and the 2014 award goes to ..

1. Much Ado about Nothing Award - Ajay Maken for leading the high decibel Congress (INC) poll campaign in the 2014 elections to get a resounding thumbs down from voters

2. Kundi fellow of the year award - Indian cricket captain M S Dhoni for giving a clean chit to Meyappan as a cricket enthusiast much before Mudgal report damned him as a confirmed bookie.

3. Bak-Bak Sur award for nuisance reporting – Arnob Goswami for his unflinching commitment to raising the pitch to hysterical levels every night at 9 pm on the idiot box

4. Foot in the Mouth award - Mani Shankar Iyer for his ‘Chaiwalla’ jibe against Modi that boomeranged on him and congress particularly

5. Monumental blunder of the year award - to BJP’s par-de-excellence strategist Arun Jaitley for giving up his safe Delhi seat to get knocked down in Amrinder sing’s turf in Punjab.

6. ‘Smell the Grass’ award - to her highness , selvi J Jayalalitha who had to perch down from her poes garden abode to the humble confines of Parappana Agrahara jail

7. Recurring itch of the year award - to Lalit Modi for staging a comeback by remote managing election win to Rajasthan Cricket Association

8. Cagey dealmaker of the year award - to Sahara shri Subroto roy for converting Tihar Jail annexe into a deal making room to sell his property in attempt to secure bail

9. Jamaai No.1 award - Mango man Robert Vadra for his uncanny ability to put himself and the hapless Congress in bad light throughout the year

10. Thunder’d’olt of the year award - Suhel hairdo Seth for his unflinching commitment to tongue-in-ckeek’anery.

11. Commotion for promotion award - Rajdeep sardesai for promoting himself in bad light in Us even as he hopped from CNN-IBN to Headlines today

12. Houdidni ‘got away’ of the year award - West indies cricket team who slipped away from Rohit Sharma’s blazing willow in the Home series

azimuth event: Malala Yousufzai

 
if you may have noticed, two of the world’s most inspiring global leaders converged in December this time, in two entirely different ways. One in passing away and the emergence of the other.

I am referring to the first death anniversary of Nelson Mandela (Dec 5,2014) and the Nobel Prize investiture ceremony to Malala Yousufzai (Dec 10,2014).

An azimuth event of a world in transition with one star in horizon and the other in Zenith!

The common stirring plot in their stories is the fight of one person against enslavement, though of entirely different types.

Malala Yousufzai to my mind is the most important global leader today. If our future holds any promise it is because of young leaders like her. She stands for a timeless yet primordial cause, that which is the fountainhead of the most ills plaguing our world today i.e., "Educating the girl child".

For someone so young, growing up in a challenging environment in Pakistan, to stand up to hardcore fanatics for a diametrically opposite belief and to face the gun without fear to my mind is a exemplar of the stirring fight of humanity towards progress .

As her voice boomed through the Stockholm Concert Hall, one just couldn’t help admire her clarity of cause 

I am reminded of what the great Swami Vivekanand said in this regard 

"if the women are raised ,then their children will, by their noble action, glorify the name of the country. Then will culture, knowledge, power and devotion awaken in the land"

'....they (women) will solve their own problems. Educate your women first and leave them to themselves, then they will tell you what reforms are necessary for them"
 

Mess in a Venn

There couldn't be a better tool than the veritable Venn diagram to describe the BCCI mess that's in the Supreme Court currently where N.Srinivasan, the Don Quixote is still pushing his luck with the apex court.