Old Man & the Bay

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DC, Hyderabad, 13th August:

New Satellite Ground Station
Groundbreaking Technology
Fish location info for fishermen

"The ability of fishermen to receive data from the Oceansat - 2 satellite through the city-based Indian National Center for Ocean Information Service's ground station's state-of-the-art facility will greatly enhance to locate fish in the vast depths of the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal...

...The net annual gain to fishermen through the use of this facility would be close to Rs 50,000 crores..."

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Upon reading this news item, my eyes went moist and my heart bled for the poor fish. There is a distinct possibility that such hi-tech fishing would drive the fish to the verge of extinction, much like our tigers.

I don't think Papa Hemingway would have liked this satellite and its nefarious skulduggery.

Nor Jim Corbet.

There is something underhand in it like the infamous episode of underarm bowling by the Trevor Chappell Brother inspired by the Gregor Chappell Brother but frowned upon by the Ian Chappell Brother:

"As the ball was being bowled, Ian Chappell (older brother of Greg and Trevor, and a former Australian captain) who was commentating on the match, was heard to call out "No, Greg, no, you can't do that" in an instinctive reaction to the incident, and he remained critical in a later newspaper article on the incident.":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underarm_bowling_incident_of_1981

See the 21st pic of this album:

http://cricket.yahoo.com/photos/cricket-s-most-iconic-moments_13155717112680#21

It is almost as if Arjun, who was challenged to hit a revolving fish on the ceiling by looking at its image in the pool below took the help of a guided missile, instead of his bow and arrow.

I lived by the Bay of Bengal for seven long years during my University days at Vizagh. The tenement I was living in was on top of a hillock a fifty meters above the sea beach. And my study table was facing a window with a sea-view (no wonder I learned no physics...much like RKN complained of the distraction posed by the sea beach at his Madras College).

And I used to regularly walk down to the beach in the evenings to have a look at the dozens of fishermen returning from their day-long outing to sort their catch and count their blessings. They were hardy boys and didn't take the help of satellite technology. And short and simple were their annals but there was a thrill in their song and dance.

At IIT KGP there was this Nepu-da in our Physics Department, who predicted right that I would be getting married within a year of a snow white tabby lodging herself and her new-born in my Qrs C1-97:

http://gpsastry.blogspot.com/2010/08/cats-dogs.html

Nepu-da was the Seniormost Technical Assistant, but I never saw him handle even a screw driver...he was the Event Manager of the Phy Dept. And our HoD HNB used to take his guidance on matters political and civil of the Department.

And he was a keen member of our Technology Angling Society.

One Sunday evening I saw him angling by the Lake and walked over to him. He didn't notice me for a good 15 minutes, lost as he was in trying to entice and snare his poor fish. After he landed one with a flourish of his rod and basketed it, he looked back and smiled at me triumphantly.

I asked him foolishly what would be the worth of that fish in rupees.

And he laughed and told me that anglers don't fish for the sake of the fish but for the sake of the sport...it is a battle of wits between the fish and him. And when I pointed out that his concentration was such that he didn't notice me for a good while, he replied that most of the nights when he dreams he dreams of fish...both the ones that got away and the ones that couldn't.

And then an urchin dropped a boulder near his line and he got up to chase him away as keenly as he chased 'in' his fish by luring it with worm and charm.

I could believe his story of dreaming of fish because, when I started learning to bike on my friend's push bike at the tender age of 13 using 'half-pedal' technique, I used to regularly dream of my salacious encounters with bikes; and spectator girls.

And now this mind-numbing satellitery!!!

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Holy Immersion

Yesterday, about 50,000 idols, large, small and mammoth, of Ganeshjee were serially immersed in our Hussain Sagar Lake in the heart of Hyderabad in a procession that took 24 hours and 30,000 policemen.

"As part of the clean-up operations, the GHMC employed 2,500 workers from the health and sanitary wing, clearing 1,300 million tons of garbage in the process. Seventy-two tipper trucks, 10 Bobcat trucks and 10 front-end loaders, four earthmovers and 31 sweeping machines were pressed into service"

Jai Ganesh Maharajkee Jai!

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