Tushar Mangl Media

If you look at the M & A activity in the past few months, it seems like an era of independent free internet is slowly coming to an end. Linked In was bought in by Microsoft, Yahoo an iconic brand of the nineties was sold out to Verizon and Monster another survivor of the dot com bust of nineties finally went to hammer. It seems as if the surviving spirit of these and many like them is waning. Look at how Uber, although now a major player but once a struggling start up, conceded defeat in China as players with deep pockets closed ranks to check it in. Indeed it seems as happens in a true capitalist world, the big boys with deep pockets and perpetual line of credit seems to be showing who the boss is, with curbs on smaller different players. Take the case of Go Javas, a logistics firm, which was supposed to be bought by Snapdeal but once talks failed, again supposedly Go Javas lost the e-commerce giant's account. So, where does future lie for upcoming tech firms? Most of...

An amazing book by a gifted writer. Is it really love what we feel for a person so close to us? Does someone really mean they love you, when they say they do? What do you do when a person says they love you but refuse to share some very important things which are bothering them? Although you share everything and never lie to each other? Does that really belie the very undertaking of love? The claims made, the vows taken? This book leaves so many questions open but very little answers. Perhaps as it is in most cases, the answers lie deep within us. Or the answers really are out in open and we refuse to interpret them, to accept them? The Pact by Jodi Picoult is a powerful and thought-provoking novel that explores the complexities of love, family, and the human psyche. The story centers around the lives of two families, the Golds and the Hartes, who have been friends for over a decade and whose children, Emily and Chris, have grown up together. However, when Emily dies in an apparent s...

Imagine the plight of those people who are in tremendous pain but nothing can be done to reduce it, simply because they need organ transplant. If you look it at common sense level, the solution is so simple. Get people to donate organs when they are no longer alive and hence don't need it. In today's times, one would be shocked to see how many well educated people are so unware about organ donation. And these are the people whom we count on to change the world. After all, if such educated people cant understand the simple fact that you no longer need your organs after death and that they can be used to help others. Gift your Organ is one such organization which is pushing for this much needed awareness. It is co ordinating and enabling pledging of organs through its online portal http://www.giftyourorgan.org/ I mean, why is it so difficult for so many of us to give up something which you wont even feel about when donation is done?

I am not someone who is quite comfortable with the hills, but mountains somehow always remind me of them. People say one should be careful during travelling to hills due to landslides etc. The penchant of destroying our environment is so ingrained in Indians that the mountains once so lovely are now bare and crumbling. Which causes problems during monsoons. Other than that I love the mountains during rains. In plains we have so much water logging and sewage overflow. In hills, the water just flows, reminding us to keep flowing. The weather chills down but the trees and the rest of the flora comes out so fresh, so clean, you can actually breathe the freshness in. The other reason is the humidity. Somehow the humidity associated with rains, in plains or near oceans is almost absent in the hills. All the more reason to enjoy the rains without worrying about the follow on of the humid weather.

Over the weekend I was browsing through some video book reviews of Six Degrees. My prime interest was to know how reader's felt about our story Entangled Lives.  As I surfed through the video streaming sites, I wondered whether the time has come for video reviews. We all know the benefits of video over text. But internet speeds are quite slow in India and access still limited. Also the quality might suffer due to inadequate or obsolete recording devices. On the flip side, video reviews are super cool. You get to relate to  your readers so much better. Will this trend be a hit? I can not be sure about it. You see when you check out reviews for a book, you just skim down a list of reviews, say on the shopping site or on a review website. You don't want to spend a lot of time researching and learning about the book.

A girl from a poor family is gang-raped in Haryana by five men. That was the year 2013. Happens all the time. We don't need to panic or do anything as it did not happen in Delhi or Mumbai. It happened in Bhiwani. Why bother? Circa 2016. The same men, again gang rape the same girl. No one is shocked. The glib, English-speaking middle class is not interested. No one wants to discuss a girl from a poor background who despite being a victim of a heinous crime, was trying to rebuild her life by shifting to Rohtak and studying for her masters. Nops, no one gives a damn, especially the police. Since society never expected them to do anything, remember the riots in Rohtak for reservation a few months ago? And by living up to its expectations, the police never did anything. You really can't police the will of the people, especially if that will is deep rooted in lawlessness. We saw it during the reservation stir when police allowed a free for all rioting for every frustrated f...

We have had a lot of discussion on this blog, in earlier days about   Kashmir   and the perennial problem it is for the Indian state.  Now that the central government is pumping in a INR 80,000 crore package for the Kashmiris, plus the usual flow of tax payers’ money for security reasons, they have received an excellent feedback from people of the state. By openly supporting the death of a commander of a terrorist organization, the people of Kashmir have clearly shown where their loyalties lay. And they do not look at all at par with the Indian state.  That leaves a very uncomfortable question for the Indian polity of the day. What to do with Kashmir at this stage? Is pumping money blindly and empowering the armed forced really going to work? This is plainly the strategy that everyone who has ruled in Delhi has followed. While militancy has weakened due to a strong army, hostility between the army and locals is only increasing. An ...

Finally the Prime Minister has shuffled his cabinet. He kept most of his council of ministers intact, just making minor changes here and there. Key takeaways - Former Karnataka CM Sadananda Gowda is moving down steadily in political circles. From Railways to Law and now to an obscure ministry his stars are not shining. PM Modi seems to have realized the need to induct more powerful females in his council of ministers. Hence two of them have been brought in, blunting the power of other formidable women leaders. Bihar still has the maximum representation in the PM's cabinet even though the people of the state have moved towards the RJD, Congress and JDU combine. The biggest gain has been for the law ministry with two senior Supreme Court lawyers taking charge of it. Talk about expertise there. Another big gainer is the environment ministry which has now got a known environmentalist to reign it in. The government now has two very well qualified doctors on board, none of t...

J Alchem's book A Road Not Traveled is an a mazing book by a debutant author. A unique plot with each character being endowed with bizzare sounding names. The book is brief yet all scenes are detailed and vividly described. The story moves at a good pace and ends with an unexpected twist. [No, I am not revealing the story].   Recieved a copy of the book through Goodreads Giveaway program from the author. 

Somewhere, someplace in the blogosphere lie blogs like Rummaging Through , with blogs so forgotten yet so beautiful. Pranita's blog is primarily about love and poetry. It probes deep into your heart and touches you deep within. The posts are quite few, just a handful of them and the blog does seem to reflect neglect. One of my favorites was Universe in Your Eyes.  Do check the blog out. 

Media is all going wild these days with speculations and support for a second term for RBI Governor. But many groups in social media are mobilizing support for him for gains that are totally contrary to interests of our nation. Under his stewardship, banks have had their worst performances, primarily for his policies to encourage loans to corporates with strong political connections. Loans were disbursed by banks without proper compliance and procedure, leading to huge losses. It is such forces which now want him to continue. So as to keep encouraging such practices. For those who feel, he being out of government is a good sign, look at how bank licenses have been issued. RBI still doles out licenses on a whim and in a very miserly fashion. A modern outlook demands that licenses should be offered on tap but no, the Governor didn't encourage that. Look at the overall customer service in the banking industry. Its pathetic, largely because RBI does not encourage banks to...