Bits And Pieces

He wears saffron robes. He has a HUGE fan following. He is almost never politically correct. And he swears by Pranayama as the cure to everything. He is Baba Ramdev. To be honest, i was a bit skeptical at first when my mother told me about him a few years ago. Another "poli saamiyar" (fake godman) i thought. Over the last few years though, from what i have seen and heard of him, my opinion has changed quite a bit. He is a Baba of the masses. Wherever he conducts his shivirs (workshops) on yoga, it is not only the affluent people, but also the "aam junta" who throng the place. He seems to have Utopian dreams for India. He follows a 2 pronged approach : 1. Popularization of Yoga in every nook and corner of India 2. Taking on national issues like corruption and poverty head on. It is no secret that he has rubbed a lot of people the wrong way with his comments on non-vegetarianism, soft drinks, homosexuality and supposed miracle cures for incurable diseases. But the fa...

Pattaasu = fire crackers I'm not talking about Diwali here. Everyone knows about Diwali. It is one of my favourite festivals ever. If you don't know, please find out about it from another source. It is very interesting. What i do mean to write about is the anticipated billion wala in our parliament. How would it be if Mukesh Ambani, the richest Indian (according to Forbes in 2010) were to donate his entire wealth for the good of the nation? The exchequer would earn 27 billion dollars! 1 US dollar = 44.2252 INR (as of 11/2/2010) so that makes it a whopping 1194.0804 billion rupees! Now, i've noticed that we Indians are more comfortable dealing with lakhs and crores rather than millions and billions. 1194.0804 billion rupees = 1194.0804*100 = 119408.04 crore rupees !!! That is one lakh nineteen thousand four hundred and eight crore rupees! Do you even realize how much that is??? Here is how a few standard numbers look against it : 10 -> ten 100 -> h...