizon. Whether we believe in miracles, rituals, prayers, sainthood or not, nothing should bar us from celebrating the spirit of festival, be it Diwali, Eid or forthcoming Christmas!

I don’t know how many of us still go through the print media and read good old Reader’s Digest, but this childhood habit has remained with me and of late, I have been reading this magazine non-stop for last 20 years. The latest December issue of RD has heartwarming lores capturing the spirit of Christmas.

The first story relates to a young girl of 4 years, who loses her father, but refuses to come to grips with the reality. The attempts by her mother and grandmother to convince that her father is in heaven from where no one returns bear no fruits. To cut the story short, on her father’s birthday, the girl buys a Little Mermaid birthday card, wraps it in plastic and ties it to a helium balloon so as to make it reach her father. Days later this balloon is noticed by a forest ranger, who in curiosity, opens the plastic packet and reads the message. He is surprised to read “Happy birthday Daddy” message sent to heaven that travels some 6000 kilometers away in a village called Mermaid in Eastern Canada. The ranger and his wife buy the book “The Little Mermaid”, pen a letter for the young girl saying that as her father cannot buy this book in heaven, he has requested them to buy it for her to be sent to her as gift from him. This has changed the life of the little girl, who now knows that though her father is in heaven, he is perpetually with her at all points of time. The balloon carrying little mermaid card and reaching the place called Mermaid some 6000 kilometers with the card in tact, if not a miracle, cannot be called anything else.

The second story is about an Australian couple to whom twins, a boy and girl are born prematurely and the boy is almost still born. Doctors have no hope of saving the boy, but mother notices a little gasp that doctors dismiss to be her imagination. She asks husband to come close to her and than holds the baby between them , hoping that skin touch and body warmth will revive the baby. And miracle happens and the boy, declared irretrievable by doctors few minutes back, starts breathing normally. Today the twins are healthy babies 9 years old.

A dancing Christmas tree gifted by a father and kept in store was taken out one Christmas much after the father’s death. The tree had long exhausted its battery and was put up like a normal tree, when it started dancing without replacement of batteries. It was a miracle attributed to the father sending his blessings to his children on Christmas.

Last story is again of a mother losing her 3 years old baby in an accident caused by a drugged driver. Her only solace was a photograph with the child sitting on her lap. When the photo got misplaced, the mother’s trauma returned to haunt her when during the Christmas clean up, she recovers the old photograph tucked inside an old book. This miracle on Christmas was the best gift she could ever hope.

Heart touching stories that have relevance in any background or any season of festival.

For us in Delhi, Christmas meant extreme and harsh winters (generally winters used to be very severe during 10 days of school winter break running up to New Year, with foggy morning, cloudy days and extremely cold nights) and Christmas bazaar at iconic Connaught Place, which was decked up like a bride. Wengers, the famous cake and pastry shop that has seen many winters and still retains its numero uno position as the best cake shop in the capital, used to sell out most of its products by the early evening leaving the connoisseurs disappointed. The local Church near our home had a mid night mass on the Christmas Eve and a fate where some of the typical delicacies were available.

However, the beauty and festivity of Christmas was much more pronounced when I moved out of Delhi, settled in Mumbai and visited overseas destinations such as Singapore and Johannesburg around Christmas/ New Year period. Bright lights, shops overflowing with Christmas goodies and prominent stores and market places having Santa distributing gifts to children caught my imagination. Catholic dominated localities like Bandra and Orlem ( Malad) wearing bridal looks transported one to a different world altogether.

It’s Christmas time once again and I am looking forward to relishing all these unique offerings of this cosmopolitan city Mumbai.