Pratik Poddar

My first post after joining my job!! \m/ \m/ Its not about job.. Its about convocation.. The official links ( Link1 & Link2 ) say: The Convocation Day marks the culmination of a students academic life for which he has striven so hard. :P Before beginning, apologies to all my friends whom I could not meet during convocation as I had fever! :( Nevertheless, went to the stage and got my degree and a convo pic :P \m/ \m/ Now the serious point.. As the Chief Guest speech, we should have got something better. Now, I can't help but compare Steve Jobs' and Oprah's speech to Stanford's graduating students and Bill Gates' speech to Havard graduating batch to the Aerodynamics Lecture we had. We should have got a better speech if not a better chief guest. :( Who chooses chief guests anyway? Thoughts on impeachment?

(From pluggd.in and TOI ) We will have a new symbol for Indian National Rupee today. The Union Cabinet will today decide on the symbol for Indian Rupee, a privilege (unique identity) available only to major currencies like dollar, euro, pound sterling and yen. The proposal, said to be prompted by the growing influence of the Indian economy in the global arena, involves a shortlist of five symbols (finalists above) for the Indian rupee drawn up the finance ministry, reflecting the Indian ethos and culture. 1) The symbol should be applicable to standard keyboard 2) The symbol has to be in the Indian National Language Script or a visual representation 3) The symbol should represent the historical & cultural ethos of the country as widely accepted across the country I think fourth one should be he winner. Both Devnagri and Roman script of Rupya and Rupee are visible in the symbol. The first and the second symbols definitely do not stand a chance. Go India Go!

Aamir, 2008 - Raj Kumar Gupta Black Friday, 2006 - Anurag Kashyap Bombay, 1996 - Mani Ratnam Mithya, 2008 - Rajat Kapoor Mumbai Cutting, 2009 - Various Mumbai Meri Jaan, 2008 - Nishant Kamat Page 3, 2005 - Madhur Bhandarkar Salaam Bombay!, 1988 - Mira Nair Satya, 1998 - Ram Gopal Varma Company, 2002 - Ram Gopal Varma Sarkar, 2005 - Ram Gopal Varma Sarkar Raj, 2008 - Ram Gopal Varma Slumdog Millionaire, 2008 - Danny Boyle Tum Mile, 2009 - Kunal Deshmukh 26th July at Barista, 2008 - Mohan Sharma Chandni Bar, 2001 - Madhur Bhandarkar Watch them and then you will say "I love Bombay" :) Can you suggest more movies? As of June 20, 2010.. I have not seen Mumbai Cutting and Tum Mile (WTF? How could I miss them? :( Both released just before placement season. :() First thing to do when I reach IIT now. Also find a Weird Things to do in Mumbai List here: http://pratikpoddar.blogspot.com/2009/12/weird-things-to-do-in-mumbai.html

I've been to 47 cities in 9 countries Asia Hong Kong (SAR): Hong Kong Island India: Agra India: Ahmadabad India: Badarinath India: Chennai India: Colangute India: Delhi India: Gangotri India: Goa India: Haridwar India: Jaipur India: Joshimath India: Kedarnath India: Kolkata India: Kota India: Mumbai India: Mussoorie India: Panaji India: Patna India: Patna India: Pushkar India: Ranchi India: Rishikesh India: Rudraprayag India: Ujjain India: Uttarkashi India: Vishnuprayag India: Yamnotri Europe Austria: Hellbrunn Austria: Salzburg Austria: Werfen Belgium: Bruges France: Etretat France: Marseille France: Montpellier France: Nice France: Paris France: Versailles Germany: Dachau Germany: Munich Germany: Munich Monaco: Monaco Netherlands: Amsterdam Netherlands: Rotterdam Switzerland: Engelberg Switzerland: Interlaken Switzerland: Lauterbrunnen Switzerland: Zermatt   Get your own widget GeckoGo   This is as on date June 15 2010. For latest updates visit http://www.geckogo.com/p...

Just uploaded some photographs of my 14 Day Trip to Haridwar, Yamunotri, Gangotri, Mussoorie, Kedarnath, Badrinath, Rishikesh on facebook. Along with doing some good work, visiting some temples, enjoying nature and having some interesting philosophical discussions, I tried to learn some photography as well. Link for the photographs is here I will use this space to cheer for the Uttarakhand Government for the great tourism development in their state. Looks like the economy of the state is driven by tourism, at least in these 4 months. http://www.gmvnl.com/newgmvn/ shows the great work that they are doing. However I still do not understand some things. I am hoping that a localite would read this and answer. 1) Why are "Prayags" (Meeting point of two rivers) not developed as tourist spots? Two rivers, one grey, one green in colour meet at a point and form a beautiful scene. I could capture one of the prayags out of the 5 great prayags forming the Panchprayag. I am sure go...

I wrote a post on purpose of life a few day back. I had some interesting discussion and I am revisiting the post. Some revelations: 1) Life does not have a purpose. Anything created does not have a purpose. Creator has a purpose. So, The creator of life has a purpose. 2) So, the purpose of life is the purpose its creator (God) would have while its creation. Any guesses? 3) As far as I can guess, God would have wanted us to live in such a way that we do not disturb god's world. We help it grow. We help it continue. We help it evolve. We improve the world. 4) So, Purpose of Life would be Help those in need Reproduction Be happy and make others happy Make the world a better place to be in Change the way people live their lives, hopefully in a positive way 5) In Hindu Dharm, there are three types of Rin which must be paid off before one's death: Dev Rin, Pitra Rin and Rishi Rin. Dev Rin is paid off to Devtaa by doing Yagya; Pitra Rin is paid off to Pitar (ancestors) by...

Read about this concept in Ignited Minds by Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam but I could not appreciate it until a discussion that I had in a beautiful swiss cottage on a beautiful hill in God's own place Uttarakhand :P Some of the ideas in the post are original. I have absolute faith in the idea and if you do not agree with me, I will love to have a discussion. :) Dr Kalam identified five important areas to transform India. These are: 1) Education and Health Care 2) Agriculture 3) Information and Communication 4) Infrastructure 5) Critical Technology Pramukh Swami Maharaj of Swaminarayan Sanstha at Ahmedabad suggested a sixth dimension: 6) Spirituality I did not appreciate the sixth point that why do we need spiritual development for development of the country.  But indeed, we need spiritual development. Spiritual development would comprise of the basic human quality to differentiate between good and bad, right and wrong, God and Satan. Spiritual development would include not ch...