Because we need to look beyond the positive side of everything

Gone are the days when our parents used to say "Padhoge likhoge banage Nawab, kheloge kudoge banoge Kaharab (Studies will make you King, Sports will make you bad)". Sports are trending in our lives. Children in our country are encouraged to take any sports of their choice and parents are playing a very important role. But all these have started to happen just a Couple of years ago when names like Saina, Sania, Vijendra, Bindra started to come up. With more than a billion population this is not what a neutral guy would have expected. Any intellectual individual would expect India to have atleast 0.1 % of their population to be involved in sports and from that 0.001% to compete at international level. Leave out the individaul, any normal being with a very rare but common sense would say that with so many people living in India, more glory should be attached with the sports.

We Indians tend to become very happy with our smaller or little succes, if not happy then I would say complacent. Latest generations are taking things seriously. But this was not the case some few years ago. Who is to blame? Is it Parents? Yes! Why? you may have heard "Strike when the iron is hot" why? because then only you get the desire shape. Parents, leave out moulding them into shape, they try to put cold water and cool them off. If you could remember once in your childhood you asked your mother to buy you a notebook, she must have felt glad to spent that special Rs.10 on that notebook but for obvious reasons, but try to remember that cold look you got when you asked her to buy a racket, bat or ball or anything related to sports. Your parents must have said, "Complete your exams first", "Bring a good rank", "What will you do with that?","Oh, we have an old one of your elder brother, play with that", "Why do you want join that club? there're so many players, you won't get a chance", "I can't afford that", "Padhoge likhoge banage Nawab, kheloge kudoge banoge Kharab" and the list continues.

We Indians have always been about individuals. We are more concerned about Leanders and Sainas, or the Bindras or Vijenders, or the Sachins or Bhuttias. Rather than the sport or the main objective behind cheering for the athletes we want our little knowing brain to filter out some name so that we have someone to support. By doing so we have suppressed our expectations. We first check what is the athlete rank in the world, did he/she won any medal previously, if the answer is affirmative they get our full support and cheer if not then who cares. Rarely do we try get to know them or promote them. A great Humanist and ethicist once said, "Social acceptance is the first thing everyone asks for without even asking".

In such high level competitions which is not neck to neck but nose to nose, winners are decided based on fraction of difference. A single medal would call for celebrations and a sense of satisfaction is seen among the fans. Those who miss out are not known and hence forgotten before even coming into the picture, even though they were not less by any means. With over a billion people, it is needless to say that we can achieve far better heights only iff....

Cricket is blamed and made the scapegoat everytime when some sport is not being pulled up. My dear it is a vicious cycle, you do well - you get awards - you get money - you get good coaching, infrastructure - you do well. So one must say there is not only competition inside the sports but also in between two sports, which hogs more limelight. And yes our parents too think that way. "So no one plays hockey these days and who the hell watches it? C'mon ignore it take swimming. Badminton ? Oh! there is Saina Nehwal you won't get much chance to win, take Tennis, but wait Sania Mirza plays tennis, not much of a chance there also, TT? not much good coaching, Kabaddi? not enough money, football? not good team, cricket? so many players already waiting for their chance....and so they wait for all the signals to turn green which never happen and they decide "LET'S CHECK WHAT THE NEIGHBOURS HAVE DECIDED"

Hey! but wait parents are not the only one to blame, I told they do not strike when the iron is hot. Here the primary and secondary schools are also to be looked after. How many schools take sports seriously? Countries like USA, China and Australia are famous to have some schools which have created some teen sensation in many sports. In India we have never heard about any such schools. What to expect from a government who is known to have created only 7 IITs (and 9 new) and 6 IIMs (an 7 new) in the whole of India with a population of more than1.2 billion. Corrupt is the only adjective that describes them. Politicians who do not even know what "S" stands for in Sports are made Sports minister. Barely knowing the National Sports of our country they are invited to present some lakh of rupees to the winners of Olympics. The winners are congratualted and showered incentives and motivated, but what about the athletes or sportsperson who missed narrowly. They too worked hard, why were their efforts not appreciated. They had to go home demotivated. Former players work hard to restore the glory of their sports while government sleeps.

some of our stars

Sports channel showing quality sports with quality commentry and quality host are rare too. Whenever some celebrity try to promote some game it looks like that is the best game of India. There is not a single sports website which will give regular updates on all sports and Indian athletes. They try to block some website, cut the power but never do anything that would encourage or motivate the young generations by coming up with some good website website because majority of youngsters are netizen). We should appreciate to what Facebook has done which our so called Sports union could not do. Through Facebook the news reach quickly to our youngsters than by any other channel. People are getting interested to know what's happening around and so it is helping.

But why would we look onto the bright side ??? Why not remove the darkness altogether??? Why to believe in satatements like, "we are improving every day..... yes the rate is low but definitely we are improving...", "Before the olympics, how many knew about Deepika, Kashyap, Jwala, Jai bhagwan, Vijay Kumar, Thapa and many more...", "We came close of winning a medal", "He is young he is bound to improve next time", "Movies are bringing out the truth, things will now change"

The winners are not different from us. China know how to use their most powerful resourse that is Human Resource, it's high time we too start using it instead of just misusing it in studies.

(The fact that I am writing this article at the time Olympics goes on to prove that I am also an Indian)

The day I was appreciated for being late

My school logo...
Always felt proud to put it
on my shirt when I was
the Vice Captain of Yellow House

I was in Class 10. It was winter season and nobody likes to get up early in the morning and that too to go to school. But being obedient as I was, I never missed school. Our classes starts at 8 AM but before that we need to assemble for the prayer at 7.50 AM and all of us were supposed to reach school by 7.45 AM after which we were considered late and got caning from a very strict but inspiring teacher Mr. Philip (I remember his Maths classes even today). The prayer would end by 8 and caning would end by 8:07 AM. Everyone would be there in their classes by 8:10 AM.

Our first class was on Mathematics taken by Chakravorty Sir (again a very good and kind hearted teacher) which was followed by English (our Principal is used to take that subject). That day I woke up at 8 AM. Since I was not a fan of bunking classes, I hurried to dress up and dashed towards my school. St. Anthony's High School was just 2 kms away from my house. It took me only a few minutes to reach my destination and there I was standing outside with my heart pumping and mind full of nervousness whether to enter or not.

Fortunately there was no security guards present at the door who would have shouted me out if I had asked him and students had already got their beating from Philip Sir and were on their way to their classes. I ran up to the Principals office to ask his permission. He was quite surprised but he did allow me.

Chakravorty Sir didn't asked me anything about my being late. He carried on with his sums on the green board.

The next class when Principal came he gave a 10 minutes lecture on being late and punctuality and pointed me out by saying "See this boy, learn from him. Most of us would have bunked school after being 5-10 minutes late, but he came. We all should learn from his sincerity and dedication towards studies. He is sure to go much forward in his life with this kind of attitude."

All this while I was smiling and had a sense of pride in myself. My friends poked me and gave a hard elbow on my shoulders and back. They were angry beacuse 1) I was late, 2) I was not canned, 3) I got appreciated and 4) I was made the hero.

(All that was worth remembering!)

The story of a football

He came out of his house, kicked the football to the wall infront. Angry at his mother he shouted to himself, "Why does it happen to me all the time?"

"What happened to you boy?" asked a voice.

He got frightened and surprised by that strange voice. "Who is that? Who is talking to me?" he asked, wondering who that could that be when no one was to be seen around.

"It's me! see below, at your foot"

Surprised, he looked below to find it was the football who was talking to him, "What worries you? Why are you so sad?"

"Everyone, the teacher, my classmates, even my mother is my enemy, they dont like me?"

"Why? What did they do to offend you?"

"They just give me enough tasks, kick me around without even asking me what I want. They don't want me around. They just tell me to go away"

The football just laughed at it. Seeing this the boy sulked even more. The football said, "Boy, I know how you feel. Your situation is not much different from me. Well you know how all the people treat me. They all kick me around. Nobody wants me too. I know why they treat me like this. I am empty that is why. If only I was fill with stones, pebbles or irons they would not dare to kick me that way. I wish I could be treated with more respect, if only I was filled with something" The football started to cry.

The boy was listening to all this very attentively. All this time he was thinking that, the idea of football could really work for him. He was treated the same way as the football. The football was empty inside, and so was the boy. He was kicked around, if only he was fill up with something he thought. Well he couldn't fill himself with stones or rocks. God has given him brains, he could fill it up. But with what? Well there were lot of good things he thought. Knowledge was the best. He then prayed to God:

 - to accept things he could not change

 - to change things he could

 - and the knowledge to know the difference

 

He was a changed boy then. He understood why was he treated that way and he could tell the solution too. Afterall there is a difference between him and a football

Power of Namaz.

In the name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful 

The muezzin calls "Hayya ala s-salah, Hayya 'ala 'l-falah" meaning "come for Namaz (Salaah), come for success". People who diligently follow the command are indeed the ones fortunate enough to be considered for Allah's greatest gift.

Ironically there are many people who listens to the Adhaan (muezzin calls) and even understands it but won't obey it. They are the ones who would say that if they leave their work then they would lag behind, success won't come to them, however Allah openly says, come toward success while you come to Namaz but they remain deaf. A question linger in my mind, "Do they really want success or not?"

I have experienced many such success due to Namaz, because of which my belief and trust over ALLAH and 5 pillars of Islam have increased many folds. But I would like to share one of them which happened recently.

I am a Sportskeeda. Give me a media and I would search for a material on sports. Cricket and Football tops the list. So, one fine day the team which I was supporting was in the final and it was a close match going on. They needed some 20 runs from12 balls. The team's main batsmen got out in that over and that left them with 16 off 8 balls. The opposite team was on top. Now was my time, I couldn't stop myself. I knew that I was not playing, that doesn't mean that I can't play a part. I went inside my room, rolled my prayer mat, prayed to Almighty for that elusive victory. When I came back after shedding some drops of tear, the equation was 7 runs off 4 balls which was very much gettable and eventually they got that. My friends sitting near the TV started to explain me how the batsman was out but ran 2 runs since it was a no ball and then they hit some 4s. Life continued after that victory, people around me even asked me after looking at the happiness on my face "You're behaving as if you contributed to the victory". I couldn't help myself but give them a mild smile.

Well that was my story, I already knew what Namaz was capable of, just that I felt something great and my trust on its power grew many folds. 

PRAYER: A CRY OF THE INNER SOUL

PRAYER: THE ASCENSION FOR A BELIEVER

PRAYER: A PILLAR OF ISLAM

PRAYER IS LIKE A FORTRESS

PRAYER AS A WEAPON

PRAYER AS A REMINDER

PRAYER: THE FIRST STEP TOWARDS ESTABLISHING THE ISLAMIC SHARIAH AS A WHOLE

PRAYER AS AN EXPIATION OF SINS

PRAYER: THE FIRST QUESTION ON THE DAY OF JUDGMENT

SANCTITY OF THE MOSQUES

PRAYER: A DUTY KNOWN TO EVERY PROPHET OF ALLAH

PRAYER: AN EVERLASTING PRESCRIPTION FOR PURITY, CLEANSING OF SINS AND ENTERING PARADISE

PRAYER: A DUTY ON EVERYONE

O my Lord! Please, let our prayers have the honor of being offered in their true meaning and wisdom, and let them be regarded as an ascension (mi’raj) to you! Let our prayers be our joy, and the delight of our souls both in this world and the hereafter!

Amen!..

Can we paint our City Purple?

Dear Mamata Didi,

Well first I would like to congratulate you and all the people of Bengal on KKR winning IPL5. It's a moment for which we were all waiting since last 4 years. You would be feeling very happy as Kolkata after a long time will be in the news for good reasons. I hope that you may allow some kind of celebrations for achieving such a landmark (no Bandh please). Why not we start with painting the city purple?

Maam, for you nothing is impossible, your one word and SRK will be ready with Nerolac ordering his knights "Chalo kuchh paint karien" I assume that you won't have any problem with the color. It's noway close to "red". I can understand your likeness to green, but you know greenery is everywhere but purple is the new theme. It now defines victory. Your people will be glad with your new move. For people to remember you always, make sure you do Toofani/Manmaani always and there will no better time than now to do so some toofani and declare "Paint it purple".

You can start with the Writer's building (it looks dirty and need a new paint!)

And then you can try with Victoria Memorial, white seems out of picture now a days and purple is the new color in demand.
You can also do away with white and black at zebra crossing. Purple will do a lot good there also to grab people's attention.
Red has been there in traffic signals for more than a century (first traffic light was used in 1868, London) which is more than 37 years. You can do away with that too. Cars, Buses, trucks and other vehicles will see purple more often, green was always there in the signal plus you have an opportunity to get rid of red.

And since there is no such thing such as state color of Bengal, why not we start a trend by declaring purple as our state color so that other state will start to follow. We will design our own State flag (I can help)
Change is what you like Maam, "Poriborton" and "Poschim Bongo" is your favorite word and so "Purple" will fit in nicely. It too starts with "P"

I have made up my mind, I am turning to purple when I am painting my house next. And If possible the gates will have a golden hint in it.
I love to eat Eclairs (my favorite chocolate). It too has a purple and gold color wrapper.
Purple define rich, class, luxury, smoothness, quality, etc.. SRK and Knights did the right thing by shifting to purple from black. Take a hint from him (he is the brand ambassador of Bengal afterall) and say "chalo paint karein"

I am from Kolkata but I live in Bangalore these days, (what to do there is not much job opportunities for engineers like us in Kolkata) but I would be readily helpful in case you need any from me. 

Knights after their final victory, see how Manoj, Shukla and Das - the Bengali dudes are celebrating.
"Babu Moshai" hum aap sabke fan hai

Sincerely
Loyal KKR fan from Kolkata