Bugatti Veyron

VeeDub has taken the plunge & launched the 16 cr Veyron in India today. Now to see who coughs up the cash on the 1st one! Are we back to the age of the maharajas?

Indian GP

30th October, 2011. The schedule was released today.

Must say this has come sooner than I expected.

Kasab to hang

The sentence was delivered yesterday.

LCH flies!

The LCH gets airborne for the 1st time ever. And it's a looker.

I'm already imagining a convoy of these along with the Dhruv WSIs. What a sight that would be!

Another Indian in F1

Karun Chandhok becomes the second Indian in F1 after signing up with HRT F1. Cool!

MiG 29K

The Navy inducted it's most modern fighters today. The 29s might be a design from the 70s, but still manage to look good.

So now, as I was reading somewhere, we have a strange situation wherein there aren't enough Sea Harriers to man the Viraat, while we do have the MiGs to man the VikramAditya which itself isn't close to setting sail before 2012. The wonders of Indian defence procurement.

Agni 3

The 4th test flight took place today. Reportedly, it's been a complete success with the 3,500 km range being fully tested & a CEP of 40m.

Opens up really interesting possibilities with regard to the big neighbor up North.

Republic Day

As India celebrates 60 years as a republic on a foggy Delhi morning ....

.... Google joins in ....

.... and a new version of the iconic 'mile sur mera tumhara ...' is released, which isn't half as good as the original ....


.... and Mumbai tests it's good looking Monorail ....

26/11

.... it's been a year ....

Our leaders

The PM consorts with Obama ....

.... while the Prez flies the MKI ....

Hmmm ....

Revving up

Very interesting article on Bloomberg today about India's car exports this year vis-a-vis China's. Seems Al-Hind has handed the much-hyped dragon some much needed humble pie. Made for pleasant reading on a gloomy day.

All over for the Chandrayaan?

It's being reported that Chandrayaan 1 has lost all contact with earth stations since 1:30 AM today. There has been talk of snags having developed on the spacecraft over the last few months, but I hadn't expected this coming.

Let's hope ISRO comes up with some ingeneous jugaad to keep the thing going for some more of it's 2 year projected life. Very disappointing news indeed.

Edit: It's confirmed, the mission has been called off.

Independence Day

A rainy I-Day at the Red Fort .....

.... while SSC had one of the best India related banners ever.

Indian Phalcon

IAF Statement: The first of the three Indian Air Force AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) platform arrived in India from Israel today. The giant IL-76 configured in its new avatar was escorted by three Mig-29 and Jaguar aircraft each that took off from an advance fighter airbase of South Western Air Command (SWAC).

Pic and text from LiveFist.

Elections 2009 - The day after ....

The NSE Nifty hits the upper circuit breaker twice before trading is suspended for the day. It's the first time this has ever happened.

It was the same with the BSE Sensex ....

Elections 2009 - The Results

• The Congress' best ever showing since 1991
• The Left's worst in 30 years
• MMS becomes the only PM since Nehru to be voted back to office
• Rahul delivers & delivers big in UP winning 21 seats
• An impressive revival for the Cong in the Hindi heartland
• Congress strengthens in AP, Kerala
• BJP goes down significantly in UP, Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana & Uttaranchal

And now my $ 0.02 ....

• I'm glad the largest alliance is far more stable than last time
• Power hungry politicians like Mayawati got a well deserved kick in the teeth
• I'm glad younger politicians like Rahul had a greater say in the Congress' showing
• The Commies' regressive & hopelessly outdated ideology has been shown it's rightful place
• People have seen the politics of division, religion & caste for what it is
• India has surprised me, & itself, yet again
• There is still hope for this country

And my wish list for the next 5 years ....

• Go full steam ahead on economic liberalisation, there won't be a better time
• Strengthen the Military ... purchase, develop & increase spending on national defense
• Show diplomatic initiative to bring around less than friendly neighbours
• Act tough with those countries that don't cooperate
• Go after the perpetrators of terror acts, Israel style
• Root out internal security threats like Naxals with a heavy hand
• Speed up infrastructure development massively
• Reform and build up the health & education sectors

I had prayed for this kind of a result and somebody up there was listening. I hope the Congress and it's allies respect this massive mandate & don't fritter it away.

All the best to the incoming government .... and Jai Ho for Indian democracy.

Elections 2009 - Phase 5

The 5th and final phase of the world's largest elections ever, took place today.

Results start Saturday morning.

Elections 2009 - Phase 4

They're calling it the 'nano' round. Just 1 more round to go before D-day on the 16th of this month.

Elections 2009 - Phase 3

Half way through the 5 phases. And same to you AB and family .... idiots.

Elections 2009 - Phase 2

We get the day off from office as MMS and wifey stand in line at a polling station in Assam.