My 13 year old nephew – Manan – has his birthday coming up soon. He is a topper in his school and has stood first in his class all throughout. As with all 13 year olds, he is very fond of emailing, computer games, etc. We were wondering what to gift him this year! He wanted Counter Strike. But we were not too keen on gifting a computer game. He will waste time one it. Additionally, we have already gifted him Need for Speed, Brian Lara Cricket and a USB Wheel on his previous birthdays.

One idea was a guitar. He has mentioned it many times over that he wants to start learning it in the coming summer vacation. He already plays keyboards, although he is still a newbie. But a guitar wasn’t sufficient! After all its a gift from so many of us! We needed to give him something more. Something that will excite him.

After much thinking, I came up with an different gift idea and all of us agreed it will excite him. The new gift is a website!! A blog!! I will soon register a domain for him and install Word Press for him. I am pretty sure he will enjoy blogging and the sheer idea of having his own website will make him proud. He will flaunt it in front of his friends and feel really good! He has won prizes for his writings earlier at inter-class and inter-school events so he should be a good blogger and a blog of an intelligent 13 year old will make for a good reading! I am now looking forward to it.

I had registered a couple of .in domains with Indiatimes. After having a pathetic experience for something as small as changing DNS, I renewed and transferred my domains to mailNspace domains.

Although I have shifted, I received a renewal mail which said renewal charges applicable are 399!! I became curious. I thought charges were 795. I clicked on the link given in the mail and then on one more link and got to a page which said charges were 795. Below are the screen shots.

IMO, Indiatimes goofed up on 2 counts. First, they sent me a renewal mail. Don’t they get rid of old records? Second, their mail showed a wrong rate! Don’t they have someone who checks and thouroughly proof-reads the drafts of outoging mails to customers? If they don’t improve, they will surely have more and more customers like me that shift elsewhere.

After a long time, I watched the results episode of Indian Idol 2. Although Sony tried a lot to ensure a female idol, the last 4 were once again male contestants – Karunya, Sandeep, Anuj and Amey. The “so called” public voting this time ousted Amey, one of the better singers – especially as compared to Anuj, who was one of the last two this time.

This time the show is not as popular as last time. So to rank up the viewership, Sony decided to try out some gimmicks! I saw one example of such gimmick at the time of the results episode where Amey was ousted. The worst part is that even the three judges – Anu Malik, Sonu Nigam and Farah Khan – decided to be a part of it to justify their “fees” They staged a walk out, they argued, they did everything that they could to create a controvery from nowhere. A perfect case of a mountain out of a mole hill!! And Farah exhibited the height of unreasonableness by demanding a re-contest! Question is not who is a better singer. Question is Anuj received more votes. That means more people likes his voice! Period. Why should there be an exception to that rule? Why should there be a re-contest?

In all this chaos in favour of Amey, did anyone even once think about Anuj? What must be going through his mind. How humiliated he must be filling! My sympathies are with him.

I have a habit of reading thru the user’s manual of all the stuff that I buy. So was the case with the Nokia N70. But I must say I was completely disappointed. The user’s manual sucks!! It looks like a very hurriedly written document with just the bare steps of operations in it.

For example, I couldn’t even find out the memory card that it supports. I find the bundled 64MB card insufficient. I want one with more capacity. Now which one should I take? I know it can take RS-DV-MMC. But can the phone work with 1GB or 512 MB cards? Will it become slow? Will it give errors? I don’t know because there’s no information on the subject in the user’s manual or on the Nokia’s site!

A manual is a document that gives complete information not just steps on writing SMS or making a call!! One can easily figure out such things on their own anyway! I can say that all that I have figured out so far has been because of my inquisitiveness with a little bit of help from the tutorials provided in the phone. The handset is great, but the user’s manual is below par!

I was priviledged to see the match between Australia and South Africa one day match on 12th March 2006. I wasn’t watching it but my friend Sanjay Jogani sent me an SMS and I switched over the channel! A truly remarkable match!! A world record by the side batting first and side batting second immediately broke it!! Unbelievable! Or as one of the headlines said – RUNBELIEVABLE! Excellent performances!! So far Sri Lanka’s 398 was the highest one day score. However, that was against a lowly Bangladesh. But these scores are the real world records!

Additionally, Ricky Ponting was offered the joint Man of the Match award, but he was gracious enough to turn it down in favour of Herschell Gibbs who deserved it more on 3 counts. First he scored more runs, second he did it under pressure and third, it was a part of the winning cause.

Let me say it one more time. WHAT A MATCH!!

A picture is worth a thousand words. But here’s a picture that can replace more than that. In my opinion, this picture perfectly summarises the budget! No point in saying more about it, have a look.

The Financial Year 2005-06 is on the verge of getting over. People have started worrying about their taxes. Last few days are left for the investment under section 80C of the Income Tax Act, 1961. Grab this opportunity to save some tax and also for your future.

Here’s a small list of some of the very popular investments options. This list is not exhaustive.

1. PPF (Where else do you get 8% tax free returns?)
2. NSC
3. Life Insurance
4. Pension Plans
5. Tuition Fees

Till last year (FY 2004-05) we had section 88 that gave us rebate from the tax. Depending on the income, percentage of rebate varied. The calculation was pretty simple.

This year we have a new section 80C which has simplified the calculation even further. Simply deduct the allowed investments from the income. Maximum deduction is Rs. 100,000 (One Lakh). Quite simple!

Let me give an example. This is how it works as tax planning.

If a person has an income of Rs. 275,000/- without planning, his tax will be as follows:
First 100,000 – NIL
100,000 to 150,000 – 5,000 (10%)
150,000 to 250,000 – 20,000 (20%)
250,000 to 275,000 – 7,500 (30%)
TOTAL 32500 + 2% education cess i.e. 33,150/-

Now if the same person invests 100,000 then it will be as follows:
Taxable Income = 275,000 – 100,000 = 175,000
First 100,000 – NIL
100,000 to 150,000 – 5,000 (10%)
150,000 to 175,000 – 5,000 (20%)
TOTAL 10,000 + 2% education cess i.e. 10,200/-

That means a saving of Rs. 22,950 in taxes. Additionally, the investments will also earn some income.

RUSH NOW!! MAKE THE REQUIRED INVESTMENT IF YOU HAVEN’T ALREADY DONE THAT!

Mumbai for the first time is on the brink of a power drought and will face power cuts! MSEB, BEST, MERC all are telling us to cut down actual, genuine use or face penalties and/or powercuts. They are giving all stupid solutions to the problem as pointed out by Deep. But what about the criminal waste by government departments?

Here’s an example. I yesterday (8th March 2006) visited a government department. The department is a hugh hall (at least 5000 sq ft.), fully airconditioned! 80% of the cubicles were empty! Still all the lights were on!! In one cubicle one gentelman was playing solitaire on his PC

Read the rest of this entry »

Today morning, it was pretty cloudy and there were some non-seasonal showers!! That really got the temperature down a couple of degrees and the sweet smell of moist clay filled the environment. Showers are on even now when I am writing this.

My twin daughters, Mahi & Meha, saw the rains for the first time. Last year, they were not even a month old when monsoon started. No words can explain the amazing mixture of expressions on their innocent faces. The initial reaction was of a little fear, then surprise, amazement and finally joy. They got very excited when I streched their small hands out of the window and few drops fell on their little palms.

Read the rest of this entry »

I have been looking for a new mobile since quite some time. My Nokia 6610 was more than 2 years old but I was not able to decide on the right model. But at last, I got a new mobile Its a Nokia N70!! I am already transferring a few MP3 and MIDI files to the memory card now! Afterall, I must personalise it

These are some of the things that I read about it

Boasting a number of minor improvements over the 6680, the Nokia N70 is a very well-rounded smartphone with a number of high-end features which competitors are hard pressed to match. Rock solid connectivity combines with ergonomic hardware and a broad set of relevant applications in a meld of form and function that’s damn good looking; our only gripe is that synchronization continues to be a weak spot for what is otherwise a truly superb smartphone.

the Nokia N70 is the best smartphone without a touchscreen, no direct rivals.

Nokia N70 is great for both work and fun. It is a nice and very well equipped phone