GAIL Indian Speedstar - Promoting young talents across India

GAIL, the well-known Indian PSU in field of Natural Gas Production and distribution has been making new business highs since its advent in 1984. As a corporate it has been doing different CSR activities and has now embarked into a new domain of promoting Young athletes from grassroots level. GAIL has done partnership with National Yuva Cooperative Society for this initiative called “GAIL Indian Speedster” whose goal is to find young athletes across length and breadth of India who are extremely talented and can be potential great hopes for India in future Olympics. National Yuva Cooperative Society has tied up with Anglian Medal Hunt Company as its Technical Partner for The GAIL Indian Speedstar project

The reason to launch this program is to identify, select and nurture the hidden talent in athletes. The targeted age group is 11 - 17 years in 100m, 200m and 800m track events across. The Project has goals to create a pool of athletes with knack which will possibly bring honor for India in track events at the highest echelon of sporting events - the Olympics 2020/2024. A panel of eminent sportspersons like P.T Usha, Rachita Mistry, Anuradha Biswal and Kavita Raut have been appointed in the selection committee to support selections and guide coaching camps. As members of the selection committee their role would include creating the selection criteria or the GAIL-Indian Speedstar program, and developing the training plan and module for the selected athletes at the National Level. Dr Ashutosh Karnatak, Director (Projects) GAIL (India) Ltd, Rajesh Pande, President, National Yuva Cooperative Society Ltd and Maneesh Bahuguna- CEO, Anglian Medal Hunt Company were also present during launch of the project in New Delhi.

District trials were conducted under the watchful eyes of coaches and selectors, appointed by the selection committee. The selection of the athletes was based on talent identification and selection criteria set by the selection committee. Initiatory, in its first year, earlier this year with initial trials conducted at 55 districts across 10 states in which more than 25,000 children participated out of which 850 children made it to the State level.

The first State level camp and trial was organized on 27-28th of February in SawaiMaan Singh Stadium, Jaipur where 60 boys and girls participated out of which 4 have qualified for the next level. The state trials were held in Odisha (14 Selection), Delhi (28 Selection), Kerala (28 Selection) and Jharkhand (4 Selection) followed by Maharashtra and Gujarat in the last week of April. The shortlisted children from the State trials will then participate in the National camp and selection which is scheduled to be held in May 2016 at Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, New Delhi. Shortlisted athletes from state trials will attend an intensive national level camp. At the conclusion of the coaching camp, final trials will be held. Winners will be selected based on the qualification criteria and their potential. The winners will be given extensive training throughout the year. The top 9 athletes will then be provided with a world class coaching for over a period of 5 years with an ultimate objective of one of these athletes to represent India at the Olympics.

Follow all the activities related to GAIL Indian Speedstar at its Facebook page and on Twitter .

Freedom to think big and think new for Career development

We Indians are known for our value system and manners which includes always listening to our parents. These values are right up to a certain extent only and when these start affecting education and career, it must be confronted with. Many times parents ask their kids to go through the same process with which they themselves had gone through in their career, like if father had done engineering from IIT, he would expect and many times force his kid to do the same or if Mother had done MBBS and is a doctor she would expect her kid to do the same.

These things might have been right in some way may be 30-40 years back when there were not many different opportunities for education and career but certainly not in present time. There are so many career opportunities young people now a days have that they can pursue their dreams and become successful in the field they like. The dynamics of the time we are living in is changing every single day and if parents try to make their kids follow same old chain of thoughts and career development process, kids might get left behind to never come up again with confidence. Aspects of spirituality that were there when parents were young is still the same, but the technology to make one smart phone has advanced in unimaginative way since that time, so when it comes to career development, parents should guide kids keeping present ecosystem in mind and not the past obsolete one.

There are universities like Lovely Professional University that offers multiple career development options to young students. There Students are given various options to choose from and are not forced upon with only certain type of courses. Parents should think big and give their kids freedom to choose from various career development opportunities LPU has and should support them throughout. 

Here is a nice short video by LPU showcasing why thinking big is so important when it comes to creating a career https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaQdCkNLtjU&feature=youtu.be

Remember that only if Parents can think BIG, Child will think BIG.

IndiPR.com - Connecting Businesses with Bloggers in few clicks

Indiblogger, one of the fastest growing blogging community in India has got nag of trying new things to not only give deserving support to bloggers but also to help various businesses when it comes to marketing. Now it has come with a new platform called IndiPR.com and by the name it’s easy to guess that it is a platform for PR activities for businesses but it is not complex like other currently existing process of doing PR. Indiblogger Team has worked hard to make this process simpler and smoother for both Businesses and Influencers.

Current Popular PR process:

Currently Businesses through their marketing / PR team try to search for bloggers to carry out the press releases. Each time there is some new thing happening in the business that need to be told to public, PR team has to repeat same stuff of trying to search for bloggers and then negotiate for remuneration, sometimes this task becomes really exhaustive and cumbersome and this might affect the future contracts between bloggers and businesses if things go out of hands.

Karthik DR, Co-founder & Business Head at IndiBlogger says, “The amount of time that people spend in trying to identify and contact influencers is huge. With IndiPR.com, you don't have to worry about any of this as the system just needs your Press Release. The rest is history!”

What is IndiPR.com?

IndiPR.com is based on an automated influencer targeting model aka A.I.T.E that connects the respective businesses with the influencers of same domain and expertise in just few clicks. The business team has to go to IndiPR.com and submit their press release and their job is done. The system itself triggers the process of identifying  suitable bloggers who are linked with Indiblogger and intimate them about what is required to be done and how much is remuneration, if the blogger is ok, all he/she has to do is accept the assignment and complete it within the timeline. 

As per Anoop Johnson, Co-founder & Director of Marketing at IndiBlogger “With a starting budget of just USD 150, a business of any size will be able to get their press releases published by influential bloggers with a few clicks”. In the new system there is internal algorithm that gives points to influencers for each work done along with the feedback points given by business for which assignment was done. It helps the businesses for next assignments and also helps the system to take more precise automated decision. IndiPR.com team is looking forward to continuously improving this system and also add few more aspects of branding like organizing events for influencers through IndiPR.com.

Indiblogger team has always tried its best to give proper platform to bloggers and IndiPR.com is one such step in that direction. According to Renie Ravin, the Founder and CEO of IndiBlogger “We believe that this system will help Influencers with fresh and new content on their site every day. In a way, you could be writing about the next Google without even realizing its immense potential.”

More information on IndiPR can be accessed at https://www.indipr.com

J.K. Architect of the Year Awards - 2016

J.K. Cement, one of the top cement manufacturing company in India every year gives award in field of architecture in different categories. This is one of the very few award program that takes place for architect fraternity all over world and it has been around since 1990. This February J.K Cement presented its 24^th Architect of the year award in Bengaluru.

The entry for this award nomination is totally free every year and this year they received total 153 entries in different categories. These categories include Private Building, Public building, Group housing, Hill architecture, Young architect of the year along with Architect of the Year in all category. To make this year different from previous years, the theme for this year was affordable housing and Green architecture. There is a very eminent panel of Jury that gets to decide winners each year and this year it was headed by MD of J.K. Cement Mr. YaduPati Singhania. Along with distinguished members from Indian architect society Jury also had 1 member each from Sri Lanka and Mauritius.

J.K Cement MD and Award Administrators addressing Press 

As per Mr. Singhania “Design has gained utmost significance in new Tech era, when it comes to construction. Hence architects and their work are increasingly becoming more relevant than ever before that would create structures for everyone to admire in days to come. M.P Rawal , advisor to J.K Cement and Administrator of AYA award said “ AYA has emerged as the most significant platform for giving fame to Architect community and we are looking forward to make it bigger and better. From this year onwards a new category was added as Student architect of the year.

Wall displaying the winners with their award winning work 

The Award show took place in Leela Palace Hotel Bengaluru and here are the 24^th J.K Cement Architect of the Year award winners in each categories :    

Green Architecture Award :  Ar. Madhav Joshi

Award for Private Housing :  Ar. Shefali Balwani

Award for Public Building :  Ar. Nanda Kumar Birudavolu

Award for Hill Architecture :  Ar Akshat Bhat

Award for  Young Architect : Ar Akshat Bhat

Student Architect of Year :  Shardul Patil

Commendation Award under Indian category: Ar. Partha Ranjan Das

Commendation Award under Foreign category :  Ar. Tin Tsin Fong Kee Shui ( Mauritius)

Architect of Year (Foreign Category ) : Ar Palinda  Kannanagara  (Sri Lanka)

Indian Architect of the Year :  Ar. Sunil Kulkarni

The Mess of one-sided sponsored Political posts on Facebook

At time of ongoing JNU conflict and with tempers running really high i have been seeing many sponsored posts related to news articles and editorials on my FB timeline. All these posts were supporting similar sort of opinion which is against view of government of India. I would just like to make sure that I am not much aware about how these sponsored posts work and whether these posts were occurring on my Timeline only or of many others too, moreover i didn't find a single sponsored post supporting government views. let me know if you had find any on your FB timeline. Out of these many posts were from Scroll which looks like replacement of notorious Tehelka and to put facts straight I don't follow any of these pages on FB. 

Some of those posts were clearly on JNU controversy, some mocking Modi, some mocking whoever looked like supporting Modi. Why would you have to boost your post if you are so sure about your ideology and way of thinking? 
Talk about austerity and then spend money to promote your thinking to masses ? 

New PF Tax Amendment - Ending "Interest Subsidy" in Unpopulist way

Ok so first of all let me say that this proposal of taxing the 60% of withdrawal of PF (Provident Fund) amount at time of maturity is really a bold step and may be one of the most Un-populist step taken by any government in recent times affecting large section of middle class. It might have been done to make it equal to other tax saving options but can have negative impact on popularity of NDA government and also this tax change doesn't apply on PPFs that many people invest into for tax saving that has 15 years lock-in period. 

As per new rule if you are withdrawing PF at maturity time, 60% of total amount will be taxable unless you invest that amount again into an annual pension scheme of government that pays you monthly pension amount. The total amount will not include the money deposited in PF until March 2016, that means:

• If you are an existing PF account holder and have deposited 5 lakh in your PF account so far, this 5 lakh will be tax free totally, and 60% of the amount added from April 2016 till the maturity time will come under consideration for tax.

• If you are new PF account holder from April 2016, whatever you deposit into PF account, 60% of that will come under consideration of new tax proposal.

• Not only this, if employer contribution is more than 1.5 lakh in a year, that amount also will be taxed on annual basis based on same rule, so it will become tax on already taxed income at time of maturity.  

Now to understand PF, it is called “Interest Subsidy” by many economists, because first of all almost 17% of your CTC (combing Employee + Employer share) becomes tax free , then you get the highest possible risk free compounding interest ( more than 8-9% ) on it by Government year on year and then at time of maturity it used to be totally tax free so far before this new budget proposal, so may be Modi government has tried to break this jinx of one more subsidy too like other subsidies.

It is up to individuals how they read this move and Government might revert this decision in future, but as per government it is done to give level playing field to other investment options like NPS. As per Government, entire moto of PPF is to make source of constant income post retirement called Pension and if you opt for pension with that 60% of PF amount, you are still not paying any tax :)

Flipkart outdoors - The day of outdoor activities with cool gadgets

Each one of us know that outdoor activities are good not only for physical health but also mental health, but how many of us get to do it and how often. There can be many reason for not doing it like lack of time, free space and accessories to make the activity a complete and fruitful one. With proper accessories one can not only enjoy the outdoor activities but also get the most benefit out of it.

For we bloggers in Bangalore, last Saturday was one such day at Flipkart Outdoors meet organized by Indiblogger and Flipkart in Mango Mist resort. There were many brands showcasing their products that are essential for outdoor activities and we got the chance to use those products while doing many physical activities. There were big MNC brands like Samsung, Garmin, Sony and many others. All of these brands had many products that could add value to our outdoor activities. The product varied from action camera to smart gears to outdoor activity specific shoes and many more.

The Event:

The event was organized by Indiblogger team and around 100 bloggers were part of it. It was happening to see so many bloggers excited for a full day event on lazy Saturday morning. We reached to venue by IndiBus at 9 AM and after awesome breakfast it was time to get ready for the activities. After initial breefing by Indiblogger Team about event, Bloggers were divided in separate teams and every team got chance to get information about the products being showcased by brands one by one and also some members of each time got chance to use those products for whole day doing different set of activities. Hosts made sure that we don’t walk hungry anytime so we were provided with awesome breakfast and lunch to feed energy within ourselves.

Team Indiblogger explaining the agenda 

The Brands:

The brands who showcased there product were Samsung, Sony ,Garmin, Red Chief, Polaraid cube, Altec Lansing and Coleman. All of these brads have different set of products that one can use in outdoor activities and value to the same.

Samsung had smart watches and smart gears that can keep track of essential parameters like heart rate of body and calorie burnt while doing the activities.

Sony had Sony action camera variance for normal photoshoot,wildlife and even under-water photo shoot. Many of these were advanced version of DSLR cameras.

GARMIN showcased its smart intelligence equipment like GPS tracker and bands for fitness tracking while performing physical activities.

Checking the steps count 

Polaroid Cube showcased some of the products that add value to working of your normal cameras like printing snaps instantly during outdoor activities and HD Cameras by Polaroid Cube of 

Red Chief showcased its various range of shoes that were suitable for outdoor physical activities, for a each type of activity there was a different shoe available.

Altec Lansing had Bluetooth speakers ,in-water earphones and various types of headphones that can take care of your boredom while doing any physical activities.

Coleman showcased products that can be really useful in outdoor activities like camping. The products ranged from Tents, sleeping bags, coolers and many more that can make your outdoor life more fun and exciting.

The Activities:

There were number of activities that one could take part in and show their physical strength, activities like rock climbing ( in hot weather with rock facing the scorching Sun) , walking on  Bamboo / Burma Bridge, Russian ladder, water and land zorbing ,archery and the most exciting Paint ball. In Paint ball 8 members team fought against each other and top 3 quickest winner got some awesome goodies as prize. 

All these activities required physical as well as mental toughness and many bloggers faced those challenges and out of them few conquered too. There were different set of prizes for all activities and the best performers were rewarded by Team Indiblogger and Flipkart, awards like winner in rock-climbing, calorie burning. As Twitter has become an essential part of Social media grid, the best tweets done from the event were also rewarded.

Aiming to shoot- Paint-Ball

To conclude the post, the event was one of its kind where we got to know the brands, the fellow likeminded bloggers and got to share weekend among them. We met many bloggers for 1^st time and now we are connected to each other like never before. These events are not only fun but also add value to one’s social media circle in big way.     

At the last but not least, 3 cheers for Team Indiblogger for keep rocking with such events time after time and thank you Team Flipkart for being part of such an awesome weekend. Thanks to our #IndiBus driver and thanks to Mango mist resort for hosting us so well. 

All the awesome tweets for this event can be found on Twitter. 

Ozil "Assists" - The Humorous side on Twitter

Mesut Özil, the World cup winning famous German Midfielder and currently playing for Arsenal FC in English Premier League has made a nag of assisting the Goals for his team rather than scoring this season, some of those could be described as clear chance of hitting shot on target. In this season he has scored only 4 Goals so far, but has assisted 17 Goals in 24 matches. While people appreciated his selfless play , there were many humorous supporters of "Ozil Assists" on Twitter.

Source :- Premier League Website (Last week)

Ozil can find Diego Costa's original birth certificate and present it to the @FA so that they can reveal his real age

— AfricanGooner (@wallacemoses95) December 13, 2015

Mesut Ozil: 13 assists in 14 games. David Moyes: "The jury is still out on Ozil" pic.twitter.com/j0bctfwpOw

— Footy Jokes (@Footy_Jokes) December 13, 2015

This young lady being assisted by Ozil @Ayourb @temiokomi pic.twitter.com/HFsPBBrLv2

— Adekunle (@jokerike) December 13, 2015

Ozil could set up 5, score 3, cook a post match meal & drive the coach home & his critics still wouldn't be convinced. Amazing player. #AFC

— John Bennett (@JohnBennettBBC) December 13, 2015

Ozil shouted at the ref to give a pen so I'm counting that as an Ozil assist aswell

— ㅤ (@Ossistician) December 13, 2015

Ozil could go on a date with a girl and let the waiter score her in the end.

— Red Hot Chilean (@ArsenalsCannon) December 13, 2015

Ozil with another assist. pic.twitter.com/WD1hrxy4iz

— Zcott (@ZcottAFC) December 13, 2015

What is Wind Energy and why India need it

India as a country of so many people and with so many complications has different needs as compare to many other countries around the world. This need can be in different aspects from economical needs, energy needs and developmental needs to environmental needs. Now to talk about Energy and environmental needs, India has to have multipronged approach to fulfil these. Having a one way approach for it can solve it in some percentage but it will never be complete and everlasting. Windergy, a group of Windmill manufactures have taken the task to promote Wind energy and how India can make most out of this alternative source of energy.

Wind Energy in short:

In simple terms, Wind energy or wind power is the kinetic energy generated through blowing winds by use of Windmills. Wind power is renewable, clean, with no greenhouse gas emissions and uses little land for setup.

Why India need Wind Energy:

Now before we get to know why Wind energy, we should know about feasibility of other energy sources as well. As we keep reading many reports that our natural resources are not going to increase but our needs keep growing every single day, so what is the solution that we have now or we will have in next 100-200 years? Is the energy generated through only coal or water dam sustainable solution for long term? Clearly not. Is the nuclear way to generate power is the most safest bet we can take to fulfill our future generation needs keeping in mind the potential security risk it has? Now we have either solar energy or wind energy as the most environment friendly and sustainable source of energy. Solar energy has its advantage and disadvantage too. The biggest disadvantage it has is use of so much land and initial costs involved in setup of even 1 solar panel. I am not saying cost involved in setting up wind energy turbine is less but in long run its cost benefit analysis can give better results. So if we compare solar energy and wind energy, we will get to know more about advantages of Wind energy over other sources. Both solar and Wind energy have its demography based advantages and disadvantages.

In India with so much of open land in rural areas or in outskirts of cities where wind speed is constantly suitable for setting up Wind turbines, local governments can subsidies the plants. As it takes very less space on Ground (just to setup the ground turbines at one place) and most of the thing is done by windmills which are really high in the air, we can reuse the lands for other purpose like agriculture. This would have not been possible in case of solar plants. Here are some of the advantages of Wind energy in India

  1. Wind Energy is really clean source of energy.

        2. Generating wind energy doesn’t require to get any technological expertise from developed countries

    

        3. It is really sustainable for long run.

     

        4. Land requirement is really less as compare to other sources of energy as it can be built on even agricultural land without taking much of the space on ground.

Though every source of energy has its pros and cons, but energy generated through Coal and Water dam is not that sustainable and environment friendly, energy generated through Nuclear reactors Is not that safe (at least in public perception), solar energy is one good option but not suitable in many scenarios. Some of the disadvantages of Wind energy plants like noise can be negated through proper setup. Government and public should try to explore more options in Wind energy and make use of it as much as possible.

What is Windergy? :

Windergy India is a digital platform launched by group of Indian Wind Turbine Manufacturers. The main aim of this platform is to create awareness about Wind energy options in India and help it grow.

Watch more videos about Windergy at Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8QB02llnGtutknhUyouHIw

My Favorite City - Allahabad

India as a country has lots of culture, languages and different types of Foods. If anyone wishes to explore entire India he or she has to dedicate a lot of time and energy but one thing is sure that it will be really great time for them. Now as I have to write about my favorite city and why I find it best among other great Indian cities in terms of design, drive and connect , I will chose Allahabad in North India as one. As I am native of Allahabad so I will surely be biased towards it though I am settled in Bengaluru. 

Allahabad is a Tier-3 city of India enjoying its peace with slow pace of growth, recently it has been selected as "to be made smart city", so some drastic changes there are bound to happen. Now to talk about Allahabad in terms of drive, it’s design and connect, it is one of the most peaceful city in India. The traffic, the crowd all are well in manageable limits. It is designed in such a way that it can accommodate Crowd of Crores of people any time. It is one of the 4 cities in India where MahaKumbh takes place and in this time the city manages to accommodate crores of people from all over world for more than a month. It is designed in such a way that it has something for everyone. Anyone who wants peace along with all the modern facilities available in any other big city will love this city. This is one of the oldest city in India having a great place historically both in religious and political ways and its design still carries same values and principles. During the month of January and February of each year a new temporary city is formed at bay of river Ganga.

The Beautiful Yamuna Bridge

Now as time has become most important for every one of us, a city that has good connect of its center to all its corners will be ranked well than other cities with less connect. In Allahabad you can drive over any corner and come to civil lines and MG Road that is heart of Allahabad very easily. Not just this, city has good connection within city to all world famous religious places and hundreds of year old Education institutes like University of Allahabad and MLNIT. It has Railway Junction, Airprot and intercity Bus terminal making it a connection hub in Uttar Pradesh.The connect is not only among the physical corners of this great city but also among the people. We celebrate all the festivals of India with same enthusiasm doesn’t matter what is going outside of Allahabad.  

Allahabad University

About driving in this city, you can drive free of traffic vows any day any time here. The roads are not that great but then that is same for all cities of India. The chaos has no place in the city so even beginners in driving also feel lot of comfort in driving over here. I have done a lot of it during my University days and trust me there is no more great feeling in the world than becoming self-dependent in driving as soon as you are eligible to drive. If you want to go for long drive in you Tata Zica the city has many places in its outskirts and one will feel very relax travelling to those places.

At last thank you Indiblogger and Tata motors for giving us such opportunity to write about our favorite city and help it promote through Social media and before I end I must say that all cities of India are great in one way or the other, it’s just that a person connects to a city with his or her soul and that makes the city great for that person. 

Once a Cancer fighter, now a Lead Singer of her own band - Kanchan Daniel

Life is not easy for anyone, for some it is little less tough, for some it is little tougher, for some it is even more tough. It has everything from hope to pessimism, from happiness to sadness, form success to failure, from excitement to anxiety and it applies to every living human being, but there are few people who have to give the toughest challenge in their lives at different points of time to end up becoming a complete person and symbol of hope and courage. Despite all these odds these people make it big in life and become an inspiration for the rest. They conquer all the challenges life throws towards them with the guts and all the power they have and end up laughing over those challenges. This journey make them such a strong person that they become almost immune to any challenge life throws towards them in future. We get to hear about some of these old stories, but many of these stories go unnoticed for reasons even I am not sure of. One such story is of a young Mumbai girl Kanchan Daniel. I came to know about her story through Facebook few days back and decided to go through it in detail. I contacted her on Twitter and thankfully she agreed to share some information related with her journey through a deadly cancer at such a young age of 17.

Her Story:

She had just completed her 12^th standards exams and was ready to move into a college for a new beginning when one day she got some severe pain in her thigh followed by fever. After checking with family doctor and doing some tests the saddest news of her life came to haunt her and her family. Tests showed a 4 KG tumor inside her, after the few more checkups it was clear that she had 3^rd stage Dysgerminoma Cancer. When the family discussed with Doctor about seriousness of Cancer, doctor replied with a 0% chance of survival. At this moment any person can go down and lose the hope but only question she asked to doctor was “Will I lose my hair?” In her words “From the very beginning I didn't allow cancer to get the better of me - if anything, cancer was always playing a losing game with me. Since the time I was diagnosed with a 0% survival chance, I had made up my mind that I would defeat it. I did lose my hair, so I called a barber home and shaved it all off and proceeded to mock myself in front of others as 'egghead' - I never allowed cancer to make me a victim. I've always called myself a 'shameless cancer patient' because I would just laugh things off and embrace them as an experience - but I think that's the only thing that got me out of it. “

After all those extremely irritating and painful cycle of treatments, she finally conquered it with her head held high. It increased her confidence even more. After getting better and bit healthier she did study clinical psychology just to help the young teens who are suffering from menace of Cancer. As per her the biggest contribution this battle with cancer has done to her is that it made her incline towards singing so that she can express herself in better way. She formed the band “Kanchan Daniel & The Friends” and became lead singer of her own band. This band is now known as Kanchan Daniel and the Beards and has all young members.Now a days her band keeps doing live shows regularly and she has won many fans with her lovely voice.

Excerpts from Some Q & A With her over Email :

Q. What was your first reaction when you heard that chances of survival was 0%?

A. I took everything in my stride. From the first time I got to know that I may not make ,I never  did the whole why me or never pitied myself or my condition because the only aim and direction that I had decided to take was to beat cancer.

Q. Who was always there next to you supporting you like solid pillar?

A. My family has been my pillar of strength. And not just my immediate family, my entire family from all over the world

Q. Did you find any negative person too around you at that time? How did you avoid their negativity?

A. Yes i did. There were people and still are people who dont understand the depth and gravity of what cancer can put you through. There were people who would say stupid things such as cancer is contagious and a few who had already deemed me dead.I didnt let their negativity to me firstly because their opinion didn’t matter and secondly because my bigger battle was with life itself and I was busy too busy fighting that one.

Q. What is one must do and one must not do for anyone suffering from Cancer?

A. The one thing that one must do is to keep the utmost positive atmosphere   around a cancer patient because it is also a part of healing process for both a patient and the family.
What one must not do around the cancer patient is victimize them. People don’t need to hear " why me " around them all the time. It does nothing to boost ones morale and fighting spirit. Try and maybe empathize even though it may be hard to truly understand what one goes through while fighting a disease like cancer.

Q. Does the age matter for anyone suffering from Cancer?

A. Cancer does not differentiate between the young and the old.

Q. What was the first thing you did after getting cured and moving out of home totally fit?

A. I decided to study clinical psychology and simultaneously music happened to me.

Q. Which journey has been better? 17 years of Life before cancer diagnosis or Life post cancer treatment?

A. Definitely post cancer. I never regret it. It’s made me who and what I am today.I am thankful for it because it turned my life around. 

To end the this story of Cancer "Fighter" Kanchan in her own words -I went through 3 chemo sessions, 8 surgeries and a million complications at the age of 17 -- but I won the battle, only because I was shameless enough to laugh at it rather than giving it the power to be life threatening.

Credits : All pics credit to Kanchan's Twitter feed @KanchanDaniel1 and some of excerpts have been taken from her discussion with "Humans of Bombay" Facebook group. 

Quit Smartphones sometimes to feel the real togetherness

Almost everyone we know in real or online life says that technology and internet has brought all of us together and made us connected to each other like never before. No doubt that it has helped us in the way where people who are really far can see and talk to their loved ones through video calling sort of things, but has it been able to provide the feel and touch of talking to someone face to face sitting next to each other? The answer will be big NO. In-fact because of overuse of technology and over dependency on it we have lost the real touch of meeting people personally. Many of us spend more time over internet talking to people many of whom may be not even remotely close to us, forgetting the real people around us. It may be friends, relatives, family members or even own kids. 

  

We should not take our hands off from the technology but clearly there should be some self-regulation we need to apply on how far we are going to use it. As long as it is not hampering our personal life its well and good to use technology. One of the way to make a proper balance between social life over internet and personal life with family and friends is get-together. I am from North India and in that side of India nothing can be a great get-together than the marriage and it brings all friends relatives together, but marriages can’t happen every now and then so we need to have other ways of meeting people personally.

For a regular get-together there can be nothing better than going out with friends and relatives to see the nature around us. I haven’t found a single person so for who doesn’t love nature or doesn’t love going out to hill areas and parks or temples in those remote areas. Spending a day or two with all of them together away from all worries of life is what makes us social animal.Now many people will say there are many other options of getting together too like going for movies and all. Yes that may be true but do we really spend time with each other when we go for a movie? I don’t think so. We actually end up putting more focus on movie in those 2-3 hours than on friends and relatives around us with whom we have come out to spend time. This amazing video ad from Kissan shows what is the real problem we face by being 24*7 connected to our smart phones and how an initiative by just one person can bring all of us together and make us enjoy our life with each other.

The joy of being together, doing things together, learning together and enjoying together is what makes we human different from other species. Nature has given us so many options to do things together and enjoy the time. Go to remote hill areas, go for trekking, go to beaches, go to wildlife sanctuaries and do many more things. There is no dearth of options for us, all we need to do is to stop the internet connection for some time and connect with the people around us. Many say that it is tough to find like-minded people around us but when it comes to loving the nature everyone says same thing and that is “We love the nature”, then why don’t take advantage of this love and spend time with each other with feel of personal touch rather than being obsessed with virtual word all the time.

Record TV shows and Watch Anywhere Anytime with Tata Sky+ Transfer

TV has become essential part of life for almost everyone all over the world, go to any house hold no matter how less money they earn everyone has TV with cable connection. There are different Cable service providers in India including Tata Sky which is a major player in this field. With so much evolution in technology this field also has changed massively in recent times and Tata Sky being a front runner also has been coming with new value added features and the newly launched Tata Sky+ Transfer is the latest value added service from them.

Tata Sky has the option for the viewers to record the shows to watch it later based on their free time but one can watch those recorded shows on TV only, now with Tata Sky + Transfer one can watch the recorded shows on their smartphones too. All one need to do is record the show on TV, transfer it to Mobile and watch it anytime. I think this is major game changer seeing the busy life everyone is having and the time we spend outside of our homes. This new feature is beneficial for everyone doesn’t matter what type of shows they watch.

Now as far as I am concerned, I am not a TV junkie and I am more interested in stock market. I do watch some of the Comedy shows but mostly I like watching Business News channels and different interviews of market experts. As I am a full time IT professional, I don’t get much time to track these interviews and shows live on TV. Sometimes even if I get time, there will be 2 or 3 different good interviews running on different business channels, for me this is the best case scenario to record the shows. Now after recording these programs I would love to watch those immediately as soon as I get free. With Tata Sky I would have to be in home during that free time to watch recorded shows, but with Tata Sky+ Transfer I can watch the recorded shows on mobile just the next day when I am travelling to office or coming from office or even in office when work is less. I think this will make my life easier and will save a lot of time that I usually waste while travelling.

Who must get Tata Sky+ Transfer?

• Those who want to watch recorded shows immediately as soon as they are free, doesn’t matter that free time they get in home or outside of home.

• Those who value their time and don’t want their free time to get wasted.

• Those who want to see their family members Happy, imagine you giving remote to your wife or kids in family because you can watch the recorded shows on your smart phone.

• Those like me who don’t want to miss any shows related to a particular field like stock market, Business news shows and interviews of market experts.

• Those who like to keep themselves upgraded with upcoming technologies.

So Tata Sky+ Transfer has given us one option whether we want to save our time by watching recorded shows anywhere any time after transferring those to our smart phones or keep waiting to reach home and then watch. Just keep in mind that giving remote to your wife or kid can make your family life happier as you can watch the recorded shows on your phone now and your wife and kids can watch their favorite shows on TV.

For complete information on Tata Sky+ Transfer visit  http://www.tatasky.com/transfer/ .

Comedy Hunt - The Next big step towards Stand Up Comedy

Comedy, the word that makes us feel energized and relaxed has been into existence since eternity and has helped many people to live life in relaxed mood despite having lots of difficulties in life. Like many other continuous changing things Comedy also has evolved with times from Slapstick comedy of Charlie Chaplin to group comedy like Circus shows to now very popular Stand-Up Comedy. All other forms of comedy still exists but Stand-up Comedy has made base very rapidly in last few years in India. Acceptance of crowd for Stand-Up comic shows has given birth to so many talented Stand-Up comedians in India who are now having fame and money both because of their humorous talent.

In last few years many new comedians have made way for themselves through social platforms like Youtube,Twitter and Facebook as the reach of these mediums is very vast and wide spread across world. Liveinstyle one of the most popular life style Website has taken the decision to promote Stand-Up Comedy in really big way. LiveInStyle in association with some of the best comedy stars in India has come up with Comedy Hunt to help new Stand-Up comedians grow and get recognized by public. Comedy hunt is for young aspiring comic talents to promote themselves by putting their Youtube Videos on Comedy Hunt's Youtube page and getting recognized  and judged by some of the best names in Indian comedy industry.There has never been such big step towards promoting Stand-Up comedy and new talents in this comedy industry. 

Stand-Up Comedy section of Liveinstyle contains all information that a new aspiring comedian or anyone who loves comedy need to know about this form of comedy. It has a lot of details about some of the most famous Stand-up comedians in India like Tanmay Bhat, Virdas, Aditi Mittal, Kanan Gill, Praveen Kumar and many more. The details ranges from their struggle to success, their genre of comedy with some of their most famous one-liners. The place also contains videos of some of their  popular comic shows..

There is also a section in Stand-Up comedy page of Liveinstyle where many knowledge full videos have been put to help new aspiring Stand-up comedians to get some tips from highly recognized comedians of India, tips related to how to make your Youtube video optimized for better views by public and many others that can help a newbie comedian grow up in Stand-Up Comedy field. 

Apart from promoting Stand-Up comedy, Liveinstyle as a lifestyle brand living fullest to its name also has a very interesting section about Cocktails. In this section one can find all details relared with different category of cocktails like Rum Cocktail,Whiskly Coctail, Vodka Cocktails and Wine Coctails.It even has details related to many other Cocktails that fall under basic Cocktail category mentioned before.For people who want to learn about Cocktails, Liveinstyle has differnt videos and useful articles and these are worth watching/reading for everyone who loves to explore more about different type of Cocktails.

So all you aspiring comic talents just record video of your performance and send it to Comedy Hunt. One good video and you are in for a big ride in Stand Up comedy industry. 

Indiblogger meetup on Flipkart Image Search launch

What one does normally on weekends ?? Watches TV lying on couch or goes out for a movie or plays games or simply sits idle in home and seldom uses it for some productive work, but for we bloggers in Bangalore it was a different experience all together last weekend. For us Saturday was filled with entertainment, getting first-hand experience and details about new feature called “Image Search” launched by Flipkart in presence of the Product and marketing team of Flipkart. This event was jointly organized and hosted by Team Indiblogger, one of the fastest growing Blogger Community in India and Flipkart which is India’s biggest E-commerce origination at Hard Rock Café Bangalore.

Band performance to start the proceedings 

The event started with a Hell –Yeah energetic band performance to make everyone more energetic on Lazy Saturday morning, then some willing bloggers were given chance to introduce themselves and it was a lot of fun. After this meet and greet, it was time to witness real crux of the event, it was time for team Flipkart to present their flipkart image search feature and also to take variety of questions from fellow bloggers, questions ranging from “Image search result accuracy” to “Why Fliipkart is going for app only “and all these questions were answered by Flipkart product team in great details and with lots of conviction.

Excited audience listening to team Flipkart 

About Flipkart Image Search:

Image Search is a new feature launched by Flipkart on app only. Through this feature one can take image of an object or use an existing image and search for products based on that image only. Based on the image provided and options selected like for Men/Women, Clothing/Accessories and like that, app will search exact or relatively close products. We got first-hand experience of it and it was amazing to get such quick searches just be clicking images. Here are simple steps to follow for image search.

1. Open recently updated Flipkart app and select Image Search option at top

2. Click an image or upload existing image and search

           

3. Select product type like for Men/Women and other applicable categories

4. That is it, you are done.

After this flipkart session, next session was about Indiblogger and their recently launched book 10 Love Stories which has 10 short love stories by 10 bloggers who are part of Indiblogger community. Two of those 10 bloggers were present at the event and also recited some excerpts from their stories in the book. All bloggers who attend the event were provided the book. I have read few stories from the book and really liked those, especially of Bangalore based author Varsha Dutta.  

Reading excerpts from her short story in the book

Apart from the sessions, the lunch, the drink, the ambience and band music was really high class and meeting so many bloggers and social media enthusiasts at one place really made our day.

For all those who couldn’t attend the event, here are the pics that explains everything about the event. 

Thank you Team Indiblogger and Team Flipkart.