2008 - Year that was!

This post is pending for few days now.

Beginning of 2008 I had listed set of people, things and events that was poised to make news. Some of them were picked up from JWT list for 2008 from yahoo.com and then I add few to the list. A quick review of the list:

Beijing 2008 - Hats off to China for putting a spectacular show but did not go off without its share of controversial issues, be it Olympic flame sabotage or under-age participants!
Facebook suicides – Ah! So much interweaving of web 2.0 technologies with our lives, rightly they had predicted that one of the effects of emotional distress would be in the virtual world. Heard few friends randomly telling that they would drop off from orkut but did not really see any suicides personally!
Google's Android – The much awaited product in 08, just one phone launched till date. I hope I am correct. Should see more of android effect actually in 2009.
Deepika Padukone – The only Asian to make it to the JWT list. The Bangalore dream girl won all the accolades for OSO from 2007 but did not see much of her on the screen in 2008 however you rock Deepika!!
U.S.election 08 – Probably this one will make to the list of top 10 events of the century. The land of opportunity for the first time elected a black President – Barack Obama. Socially it has lot of unwritten connotation but truly spectacular event. He has come in the midst of huge financial turmoil and war legacy left by Bush, can he meet people expectation across the globe? Big ticket item for global debate in 2009.
Weak dollar/strong euro/rupee/yaun – This hasn’t worked for India. Thanks for all the financial turmoil, emerging markets took the beating. Rupee dropped from a high of 39/dollar to 50/dollar.Exporters must be making a merry!
Tata 1L car – The black episode of 2008 in the India Corporate story, probably in the India Growth story as well. Mamata didi re-iterated how illogical politics can stop growth & development and nobody can do anything about it except watch helplessly. Kudos to Mr.Modi for bagging the project. Need to wait for a while longer to see the Nano on the roads.
Gary Kristen Impact - ah!! what a win! Indian cricket came back with all the form and spirit. Kristen coupled with Dhoni is rocking the Indian Cricket. Keep it going boys!
Reliance Blue Magic – Except for scoring some brownie points on Airtel ads really did not make the expected impact.
Karnataka elections – As predicted BJP won absolute near majority creating first-to-form-BJP-government-in-south India. The win did not go without all the drama. However Operation Lotus went overboard I guess.
Pakistan – Least said the better. From bad stage at Benzir’s assassination went to worse with Mariott bombing and 26/11. It appears one army general has taken over from another. The only difference is that this time there is a bunch of puppets to execute what army wants.
Climate sightseeing – Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth and the time-lapse photography were not lost on a number of people. And increasingly, people are wanting to see these sights of the world before they change shape or change form however did not hear much in the media. Probably fears of recession in US and Europe ate away this phenomenon.
Couch Surfing – Innovative concept linking travel and social networking. Not heard much in India, should work well in India, isn’t one of our cultural ingredient - “Athithi Devo Bhava”?
Bengaloru International Airport – Finally my city has an international airport after 17 years of starting the project. Airport opened amongst drama from all quarters – Political, Corporate, taxi services etc. Ride to airport has not been that bad, personally had few national and international trips this year, got to see domestic and international wing. Sad part remains, Albert Brunner has decided not to renew his contract. Hats off to the man for holding the fort together!
SEZ – No full blown official policy, offcourse government did not get anytime to think about SEZ apart from Nuclear deal. To add, wanted time to think and plan to pay huge insurance premiums for 2009 General Elections such as 60K crore loan waiver and 6th pay commission.
Teleco Spectrum – Too much drama. Drama had all the elements of political accusations, corporate blame game, typical interest group lobbies and scent of kick backs. Continue to remain shady deal of the year.
Vickram Pandit – The man who took over the toughest job on the planet at the start of 08. Fortune ran a 5-8 page story in Q108 with a very positive tone of Mr. Pandit, not all is well coz problems for Citi appears never ending but Mr. Pandit still holds the fort and will clear the exam with distinction.

Following add to the list that marked 2008.
India Nuclear deal – First country to get NSG waiver without signing NPT or CTBT.
Olympics – India’s first individual gold medal, thank you Abhinav Bindra.
Global Financial Tsunami – Most devastating financial crisis that has challenged the idea of free markets.
MNS – Raj Thakrey’s attempt to score brownie points challenging the “Idea of India”
26/11 – 9/11 of the east.

Hope 2009 will be a year of rejuvenation, triumph and success of man kind more than ever.

Boat se Vote tak via Ramu

An interesting quote that a colleague shared today…

“I am not worried about the men who come thru BOATS

I am scared of the men who come thru VOTES”

Very ironical and true, not sure if this originated from despair or creativity.

Thinking of creativity, on a different note, I guess all the media bashing on RGV for accompanying Maharastra CM to Taj on Monday was uncalled for.

Common, give RGV some credit for creatively thinking about nexus between underworld and terrorist forces in his last movie – CONTRACT.

Now, please don’t argue that his movie provided the plot to do the same in real life. At least, Ramu was creative in predicting such incidents if not in similar fashion.

At times to draw up huge predictive, preventive and pre-cautionary measures and mechanisms not only intelligentsia is required but also creativity.

Deaths have not woken up our governments; hope some of Ramu’s creativity can make our representatives think adding to the futile list of attempts to wake the duds.