Dont drink and drive.. Please.. !

It was sometime back last year. It was a saturday morning in Bangalore. As like every weekend, it was 9:30 in the morning and I am still in bed. My mobile was ringing. But I was too lazy to getup and pick it. So, I ignored it the first time. When it rang again, I had to pick it up. As I was picking up the call, I saw that there are around 5 missed calls. It was my Dad. He was angry that I needed five calls to getup. And the second thing he said was kind of shocking. He said that Mr. L has met with an accident. He asked me to call Uncle K. K is my Dad's buddy, from our village and was living in Bangalore for past 20 yrs. I gave a call to K's home but his phone was busy.

L and I are good childhood friends. Its a different story that we didnot get time to meet in Bangalore, even though L has moved to the city a good 3 months back. Our friendship might have started because L's dad and my dad are best buddies. We were from the same village. We used to go to the same school and we were in the same class. We also used to go to school on the same cycle rickshaw. After our forth standard, we both moved to boarding schools in different places. But we would meet everytime we came to our village. As we grew up, we were not the best of the friends anymore, but still were friends. After all, he is my first friend and I am his.

I quickly got ready and gave a call again to K's house. K's wife has picked up the phone this time. And I heard the thunderbolt. L is no more. He died in the accident and so were two of his friends. I rushed to the Ramayya hospital, which was about 20 kms from my home. I went straight to the Mortuary. I couldnot find K outside. As I was waiting for about 10 mins, K has come from in. He confirmed it was indeed L. As K was finishing the formalities at the Mortuary for the Post-Mortem, he told the details of the accident. L was drunk and so were his friends. L was driving the car. The car they were driving crashed onto the leftside of the lorry coming from the opposite side near Hebbal. And all the three were head on the spot. It took the police a good 2 hours to cut through the car and take out the bodies.

I went to our village about three times after this incident, but never went to L's home again. I didnot want to meet his mother. She doted on her son. She had two sons, I knew she loved L more, maybe because he was younger. I didnot want to remind her of L again. I am sure she will think of L the time she sees me. Afterall, she would always see me with L. I did meet L's dad, but never spoke to him about L or about that incident.

This is an old article on drunken driving, but still worth a read. According to this, about 75% of the people involved in drunken driving are in age group 15-30 years. These are people who have lots of years of future ahead. There would definitely be a lot of bread winners for their families among them. Another statistic is that the number of traffic accident deaths in Bangalore a.k.a The Pub City are more on weekend nights. Though not specific to drunken driving, India accounts for 10% of world's traffic accident deaths, while it accounts for only 1% of vehicles.


Isn't this world a beautiful place? Is it worth giving our life for a bottle of Whisky, Vodka, Brandy, Beer.. or whatever... ? I know this has been said a numerous times at numerous places.. but again, for my L and for all of you out there who drink, Please dont mix drink with driving. It will kill you.. if not the first time.. maybe the Nth time...

technorati tags: drunken driving, road accidents, traffic accidents

Gas Prices - Lighter on Pocket

gasprice, originally uploaded by rmutyala.

Gas prices have finally fallen to less than $2 dollar/galon this week!!!

Welcome to Rahulabad, The city of Rajivminar and SoniaSagar !!

Most Congress governments in the past had the habit of naming important public projects and schemes after the members of this family. And thus have come, Nehru Zoological Park, Indira Zoological Park, Indira Park, Indira Gandhi International Stadium, Rajiv Gandhi Road, Indira Gandhi Road..... and this list goes on. But this habit has turned into an obsession for the Andhra Pradesh Government headed by Y.S.Rajasekhara Reddy. YSR, as he is popularly known as, knows very well that his CM post is safe as long as Sonia Gandhi is happy. So, he stepped into a naming spree, naming every new scheme and project after Rajiv, Indira or Nehru. Not just that, he is also ready to change the names of some of the existing schemes and projects.

Below is the list of schemes(scams??) started by YSRs government in the last one year. The list may not be elaborate given the pace that which this naming is taking place.

1. Rajiv Palle Bhata. - CM visits villages in the state.
2. Rajiv Nagara Bhata. - CM visits towns in the state. (hmm.. do these require names too..??)
3. Rajiv Yuva Shakti. - A scheme to provide wage employment and self employment to youth.
4. Rajiv Grihakalpa. - Housing scheme for low-income urban population.
5. Rajiv Punaravasam. - Tsunami victims rehabilitation
6. Rajiv Internet Village. - A chain of 22,000 internet kiosks in villages.
7. Pratibha Rajiv Puraskaralu. - Awards to eminent personalites
8. Indira Praba. - A scheme to facilitate effective cultivation by the poor in their lands.
9. Indira Kranthi Pathakam. - Women welfare program.
10. Jawahar Knowledge Centres. - A centre in each city to help female engineering students.

If you think thats a long list, here are the names of some projects.

1. Rajiv Sagar. - Dummagudem irrigation project
2. Rajiv Gandhi International Airport - Hyderabad International Airport under construction.
3. Rajiv Ethipothala Pathakam - Bhima Lift Irrigation Project
4. Indira Sagar. - Polavaram irrigation project
5. Jawahar Pharma City. - Pharma City near Visakhapatnam

Now, YSR is all set to add another feather. The latest victim is Cricket Stadium in Hyderabad. It is supposed to be called 'Visaka Stadium', after a company, Visaka industries contributed 6.5 crore for the project. Now, the government is putting pressure to change the same to 'Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium'. Interestingly, it is not even ready to reimburse the 6.5 crore put in by Visaka Industries.

So, what next?? I'm getting worried now. Hope YSR doesnot ask all the people of Andhra, to add a middle name with one from Rajiv, Indira, Nehru, Jawahar, Priyanka, Rahul.... . Or the next time, I land in Rajiv Gandhi International Airport, in Rahulabad (formerly Hyderabad), The city of Rajivminar (formerly Charminar) and Sonia Sagar (formerly Hussain Sagar), I have to take a Jawahar Metro Rail or drive through Indira freeway and take the Priyanka Park exit , to my home in Rehanpet(formerly nizampet).


P.S. Rehan in Rehanpet is the name of Priyanka Vadra's son.

technorati tags: andhra, rajiv, telugu, politics

Delhi Blasts - Have you seen him?

This is the sketch of the suspect who placed bomb in the DTC Bus in Delhi. Sketch released by Delhi police. This is taken from rediff. When I checked the news that the sketch of this idiot is released, I searched in almost all the online newspapers. This is the best image I could find. Most newspapers carried the news that the sketch is released and haven't put a link to the sketch. What use is this 'news' if people can't see teh sketch??



Policeman displaying look-alikes of bags which are suspected to have been used in the bomb blasts. Photo: Shiv Kumar Pushpakar

Top spin by suni - WTH??

I have this habit of going thru the news websites of our opponent
cricketing nations to find out the alternative views and opinions. As
always, today I was going through lankaweb. This has a column named
'Top Spin' by Suni. This seems to be almost a regular column there.
This is the column after the end of second match.

Some interesting snippets:

For the record and by rights ! this Sri Lankan team should have been brimming with confidence having won even of their previous eight completed encounters against India. They were well knit, organized, confident, and looked very capable of continuing their run of successes against the Indians who seemed disoriented through internal disagreements, the replacement of their former captain and other circumstances which seemed to affect their production potential but here they are having inflicted two painful drubbings on their nemesis and little wonder that their spirit is cock a hoop and of a jubilant nature! They are looking spritely, on their toes and gung ho towards inflicting further pain and embarrassment on the Lankans who must now feel duty bound to fight back whether the venues are reminiscent of forest reserves and game parks metaphorically speaking and the pitches overseen by Doctors Do Little or Messers Fix Rights!

Other circumstances which seemed to affect our production
potential.What does he mean?? Two painful drubbings on their
'nemesis'.. When
did Indian team or Indians started thinking SL as our nemesis? Venues
reminiscent of forest reserves and game parks.. pitches overseen by
Doctors Do Little or Messers Fix Rights.. what an absolute gibberish.I
wonder what this guy is smoking when he wrote this. Nagpur, Mohali,
Jaipur, Pune, Ahmedabad, Rajkot, Baroda. Which one of this is
reminiscent of 'Forest Reserve' or 'Game park' ? What have the
curators of the first two ODIs done to deserve this incrimination?

one might reflect on the sentiments of last World Cup Winning Skipper Arjuna Ranatunga who berated the Indian Cricket Board for the remote venues selected and the beligerence of the multitudinous grass roots type audiences the Lankans have had to encounter in these locations in a "lions against gladiators" type scenario and perhaps a factor!

No words to comment on this. Better left for the readers to decide.

with a World Cup looming over the horizon and India should be the least of their worries with bigger guns to face down the road

So Sir, India is equivalent to Zim, Ken and Bangladesh for SL team?

That Sri Lanka has not toured India in seven years and the build up of crowd fervour and playing in strange rural arenas on unfamiliar wickets could also be attributed to the general composure of some of the younger players accustomed to playing in more genteel albeit vociferous but sporting home crowds

Strange Rural Arenas?? So, this guy calls Jaipur, Pune, Ahmedabad
rural. One straight question. Has he ever been to India? Or does he
know India past Chennai?