Ek bar firse nind me wo khwab bone do - The future beckons you O India

To be continued....

And I always thought you have to have bad handwriting to be a doctor ......

This is an article in Time magazine. http://www.time.com/time/
health/article/0,8599,15780
74,00.html
Very funny but at the same time serious to think of this. Here are some funny thoughts that come to my mind in full seriousness of the matter-

It is an eternal truth that doctors have bad handwriting. Finding a doctor with good handwriting is like finding a white crow in India outside zoos. The fact is so widely observed that I suspect they have a course on making the writing undecipherable. Almost seems like a part of defense mechanism against insurance companies, along with the face masks during surgery. No wonder if someone thinks that worse the handwriting better the doctor. Maybe because of this guilt consciousness my father took efforts on my handwriting in my childhood.

The handwriting adds to the mystique along with the heavy latin terms used in the medical terminology. Electronic prescriptions would be an easy let away for the doctors:). If one was to put down a list of signs to identify a doctor, bad handwriting would be the first one. This could be a subject of a seperate post.:)

Not to be taken personally as these are some harmless potshots at one of the oldest respectable profession.

Panipat Reloaded- after 246 years

Scene -
Location- UPSC final interviews

Interviewer: So Mr. xyz kar (:)), I see that you are interested in Indian history. Could you tell me what would have been the consequences had the Marathas won the third battle of Panipat?

Interviewee: Sir, to sum it up in short, had the Marathas won the battle we would have been having this interview in Marathi.

This is an anecdote I heard when I was growing up. I don't know how true it is but is quite possible indeed.

Today it has been 246 years since the battle which killed 100,000 soldiers in 8 hours. A whole generation of marathas was lost in the battle. 22,000 women were captured by the Afghans and taken back. Infact the 12 O'clock joke on Sikhs started because they used to raid on the Afghan caravans at night to rescue these women. They rescued a lot of the women. The Peshwa took it to heart and died after a few years. The great Maratha empire which ruled a vast portion from Attock in Pakistan to Orissa and had the Mughal emperor as their vassal was divided in confederates. The Marathas raised another army of 100,000 to rescue those captured but that never happened. The afghans too suffered a death blow and never attacked India as they used to do earlier.

Infact the Marathas went into the battle supremely confident of their victory. Infact they took their women and older relatives to the battle so that they could visit the kurukshetra and other holy places after the battle. Marathas had a French trained artillery which was vastly superior to the Afghans. Infact the Marathas had the Afghans by their necks at the start till two Maratha cavalry commanders (sardars) got jealous of the artillery getting the credit and charged at the enemy prematurely with their men and were killed. The Marathas still fought bravely and had the Afghans on the backfoot till a bullet killed Vishwasrao, son of the rulling Peshwa Nanasaheb, and Sadashivrao Bhau charged at the enemy to avenge the death.

The aftermath is just tragic and full of atrocities commited by the Afghans on the Maratha women and old. A lot of them fled and tried to get shelter in the surrounding areas. Infact you can see many marathi surnames in this and adjoining region. The women jumped in the wells to save themselves and 22,000 were captured and taken back to Afghanistan. Their offspring served as slaves in Balochistan region of Pakistan to the Marri and Bugti tribes for generation. Infact these Marathi Marri and Bugti people are aware of their heritage.

Dr. Jayant Naralikar, a noted scientist and sci-fi writer, has a story written where his hero by some quirk of space and time goes in a parallel universe where Vishwasrao never got hit by a bullet which had a ripple effect on the battle and the Marathas won it. The British could never rule India and India remained free. It became a progressive kingdom, much like Japan, ruled by the Mughal emperor in Delhi and the Peshwa in Pune as his prime minister. The result of the battle shaped the present day India. The Vaccuum created by the declining maratha kingdom was filled in by the British who were defeated by the Marathas in the first war but by 1808 ruled India.

There is a statue of Sadashivrao bhau at Panipat. At actual place of the battle a monument near 'kala amb' (black mango) has been constructed in memory of numerous faceless soldiers who died in the battle. The mango tree is said to have turned black due to the blood of the soldiers. My tributes to those marathas who died in the battle and suffered for the cause!

A search for credible source of Indian history to suggest to my team leader who takes pride in his englishness rekindled my interest in this part of Indian history which is not just relevant to Maharashtrians but to all Indians. Looking at it in regional terms would be foolishness.
Jai Hind! Jai Maharashtra! :)

References-
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Battle_of_Panipat
2. http://www.google.co.in/search?q=Maratha+Bugtis&sourceid=mozilla-
search&start=0&start=0&ie=utf
-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=
org.mozilla:en-US:official

Puzzle

Meanwhile, I have a puzzle given by a friend, which I enjoyed solving (ya i solved it, thats why its here :)).

This is find the odd ball out type.

Task- Find the odd ball out from 12 given balls using a two pan balance scale in 3 measurements.

Hint- It is not stated whether the ball is heavy or light. The 12 balls can't be differentiated in any possible way other than weighing. Also you could compare groups of balls and get as much subjective, comparative information as possible in the deduction process.

I would be interested in hearing from you on this.