Category Archives: General awareness & Knowledge

INTERESTING FACTS FIGURES & QUOTES: EPISODE 24

June 26, 2019facts, General awareness & Knowledge, general knowledge, gk, interesting facts, quote, quotes and lines, Uncategorized3m, ai, amazon, cyclone, fani, football, gun violence, indira gandhi, indonesia, joseph kennedy, kamlesh tripathi, king lear, labour, manmohan singh, odisha, purple patch, R&D, republicans, rivers, shravancharitymission, sunil chhetri, tories, UK, us, usa, william coyne, william shakespeareshravancharitymission

‘The best management is sometimes less management or no management at all.’ William Coyne, who led 3M’s R&D efforts for over a decade, believed a big part of his job was to leave his people alone and protect them from other curious executives. He said: ‘After you plant a seed in the ground, you don’t dig it up every week to see how it is doing.

Purple patch means, a run of success, a winning streak.

‘More sinned against than sinning.’ Is an expression used by those who may be guilty of wrongdoing, but consider themselves the victim of a more serious wrong against them. The phrase comes from William Shakespeare’s play King Lear.

Indonesia which has a population of 270 million (27 crores) and is spread over more than a thousand inhabited islands, managed its recent elections in just one day. Can India ever do the same?

People are more effective when they conquer smaller tasks and celebrate small victories.

Football: We are not Japan who can keep the ball for long spells, especially when we play better opponents—says Sunil Chhetri, Captain Indian Football team.

Indian political outfits can learn from their Western counterparts like the Republicans and Democrats in the US or Tories and Labour in the UK, where the grassroots have a say in choosing party leaders, and defeat leads to churning and shuffling of leaders on the top deck.

Odisha has had close to 300 cyclones between 1800 and 2019 categorized as extremely severe to severe to moderate including cyclone Fani.

Joseph Kennedy (American businessman, investor and politician) once said, ‘The Chinese use two brush strokes to write the word ‘crisis,’ one brush stroke stands for danger, the other for opportunity in crisis, so be aware of the danger –but recognize the opportunity.

World War I lasted from 1st August 1914 to 11th November 1918 (1564 days).

There are about 165 major rivers in the world. These major rivers are long and wide enough to be classified as major rivers with large volumes of water flowing through them every day. They have tributaries that provide fresh water to billions of people.

The Amazon River is the largest in the world. It is 3,980 miles or (6,400 kilometers) long, according to the U.S. National Park Service. It is, however, the world’s largest river by volume and contains 20% of the Earth’s fresh water, according to the National Science Foundation.

Artificial Intelligence is enabling computers to do our thinking for us, and do it much faster and better than we can ourselves.

People from the pharmacy industry know very well that it takes 12 years to make a new drug and maybe it costs $1 billion.

Indira Gandhi openly backed the Bengali Guerrilla movement in 1971 and opted for the military offensive to liberate Bangladesh after asking the army to prepare for the final push at least five months before the war in December. Whereas, Manmohan Singh from the same party, decided to exercise restraint after the 26/11 terror strike on Mumbai.

To scrape the barrel or to scrape the bottom of the barrel means to be reduced to using things or people of the poorest quality because there is nothing else available.

There are many references in the Bible with regard to God’s beneficence in Nature. “When a tree is wantonly cut down, its voice rings from one end of the earth to the other. Be like a tree, because the tree gives shade even to those who cut off its boughs.”

Gun violence in America is out of control. It has been for some time now, but with 307 mass shootings in the first 311 days of 2018. It is reaching, one a day average. Gun homicide rate in the US is 25 times higher than in other high-income countries.

Only 65% of Indian children are presently covered-under Universal Immunization Programme (UIP). Mission Indra-Dhanush’s configuration will cover 90% full immunization coverage by 2020.

India has only one individual gold medal to show for 92 years of Olympic participation.

A house insurance costs just Rs 6-12/ day however only less than 1% people who can afford it have house insurance.

In Greek mythology, Prometheus, (possibly meaning forethought) is a Titan, culture hero, and trickster figure who is credited with the creation of man from clay, and who defies the Gods by stealing fire and giving it to humanity, an act that enabled progress.

Dutch-Scilly War between the Netherlands and the Isles of Scilly (located off the southwest coast of Great Britain) (has lasted from 1651- to 1986: 335 years) is one of the longest, and even the strangest, wars in the world’s history, characterized by a complete absence of battles and bloodshed. It is known as the Three Hundred and Thirty-Five Years’ war. The conflict began on March 30, 1651, as a by-product of the English Civil War. That this war ever existed is disputed. It is said to have been extended by the lack of a peace treaty for 335 years without a single shot being fired.

The country with the most time zones is France, mostly due to its various territories around the world.

Vatican City with a population of fewer than 1,000 people, is the smallest population of any country in the world.

Whether elephants make love or war, the grass always suffers is a hackneyed expression.

Harry S. Truman the 33rd President of the United States once said, ‘It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.’

“The purpose of a fish trap is to catch fish, and when the fish are caught the trap is forgotten. The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits. When the rabbits are caught, the snare is forgotten. The purpose of the word is to convey ideas. When the ideas are grasped, the words are forgotten. Where can I find a man who has forgotten words? He is the one I would like to talk to.” said Chinese philosopher Chaung Tzu.

The soldier above all others prays for peace—said American five star general DOUGLAS MACARTHUR.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started—said American writer Mark Twain.

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

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Shravan Charity Mission is an NGO that works for poor children suffering from life threatening diseases especially cancer. Our posts are meant for our readers that includes both children and adults and it has a huge variety in terms of content. We also accept donations for our mission. Should you wish to donate for the cause. The bank details are given below:

NAME OF ACCOUNT: SHRAVAN CHARITY MISSION

Account no: 680510110004635 (BANK OF INDIA)

IFSC code: BKID0006805

Our publications

GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

(The book is about a young cancer patient. Now archived in 7 prestigious libraries of the US, including, Harvard University and Library of Congress. It can also be accessed in MIT through Worldcat.org. Besides, it is also available for reading in Libraries and archives of Canada and Cancer Aid and Research Foundation Mumbai)

ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

(Is a fiction written around the great city of Nawabs—Lucknow. It describes Lucknow in great detail and also talks about its Hindu-Muslim amity. That happens to be its undying characteristic. The book was launched in Lucknow International Literary Festival of 2014)

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

(Co-published by Cankids–Kidscan, a pan India NGO and Shravan Charity Mission, that works for Child cancer in India. The book is endorsed by Ms Preetha Reddy, MD Apollo Hospitals Group. It was launched in Lucknow International Literary Festival 2016)

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

(Is a story of an Indian salesman who is, humbly qualified. Yet he fights his ways through unceasing uncertainties to reach the top. A good read not only for salesmen. The book was launched on 10^th February, 2018 in Gorakhpur Lit-Fest. Now available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

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INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES EPISODE-23

June 19, 2019column, facts, General awareness & Knowledge, gk, Indian Agriculture, interesting facts, quote, quotes and lines, Uncategorizedamericans, bengaluru, bihar, bmc, buckingham palace, cartel, cash transaction, china, composer, crude oil, delhi, demonetizing, drawbridge, economy, england, eric arrthur blair, flood prone, forest, george orwell, global merchandise, gst, hasan suroor, hongkong, hyderabad, india, kamlesh tripathi, labour laws, magadha, mahabharat, mithila, motihari, mozart, mumbai, plumbing, rain fed, shravancharitymission, single, soil, sweden, talisman, umbrella movement, UN, vaishali, washington irving, watershravancharitymission

Eric Arthur Blair, better known by his pen name George Orwell, was a famous English novelist, essayist, journalist and critic. He was born in Motihari, Bihar, India on 25^th June 1903 of all the places.

Very few are lucky to be a Mozart the world famous composer of classical era who found passion for music at the age of three. The way to tell you’ve found a passionate work is when it doesn’t feel like work.

Around 30% Americans get less than seven hours of sleep per night, and among single mothers, this rises up to 47%.

India is one of the world’s most flood prone countries with 113 million (11 crore) people exposed to floods. According to a UN report India’s average annual economic loss due to disasters is estimated to be around $9.8 billion, out of which more than $7billion loss is due to floods.

Talisman is an object, typically, an inscribed ring or stone, that is thought to have magic powers, and brings good luck.

In a country with a median age of below 30, where, a million people enter the work force every month, sudden demonetizing can be devastating.

Even after a full scale up, a fully, financially, digitized economy, like Sweden, still conducts, about 20% of its money transaction in cash.

England: Running a palace is becoming tougher and tougher. It seems that London’s Buckingham Palace is in urgent need of essential repairs, mainly in the plumbing department. However, a number of British taxpayers—over 85,000 of them, who have signed a petition to that effect- are reluctant to foot the bill for the job.

Drawbridge—is a bridge that can be lifted so that ships can pass.

For far too long, emerging economies such as India have been at the mercy of a supplier’s cartel. It’s therefore time now to change the rules of the game—this is especially in the context of oil.

China and India are the second and third largest oil importers respectively. When they negotiate together their combined influence in the oil market will help them get a good deal. But will it ever happen?

The global market of merchandise exports today is approximately $15 trillion. Share of India in these exports is only 1.6% compared to that of 12% of China.

References to Bihar regions like Magadha, Mithila and Vaishali can be found in ancient texts and epics. The world’s first known republic was established in Vaishali in 6^th century BC.

The ‘Umbrella Movement’ was a political movement that emerged during the Hong Kong democracy protests of 2014. Its name arose from the use of umbrellas as a tool for passive resistance to the Hong Kong Police’s use of pepper spray to disperse the crowd during a 79-day occupation of the city demanding more transparent elections, which was sparked by the decision of the Standing Committee of National People’s Congress (NPCSC) on 31 August, 2014 that prescribed a selective pre-screening of candidates for the 2017 election of Hong Kong’s chief executive.

Soil and water are not commodities, but life-making material.

The element composition of the human body is 72% water and 12% earth.

Since most of our rivers are forest fed, the best way to resuscitate them is with more vegetation. But the organic content of soil has fallen drastically and the rapid pace of desertification is alarming.

Soil depletion in this country is so acute that nearly 25% of the Indian agricultural land will not be cultivable in the next 3-5 years.

In 40 years time, it is estimated that over 60% of our land will be uncultivable.

The only way to increase organic content of our soil is through tree cultivation and animal waste. If we destroy that our capability to generate food, will be heading towards a disaster.

Due to lack of vegetation and indiscriminate urban expansion, we are witnessing alarming cycles of food and drought. In the last 12 years, nearly three lakh farmers have committed suicide.

There are many reforms that India could carry out to become more competitive in manufacturing. These would involve changing its cumbersome labour laws, cutting corporate taxes to levels seen in East Asian countries and improving the transportation networks.

Bullet train in India is likely to cost $17 billion which is a third of India’s annual defence budget.

India was famous for having many sick industries but no sick industrialist. But I guess the trend is changing now with Mallaya and Nirav Modi in spotlight in the U.K.

Bengaluru, once a city of 2,500 lakes, boasted of an efficient storm water drainage system of interconnected lakes. If one lake overflowed water would automatically flow into another lake. But with increasing encroachment and solid wastes blocking the channels, floodwater cannot flow to the next water body. Drawing similarities are Hyderabad that has reported extinction of 375 lakes, and Delhi where 274 of 611 water bodies have dried up due to neglect and exploitation.

Not a single Indian city has drainage system that can promptly evacuate intense monsoon rainfalls that occur over short time periods.

A large part of BMC (Bombay Muncipal Corporation) revenue amounting to Rs 61,000 crore is locked up in fixed deposits and are not being deployed for civic amenities.

Almost all Indian cities are water-scarce in dry seasons and prone to severe flooding during monsoons. Cities like Delhi, that witness floods every monsoon, are also, some of the most water-stressed cities of the world.

Singapore, a monsoon country, has for the most part, solved urban drainage and water scarcity problems by installing a proper functional drainage system and collection of rainwater harvest.

When a poor man gets government money, it’s called subsidy, when a rich man gets it, it’s called incentive.

GST replaced 17 state and central taxes to make India one common market.

Vidur the royal counsellor in Mahabharat, tells the king that he should sacrifice a person for the sake of a village and a village for the sake of a nation.

The National Mental Health Survey 2016 published by NIMHANS recently showed that 13.7% of Indians are likely to have some mental illness during their lifetime.

INTERESTING QUOTES & LINES.

The worst form of democracy is a million times better than an ideal form of dictatorship.

Muslims are Islam’s biggest enemy—says Hasan Suroor, London based journalist.

All labour is precious but some are more precious than others: “Believe me, the man who earns his bread by the sweat of his brow, eats oftener a sweetener morsel, however coarse, than he who procures it by the labour of his brains—Washington Irving, American author.

Buddha said that the past is—already gone and the future is not yet here; there is only one moment when you can be fully alive, and that is the present moment.

If one’s mind is agitated, one’s breathing will not be calm.

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

Share it if you like it

NAME OF ACCOUNT: SHRAVAN CHARITY MISSION

Account no: 680510110004635 (BANK OF INDIA)

IFSC code: BKID0006805

Our publications

GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

*****

INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES EPISODE-22

June 12, 2019beautiful lines, causerie, column, facts, General awareness & Knowledge, general knowledge, gk, interesting facts, quote, quotes and lines, snippet, Uncategorized, verses, vignetteagriculture, ambedkar, aphorism, arvind panagariya, brahminical, brahminism, china, deomocrat, eckhart, gagandeep, gdp, gk, green eyed monster, hiv, indore, interesting facts, irish, kamala devi harris, kamlesh tripathi, oeuvre, plays, ppp, presidential nomination, quote, rabindranath tagore, rauf akftar, safaigiri, shravancharitymission, sonnets, usa, water, william shakespeareshravancharitymission

Though William Shakespeare’s entire oeuvre –37 plays and 154 sonnets—is brimful with words of wisdom for every stage and situation of human existence, one of the most quoted aphorisms of his is, “Always the wrong person gives you the right lesson in life.” It may sound a bit contrary and even oxymoronic at first blush, but it’s pregnant with profound wisdom.

Purchasing power parity (PPP) is an economic theory that compares different countries’ currencies through a “basket of goods” approach. According to this concept, two currencies are in equilibrium or at par when a basket of goods (taking into account the exchange rate) is priced the same in both countries. Closely related to PPP is the law of one price (LOOP), which is an economic theory that predicts that after accounting for differences in interest rates and exchange rates, the cost of something in country X should be the same as that in country Y in real terms.

Kamala Devi Harris is the first person of Indian descent to post a credible candidacy for the Democratic Party nomination for US president. Daughter of an Indian cancer researcher and a Jamaican economics professor, for many Desi Americans she is proof that they have ‘arrived.’

Indians on an average do believe that things are getting better: 74% of them, according to a recent Ipsos-MORI poll. Indians are more optimistic than people in wealthy Western countries like those in Europe, North America and Oceania.

India has made significant improvements in reducing HIV infections—from 5.1 millions in 2003 to 2.1 millions in 2017—but it still has the world’s third largest HIV-infected population after South Africa and Nigeria.

India has the highest population of cattle in the world.

India is also the biggest milk producer in the world.

Indore is India’s cleanest city (winner of the Safaigiri Award of 2018).

Agriculture, mining, manufacturing and construction account for 45% of India’s GDP.

The global market in merchandise exports today is approximately $15 trillion. Share of India in these exports is only 1.6% compared with 12% that of China.

Nearly half of India’s farms are less than half hectare, a size too small to yield adequate living standard for a family of five—Arvind Panagariya.

I have never been to mars. What will we discover when we get there? A red landscape, quiet horizon and frozen glaciers? Probably all is as beautiful, in its own way, as the Earth was, thousands of years ago—MA YANSONG.

History is testimony that whenever the majority developed a sense of victim hood, it led to genocide of minorities.

Amongst the great man made places visible from outer space are the pyramids of Egypt, the Great-wall of China, and the Palm islands of Dubai. Now added to the list is the 600-foot figure of Sardar Patel—so tall, at dusk it casts a mile-long shadow over an enormous dry agriculture stretch. The base of the statue houses a research centre dedicated to good governance and agricultural development.

Donald trump is now arguably the most joked about US president on a parody-per-day basis.

Eckhart was once sitting alone under a grove of trees in a lonely place. A friend who was passing by went up to him and said, “I saw you sitting, lonely, and I thought I would keep you company.” Eckhart replied, “I was with myself, but you have come, and if anything, I am feeling lonely now.”

A key facet of water policy must be induction of technology to promote reuse. Recycling does take place in India but it’s nowhere close to the level needed. Elsewhere, recycling has moved to another level. Singapore recycles water for drinking.

Pre-monsoon rainfall from March to April has shown a 27% deficiency. Separately data put out by government shows that water levels in India’s major reservoirs and river basins have fallen to 21% of its average of the last decade.

Agriculture consumes most of India’s water resources.

In March 2019 the Baltic State of Estonia’s parliamentary elections saw almost half the votes cast through E-voting. That should be the vision of our future.

Nobel Prize in science are not given for R&D, they are given for fundamental discoveries.

Gagandeep Kang from Faridabad’s Transnational Health Science and Technology Institute is the first Indian woman to be made fellow of the Royal Society of London—now in the company of Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein and Charles Darwin.

All told private investment alone remains the key to sustained growth.

Current Account Deficit is simply the (investment) – (savings) gap. Therefore if savings are higher than reported, the Current Account Deficit (CAD) will be lower.

Origin of Green–Eyed Monster. The term green–eyed monster, meaning jealousy, first appears in Shakespeare’s Othello, when Iago says, “Oh, beware, my lord, of jealousy! It is the green–eyed monster which doth mock the meat it feeds on.”

The phrase luck of the Irish is commonly thought to mean “extreme good fortune.” … “During the gold and silver rush years in the second half of the 19th century, a number of the most famous and successful miners were of Irish and Irish American birth

INTERESTING LINES

The moment I realised God sitting in the temple of every human body, the moment I stand in reverence before every human being and see God in him—that moment I am free from bondage, and I am free—Swami Vivekananda.

Rabindra Nath Tagore—‘The mind is without fear; and the head is held high; where knowledge is free; where the world has not been broken into fragments by narrow domestic walls.’

Brahminism or Brahminical are not to be understood as related to a community or caste called Brahmins as explained by Babasaheb Ambedkar himself.

Rauf Akhtar stated in his Taslees: Khud ko na kar itna majboor khud ko na kar paamal tu hi woh khuda hai jiski hai tujhe talash.

A commonly quoted aphorism says, ‘New beginnings are often disguised as painful endings.’

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

Share it if you like it

NAME OF ACCOUNT: SHRAVAN CHARITY MISSION

Account no: 680510110004635 (BANK OF INDIA)

IFSC code: BKID0006805

Our publications

GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

*****

SHORT STORY: Rs 7

June 11, 2019article, book corner, book launch, book review, causerie, column, facts, General awareness & Knowledge, general knowledge, gk, short article, short story, snippet, spiritual article, story, storytelling, Uncategorizedbangalore, cv raman, einstein, honesty, kamlesh tripathi, nobel laureate, professor, progress, research institute, rs7, rupees seven, shravancharitymission, subrahmanyan chandrashekhar, usa, valueshravancharitymission

    Nobel Laureate Professor C. V. Raman after retirement wished to open a Research Institute in Bangalore. So, he gave an advertisement in the newspapers for recruiting three physicists. Lots of eager scientists applied thinking that even if they were not selected, they would at least get an opportunity to meet the Nobel Laureate.
    In the preliminary selection, five candidates were selected and the final interview was to be taken by Professor C V Raman himself. Where, three were selected out of the five.
    Next day Professor Raman was taking a walk around when he found one young man waiting to meet him. He realized that it was the same man who was not selected.

Professor Raman, asked him, what was the problem and he replied that there was no problem at all, but after finishing the interview the office had paid him ₹7 extra than his claim and he wanted to return it. But because the accounts had closed, they could not take back the amount and asked him to enjoy.

The man said that it is not right for him to accept the money which did not belong to him. Professor C V Raman said, so you wish to return ₹7 and he took the money from him and started walking back.

But after taking a few steps forward Professor Raman asked the young man to meet him the next day at 10.30 am. The man was happy that he would get an opportunity to meet the great man again.

When he met the Professor next day the Nobel Laureate told the young man “son, you failed in the Physics test but you have passed the honesty test. So I have created another post for you”. The young man was surprised and very happy to join.
Later on he too became a Nobel Laureate in 1983. This young man was no one else but Professor Subrahmanyan Chandrashekhar (US Citizen of Indian Origin). He has written a book on how seven rupees changed his life. This was how honesty made a great scientist.

What is lacking in talent can most often be made up for, with hard work, guidance and help from others. But what is lacking in character and values can’t be made up for with anything ever.
Which is why Einstein had said, “Don’t try to be a person of success, but always be a person of value.”

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

Share it if you like it

NAME OF ACCOUNT: SHRAVAN CHARITY MISSION

Account no: 680510110004635 (BANK OF INDIA)

IFSC code: BKID0006805

Our publications

GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

*****

The Atomic Bombing of Japan in World War II, 1945

June 9, 2019article, article on foreign affairs, casual causerie, column, facts, General awareness & Knowledge, gk, politics, short article, short story, snippet, story, Uncategorized1945, atom bomb, boeing b29, bombers, china, dresden, enola gay, hawaii, hiroshima, japan, kamlesh tripathi, manhattan engineer, mariana islands, nagasakhi, pearl harbour, shravancharitymission, tibbets, tinian, usashravancharitymission

The United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 only to hasten the end of the World War II in the Pacific. Although, it was the first, and to date the only, actual use of such weapons of “mass destruction,” the mushroom clouds have hung over every military and political policy since then.

Less than five months after the sneak attack by the Japanese on Pearl Harbour, in Hawaii the Americans launched a small carrier-based bomber raid against Tokyo. While the attack was good for the American morale, it accomplished little other than to demonstrate to the Japanese that their shores were not invulnerable. Later in the war, U.S. bombers were able to attack the Japanese home islands from bases in China, but it was not until late 1944 that the United States could mount a sustained bombing campaign.

Because of the distance to Japan, American bombers could not reach the targets and safely return to friendly bases in the Pacific until the island-hopping campaign had captured the Northern Mariana Islands located in (Western north pacific islands). From bases on the Mariana Islands, long-range Boeing B-29 Super-fortresses conducted high altitude bombing runs on November 24, 1944. On March 9, 1945, an armada of 234 B-29s descended to less than 7,000 feet and dropped 1,667 tons of incendiaries on Tokyo. By the time the fire storm finally abated, a sixteen-square-mile corridor that had contained a quarter million homes was in ashes, and more than 80,000 Japanese, mostly civilians, lay dead. Only the Allied fire-bombing of Dresden, in East Germany, the previous month, had killed 135,000, people that exceeded the destruction of the Tokyo raid.

Both Tokyo and Dresden were primarily civilian rather than military targets. Prior to World War II, international law regarded the bombing of civilians as illegal and barbaric. But after several years of warfare, however, neither the Allies nor the Axis distinguished between military and civilian air targets. Interestingly, while a pilot could drop tons of explosives and firebombs on civilian cities, an infantryman often faced a court-martial for even minor mistreatment of non-combatants.

Despite the air raids and their shrinking territory outside their home islands, the Japanese fought on. Their warrior code did not allow for surrender, and soldiers and civilians alike often chose suicide rather than giving up. By July 1945, the Americans were launching more than 1200 bombing sorties a week against Japan. The bombing had killed more than a quarter million (about 2.50 lacs) and left more than nine million homeless. Still, the Japanese gave no indication of surrender as the Americans prepared to invade the home islands.

While the air attacks and plans for a land invasion continued in the Pacific, a top-secret project back in the United States was coming to fruition. On July 16, 1945, the Manhattan Engineer District successfully carried out history’s first atomic explosion. When President Harry Truman learned of the successful experiment, he remarked in his diary, “It seems to be the most terrible thing ever discovered, but it can be made the most useful.”

Truman realized that the “most terrible thing” could shorten the war and prevent as many as a million Allied casualties, as well as untold Japanese deaths, by preventing a ground invasion of Japan. On July 27, the United States issued an ultimatum: surrender or the U.S. would drop a “super weapon.” But Japan refused. In the early morning hours of August 6, 1945, a B-29 Superfortress Bomber named Enola Gay piloted by Lieutenant Colonel Paul Tibbets lifted off from Tinian Island in the Marianas. Aboard was a single atomic bomb weighing 8,000 pounds and containing the destructive power of 12.5 kilotons of TNT. Tibbets headed his plane towards Hiroshima, selected as the primary target because of its military bases and industrial areas. It also had not yet been bombed to any extent, so it would have provided an excellent evaluation of the bomb’s destructive power.

At 8:15 A.M., the Enola Gay dropped the device called “Little Boy.” A short time later, Tibbets noted, “A bright light filled the plane. We turned back to look at Hiroshima. The city was hidden by that awful cloud … boiling up, mushrooming.” The immediate impact of Little Boy killed at least 70,000 Hiroshima residents. Some estimates claim three times that number but exact figures are impossible to calculate because the blast destroyed all of the city’s records.

Truman again demanded that Japan surrender. After three days when there was no response, a B-29 took off again from Tinian with an even larger atomic bomb aboard. When the crew found their primary target of Kokura obscured by clouds, they turned towards their secondary target, Nagasaki. At 11:02 A.M. on August 9, 1945, they dropped the atomic device known as “Fat Man” that destroyed most of the city and killed more than 60,000 of its inhabitants.

Conventional bombing raids were also conducted against other Japanese cities on August 9, and five days later, 800 B-29s raided across the country. On August 15 (Tokyo time), the Japanese finally accepted unconditional surrender. World War II was over.

Much debate has occurred since the atomic bombings. While some evidence indicates that the Japanese were considering surrender, but far more information indicates otherwise. Apparently the Japanese were planning to train civilians to use rifles and spears to join the military in resisting a land invasion. Protesters of the Atomic bombings ignore the conventional incendiaries dropped on Tokyo and Dresden that claimed more casualties. Some historians even note that the losses at Hiroshima and Nagasaki were far fewer than the anticipated Japanese casualties from an invasion and continued conventional bombing.

Whatever the debate, there can be no doubt that the dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan shortened the war. The strikes against Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the only air battles that directly affected the outcome of a conflict. Air warfare, both before and since, has merely supplemented ground fighting. As confirmed by the recent Allied bombing of Iraq in Desert Storm and in Bosnia, air attacks can harass and make life miserable for civilian population, but battles and wars continue to be decided by ground forces.

In addition to hastening the end of the war with Japan, the development and use of the atomic bomb provided the United States with unmatched military superiority—at least for a brief time, until the Soviet Union exploded their own atomic device. The two superpowers then began competitive advancements in nuclear weaponry that brought the world to the edge of destruction. Only tentative treaties and the threat of mutual total destruction kept nuclear arms harnessed, producing the Cold War period in which the U.S., along with the USSR, worked out their differences through conventional means.

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

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ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

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THE TWELVE JYOTIRLINGAS

June 9, 2019articles, casual causerie, column, facts, General awareness & Knowledge, general knowledge, gk, moral lesson, short article, short story, snippet, spiritual, spiritual article, story, storytelling, UncategorizedBhima shankar, Ghrishmeshvar, himalayas, jyotirlingas, kailash, Kamandal, kamlesh tripathi, Kedarnath, Mahakaleshwar, Mallikarjuna, Nagesh, Omkareshwar, Rameswaram, Shiva, shravancharitymission, Somnath, Trimbak, Vaidyanath, Vishvanathshravancharitymission

Just in case you have not read Shivpurana let me tell you it is all about Lord Shiva. It contains 24,000 verses divided into twelve Samhitas. Out of these one of them Roudra-samhita narrates the following story.

Once, Brahma tried to claim superiority over the trinity of Shiva, Mahavishnu and Brahma himself. He vented this thought of his to Mahavishnu. When, suddenly, a huge column of fire, burst out of the earth, between the two and rose into the sky. Brahma flew upwards on his swan to see the tip of the fire while Vishnu as a boar dug deep into the earth to see the lower end of the pillar of fire. Both failed in their mission and returned. It was then that Shiva appeared at the centre of the fire column. This was the first Jyotirlinga.

Jyotirlingas, represent the beginningless and the endless Stambha or Pillar, indicating the infinite nature of Shiva. In India, there are twelve Jyotirlinga shrines as follows:

SOMNATH

The Somnath Temple of Gujarat, is near Veraval in the Kathiawad district of Saurashtra. This is a Jyotirlinga shrine. This region is also known as Prabhasa Thirtha. According to the Shivpurana, the Moon God married all the 27 daughters of Daksha Prajapati. However, he liked Rohini more than others. Rohini’s sisters complained to Prajapati, who cursed the moon. As a result, the moon lost his radiance. So, he went to Veraval and prayed to Lord Shiva in a temple. And by the Lord’s grace, he regained his lost shine. Since then, the temple came to be known as Somnath Mandir. It was ransacked and destroyed as many as seventeen times by Muslim invaders, and each time, it was resurrected.

MALLIKARJUNA

This Jyotirlinga can be seen in Shrishailam Mountain, on the banks of the Krishna River in Andhra Pradesh. According to Shiva Purana, Lord Ganesha got married before Kartikeya. So, an angry Kartikeya left the place and went to Shri-shailam. Seeing their son offended, Shiva and Parvati followed him there. Shiva assumed the form of a Jyotirlinga and resided there as Mallikarjuna. Where, Mallika means Parvati, while Arjuna is another name for Shiva.

MAHAKALESHWAR

This Jyotirlinga is located on the banks of river Kshipra in the dense Mahakal forest in Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh. It was known as Avantika in ancient times. Legend has it that a five-year-old boy by the name Shrikar was amazed at the devotion of King Chandrasena of Ujjain towards Lord Shiva. Shrikar took a stone and started worshipping it as Shiva. Many people tried to discourage him in different ways, but his devotion only grew. Pleased by his devotion, Lord Shiva assumed the form of a Jyotirlinga and decided to stay in the Mahakal forest.

OMKARESHWAR

This Jyotirlinga is also in Madhya Pradesh. It is situated on an island called Mandhata or Shivapuri in the Narmada River. The island is shaped like an ‘Om,’ as written in Sanskrit. Omkareshwar means ‘Lord of Omkara,’ the sacred syllable Om. Once, when the Asuras defeated the Devas, the latter prayed to Lord Shiva. Pleased with their prayer, the Lord emerged in the form of Omkareshwar and defeated the Asuras.

VAIDYANATH

Also known as Vaijnath or Baidyanath, this Jyotirlinga is located at Deogarh in Jharkhand. This place is also called Chitaa-bhoomi. According to a well-known legend, Ravana once requested Lord Shiva to reside in Sri Lanka permanently. Shiva gave him a Jyotirlinga and told him that he should not place it on the ground before reaching Lanka. On the way, however, Ravana felt an urgent need to relieve himself. When a young boy who appeared there offered to hold the lingam in the meantime. The boy, was no one else but Vishnu in disguise, placed the lingam on the ground and disappeared, for he knew that Shiva’s presence would make wicked Ravana’s Lanka invincible. The lingam got fixed to the spot. On his return, Ravana saw what had happened. To propitiate Shiva, he cut off nine of his ten heads. But Shiva joined the severed heads of Ravana’s body, like a Vaidya. Hence the name of the Jyotirlinga became Vaidynath.

BHIMA SHANKAR

This Jyotirlinga is located on the banks of Bhima River in the Sahyadri region of Pune, Maharashtra. Legend has it that Kumbhakarna’s son, Bhima, vowed to take revenge on Lord Vishnu who, in His incarnation as Rama had killed his father. He began a severe penance and Lord Brahma was pleased and granted him immense power. Soon, Bhima the demon started creating havoc in the world. In the end, Lord Shiva reduced him to ashes. The Gods were overjoyed. On their request, Shiva made the place one of his abodes and manifested himself in the form of Bhima-shankar Jyotirlinga.

RAMESWARAM

This Jyotirlinga is located on the island of Rameswaram in Tamil Nadu. On his way to Sri Lanka, Sri Rama had stopped at Rameswaram, and worshipped a linga that he had made out of sand. Lord Shiva blessed Rama and then remained at Rameswaram in the form of Jyotirlinga.

NAGESH

The Nageshwar or Nagnath Jyotirlinga is situated on an island near Dwarka in Gujarat. The place is also known as Daaru-kavan. This Jyotirlinga is known far and wide for protecting devotees from poisons of all kinds. As per the legend in the Shivapurana, a demon by the name of Daruka imprisoned Supriya, a devotee of Shiva. On Supriya’s advice, the other prisoners began chanting, ‘Aum Namah Shivaya.’ Daaruka was enraged on hearing this chant. He sprang forward to kill Supriya. Suddenly, Lord Shiva appeared and put an end to the demon. He then remained on the island as a Jyotirlinga.

VISHVANATH

The Jyotirlinga at Vishvanath temple is located in Varanasi or Kashi, one of the most ancient cities of the world. It is believed that it was here that the pillar of fire representing Lord Shiva’s endless power broke through the earth’s crust and splayed towards heaven. The faithful are certain that those who die here attain salvation. The original Visvanath temple was destroyed and rebuilt many times. Emperor Aurangzeb destroyed the temple for the last time and built the Gyanvapi Mosque in its place. Later Ahilabai Holkar constructed the present temple adjacent to the mosque.

TRIMBAK

The Trimbakeshwar temple is located about 30 km from Nashik in Maharashtra, near the Brahmagiri Mountain. It is from this mountain that the river Godavari, also called the Gautami Ganga flows. Long ago, Maharishi Gautam, through his penance, had obtained an everlasting supply of grains. Some Gods became envious of the Maharishi and sent a cow to the granary. The cow was accidentally killed by the sage. On realising this, Maharishi requested Lord Shiva to get the premises purified. Shiva asked Ganga to flow through Nashik and He himself remained there as Trimbakeshwar Jyotirlinga.

KEDARNATH

At a height of 3,583 metres (12,000 feet) in Uttarakhand, the Kedarnath temple is located on the Rudra Himalaya range. It opens for only six months in a year, from May to November. During the other months, all the mountains here get fully snow clad. It is believed that in ancient times, Lord Shiva, pleased by the penance of Rishis Nara and Narayana, who were incarnations of Lord Vishnu, made a permanent abode in Kedarnath in the form of a Jyotirlinga. Many believe that the Pandavas had come here after the Mahabharta war to pray to Lord Shiva.

GHRISHMESHVAR

The Ghrish-meshvar or Ghush-meshvar Jyotirlinga is located in a village named Verul, near Aurangabad in Maharashtra. The place is not far from the famous Ajanta and Ellora caves. According to Shivapurana, there was a man named Sudharm, who had two wives, Sudeha and Ghush-ma. They were sisters. When Ghushma bore a son to Sudharm, Sudeha became jealous and threw the baby into a lake. Ghushma, a devotee of Shiva, prayed to the Lord and got her son back. On Sudharm’s request, Shiva manifested himself in the form of Jyotirlinga at that spot and assumed the name Ghush-meshvar.

By Kamlesh Tripathi

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GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

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INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES EPISODE-20

June 6, 2019column, facts, General awareness & Knowledge, general knowledge, gk, snippet, Uncategorizedamerican economy, devesh kapur, general knowledge, gk, indus, kamlesh tripathi, latin greek, milan vaishnav, olympic game, oxfam, pakistan, read the tea, sanatam sharma, shashi tharoor, short work of, sindhu, tasseography, wear one's heart on one's sleevesshravancharitymission

“Reading the tea leaves” is an idiom that comes from tasseography—(a fortune telling method) which is the practice of telling someone’s fortune by “reading” a splotched or smeared substance. For example, “everyone says things are going great for our company, but if you read the tea leaves you’ll see trouble ahead.”
Wear one’s heart on one’s sleeve—if you wear your heart on your sleeve, you openly show your feelings or emotions rather than keeping them hidden.
Make short work of—means to complete or consume quickly, for example: The children made short work of the ice cream, or they made short work of cleaning up so they could get to the movies. This term, first recorded in 1577, in effect means “to turn something into a brief task.”
70% of all English words are Latin or Greek words.
Originally, Hindu simply meant people beyond the river Sindhu, or Indus. But the Indus is now in Islamic Pakistan; and to make matters worse the word ‘Hindu’ did not exist in any Indian language till its use by foreigners that gave Indians a term for self-determination. Hindus, in other words call themselves by a label that they didn’t invent themselves in any of their own languages—the alternative to Hindu could have been Sanatan Dharma—says Shashi Tharoor.
It’s time to vote: If turnout increases, it is believed: ‘People are unhappy with the government and that’s why they are turning out in large numbers to vote to express their anger.’ If the turnout decreases, it is believed, ‘that people are unhappy but since the opposition has nothing concrete to offer they have decided not to turn out to vote.
Political analyst Milan Vaishnav, who co-authored with Devesh Kapur a book on political funding titled (Cost of Democracy) says India’s elections this time can cost up to $10 billion, much more than the 2016 US general election, which saw a spending of around $6.5 billion.
The 19 trillion$-plus American economy hosts a poll spending of around $6.5 billion, and the $2.7 trillion Indian economy may host a poll spending of around $10 billion. Even if you measure everything in purchasing power parity and not exchange rate terms—by PPP, India’s economy is roughly half the size of that of America—so the comparison still holds with as much force.
The Cathedral of Notre Dame was built 850 years ago.
It was only in Notre Dame Cathedral: the coronation of Napolean and the canonisation of Joan of Arc took place. Here a special mass celebrated the liberation from the Nazis and the bell named Emmanuel was rung to mark the tragedy of 9/11. This is where France came to cheer or to mourn.
Oxfam’s latest Wealth report points out, the nine richest Indians own as much wealth as 50% of the Indian population.
The first European power, to implement a meritocratic civil service was the British Empire in India.
2018 was the fourth hottest year on record and this year-2019 could beat that. Arctic sea ice continues to disappear at an alarming rate and sea-level rises are threatening island nations and low lying areas. In India, 2018 was the sixth warmest year on record and all the six warmest years have come only in the last decade.
A man goes to buy a national flag. The shopkeeper shows different sizes of the national flag to him. Then the man says something to the shopkeeper and the shopkeeper is shocked to hear that. Can you guess what was it that the man said to the shopkeeper? He asked, without thinking. “Can you show me other colours of the national flag?” Friends this is what absent mindedness can do to a person.
It takes a contingent of 30,000 strong international media to cover Olympic game’s function with events spread far and wide.
A house insurance costs just Rs 6-12 per day however only less than 1% people who can afford it have house insurance.
Ayurveda is a 6000 year old science.
Liquid biopsy being tested in the US may soon become a boon for cancer treatment.
Delhi has more than 500,000 manual rickshaws on its streets: Of these, less than a fifth are licensed. And 80% of rickshaw pullers continue their back breaking labour by paying ‘hafta’ to the police that amounts to Rs 10 crore per month.
Europeans began to wear underwear only in the 17^th century when they discovered soft and affordable Indian cloth brought by the East India Company.
With 5,000-mile coastline, India has historically been a great trading nation and in some periods, commanded as much as 20% share of world trade compared to 2% today. It always had a positive balance of trade with the world until the industrial revolution in 19^th-century England when the mills of Lancashire made our handloom textiles technologically obsolete.
80 richest people own more wealth than what is owned by one-half of the human race and very soon just 1% people will own wealth which equals what the rest 99% would have.
Food amounts for almost half of the (CPI) consumer price index basket of India.
6 crore, small entrepreneurs employ 12 crore people in India.

INTERESTING LINES

“You should teach your children that the soil under their feet are the ashes of their grandparents. To respect the earth, you must tell your children that the earth is full of the lives of our ancestors.”
“Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn’t mean politics won’t take an interest in you—said PERICLES. He was a prominent and influential Greek statesman.
When a man understands the art of seeing, he can trace the spirit of an age and the features of a king even in the knocker on a door, wrote Victor Hugo in his novel, ‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame.’
The economy grows mostly at night when government is sleeping.
‘I had been the author of un-alterable evils; and I live in daily fear, lest the monster whom I had created should perpetrate some new wickedness.’ –wrote MARY SHELLEY the author of/ Frankenstein.’

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

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NAME OF ACCOUNT: SHRAVAN CHARITY MISSION

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Our publications

GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

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LEADERSHIP A TOUGH BALL GAME OR A CHILD’S PLAY

May 17, 2019article, article on feedback, column, General awareness & Knowledge, general knowledge, short article on business, snippet, Uncategorizedaccountability, american author, commitment, communication, confidence, creative thinking, decision making, eisenhower, empathy, environment, francis galton, glasow, henry kissinger, hereditary genius 1869, honesty, innovation, inspire, integrity, john c maxwell, kamlesh tripathi, keynes, labyrinth, leadership, narendra modi, passion, shravancharitymission, steve jobs, thomas carlyleshravancharitymission

U.S. academic environments, define leadership as, ‘a process of social influence in which a person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task.’ Leadership is a primordial trait. Where, the ancient leaders were of course, the ‘Blue Bloods.’

Says Henry Kissinger, ‘The task of the leader is to get his people from where they are to where they have not been.’ Says John C Maxwell, American author, ‘A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.’

To me, leadership is neither a tough ball game, for all times to come, nor a child’s play, but the cyclic median of the two. It’s about motivating people to achieve both, covert and overt success, in their hitherto unproven life. For people, who enjoy leadership challenges, it’s a child’s play right up to the grand finale, and for those who don’t, it’s a tough ball game … a Herculean task, akin to boiling the ocean or even the ‘Achilles heel.’ But I guess the toughness of ‘leadership’ wanes in front of dexterity, passion and perseverance, the hallmarks to fame.

Sanskrit literature professes ten types of leaders. Aristocratic thinkers of the past have postulated that leadership depends on one’s ‘blue blood’ or ‘genes’. Where monarchy takes an extreme view of the same idea.

The flock of leadership largely depends on the number of challenges that the environment emits. Environment could be both micro and macro. As and when the number of challenges goes up, one will find new leaders are born to handle those challenges. So, one can safely assume that challenges create leadership and concomitantly one can say leaderships envision new challenges?

Leadership is a stubborn labyrinth to begin with and so, a hard nut to crack at the initial stages. But once the tricks of the trade are learnt, it becomes a feather touch to operate.

A number of theories have sprung up on leadership. Where, the trait theory, explores at length about the authority of monarchs, lords and even bishops and how their authority later began to wane, is sumptuously spoken about. The writings of Thomas Carlyle, Scottish philosopher, and Francis Galton, a Victorian era statistician, whose works have prompted decades of research on the subject are equally popular. Carlyle identified the talents, skills, and physical characteristics of people who rose to power. Meanwhile, Galton’s Hereditary Genius (1869) examined leadership qualities, in the families of powerful men. However, the numbers of eminent relatives dropped off when his focus moved from first-degree to second-degree relatives, Galton concluded that qualities of leadership are inherited. In other words, leaders are born, not developed. So, both these notable works, lent, great initial support to the notion that leadership is rooted in the characteristics of a leader. But then, how does one decipher if leadership is a tough ball game or a child’s play. Also, how do you explain a recent example of Prime Minister, Narendra Modi who is not a blue blood nor a born dynast and comes from a humble back ground? Yet, he turns out to be one of the most popular Prime Ministers of India.

Over a period of time the essence of leadership has evolved into, simplification of traits and virtues. But before I move forward let me also tell you, that leadership is, an extensively written and described art, that touches the research area along with practical skills that burnishes the brand of an organization, and within that the team or an individual, to achieve the specialised goal. Exceptions are however there. Just as we have Orwellian states running into dystopia we also have Orwellian organisations that semaphores as one man show. But then that is not the epitome of sound leadership.

Leadership has an umbrella of qualities. I would for your immediate practice, list out some of them. These are indeed effective tools to practice.

‘The supreme quality for leadership is unquestionably integrity. Without it, no real success is possible, no matter whether it is on a section gang, a football field, in an army, or in an office.’—said President Dwight D Eisenhower. Honesty and integrity are two bliss ingredients that make a good leader. How can one expect, one’s followers, to be honest when you yourself lack in these qualities. Leaders succeed when they stick to their values and core beliefs. Remember, without ethics, this will not be possible.

Confidence is the core attribute an effective leader must have, at his, or her command. If you are unsure about your own decisions, then your subordinates will never follow you. As a leader, you have to be oozing with confidence. Where, one needs to exhibit a ray of swagger and assertiveness to gain the confidence of one’s subordinates. But the caution is that confidence should not translate into overconfidence.

A leader needs to inspire his or her subjects. They look up to him for guidance. The most difficult job of a leader is to persuade others to follow him. You can only inspire by setting a good example. When the going gets tough the tough get going, and that is where you come in. A positive leader is calm and positive in all situations and keeps the motivation level high. Says American statesman, John Quincy Adams, “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.”

If you have commitment and passion in you nothing remains a challenge. When your teammates see a hands on person they too will give their best shot.

An effective leader needs to be an effective communicator too. Until you communicate clearly and effectively to your team things will not move. The other important prowess of leadership qualities is the art of decision making. Sound decision making comes with good on the job knowledge. This also requires long term vision. And then we come to accountability. Where, one needs to follow the approach of late Arnold H Glasow, a U.S. businessman when he said, “A good leader takes little more than his share of the blame and little less than his share of the credit.”

Focus on the core issues. Issues that will take the organisation to greater heights and into the formidable bracket, while delegate and empower the rest to your subordinates. For that will give the right synergy, to both, the organisation and the subordinates to grow.

Steve Jobs was way ahead of times along with his visionary thoughts and ideas. Perhaps, he had the sixth, the seventh and even the eight sense about leadership. He went on to say ‘Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.’ True enough, in order to get ahead in today’s fast-paced world, a leader must be both creative and innovative at the same time. Creative thinking and constant innovation is what makes you and your team stand out from the crowd. Think out of the box to come up with unique ideas and turn those ideas and goals into reality.

Last but not the least is empathy. A true leader should have a reserve of empathy for his followers. But on the contrary, most leaders, only follow a dictatorial style of working these days, that lacks empathy altogether. Due to this, they fail to make a closer connect with their followers. The first step towards becoming an effective leader is to understand the problems and feel the pain of your followers. This should be supplemented by the endeavour to provide them with suitable solutions to solve their issues.

There is no fixed mould of learning for an effective leader. The path traverses through the high frequency highs and lows of life. And that is why for some people leadership is a tough ball game and for some others a child’s play. But yes, there is a lot to learn from the day-to-day.

Let me cite the example of the most influential economist of the twentieth century. His name was John Maynard Keynes. Although, he was an economist, he did not have a formal degree in Economics. And, if I remember correctly, he had, just about eight days of formal training and the rest was all, on the job learning. Yet, he turned out to be one of the most influential economist of the world. A revered leader.

The offbeat para above, solely, tells us, that for an open mind everything is a child’s play. But for a closed mind everything is a hard ball game. And of course in life one thing that doesn’t have a cul-de-sac is the razzmatazz of leadership.

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

Share it if you like it

NAME OF ACCOUNT: SHRAVAN CHARITY MISSION

Account no: 680510110004635 (BANK OF INDIA)

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Our publications

GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

*****

INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES-19

May 13, 2019article, articles, casual causerie, causerie, column, facts, General awareness & Knowledge, general knowledge, gk, interesting facts, quote, quotes and lines, snippet, Uncategorized, versesbeas, china, facts, ganjes, general knowledge, gk, global brands, indus, interesting facts, jhelum, kailash mountain, kamlesh tripathi, ladakh, lines, mansarovar, punjab, quotes, ravi, russia, shravancharitymission, sindhu, sutlej, tibetshravancharitymission

Boiling the ocean: Means to go overboard or to delve deep into such small details that a project becomes impossible. The phrase, boil the ocean, appears in business as well as other group settings. In the literal sense, boiling the ocean is impossible because there’s too much water for it to be possible.

What are brown, grey and white goods? Brown goods are consumer electronics, grey goods are computers etc., and white goods are domestic appliances. These are collective names for different types of electric and electronic equipment. These goods also include equipment powered by batteries such as computers, monitors, industrial dishwashers, ventilation units, etc.

Difference between advertising and publicity: Advertising is what a company says about its own product, but Publicity is what others says about a product. Conversely, publicity is done by a third party which is not related to any company. Whereas, advertising is under the control of the company which is just opposite to publicity.

Mumbai discharges 750 metric tonnes of plastic every day, which is a sixth of its total garbage.

Mckinsey & Company an American worldwide management consulting firm estimates that tech giants worldwide spent anywhere between $20-30 billion on artificial intelligence in 2016.

Till 1985 marijuana and cannabis, that is, ganja and bhang derivatives, were legally sold in the country through authorised retail shops in India. It is believed moderate consumption of marijuana is far less harmful than tobacco and alcohol.

An old Rabbi once asked his pupils how they could tell when the night had ended and the day had begun. “Could it be”, asked one of the students, “when you can see an animal at a distance and tell for sure, whether it’s a sheep or a dog?” “No”, answered the Rabbi. “Is it, when you can look at a tree at a distance and tell whether it’s a fig tree or a peach tree?” wondered another. Again, the Rabbi answered “No”. The impatient pupils demanded: “Then what is it?” “Well … it is, when you can look at the face of any man or a woman and see that it is your sister or brother: Till then it is still midnight.”

Although we are second to China in population, our country is adding almost an entire Australia each year.

Recently published data shows that a quarter of white extremist’s attacks, in Europe since 2015 targeted Muslims and mosques. And now you have the retaliatory Sri-Lanka terror attack.

It’s always been the nature of government that it underpays at the top and overpays at the bottom.

The latest report of the UN’s Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), released recently, states that Indian agriculture may be significantly impacted even by a 1.5 degree centigrade increase in average global temperature.

According to the Indian healthcare market research report 2016, our healthcare sector is one of the largest in terms of employment and revenue generation. Growing at a CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of 16.5%, it will possibly be worth $280 billion by 2020. The 2017 national health policy seeks to increase government spending from the abysmally low 1.4% to 2.5% of India’s GDP.

Russia has lost more than it has won through its policy of confronting the west.

Rivers have been the lifeline of all civilizations. No wonder they are considered sacred across cultures. In India, the Ganga symbolises knowledge, Yamuna was known for love stories, Narmada stood for bhakti, knowledge and logic, Saraswati for brilliance and architecture, and India got its name from the Sindhu also known as Indus.

The name Punjab has been derived from five rivers, which are Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas and Sutlej that collectively signify “five waters” or “the land of five waters.” Starting off in the Tibetan highland of western China near Lake Mansarovar in Tibet Autonomous Region, the Indus river flows through the Ladakh district of Jammu and Kashmir.

One of the longest rivers in the world, the Sindhu also known as Indus has a total length of over 2,000 miles and runs south from the Kailash Mountain in Tibet all the way to the Arabian Sea in Karachi, Pakistan. Where, Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas, and Sutlej—eventually flow into the Indus.

Russia has no companies in the top 100 global brands. The three most valuable companies in Russia today were also the three most valuable 10 years ago.

The brain contains 10 billion nerve cells, making thousands of billions of connections with each other. It is the most powerful data processor we know, but at the same time it is incredibly delicate. As soft as a ripe avocado, the brain has to be encased in the tough bones of the skull, and floats in its own waterbed of fluid. An adult brain weighs over 3 lb and fills the skull. It receives one-fifth of the blood pumped out by the heart at each beat.

82% of the wealth generated last year went to the richest 1% of the global population, while the 3.7 billion people who make up the poorest half of the world saw no increase in their wealth. Adding Indian dimension to the horror story of global inequity, the report, added India’s richest 1% garnered as much as 73% of the total wealth generated in the country in 2017.

India is a water stressed country with a per-capita water availability reducing from 1820 to 1545 cubic metres between 2001 to 2011.

Online retail in India is estimated to grow to $200 billion by 2026, up from just $15 billion in 2016.

Car penetration—India is around 20 per 1000 people, China is at 90 per 1000 people, and the US is at 750 1000 people.

Greenpeace International, an NGO estimated that the beverage giant Coca Cola produced 110 billion throwaway plastic bottles in 2015. Most of these go for landfills or to the ocean. Owing up to its responsibility the company recently announced that it would make all its packaging recyclable by 2030.

Tripura has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country and suffers from lack of infrastructure. Manik Sarkar of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) served as the Chief Minister of Tripura from 1998 to 2018. His reign was the longest in the state’s history.

Prices are the only thing that defy the law of gravity.

Interesting quotes and lines.

‘In depth of the winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer’—ALBERT CAMUS, French philosopher, author, and journalist.

‘God’s in His Heaven, All’s right with the world’–Robert Browning.

Don Marquis once joked, ‘an idea is not responsible for the people who believe in it.’

‘Everyone dies. But not everyone lives’—Shobha De.

‘Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving’—ALBERT EINSTEIN

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

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GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

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(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

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(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

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INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES-18

May 5, 2019article, column, facts, General awareness & Knowledge, general knowledge, gk, interesting facts, quote, quotes and lines, Uncategorized, verses, word power idioms phrasesangus maddison, blue, brahma kumaris, children, colour, cyan, deloitte, employment, god, hindu mahasabha, indra, kamlesh tripathi, keynes, magenta, mahatma gandhi, mark twain, millennial, muslim league, paddy, partition, punjab, railways, rss, shravancharitymission, unemployment, vedasshravancharitymission

The difference between an enemy and an adversary. An adversary is someone you want to defeat, an enemy is someone you have to destroy. Our political leaders have started treating their adversaries as enemies which is sad.

What does the expression mutually exclusive mean: If two events are mutually exclusive, it means, that they cannot occur at the same time. For example, the two possible outcomes of a coin flip are mutually exclusive; when you flip a coin. It cannot land both on heads and tails simultaneously.

A rat’s ass: I don’t give a rat’s ass means a minimum degree of interest. The phrase is considered vulgar. Generally meaning minimum amount or degree of care or interest—usually used in the phrase don’t give a rat’s ass.

The boom barrier (also known as the boom gate) fell on gate no. 28C, of the Chunar-Chopan, railway crossing near Khairahi railway station, 180km from Allahabad, in the recent past. With this the last unmanned level crossing on Indian Railway’s 67,300-km track comes to an end.

The founder of the Brahma-Kumaris taught seekers not to renounce hearth and home, nor worldly responsibilities to get spiritual salvation but to attain it by balancing material life with the spiritual, through regular practice of soul-consciousness.

To be fair the British Raj did impoverish India. In this regard there are credible estimates available, from the leading British economist Angus Maddison that shows India’s share of world GDP shrunk from 24.6% to 3.8% between 1700 and 1952. However, Maddison also notes that in terms of per-capita GDP, India has consistently lagged behind several European nations even 2,000 years ago. By 1700, per-capita income of countries like the Netherlands and Britain was double or thereabouts that of India.

Ancient India had its time under the sun, but that is over. The modern world, led by China, is now playing a completely different ballgame. Today, China is known as the world’s factory.

The UAE launched in 2009 an ambitious 10-year plan to teach English to locals to prepare them for a future without oil, attracting English teachers from all around the world to come and teach local children. Meanwhile, the English-speaking population of the Philippines, Indonesia and Sri Lanka has already taken over India’s burgeoning BPO industry. So, India needs to wake up fast.

A huge tusker was crossing a wooden bridge. A fly was perched on his left earlobe. After they got across, the fly said, ‘Hey didn’t we really shake up that bridge?’ That sums up the human attitude today. Though we are a microscopic speck in the cosmic scale, we delude ourselves that we are the centre of creation. We think the planet is in peril when only human existence and their well-being are truly imperilled.

Though John Maynard Keynes was one of the most influential economic policy makers of the 20^th century. Keynes did not actually have a degree in economics. In fact, his total professional training came to little more than eight weeks. All the rest was learnt on the job.

Despite the Rs 1.6 lakh crore annual PDS (public distribution system) subsidy. India ranks at 103 out of 119 countries in the world Hunger Index, and 21% of Indian children between 0-5 years are malnourished. India’s touted demographic dividend could partly turn out to be a demographic time bomb.

India with the world’s youngest workforce, comprising, nearly a fifth of the world’s millennial is struggling to keep pace with changing times. Millennial or Generation Y, comprising 34% of India’s population are already 45% of the Indian workforce and by 2025 this number is expected to reach 75%.

According to a 2016, millennial survey by Deloitte, 16.8% of millennial evaluate career opportunities by good work-life balance, followed by 13.4% who look for opportunities to progress, and 11% who seek flexibility. Companies where millennial talent is a significant part of the workforce are implementing initiatives like relaxed dress codes and flexi-timing to attract and retain talent. Living in the gig economy, key skill for millennial is preparedness to move across industries and roles.

There are 1.3 million Anganwadi centres across India. Anganwadi is a type of rural child care centre. They were started by the Indian Government in 1975 as part of the Integrated Child Development Services Program to combat child hunger and malnutrition. Anganwadi means “courtyard shelter” in Indian languages.

The Greeks probably invented the idea of organised competitive sports. Where, organised team as well as individual sports came mostly from the British.

Lights are very tricky. See how they behave. When blue green and red lights combine, they produce a white light. On the other hand, intersection of magenta, (purplish red) yellow and cyan, (greenish blue) leads to black that absorbs all colours. So be careful with lights.

Two-third of the paddy procurement in India is just from 5 states led by Punjab.

US confirms 90% of addicts experience a relapse shortly after undergoing de-addiction treatment. Around 22.5% of the world’s population is tobacco-dependent and 4.9% people have alcohol use disorder.

Over 80% of India’s workforce is employed in the unorganised and informal sector.

When over 18.6 million adults remain unemployed in India, what is the reason India still employs over 10 million children.

Fascism arose in Europe as a reaction to communism.

No Hindu worships the primary God of the Vedas today. Have you seen a temple of Indra today?

In 1934, the AICC passed a resolution prohibiting Congress members from also being members of the RSS, Hindu Mahasabha or the Muslim League.

14 of the world’s 15 most polluted cities are in India.

India Pakistan partition of 1947 was an event that displaced around 15 million and killed a million.

Interesting lines & quotes:

I think Mark Twain sums it up pretty nicely: “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do then by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”

Whoever, fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster—FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, German philosopher, poet and cultural critic.

Words on the street is that elections are already over, only the polling is left.

Mahatma Gandhi once said—’there is no way to peace, peace is the way.’

Misery is the by-product of a lazy mind. Happiness is the by-product of an alert mind. Stop kicking yourself with regrets and guilt feelings. Give up feelings of being guilty. You will find yourself happy—SWAMI SUKHABODHANANDA

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

Share it if you like it

NAME OF ACCOUNT: SHRAVAN CHARITY MISSION

Account no: 680510110004635 (BANK OF INDIA)

IFSC code: BKID0006805

Our publications

GLOOM BEHIND THE SMILE

ONE TO TANGO … RIA’S ODYSSEY

(Is a book on ‘singlehood’ about a Delhi girl now archived in Connemara Library, Chennai and Delhi Public Library, GOI, Ministry of Culture, Delhi)

AADAB LUCKNOW … FOND MEMORIES

REFRACTIONS … FROM THE PRISM OF GOD

TYPICAL TALE OF AN INDIAN SALESMAN

RHYTHM … in poems

(Published in January 2019. The book contains 50 poems. The poems describe our day to day life. The book is available in Amazon, Flipkart and Onlinegatha)

(ALL THE ABOVE TITLES ARE AVAILABLE FOR SALE IN AMAZON, FLIPKART AND OTHER ONLINE STORES OR YOU COULD EVEN WRITE TO US FOR A COPY)

*****

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Our NGO works for poor children suffering from life threatening diseases especially cancer: We cover our blog with short stories, children's stories, articles, book reviews, vignettes, spiritual, episodes, poetry, analysis, news report, general knowledge, quotes for the benefit of our readers.

Category Archives: General awareness & Knowledge

INTERESTING FACTS FIGURES & QUOTES: EPISODE 24

INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES EPISODE-23

INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES EPISODE-22

SHORT STORY: Rs 7

The Atomic Bombing of Japan in World War II, 1945

THE TWELVE JYOTIRLINGAS

INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES EPISODE-20

LEADERSHIP A TOUGH BALL GAME OR A CHILD’S PLAY

INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES-19

INTERESTING FACTS & QUOTES-18