ChinmayC Blog

The harvest festival of Assam starts today, the 14th of January, 2019. Tonight, called Uruka , community feasts are being organised in temporary straw-bamboo structures and at homes plus other venues all over, irrespective of any divisions. If you need to know more about this try the following link: Happy Bhogali Bihu!

In the olden ages Facebook was a manageable affair. Your indulgence time in this fascinating book had to be found, because you could either do it on your desktop or on your laptop and everywhere it was not convenient to do so. The moment the smart phones inundated the eager hands of users things changed completely—for the better or for the worst is yet to be ascertained. Facebook indulgence became an anytime or rather a full time activity, to such an extent that if one picks up the mobile for doing a specific thing one inadvertently gets distracted to FB notifications, and finally forgets about what s/he picked up the mobile for. Its use stopped to be location-specific—it began to haunt users everywhere including travel time, in public transport and in public places apart from very private encounters.   As a corollary to the above users started getting restless thinking about the time being devoted to this indulgence, if the time devoted or wasted is too much, if the things one is ...

The ‘festive’ thought as mentioned above could be interpreted as controversial after the words that follow are swallowed up, and therefore I clarify at the outset that there is no malicious intention behind this thought. There is only the spirit of celebration. The Indian festive season starts around September every year with various non-religious, religious and intra-religious festivals taking place almost every week. Since all such events of worship or otherwise are now called ‘festivals’, these get naturally opened up for everybody to participate. Like the quintessential slogan given in West Bengal by the Chief Minister during the Durga Puja ‘festival’, ‘Religion is mine, religion is yours; festival is for all’. For example, in this year’s Christmas ‘festival’ on the streets of Kolkata you would hardly find a ‘religious’ being among the thousands of intense merrymakers. So then, everyone waits for the occasion from September to New Year Day to participate which translates into roami...

Movie watching has always been a passion with us, particularly anywhere in India, ever since the discovery of motion pictures. This passion has always been independent of the conditions of the movie theaters or the environment of viewing. All of the cinema halls in India were single screen till about two decades back when multiplexes and malls came up in the major cities. In the small towns cinema halls or movie theaters were abysmal—people smoked and spat inside; they talked and roared with laughter anytime; seats were congested and there was an acute problem of craning necks; there was no air-conditioning and the wall or ceiling fans made it all the more noisier; no lounges outside, only holes around and most of the theaters looked like warehouses. However, we never complained about the lack of such amenities, mostly because we had no access to better environment to compare with. Of course, in the metros or in the major cities the theaters were much better, and once in a while we enj...

I was disturbed by various ‘business’ calls during work on that day. Since the Indian festive season was in full bloom such calls were not that unnatural. Getting exasperated with a plethora of telemarketing calls from banks, insurance companies and the like I ignored one from an absolutely unknown mobile number. When the same number called again, I answered thinking it could be an important call from someone not at all connected to the lot. I cursed myself as the lady voice spoke up on the other side... ‘Hello Sir, I’m calling from xyz finance company...” “Yes?” I responded. “Sir, our xyz finance company is giving you an overdraft facility...” “Why?” “Sir, half of your monthly salary will be given as overdraft to you...” “Why?” “Sir, the amount will be totally interest free...” “Why?” “So Sir, where do you work and what is your monthly salary?” And then I hung up. The audacious lady tried several times later on. However, I decided to follow the age-old dictum ‘once bitten, twice shy’ ...

Kumartuli or Kumortuli is located in the northern part of the city of Kolkata. The locality is a traditional habitat of the potters for nearly three hundred years. The potters or the artisans or the artists settled here during the restructuring of the Kolkata colonial region by the British East India Company. Earning a livelihood by making earthen pots and utensils first they gradually shifted to the making of the idols of Gods and Goddesses for various festivals round the year.  With increasing demand and quality of their creations over time the artisans became famous and Kumartuli came to be known as the hub of idol makers supplying thousands of idols, particularly of Goddess Durga, to whole of the state of West Bengal and to NRIs of around 90 countries across the globe. At least three months before Durga Puja, the biggest festival of West Bengal and one of the biggest across Eastern India, more than five hundred workshops come alive with hyper activity day and night. First, the ...

It is only logical that the unbeaten team of the Unimoni Asia Cup tournament become the eventual champions. India was the only team that remained unbeaten and in the Final tonight became the worthy champions beating an upbeat Bangladesh by  3  wickets. However, the highly competitive match was not without its moments of worries or even scares. First, it was a risky toss to win owing to India’s decision to field first, because in the slow pitches of UAE a total around 250 often proved to be insurmountable. Second, Bangladesh did show the promise of running away with the match while batting. Third, in the Indian innings loss of Dhawan and Rayadu early and the departure of Rohit while in full flow raised scares for an Indian conquest. And then the fall of Dhoni at the score 160/5 put the onus of a victory on the bowlers again. Put into bat Bangladesh started a brilliant opening partnership of 120 runs in just 20 overs and looked set for a total of over 250 runs. However, all the ...