Madhosh Kiye Jaa: 2026

Defining Moments in Life

Even if you subscribe to the notion that Life is a four-letter word, there are always bright spots. Or defining moments, to use another term. Ok, bright or not, these are/were some of mine.

Listening to great songs on radio. Ceylon/Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation, and later, Vividh Bharati.

Buying and using a record player and records to play on it. Brand HMV.

Playing cricket for school.

Reading Wodehouse, Agatha Christie, Perry Mason, Enid Blyton, Phantom, Mandrake, Asterix, Tintin.. later, Rex Stout. In Marathi, Pu. La. Deshpande.

Writing a book.. Marketing Research.

Watching films- the 70s, almost all. 80s- less and nineties, most of the good ones. (Now, it's a rarity.)

Joining Facebook at my daughters' insistence- it was a game-changer, has kept me going through good and bad times.

Karaoke-ing, which started from my 50th birthday, in 2010, when I got a mic as a gift.

Marriage, of course, in 1988 and what follows- 2 daughters, in my case.

Switch to teaching from the corporate world. Enabled by a Ph.D.

Wall mag writing at IIMB. Before that, editing a magazine at engineering college in Hyderabad.

Starting this blog. Lately, a Youtube channel, Chat Masala.

A Golf trip to Thailand with Golftripz in 2010.

Travel- to various places and more than that, friends or people I met during the travel.

Joining a music group on facebook.

Could be a few more, but I am forgetting them right now.

Spending Versus Saving

What should be your goals? Our parents were clear. Save before you buy. Almost no credit.

Made sense, but delayed gratification. Loans were not available, salaries were low.

But when I went for a few years to the U.S., I saw consumerism driving the economy. Most people bought on credit/loans. Homes, cars which had to be paid off in 15-20 years (homes) or 5 (cars). Credit checks were done through independent agencies that were reliable.

Our generation lost that clarity. Incomes went up (back in India, after late 90s). So we did take loans as they opened up, for cars, computers (yes!) or washing machines (EMI), and sometimes homes.

Now, spend as you earn seems to be a norm, among young people, with building wealth the last thing on their minds.

My view is it depends on the life cycle, and how long you expect to live. If you can, finish your loan payments as early as possible in your working life- say, 30-50 years of age, and build capital for a pension or equivalent in the next ten or twelve. After 60, slow down and work less, spend on experiences that don't cost a bomb, steadily. Have an emergency fund for unforeseen large spends- usually medical.

Foolishness and April 1st

Looks like world leaders don't wait till April 1st to be foolish. Russia launched the war in Ukraine in February 2022. Not to be outdone, Trump launched his Iran war in February 2026.

We will have to wait and see if it ends by April 1st. Unless he gets the peace prize, looks unlikely. So some new foolishness may happen.

But the rest of the world can indulge in their own foolish things. Elections, for example. There are some coming up in the neighbourhood (Bengal where I am right now), and a couple of other states in India. I usually don't understand the claims and promises made by politicians of all hues every 5 years, and have mostly given up trying to.

Of course, there are other things. Pettiness in personal life, and pandering to the ego, in all sorts of people. Ego massage could be a big industry if it were monetised.

Fun times ahead, if you take a comical view of things. Look forward to April 1st.

Meeting Ananya and Sayantani

It was a great afternoon-met two friends who are in Kolkata, one an alum of IMT N, and another a Ph.D. scholar who I met at a doctoral consortium. Sayantani is from the 2012 batch of Nagpur, and with ICICI Lombard ever since. Ananya Ghosh is doing her Ph.D. at St. Xavier's university.

We had fun driving to Axis Mall, and having lunch at German Cafe at the entrance. We discovered the food was more Italian than German, and feasted on Pizza and Pasta. It was Eid, Ramzan, and most restaurants were crowded. We couldn't get parking inside Ecopark, which was our first choice.

Talked about Merchant Navy, Doctors doing an MBA, and life in Kolkata, NOIDA and Pune (where I will be soon), and retirement time pass.

Pics from the fun outing- we had a cake too, that they'd brought along!

Sayantani (left) and Ananya

The cake came as a surprise! Had mine and ate it too!

Classifying Heroes

Most entertaining - Rajnikanth, for sure.

Handsome? Tie between Rajesh Khanna and Dharmendra

Great dialogue delivery- Raaj Kumar

Intensity - Amitabh Bacchhan

Natural- Sanjeev Kumar

Funny- Randhir Kapoor

Youth Icon- Rishi Kapoor (in my youth)

Evergreen Romantic- Dev Anand

Intangible- Kishore Kumar

Others, I was not so fond of

Wars at Will

It's becoming a pandemic, with world leaders the most susceptible.

Starting wars, I mean. Look around in the last few years. More than any other problem, Coronavirus excluded, it's the manmade ones that are endemic.

The Russian and the American (and a couple of others) heads of state seem to think it's their playground. They can get up one fine morning and declare a war. Or Abduct Heads of State.

The U.N. watches helplessly.

If China were to take over Taiwan, the same jokers would preach differently. Or if North Korea were to attack South Korea.

A democracy should probably have a referendum, like that for Brexit, when an offensive is to be launched. The laws must hold a Head of State guilty for a war that nobody in the country wants.

Uprisings in Bangla Desh and Nepal have underscored that unpopular governments or leaders can be unseated by popular will. Some day, it might happen in the bigger nations.

Aunt Turns 90 in April

I have many maternal aunts, two of whom are surviving. The elder one, Manik Gokhale, will soon turn 90. She has been global in her outlook, like many of her sisters, and lived in Malta and Libya for some years. Has two daughters settled in Australia and Germany. Her son, my cousin, is in Pune, so we meet more often.

She is in the centre in this pic, while we were celebrating the 75th of my cousin, right, back to the camera. Other cousins (mine) are in the pic, and one cousin's husband.

Her 90th will be celebrated soon, in Pune where she lives.

Selfies - A Collection

These are selfies taken at different times..

Pratishtha Batra, Neeti Ingole, Sohni Roy at IIM Indore Audi

Rimjhim, Dheeraj at the lake (Doddabommasandra)

Garima and Ayan at our place, Pune

Vijayakumar, Dhanapal at Kodaikanal Golf course

Silky Shrivastava and Arun Bhattacharyya, Prestige University

Howrah Bridge

Debasmita and Shrabani, JISU Convocation 2026 Feb.

Abha and Sheetal Koyla restaurant.. Colaba

Prachi and Akansh, IIM Indore ground

Satirical Movies and Plays

Peepli Live

Zed Plus

Jane Bhi Do Yaaro

Mirza Ghalib in New Delhi

Adrak ke Panje

Kishore Kumar with Shankar Jaikishan

Zindagi ek safar hai suhana from Andaz, the most upbeat song about Life.. yodeling at its best.

Geet gaata hoon main, gungunaata hoon main.. from Lal Patthar, a serious film with some good songs.

Tum kitni khoobsurat ho.. from Jangal Mein Mangal.. a soft romantic number

More often, Shankar Jaikishan were know to team up with Mohhammad Rafi, and created some great melodies in his voice for Shammi Kapoor in particular.

Badan pe Sitare from Prince and Aji aisa mauka phir kahaan milega are two examples.

Where I Watched Which Films

Maya Memsaab- at Sangeet, Secunderabad. Ek haseen nigaah ka dil pe saaya hai is a favourite song from this.

Anand, and later, Damaad, at Navrang, Jambagh, Hyderabad.

Sholay in 70 mm, the first time, at Ramakrishna 70mm, Abids, Hyderabad.

Hathi Mere Sathi and Hare Rama Hare Krishna, in Bellampalli.

Painangal Mudivethilai, Tamil in a tapri theatre in Bannerghatta Road

Swapnakudu, Malayalam, in Calicut

Mungaru Male in a Bangalore theatre in Majestic area

Don at Tarakarama, Ramkote, Hyderabad.

Namak Halaal, at Maheshwari, Hyderabad.

Aulaad in a club in Andhra Pradesh. Jodi hamari jamega kaise jani was a nice song.

Salaakhen, in Chandrapur town, Maharashtra.

Robot, in Smruti theatre, Nagpur.

Katyar Kaaljat Ghusli, Marathi, in Nagpur.

Natasamrat, Marathi, in Victory theatre, Pune.

Mohra, in Venkatesa theatre.

Golf Courses I Played On

The most exotic ones were around Pattaya, in Thailand, where I went with Golftripz in 2010. Laem Chabang was one of three we played, and a tough one. It was designed by Jack Nicklaus, I think.

Where I learnt my Golf was actually a free (for us) Golf course in Harihar built by the Kirloskars. It was an 18 hole course with narrow fairways, so you had to hit straight. It also had a 3 par with a green surrounded by water, requiring a precise drop.

Hyderabad Golf Association has a course around the Golconda Fort, very scenic. Also the Kodaikanal Golf Club, with winding fairways, and many ups and downs (apart from your game)-proud to have got a Hole in One there, in 2014. Also Wellington where I got a second one.

I also played at Ooty Gymkhana, ASC Bangalore, Air Force Golf Club at Nagpur, KGA and BGC at Bangalore, Madras Gymkhana, and a course in Kolar, near Bangalore.

Played with Yashad Gaur, Vijayakumar, Dhanapal, and Muthu in Bangalore, classmates in Chennai, and Gadgil, in Nagpur. Garima Shah and Aditi Gupta and Akshar also joined us in Nagpur, and so did Smita Dabholkar and Madhu Helchel.

I am planning to do one in Kolkata soon.. more on that later..

Bouquets and Brickbats

I got more bouquets than brickbats during a stay of around 11 months in Kolkata. So I consider the tenure a successful one, by that standard. But also from my own standards- how many people met, new friends made, etc. Did not do badly on that count as well, as the following pics may suggest-

Debasmita Das, Shrabani, Karanjyot and Sunita Samanta.. my best friends.

Samarendra (student of Comp. Science), Shrabani, Surjeet.

Students of Education Dept..

Tista Biswas and Anupam Bandopadhyay, HR.

Shower of gifts from these young friends.. and a cake.

Atanu, Manua, Moumala, colleagues at JISU. Bratati, likewise, below.

Caught up with Sayantani Saha ex-IMT and Ananya Ghosh, Research scholar at Xavier's, again.

Exiting the City of Joy

Much depends on how you view your stay in a place. Every place can provide you with joy (or sorrow) depending on what you do to get along with that place, and the people in that place.

Though I was a visitor to Kolkata regularly for admissions since around 1996 (I was with Kirloskar Institute then), I had not lived here. A friend, Ajanta Sircar, worked here (she's a prof. at VIT Vellore now), and during one of our visits, she took me around to visit places here, including Olypub. Oxford Bookstore too. I have visited both since I started working here last year, and a couple of other places like Tollygunge Club, thanks to Dash, who is a member.

I did not manage to play Golf so far, but might do so before I move out. Did go to a restaurant at the Ecopark Golf Course called Club de Golf though, to meet a visiting alum, Navneeta. Also met Amit Gope, a student from XIMB long ago, who is a Golfer himself.

And re-met Ananya Ghosh and Sayantani Saha. Ananya I had met at XLRI once before, and I helped her a bit with her Ph.D. analysis here. Sayantani is an IMT Nagpur alumna, and works with ICICI Lombard ever since she graduated in 2012.

Made a few friends in the JIS University too, among colleagues at both campuses - New Town and Agarpara. Tried some food specialities from here. and liked most. A couple of old friends also visited, one a prof. from my XIMB days- Banikanta Mishra, and another, a Ph.D. student from Indore-turned prof. at OP Jindal, Akansh Khandelwal.

Also met Suhasini Barman, my third favourite after SD and RD Burman. This one runs a marketing and communications firm named after her, located in the Park Street area. Also guest lectures in B schools. We met on Linkedin, I think, and met a few times after that.

I also represented JIS University at a few events in Delhi, Hyderabad and Kolkata over the last few months.

As I said, it depends on you too, whether you take the joy or the sorrow from a place..

Women Students and Colleagues

I had a lot of women colleagues and even more women students at all the institutes I have worked in. Some that I am in touch with offline or online, after a varying number of years since I met them at those places-

IMT Nagpur- probably the maximum number from here. Sheetal Garg, Ananya Nandi De, Abha Kulkarni, Tosha Dubey, Shraddha Nigdikar, Aditi Atre, Swati Jain, Nikita Kumar/Ray, Shreyashi Chakraborty, Shruti Sharma, Meghna Sinha, Meghana Khadilkar, Meghana Joshi, Meenu Mynam, Anshita Chetty, Rupam Verma, Gowri Kishore, Anusha Mamidanna, Twinkle Jain, Ishita Modi, Vrinda Khanna, Pallavi Bajpai (my twin, as per FB), Roshni Chhabra, Divya Singh, Sayantani Saha, Gunjan Nagpal, Nitya Pranav Chawla, Nidhi Naseri, Laura Shah, Noori Agarwal, Kanika Bhatia, Phalguni Banerjee, Priyanka Rajurkar, Karishma Dattani, Garima Shah, Esheeta Ghosh, and profs. Veena Pailwar, Smita Dabholkar Singh, Saleena Khan. Lots more, actually..

IMT Ghaziabad- Profs. Lubna Nafees, Sita Mishra, Jayanti Ranjan, Rashmi Agarwal,

IIM Indore- Prof. Shweta Kushal, Prof. Surbhi Dayal, Radha Ladkani. Students- Anusha Soni, Shatakshi Tripathi, Shailja Gupta Kapoor, Pratima Gaekwad, Sapna Patni, Prachi Jain, Neeti Ingole, Geeti Mishra, Vartika Varyani, Pratiksha Batra, Sanjana Rao Yarram, Shreya Surana, Anam Nuhi, Bhuvneet Raheja

Kirloskar Institute- Nidhi Kanungo, Achint Kaur, Savitha, Jogeswari, Sharmistha Singh, Shweta Agarwal, Padmapriya Janakiraman, Nishka Rathi, Sudeshna Srivastava, Pooja Daniel, Smita Mohan, Vidya TC, Swapna Gurijala, Anushka Mishra..

Prestige University- Prof. Juhee Singh, Sohni Roy, Divya Sairam, Ayushi Kabra, and students Bhavna Ojha, Annette, Jayantaa, Nandini, Roshni, Sakshi,.. and admissions team.

JIS University- Bratati Bhattacharyya, Surjyasikha Das, Moumala Bhattacharya, Shrabani, Debasmita, Ankita, Riya of admissions team, Sanghamitra Kundu, Sunita Samanta and Karanjyot Kaur from exam cell, ..

Vignana Jyoti- Deepa, Deepthi, Ranjana, Rashmi,

PESIT- Pooja NM, Yogita Shanbhag, Roopshree Narayan, Profs. Manasa Nagabhushanam, Bhagyalakshmi Venkatesh,

IFIM- Chaithu Gunapali,

Jeffrey Epstein

This is darker than any fiction an author could cook up. The scale of his operation, which went unchallenged for so many years, aided apparently by a lady who recruited other handlers or procurers, was unprecedented. We do hear of gangs of sex traffickers, but usually those are gangs of criminals. This was a gang of sophisticated socialites who routinely did sick stuff and blackmailed the elite of the U.S. and the world to perhaps arm-twist them into paying money, and using influence to silence any attempts to inquire into their crimes.

Thanks to some activists in the U.S., the DoJ has been forced to release the possible evidence of wrong-doing. Funnily, no American other than the lady Maxwell has been arrested, or charged, in spite of a lot of statements which are in the files. Other countries have done slightly better.

No idea when this will end or how, but surely, some more people must be guilty?

Ghalib in New Delhi- Play Review

Reminded me of Adrak ke Panje by Babban Khan. That was in the 70s. I think Sayeed Alam acted as Ghalib. He was brilliant. Ghalib takes birth again in Modern Delhi, is the basic storyline. He asks God to give him rebirth in either Varanasi or Delhi. God says there is already a tough guy with a beard in Varanasi. So he sends him to Delhi.

It is full of jokes about politics, society, education, corruption, language and everything in between. And includes all that is happening, therefore topical and relatable.

The best jokes were about Galgotias University, which was in the news recently. Also about Kejriwal, whose contribution was to give khaansi (cough) to the whole of Delhi.. and as a result, the IQ of Delhi went up (a joke about the current CM, who doesn't know the difference between AQI and IQ).

Also, many jokes about Kangana, Language deterioration, Haryanvis, Gurgaon, Yamuna-paar Dilliwasis, Modi's travels, Chara ghotala of Lalu Yadav, removal of Mughals from history books, and so on.

He says, If Kapil Dev can learn English, anyone can..

It's in the form of 5-6 skits, including Ghalib's encounters with a paanwali, a drunk, two taxi/auto drivers, a Punjabi landlady (with jokes about Punjabis included), a police constable who thinks he's a terrorist, and a couple of ad agency executives who try designing a campaign to make him famous- through photoshoots with Mallika Sherawat or Kareena Kapoor. Very engaging, a laugh a minute. Political and social satire at its best!

Meetings With Old Friends in Kolkata

Met Navneeta, Shakti Ghosal and Indukant Gautam of IIMB 1982-84 fame, in the last year.

Met Banikanta Mishra of XIMB- a colleague from 1991-92, on his visit. Also Amit Gope, a student from the same institute, who is settled in Kolkata.

Renewed contact with Ananya Ghosh, a Ph.D. scholar with St. Xavier's University, whom I had earlier met in XLRI at a doctoral consortium. She is close to finishing her Ph.D.

Akansh Khandelwal, a former Ph.D. student at IIM Indore.

Jasbir Matharu, a former colleague, along with Abhinav Chandel, both from IMT Nagpur.

Sayantani Saha, also a former student at Nagpur who is with ICICI Lombard.

And of course, Dash who is also an IIMB classmate, retired cop now settled here.