Video Gadget For Blogger and IGoogle

For a long time, I have been thinking of how to promote Loksatta Videos on Loksatta News. I developed a google gadget by which the videos can be shown in a small space. This is useful for sites like LoksattaVideos, which have only videos in all the posts. This gadget displays the latest videos from that site, and the videos can be watched from the gadget itself.

To add this gadget, open blogger.com and goto Layout -> Add Gadget -> Add your own, and enter the gadget url http://www.tnsatish.com/softwares/gadgets/videofeed1.0.xml. In the preferences, the URL and feed has to be entered. There are other options to change the width, height and no.of videos to be displayed etc. Once the gadget is added, the latest videos can be watched without going to the actual site.

There is one problem with google gadget. Google always refers to the original URL. So, if the original gadget in the given URL is changed, then all the blogs that use this gadget would be effected. That's why I have to keep different URLs for different versions

Gadget V1.0 : http://www.tnsatish.com/softwares/gadgets/videofeed1.0.xml

Latest Gadget (V1.0) : http://www.tnsatish.com/softwares/gadgets/videofeed.xml (Not Recommended, since it may change).

If Hitler Had Won the War

During the second world war, Subhash Chandra Bose asked Hitler for the help. In that war, Hitler had lost. Had he won the war, and if he had made Subhash Chandra Bose as the leader of India, what would have happened? Would we have lost Pakistan? What would have been the positions of Gandhi and Nehru?

The bitter truth is, the world respects only those who wins.

Taken from All in one by Omkar

Nadendla Bhaskara Rao - 1984 - till now

N.T.Rama Rao and Nadendla Bhaskara Rao went to court that, Telugu Desam Party belongs to them. The judge Devaiah gave judgement in favor of NTR. After few days, Devaiah resigned and joined Telugu Desam Party and became MLA, and then he later on became Finance Minister in the government of TDP.

After the death of Indira Gandhi, Nadendla and his supporting MLAs went to Delhi. After the last rites, Nadendla wanted to join Congress party with all his supporters in the presence of Rajiv Gandhi. But, his supporters were not interested. So, he did not join. NTR dissolved the government, and elections were conducted. For the elections, Rajiv Gandhi wanted to give few seats to Nadendla Bhaskara Rao. But, P.V.Narasimha Rao did not allow that. Then, Nadendla started, Prajaswamya Telugu Desam Party (Democratic Telugu Desam Party).

In 1989, by the call from Rajiv Gandhi, Nadendla merged Prajaswamya Telugu Desam Party in Congress. Rajiv Gandhi asked him to contest from Vemuru constituency. But, P.C.C. President Marri Chenna Reddy gave B-Form for Tenali constituency and asked him to contest from there. The reason was, if Nadendla contests from Vemuru, he would win, otherwise, he would lose. They wanted Nadendla to lose in the elections, so, they gave the ticket for Tenali. But, Nadendla won in that election from Tenali with a good majority.

After Chenna Reddy became Chief Minister second time, Rajiv Gandhi asked him to take Nadendla in the Cabinet. But, Chenna Reddy was not interested in that. Even Nadendla was also not interested in joining the Cabinet. After seeing the politics in the state, Nadendla lost interest in the politics. Rajiv Gandhi made him as the in-charge of the Karnataka state party.

Nadendla has been supporting Nehru's family since the beginning. When Seetha Ram Kesari was the president of Congress, he told that, the party president post should be given to Sonia Gandhi. He also said, someone from Nehru's family should take reins.

In 1998 elections, Congress party asked him to contest from Vijayawada Parliament constituency. But, Nadendla was not interested in that, because Vijayawada is a very developed city, and it is not that much easy to contest, and he asked for Tenali constituency. But, they gave Khammam constituency. One young leader who expected Khammam seat has opposed him from the beginning. Still, Nadendla won in that elections.

In 1999 elections, Nadendla thought, all the sitting M.P.s would be given the same seats. But, Nadendla was given Secunderabad, and he lost in that elections.

Reservations - When Will It Stop?

Whenever I talk about abolishing the reservations, the immediate reply that I get from many is, "Don't think just from your perspective. See the situation of the poor people in those communities. They don't have anything, and they desperately need something for them to improve. That's why we need reservations for some more time."

From the definitions of many intellectuals, that is nothing but, those people are begging, and this person is trying to donate.

If they want to really improve them, then they should solve the root problem. If there are not enough schools/colleges, then they should increase the no.of schools and colleges so that everyone can study. In jobs, if they cannot get it, because of lack of skills, then those people should be trained in those skills to compete with everyone. Without training in the skills, if they are taken into job, then only the organization will suffer. There will be only pseudo-improvement in those communities, and no real improvement.

My next question to them is, why don't they introduce reservations for doctors who treat politicians? Their immediate reply is, don't go to that extreme.

Why cannot we go that extreme? If a person is in a prominent role, he/she can control lives of many people. In that case, that person is more important than a doctor. 545 M.P.s can control lives of 100 crore people. Even a small reduction in the quality of the M.P. can easily effect crores of people. That is not at all acceptable for anyone who wants to improve their life.

The president (Pratibha Patil), The head of the alliance that formed the government (Sonia Gandhi), The head of the most important house of India (Meera Kumar), the head of the chief opposition party of the most important house of India (Sushma Swaraj) are women. They reached that position without any reservation. Still, all of them are involved in bringing the reservations for women.

The elections already have too many problems in India. People vote for money and Liquor. Political parties do rigging. There is a problem with splitting of votes (Let's suppose one good candidate and one bad candidate contests, and good candidate wins. If another good candidate contests there, he/she would increase the winning chances of the bad candidate. The more no.of good candidates contests, the more is the winning chance for the bad candidate). The no.of seats in the Assembly/Parliament is not proportional to the supporters of the party. If a party gets 2% of votes, they may not have 2% representation. But, a party which has 20% of votes may have 50% of representation. When we are already having these many problems, introducing yet another restriction causes a significant trouble for the country.

It is very unfortunate that the Women's Reservation Bill has been accepted in Rajya Sabha. Today is a very sad day.

Nadendla Bhaskara Rao - 1984 - As C.M.

Nadendla Bhaskara Rao has done the following when he was the Chief Minister of A.P. for one month.

• Increased the retirement age from 55 to 58. (Marri Chennareddy increased retirement age from 55 to 58, and NTR decreased it from 58 to 55.)
  
  
• NTR took Rs.30 crore from Tirumala Tirupathi Devasthanam (TTD) and credited to the state government. Nadendla returned that money to TTD.
  
  
• Decreased the price of milk by 30 paise per liter.
  
  
• Green ration card holders used to get 5kgs of rice per head, and Nadendla changed it to 25kgs per family.
  
  
• Increased the grants to hostel students from Rs.125 to Rs.175.
  
  
• Started two orphanage homes in every district.
  
  
• Cancelled Dharma Maha Matra, since Lokayukta had the same power and responsibilities.
  
  
• Granted Rs.10 crore for the development of the old city in Hyderabad.
  
  
• Introduced 3 grace marks for those who failed by few marks.
  
  
• Increased the engineering seats to 240, and reduced the fees from Rs.5000 to Rs.3000.
  
  
• Introduced 20% management quota in private engineering colleges, and cancelled the recurring grant to those colleges and saved Rs.7 crore to the government.
  
  
• Started Engineering and Medical colleges for minorities.
  
  
• Cancelled slab system in cinema theatres.
  
  
• Returned sales tax on sugar cane to farmers.
  
  
• In 1984, there was drought, and to save the farmers, waived off the current charges for 5 H.P. Motors.
  
  
• Postponed the recovery of I.M.S.Loans due to drought.
  
  
• Decreased the tax on tourist buses from Rs.250 to Rs.150 per seat. (The tax was increased by NTR.)
  
  
• Reintroduced the pension scheme for MLAs and MLCs. (It was cancelled by NTR.)
  
  
• Restarted all the academies for fine arts. (It was cancelled by NTR.)
  
  
• Accepted the report by Muralidhara Rao commission on backward classes.
  
  
• Every year from Jan 1st to Feb 10th, there would be an exhibition in Hyderabad. The lease agreement was expired in 1983 and NTR did not extend it. Nadendla extended it for few more years.
  
  
• Increased the ex-gratia for R.T.C. Employees from Rs.750 to Rs.1000.
  
  
• Permission granted for many B.Ed. colleges.
  
  
• Congress government gave land for constructing house to all the MLAs for less price. When Telugu Desam Party formed the government, NTR was not interested in giving land to MLAs of TDP. Nadendla gave land to all the MLAs.
  
  
• Cancelled Detention system in Osmania University. (Only Osmania University had this system and no other University had this).
  

Taken from the book Naa Jeevitha Prasthanam (My Life Journey) by Nadendla Bhaskara Rao.