‘MOHALI’DAY

30th March 2011 is a day that will get embossed in History. It’s the day when India met its arch rivals Pakistan for the 6th time in World Cup. While the past statistics strongly support India for it had won on all previous occasions. But as we all know statistics are just numbers and can be changed anytime. And on top of that, it was a Semi-Final encounter.

While I am not going to blog about the above as by now everyone has gone through an extensive emotional turmoil and a frenzy of excitement, I just wanted to share what an interesting day I spent on this momentous day. So to start with, not knowing the day and the WC schedule (and also at that time not sure if India will reach this far), I had pre-booked some meetings in Delhi with a return flight in the evening (Yes evening, the same time when the chase begins and the entire sub-continent will be glued to TV at their homes (or may be pubs, multiplexes and in some cases even stadiums like the Gachibowli stadium in Hyderabad)

The meetings got over and I did manage to watch the initial explosive batting of Sehwag and some of the dropped catches of Sachin. But the real fun started, when we reached the Delhi airport at T-3 around 6:30pm for my 8pm flight back to Mumbai. First, we were told that the flight has been cancelled due to lack of passengers and now I am shifted to 9pm flight. Well not that bad, I might be able to watch some more overs.

So I got my boarding pass and proceeded to security. Not a single soul in sight. The security check which in any normal day would have taken 15-20 mins was such a breeze... only 2 mins. I asked whether there would be TV inside showing live match, and the security guard very heartily responded "YES... OF COURSE" (as if I just asked for some basic essential services). Infact, he also updated me with the latest score. India had lost its 5th wicket and was struggling (as usual in its last 15 overs).

I was almost through security when I heard some loud screams inside...Not sure what it was, I walked past security and would have just crossed the first shop when I realized what cricket can do to the nation.

There was a Giant screen showing cricket with a whole lot of crowd standing in front of it. Audience included passengers, cabin crews, pilots, air hostesses and even the security guards (so much for our tight security). The power play was on and Suresh Raina was trying to achieve a respectable score for India while wickets were falling at the other end. We started searching for a place where we can sit and watch the remaining few overs of Indian batting but there was not an inch left which could offer us a good view. Finally, we went to a pub and watched the remaining overs from there.

1st innings got over and suddenly the entire space was empty as if all flights for takeoff were just waiting for the break.

We watched the first 20 overs quite comfortably before our flight announcement was made.

With some very heavy heart of missing the action, we started walking towards the gate only to find that there were more TVs near each boarding gates. Some passengers even had radios and were listening to the commentary while waiting for their boarding passes to be scanned. We boarded the plane and just casually asked the air hostess... ‘By any chance would you know what the latest score is?’ She immediately responded “Don’t worry Sir, the pilot will be updating shortly and will give regular updates throughout the journey”. Our jaws dropped...’Can this happen??’ She said “YES...OF COURSE” ... once again as if it’s part of the flight price we paid like the cold meals and the tiny water bottles we were entitled to.

The flight took off and as soon as the initial boarding instructions got over; came the first score update. ... Pakistan has lost its 5th wicket and its 144/5. We were happy that at least we will be able to hear (if not witness) some action and are not totally betraying our nation.

The score updates continued and with each update, India’s chances of winning increased. There were some Ethiopian journalists sitting next to us and they were quite curious to know what this frenzy is all about. They had very little clue about cricket and all they wanted to understand after every update was if India was winning or not. We kept confirming "YES...OF COURSE".

The anxiety continued and the pilot mentioned Pakistan needs 86 runs from 63 balls with 3 wickets remaining. And then for the next 20 mins, there were no updates... We got anxious, worried, eager, tensed and many more such emotions flooded our nervous systems. Various theories started coming in the mind. Has India lost? Has Pakistan utilized its batting power play effectively? During those 20 mins, we must have asked the airhostess at least 5 times. The poor girl said she was also upset and has reminded the pilot many times. If she barge in once more, she would be killed.

Just when all hopes were lost, there was a sound of a throat getting cleared and the update being announced. Pakistan needs 31 runs from 10 balls.

Yeh Dil Maange More... We were now desperate for a ball by ball update but the pilot couldn’t oblige much and obviously we couldn’t let the beautiful airhostess get murdered. Then suddenly as if the prayers were answered. I heard a sound which would have been normal if I were on ground. But in the flight....? Is that by any chance sound of a commentary? Is someone able to catch radio signals in the flight? No it cant be possible? I rushed to the source of the sound and tapped the gentleman? ‘By any chance, are you listening to commentary? Do you know the score?’ And he responded “YES... OF COURSE... 30 runs from 6 balls with 1 wicket remaining ... Zaheer will bowl the last over.” Phew...

Another 2 mins and the pilot announced “INDIA HAS WON”. We all clapped and cheered along with our anxious African colleagues. One of their female journalist asked if that’s all we are going to do? Won’t there be any Victory Dance and we immediately imagined and missed the streets in India at that point of time.

What a journey this was... These memories will remain embedded forever. Last but not the least, for the first time in my life, I thoroughly enjoyed flying with the “Maharaja”

Necessity is the mother of all inventions

I have been in sales for past 5 years and have got the privilege of working with a variety of clients across many countries. Interestingly there is one question I face from most of my prospects -
Why has India succeeded in software sector and others haven’t? How is India producing some of the most bright and talented software engineers?
Is it because of we have many educational institutes? Is the quality of education really good? Are Indians naturally bright? Are we good in analytics and mathematics (the two most perceived requisites to be in software industry)?
Now we as Indians know that the reasons listed above might not be necessarily true. I don’t think we have the best of institutes. I don’t think we have the best of quality and coverage in education. And I definitely feel we are not the best mathematicians and analysts in the world. So what’s the real reason?
My most common response to all the above queries is fairly simple: Necessity is the mother of all inventions. India doesn’t provide any sort of social security benefits. It also doesn’t provide any assurance on employment. We have to fight for it. From school admissions to post graduation courses to final placements, everything is competition based. Even for a kid to get into a nursery school, there is a selection process (ask the parents who have to get their kids admitted to a nursery school). So from the time we are kids, the parents instil a sense of insecurity in us: Unless we study hard, we may not get into a better school or college. Unless we study hard, we may not get through the cream of institutes. Unless we do well at our respective courses, we may not get a placement.
All who try for engineering (atleast most of us) try for IITs, RECs and the other engineering institutes. Job security is prevalent only for the best of the institutes. The process goes on to higher educations as well like MBAs, MCAs and others.
Only the top 2 percent of the IIT applicants are admitted and to get into a decent department. Almost 2.7 lakh candidates appeared for CAT (Apart from IIMs, 118 B-schools also accept CAT Scores) this year (2008). IIM A alone has seen about 51,000 applicants this year. In CAT, success is awarded to only one percent of the total applicants.
With such kind of statistics and success ratio, Indians have to really try hard to get in. This competitive spirit goes a long way in Indians taking up some of the best jobs worldwide. And the success is not just restricted to software industry but extends to financial services, telecom, and other verticals as well. So that sums up my response in that single proverb I wrote earlier… necessity ….
Before I end, I will also like to highlight an increasing recent trend in India which may hamper our future prospects. Due to the booming demand in last few years (and please discount the current economic crisis), the competition has started decreasing. These days jobs are available for simple graduates (even BAs) in software companies. XII pass candidates with some add-on silly courses have started getting jobs in BPO industries. This is slowly going to decrease the competitiveness within us thus decreasing the quality of output from India. Unless we act now, we might very soon stop facing the queries with which I started this blog.