The taste of India .. gone sour?

Amul, the well known and well respected Indian dairy co-op is in hot water. Or soured cream, if you prefer. Apparently, the Amul facilities were raided by Gujarat's Food and Drugs Control Administration last week, on complaints of worms being found in their milk powder. The raid however, revealed much more.
1. Amul was printing the 'packed on' date as a day late than the actual date for milk pouches.
2. Amul butter packets, being manufactured currently (Jan 2005) had a manufacturing date of March 2005.
Me thinks printing such a late date would apparently have limited use as Amul would have to hang on to the butter for 2 months and then release it in the market. That means additional cost of storing it properly etc. If true, this is gross misconduct on the part of Amul and calls for strict action.

R-day musings

What exactly does the republic day stand for? We have learnt that on 26th Jan 1950, India became a soverign state, a republic. By adopting the Indian Constitution. We, it seems have forgotten the significance of this, and remember 26th Jan more for the parade, the holiday and the small paper flags that spring out of nowhere.
While the parade is a magnificient display of our military might, it also serves to showcase the discipline and vigour the armed forces instill in one. It would do well for ourselves as well as our lawmakers to learn something from this. I wonder what goes through their minds on republic day? Does their spine tingle when the army marches past, or when the national anthem is being played? For the politicians it is something exactly opposite to a hopliday. It is a day to make patriotic speeches. They must be a patriotic lot, these politicians. Else what are they doing in politics in the first place. No? From fist-fighting in the parliament to making amendments to the constitution, they are quite flexible.
Anyways, back to my original point. What is the republic day? Why do we celebrate it? Do we mark the occassion of adoption of the constituition? Do we revel in the mlitary might of a soverign India? Do we acknowledge the maturity we have attained as a state? Yes. That and more. This day is being marked as a celebration of the idea that is India. And the celebration is for us being a part of it.

Satisfaction

Good food. Not only does it rhyme, but it also gives us an immense sense of satisfaction. Ofcourse, you have to take part in the food being good. You won't feel satiated just looking at good food. I always got unrivalled satisfaction from eating good stuff. Only since I came to amrika did I really start enjoying cooking, and thus learnt that cooking a good meal also gives you satisfaction. So, in essense; the participation must be either in the eating or the preparation of the food. [How else can one participate].
The general feeling of happiness of making an absolutely smashingly delicious dish is something ... I havent experienced yet; but even preparing a decent one gives a certain amount of content. Good cooks, I say, must be a satisfied lot. Those who hire them, even more.
Eating, on the other hand (or fork if you must), is something everyone enjoys. You crave something. Like I am craving Mango Icecream right now. Delicious, yellow, creamy, mango icecream. Indian. The kind you get in amrika is palatable, thats it. Sigh. It all boils down to the same old thing doesnt it?

P.S. I have observed I tend to write/think about food AFTER lunch.

P.P.S. Which word occured most times .. good / food / satisfaction?

ONGC looking up

ONGC has been in the news a lot these days. This represents a totally new approach for PSUs. A professional approach. I think this is a whole new perspective Indian companies have nowadays .. they are getting to know themselves better. They know they can compete in international markets. The way these companies are carrying themselves shows a new confidence. ONGC in particular has been eager to make investments in foreign soil, participate in exploration of new fields and set up infrastructure where it is lacking. This not only generates some amount of goodwill, but also strengthens the PSUs hold on other markets.
P.S.: No, I dont own ONGC stock.

can't do without?

things i never thought i could'nt do without
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cell phone
cell phone hands free
listerine pocketpaks
chapstick
chocolate

things i always knew i could'nt do w/o
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loose change
my car
my friends

things i used to think i could'nt do w/o but can
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a pen
my watch
a better half
eating out
the internet
a baniyan
milk and sugar in tea/coffee

thats how many buffalos?

Went to BuffaloWildWings yesterday night. Good place, excellent wings. Buffalo wings and beer and good friends. What more can one ask for? A good game on TV maybe .. well .. next time. They have some 12 different sauces you can have the wings with -- ranging from mild to hottest. We ate about 75 wings .. plus some other stuff. Late into the night, in one moment I can only describe as mentally dilapidated, me and a friend decided to try one -- just one wing each with their hottest sauce - the blazing hot sauce or whatever its called. We ate it .. nothing. After about 10 secs ... it felt like the whole of my mouth was on fire, my lips started burning, no matter how much water or beer I drank. Only copious amounts of blue cheese dressing made things better. Couldnt eat anything after that. Will surely go there again though.

Open mouth, Insert foot

Shut up. Do not give away little things noone has to know even if they sound (and are) cool. You will be better off that way. Believe me.

What estimate?

I was just browsing the Planning Commission of India's website. The site itself surprised me pleasantly, and I spent a lot of time taking in some of the information available. One thing that I had been thingking about for a while struck me again. While looking at the status of ongoing irrigation projects, the increase in the estimated cost of each project shocked me. Now, in India many projects are delayed over a lot of years and this itself increases their cost by a large amount. But these figures definitely have something more to them. I hope it is something that I failed to understand and there exists a simpler logical explanation to it. I will list a few examples .. the order is
State - project name, initial estimated cost --> latest estimated cost (Rs. crore).
Andhra - Sriram Sagar 40 --> 2600
Maharashtra - Kukadi 18 --> 1600
Maharashtra - Mor 1 --> 49
Rajasthan - Panchana 1 --> 125
Tripura - Gumti 6 --> 50
UP - Sarayu Nagar 78 --> 2765
Gujrat - Sardar Sarovar 4600 --> 30000

WTF?? Almost all the projects read this way. The only estimates that havent been raised yet are of those projects which are yet unapproved. The whole list is numbing. Hundreds and hundreds of projects each costing way more than originally expected. Why so? Normally in any project you can consider the estimate to fall short by a small margin, thus the total cost may come to 110 - 150% of the original estimate. But many projects here have exceeded their estimates 20 to 50 times!! We can consider that some projects were expanded to make them bigger etc .. but surely not all!
More importantly -- who is answerable to this? Where is all this money going? Can any particular official be questioned on why the costs spiral out of control? If contractors are given jobs, why arent they fined when it is not completed on time and not within the given budget? How long will this bleeding of the public continue?