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My Royal Connection--a Birthday Bonanza

My Royal Connection--a birthday bonanza The other day while surfing the net to read the newspapers published abroad as part of my routine cerebral exercise, I came across the news item on the colourful celebrations of the 90th. birthday of Queen Elizabeth II. The queen, surrounded by her family members, made public appearance on the balcony of the Buckingham Palace to enjoy the spectacle of air show by the RAF and marching army band.I was a little surprised as I had perused a news item in the web version of the same newspaper on the Queen celebrating her 90th birthday in a rather muted manner a couple of months back. After a little searching in the net, it was revealed to me that the British monarchs had been observing two birthdays since the days of King George II of the 18th century--one being celebrated on the biological, that is, actual day of birth and the second being observed officially on a Saturday in the month of June. In case of Queen Elizabeth II, her actual birthda
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Beyond Rohithgate

Beyond Rohithgate ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ These days the media--print as well as electronic- come up with stories on daily basis that sadden my mind, often make me extremely despondent. Some, mostly belonging to vested interest groups, would often say the media thrive on them(for commercial reasons).I think such description does not stick to them under the prevailing environment of our country which is indeed standing on a crossroad. The moot point is how much of 'history' is allowed to carry on board on our long-pending flight to inclusive growth and prosperity in social, economic and political terms. The tragic suicide of Rohith, a research scholar at the Central University in Hyderabad is not just a case of unfortunate demise of a budding scholarly pursuit. It begs many questions from us. We must face them with an open and unimpassioned mind. It has become expedient to highlight this point,as it appears that some people are ONLY concerned with the 'dalit' ident
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Media Madness or Mission Impossible

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Media  Madness on Mission  Impossibl e Too many things are happening around us to grab our eyeballs to dozens of TV news channels working overtime, it appears. Breakneck speed with which these channels are vying one another to bombard the viewers with "BREAKING NEWS" has nearly achieved  a supersonic scale. The prime reason for this is obviously the increased number of competitors. This story is common to all TV channels having all-India reach (English and Hindi) as well as  the ones  catering to needs of the news-hungry Bengali "bhadrolok", generally in search of material for a round of animated gossip in the next morning's 'adda' at the local teashop and/or office. BENGALI  BURP Of course, many would tend to ascribe the rise of the Bengali news channel to the huge number of "politically conscious" population of the State. But going deeper into the impact of the presentations of the contentious topics –mostly related to the State politi
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Salutations sans Shoes

                                                  Salutation sans Shoes                                                   ----------------------- Believe it or not , it happened in less than 40 years ago at my first place of posting as the BDO in the eastern part of the State. Before proceeding further, locational details of the office building in a few more words are necessary for proper appreciation of the situation.The office happened to be one of the earliest ones established under the ambitious rural development project called "Community Development" in the early fifties. It was a U-shaped pucca building with asbestos roofing and a wire fencing around it, probably to add respectability to the otherwise humble edifice ; as there was no human habitation within a radius of atleast one kilometre (except a dozen or so of staff quarters a little away from the office building on its rear corner) to keep off grazing animals. It was a conspicuous structure standing on a
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The Art of Leaving

THE ART OF LEAVING As I proceed with my thoughts, it will be clear that this has nothing to do with the discourses delivered by the well-known public figure who has been credited with the noble job of teaching on how to live in this stressful world of today. It's a different question that such inputs would not normally reach the audience for free. But here I will try to touch upon only one aspect of the emotional, physical and practical basis of day-to-day human action/inaction in a given situation-- the art of "leaving". To make the discussion point a little more clear and being a football lover, I am easily drawn toward a fact that happens in a football ground. It is a treat for the eyes to see a player keeping the ball to himself for a long time despite stiff opposition from the opponents who may sometimes take resort to rough tackles too. But we adore the player who has such wonderful skill , at the same time knows exactly when to leave the ball for a better pros
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Short Circuit

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                                                                             T he life of a West Bengal Civil  Service ( Exe .) Probationer at the district headquarters as part of induction-level training was usually  arduous, but very interesting at the same time. Unlike All-India Service Probationers, their counterparts in the State Civil Service, had a mixed taste of acceptance by the officers and subordinate staff posted at the district. The upper-class probationers were often treated with a conscious display of measured deference by one and all,  especially in remote districts , except of course,by their seniors in All India Service like the District Magistrate and the ADM(s).The reason for this attitude might partly be attributed to the fact that the subordinate officers and assistants at the D.M office did not find too many All-India officers around. On the other hand,the WBCS(Exe.)  officers in the district were sighted and interacted with very often.The State Servic
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The Best Foot Forward

For a change, I keep off the theme of my days as a small-time bureaucrat in particular,and  my observations on functioning of the big wheel called bureaucracy in general. I propose to talk about the game of football, the one having the highest following on this planet. I  must confess  here I was not a  footballer of any consequence.  I did play football like any other boy in my childhood and pursued my passion all through my school-days. My dream to excel in the game was limitless. However it was not backed either by a natural skill or stamina or perseverance. So it met with its natural death, as I got entangled in my scholastic persuasions in college and later in university education. But my love for the game never got diminished, even though I was physically away from the playing field as also living away from the football-crazy city of Calcutta. Before the advent of live coverage of sporting events in the electronic media, we had only shabbily-printed sports tabloids in Beng
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