The Sachin Experience

Some time in the future, neuroscientists will perhaps have the answer. But right now it is impossible to say why there are distinctly different kinds of emotional reactions among Indian cricket fans while watching

a) Sachin Tendulkar and, b) Other players.

The effect produced by a Sachin masterpiece - such as the against-all-odds 175 against Australia at Hyderabad recently - appears to be unique.

This is equally true of a Sachin failure. He doesn't just botch paddle-scoops, he plunges an entire nation of a billion-plus people into a prolonged spell of mourning. As Roger Federer said of himself, Sachin has "created a monster."

Moulding our moods

It is almost as if, as a people, we believe that we are as successful or unsuccessful as Sachin is. We owe him our ecstasy; equally, he is the cause of our despair. It is quite possible that the maestro activates a reward/punishment system in the cricket fan's brain that might be inaccessible to the lesser mortals of Indian cricket.

If you believe that this is a lot of mumbo jumbo, then take time off from watching Sachin and, instead, watch people watch him on television or in the stands. It won't take long for you to see the truth.

A well-mannered, focussed legend

Australian great Steve Waugh has referred to the Indian maestro as the `(Don) Bradman of our times'.

Some of the world’s greatest cricketers have heaped praise on Sachin Tendulkar as he reaches another milestone in his career with former Australian skipper Steve Waugh paying him the ultimate tribute by calling him the “Bradman of our times“.

A day before completing 20 years of international cricket, Tendulkar’s peers doffed their hats to the batting genius, recalling their association with him.

“The last time I watched Sachin was last week when he was on his way to a spectacular 175 and once again I felt that I was watching a player who comes but once in a century. It can be said that he is the Bradman of our times and I do feel privileged to have played a lot of cricket against him,” Waugh said in his tribute.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles to be used against Maoists

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) will be used for the first time to detect Naxal hideouts in dense forests and hilly terrains and monitor the movement of ultras to help ground forces carry out precision attacks.

The UAVs, with in-built camera, well-equipped data link and video link, will gather and record information which will be shared among the security forces engaged in anti-Naxal operations, specially in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, Maharashtra and West Bengal.

The trials of the UAVs, developed by the Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL), have recently been conducted in Hissar and Delhi while more trials will be conducted in jungles of Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand soon.

“We are satisfied with the UAV trials in Hissar and Delhi. If we are satisfied with next stage of trials, we will take the help of UAVs in our operations against Naxals,” a Home Ministry official said.

Security experts also want to see which of the UAV variants will be useful in forests and hills as most of the Maoist bases are located there only.

The UAVs also provide flexible surveillance and reconnaissance capability with external payload, including weapons capability.

“Since Maoists keep changing their movements, deployment of UAVs will certainly be an advantage for security forces,” the official said.

Muralitharan wants to end his last tour abroad with win

Sri Lankan spin-legend Muttiah Muralitharan on Saturday said he would like to complete his possibly last assignment abroad by beating India in their den, which his team has never done before.

The three-Test series between India and Sri Lanka will start on Monday here.

“I have played enough cricket over the years. This could be my last tour overseas. Sri Lanka has not won a Test series in India, so it would be great if my team won the series this time,” Muralitharan, the highest wicket taker in the world told reporters here.

The legendary off-spinner’s comments indicate that sooner than later he would announce his retirement from international cricket.

Tendulkar's career has been saga of sacrifice

Maestro Sachin Tendulkar will complete 20 years in international cricket on Sunday. The 36-year-old batting legend will be the first Indian cricketer to achieve the feat.

Tendulkar made his debut as an immensely talented 16-year-old against Pakistan in Karachi on November 15, 1989.

"You only get to see one Tendulkar in a life-time. In the next 100 years, you will not witness another Tendulkar. He is once-in-century-player," said international cricket's most successful bowler Muttiah Muralitharan here on Saturday while interacting with the media.

India meets Sri Lanka in the first Test of the three-match series at Motera from Monday.

And Muralitharan will be up against a cricketer who is only 39 runs short of a mind-boggling 30,000 runs in international cricket.

Tendulkar has most runs in Tests (12773 runs in 159 matches at 54.58) and ODIs (17178 runs in 436 matches at 44.50). His 42 Test hundreds and 45 ODI centuries are more than anybody else in the game.

SACHIN TENDULKAR - MARATHON MAN

Sachin Tendulkar has been on the road for 20 years, but still loves to carry on. “There is nothing like playing cricket. I like to play matches all season,” he says in a chat with Vijay Lokapally.

  S.VELMURUGAN

(If I had not become a cricketer) maybe, I would have become a tennis player. Maybe, I would have won a Grand Slam.’
It was a journey that began on a humble note with an innings of 15 in his debut Test in Karachi in November 1989. And today, Sachin Tendulkar is ranked among the all-time greats of the game, having amassed 12,773 runs in 159 Tests and 17,178 runs from 436 ODIs (up to the India-Australia match in Guwahati on November 8, 2009). He continues to grow and promises much more. The legend gets up close with Sportstar.
Excerpts from the interview:
Question: Have you ever had the fear of losing your place in the Indian team?
Answer: Honestly, I have never had this fear. I have never had this feeling that I could lose my place in the team, not even when I was playing junior cricket.
Don’t you get tired of playing so much cricket?

Hungry on Children's Day

On Children's Day, India faces a grim fact that despite having 60 years of democracy and a high growth rate, almost half of the children under six years are malnourished.

The rate of childhood malnutrition in India is twice that of sub-Saharan Africa.

In Naxalite-infested Sonbhadra district of Uttar Pradesh, a memorial has been erected to remember those 18 children who died of malnutrition five years ago.

This in a district, which is fertile and produces tonnes of coal, limestone and dolomite.

The children belonged to the acutely poor Ghasia tribal community in Raup village who are victims of internal displacement. But the administration seems reluctant to settle them.

Memorial or no memorial, the children have been forgotten.

Sreesanth, Zaheer recalled for Sri Lanka series

Temperamental paceman S. Sreesanth, whose on-field antics have often landed him in trouble, was on Tuesday surprisingly included in India’s 15-member squad for the first two cricket Tests against Sri Lanka starting on November 16 in Ahmedabad.

Pace spearhead Zaheer Khan expectedly returned to the squad after recovering from a shoulder injury, which had kept him out of the tri-series in Sri Lanka and the ensuing Champions Trophy in September.

The team to be captained by Mahendra Singh Dhoni also includes Tamil Nadu players opener Murali Vijay and middle-order batsman S. Badrinath, while pacers Ashish Nehra and Munaf Patel were ignored.

Nehra who has done reasonably well in the ongoing one-day series against Australia, failed to find a place in the squad announced by BCCI secretary N. Srinivasan after a meeting of the selection panel here.

The selection of Sreesanth raised eyebrows as the Kerala pacer has not really done anything significant in the domestic circuit since recovering from a back injury.

The selection seems all the more baffling given the fact that the bowler, who has a history of disciplinary indiscretions, was only last month given a final warning by the BCCI to mend his ways.

The 26-year-old Sreesanth will return to the Test fold after more than a year having played his last Test in April 2008 against South Africa in Kanpur.

India last played a Test match in April this year against New Zealand and the players to miss out from that squad are pacer Laxmipathy Balaji, wicketkeeper-batsman Dinesh Karthik and Dhawal Kulkarni.

Batsmen Suresh Raina and Virat Kohli, all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja and pacer Praveen Kumar, who are playing in the ongoing series against Australia, were not considered for selection for the three-match Test series.

As expected, the veteran batting duo of Rahul Dravid and V.V.S. Laxman retained their places.

Barring Sreesanth’s comeback, there were no major surprises in the squad, which has eight specialist batsmen, three pacers, three spinners and one wicketkeeper in Dhoni.

Zaheer’s return will bolster the pace department which also has an off-colour Ishant Sharma, who has been retained despite his indifferent performance in last few months.

Off-spinner Harbhajan Singh will lead the spin attack with leg-spinner Amit Mishra and young left-armer Pragyan Ojha supporting him

 

Team: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt), Virender Sehwag, Sachin Tendulkar, Gautam Gambhir, Rahul Dravid, V.V.S. Laxman, Yuvraj Singh, Harbhajan Singh, Amit Mishra, Zaheer Khan, Ishant Sharma, M Vijay, Pragyan Ojha, S Sreesanth and S. Badrinath.

Efforts on to save child trapped in a borewell

Massive rescue operations are underway for 5-year-old Saahil, trapped in a borewell for over 24 hours. A team of doctors is monitoring the situation.

India will bounce back against Lanka: Laxman

India were "unlucky" to lose the One-day series against Australia and the team will bounce back to tame the Sri Lankans in the

upcoming Test and ODI series, feels senior batsman V V S Laxman.

"They were unlucky to lose the series against Australia," Laxman said.

"The players are hurt but the defeat is not going to affect the team's morale," he added.

The stylish right-hander said Mahendra Singh Dhoni's men would be striving to achieve the number one Test ranking by beating the Lankans in the three-Test series starting November 16.

"The team is targetting the number one spot in Test rankings and has a very good chance of reaching there if we win the series against Sri Lanka," he said.

'No proof of Himalayan ice melting due to climate change'

The environment ministry on Monday published a discussion paper stating that there was no conclusive evidence to prove that the

Himalayan glaciers are melting due to climate change.

The report, released by Union environment minister Jairam Ramesh, however, made it clear that the views expressed by the author, Dr V K Raina, retired deputy director-general of the Geological Survey of India, are not that of the Union government and that it is meant to "stimulate discussion".

While releasing the report, Ramesh said that the discussion paper presents evidence that most glaciers are in the process of retreat while some Himalayan glaciers, such as the Siachen glacier, are actually advancing and some others are retreating at a rate lower than before, such as the Gangotri glacier.

The minister clarified that there was no doubt that the `health' of the glaciers was very poor and the situation was reaching alarming proportions but warned that there was little evidence to connect it to climate change or black carbon.

'India among the worst in man-woman equality'

India may be the world's second fastest growing economy, but it figures among the worst when it comes to man-woman equality - at 114th among 134 countries, on the World Economic Forum (WEF) rankings.

Worse, sharing Nobel laureate Amartya Sen's concern over female foeticide and 25 million 'missing women' in India, the WEF has placed the country at the bottom of the table on health and survival issues, reflecting the huge gender gap.

The India Gender Gap Review 2009, released at the India Economic Summit in New Delhi

on Monday, ranked the country behind Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal - showing that women in these countries share resources with men more equally than in India.

The Geneva-based international organisation, known for its global conferences and studies, has made strong remarks against the wide inequalities between the health facilities extended to males and females. "We find that there are still persistent gaps in health and survival, a fact that contributes to India's 'missing' women," it said.

Jessica killer returns to jail before parole ends

In the midst of a gigantic controversy over his parole, the man who killed Jessica Lall, has returned to Tihar Jail, two weeks before his parole expires.

Manu Sharma reportedly did not discuss his decision with his family in Chandigarh. He has allegedly left a letter for his mother behind at their home.

On Tuesday morning, the Delhi government had reportedly decided to look into whether his parole should be cancelled, because Sharma visited a Delhi nightclub over the weekend.

'Global recovery sees increased offshore activities in India'

The global outsourcing and offshoring industry continued to show signs of business recovery leading to increased momentum in the Indian offshore industry during Q3 2009, according to "Market Vista: Q3 2009" report by Everest Group, a global consulting and research firm. Everest's quarterly study on global outsourcing and offshoring activity reports that the new captive set ups increased to an 18-month high in Q3 2009 compared to Q2 2009.

Comparing Q3 to Q2 in 2009, the global demand for offshore services continued its momentum on the back of improving business sentiments:
* Key verticals such as banking, financial services, insurance (BFSI) services and manufacturing, distribution, retail (MDR) contributed towards 36% of deal signing and retained their dominant share in total transactions.
* The market activity also increased for some emerging verticals such as healthcare where the transaction volumes doubled compared to last quarter.
* North America also showed some signs of recovery with doubling of transactions in the BFSI vertical from the region.
* Twenty-eight new captives were established in Q3—an 18-month high.
* Offshore activity increased with 36 new supplier delivery centres established in Q3 compared to 30 during Q2.
* Although there was a marginal decline of 10% in the reported global transaction volumes (BPO volumes decreasing by 14% and ITO activity reducing by 8%), there were signs of improvement in key geographies and verticals.
The Indian offshore services industry witnessed growth amidst the signs of revival in demand:
* Eleven new captive centres were set up in India during this quarter, highest in any single geography. These included names such as Standard Chartered, Ingersoll Rand and Kontron.
* One-fourth of new supplier delivery centers were established in India.
* India-centric suppliers witnessed increased transactions activity in Q3 compared to Q2.
* The cost arbitrage opportunity for Indian cities improved with depreciation of the currency and reduction in operating costs. At the current momentum, the arbitrage is sustainable for about 20 years in both ITO and BPO services.
"The Indian offshore industry is growing on the back of improving demand and continued advantages of the country as an offshore destination. India-centric suppliers are investing in delivery capabilities and setting up new centres," said Gaurav Gupta, principal and country head-India, Everest Group.
"The increase in the number of captive set ups reflect signs of recovery in the overall market. We expect the industry in India to continue this momentum in the last quarter of 2009 as well as in 2010," said Amneet Singh, vice-president-Global Sourcing, Everest Group.
Everest Group is a global consulting and research firm that comprehensively serves the outsourcing and offshoring market. An industry leader since creating the sourcing consultancy practice in 1991, Everest has earned a worldwide reputation for ongoing innovation by helping clients capture optimum value through sourcing strategies and implementation.