Unsolicited advise to Jaganmohan Reddy

Hi.,

My condolonces to you & your family for this huge loss. While the state has lost it's CM, the loss for your family is huge. In these trying times, i apologize that i need to talk about politics when it might be the farthest in your mind.

The reason why i had to interrupt your mourning is the increasing clamour to make you CM. Believe me, most of them are following the true traditions of the Congress party or trying to take advantage of the situation. A novice CM who is out of place in regional politics isn't their nightmare but their dream come true. It need not be said that your CMship will be one of the most corrupt in state history, not because you want it that way, but because you would have no control over these ravaging lunatics.

You entered politics about 6 months ago. You have been elected MP. Can you state five things you have accomplished in these 4-5 months? Politics, unfortunately, is easier spoken than acted upon. I am not denying your way to the CM post, but asking you to mature beforing seeking it. Remember that this is the last time you will get the CM post handed on a platter, you need to earn it going forward. Are you ready & prepared for it?

Putting myself into your shoes, i would do the following. If you are keen on the CM post, consult with Sonia & Rahul on the path leading to the CM post. Consult Rahul on how he got educated on people's issues. Get a mandate from Sonia that you will succeed Rosiah whenever he is ready to give up the CM post. Ideally, he should occupy the chair for 2 years and hand over to you at mid term. Take these 2 years to tour the state, tracing the same steps as your father. Learn the issues of the farmers, traders, businessmen, salaried class, working women, housewives and all. Once you attain maturity, the post is as good as yours. Remember, politics is like a bank account, you can only draw what you put in. Frankly, my dear, you haven't put in much to date. Start investing and then encash at a latter stage. 

It is obvious that the support you have today will dwindle drastically as time flies, but you will be left with your core supporters and that's going to be your first lesson.

Regards

Prakashraj - He deserves it!

I just read in Rediff that Prakash Raj has won the National Award for Best Actor for his performance in Kanjeevaram. While i didn't see the movie, i don't think there is one actor in the southern states in current times who can challenge PR for his acting skills. 

Kudos, sir. I like it that you do a variety of roles - stereotype villans (Anthapuram, Okkadu, Pokiri); side actor sharing/stealing hero's thunder (Athadu); father roles (Bommarilu etc) and in a few rare cases, the role of hero. For those who haven't heard of this actor, he is a gold medalist at National Film Institute and is the Amol Palekar-Nanna Patekar-Amrish Puri mix. 

No wonder, famour Southern stars like Chiranjeevi, Rajinikanth, Kamalhassan have praised him often! Enjoy your hour of glory, some lesser talented actor will steal the thunder soon!

PS: To the Rediff Editor. Please check the dictionary for the meaning of "sweep". 

Google Maps - Beats Nokia maps hands down!

My wife recently gifted me a high end Nokia mobile phone. Rest assured, we did quite a bit of research on the available options before settling on our final choice (my wife wanted to buy a blackberry but it didn't make sense for me to pay 800 rs for their GPRS+ services while i could pay only 200 rs for unlimited internet from my TSP).

The phone came installed with a Nokia maps application and 3 month free subscription of GPS service. We wanted to test out and took the phone for our visit to Tirumala (more on it in the next blog!), opening it and making some installations the previous night. Sadly, i missed one major application! Nokia maps is pretty good when it comes to the metros. It has mapped all major Indian cities - Delhi, Mumbai, Bangaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai amongst others. However it has ZERO details of other areas. Some NHs show up in the application but it's coverage is pretty weak. I was surprised (sadly!) that Nokia maps didn't even add a high level map of Tirupati in their application.

I got time to install Google maps after my trip to Tirumala and i was so surprised at their map coverage. It recommended the same path that we took. More so, it has detailed a lot of Tier-2 & Tier-3 cities in India and shows major roads in all these places.

Thumbs down on Nokia maps and astounding thumbs up for Google Maps.