Me & IMTEX - Indian Machine Tool Exhibition.

Photo: Me with Sri. P. Chidambaram, Union Cabinet Minister, at IMTEX.

IMTEX stands for Indian Machine Tool Exhibition. To be more specific it is Indian Metal-cutting Machine Tool Exhibition with International participation. The Exhibition showcases the latest trends in Metalworking Machine Tools and Manufacturing solutions. The Exhibition is organized on a very large scale by IMTMA – Indian Machine Tool Manufacturers Association. Earlier it used to be held alternatively once in three and four years but now it is being held once every two years. For many years IMTEX was held at Godrej premises in Mumbai and then till recently at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi. IMTEX 2007 and 2009 were held at Bangalore International Exhibition Centre, Bangalore. The Exhibition is held in January or February for duration of one week. Normally there are over 800 exhibitors and about 50 percent of them are overseas participants. In huge sheds small and large, spread over an area of over 45,000 square metres, Machine tools of every type are on display and are functional with live demonstration. Almost everyone associated with Machine Tools in India makes it a point to visit this Exhibition.

Since 1981 to 2001, I had an opportunity of being at almost every IMTEX, participating in the Stall of my company – Praga Tools Limited. Firstly I used to have a role to play in the assembly of Machines being sent to the Exhibition, then the task of erecting these machines at the Exhibition. Once the Exhibition is inaugurated, there was the task of explaining the features of our Machines to innumerable visitors. And lastly at the end of the Exhibition we had to dismantle the Machines and dispatch them to our Company. The entire duration of my stay at IMTEX used to be a minimum of 15 days. Transporting the machines to the Stall, providing power supply for the machines, Carpeting, Lighting and Furniture for the Stall, had to be arranged by us in coordination with the IMTEX appointed contractors. Our team at IMTEX consisted of persons from our Sales office at Mumbai or Delhi, my colleagues from Marketing and Production at Praga Tools– Hyderabad. While shifting the Machines to our Stall and during erection the Exhibition environment looked very dusty and shabby. But by the day of inauguration it looked spick and span with every inch of the gangways carpeted in red and stalls carpeted in different colors. With ornamental plants everywhere, excellent lighting and a variety of modern Machine Tools on display it is a spectacle to watch.

At Delhi, IMTEX was always inaugurated by the Rashtrapathi. As Exhibitors, we were invited to this ceremony. Thereafter thousands of people visit the Exhibition every day. We were not required to be in the Stall all the time. We used to go around a lot visiting other Stalls, learning about new trends in the field and attend seminars. Even after retiring from Praga Tools Limited, I am visiting every IMTEX for two days to keep in touch with the developments in Machine Tools.

Modern means to reinforce our friendship!

Yesterday was a tough day. I returned home well past midnight at 1:45am. As a CNC-Maintenance Consultant I normally work for 4 to 6 hours on 2 or 3 days a week. But yesterday was an exception. I had an appointment in the morning from 10:00am to 1:00pm and again at 4:30pm I was picked up by another Engineering Works Company. A CNC machine was down with a complex problem and it took a long time to sort it out and test it. I was tired and my legs were aching by the time I reached home at 1:45am. As my wife was getting some supper ready for me I went to the PC to check my mail. I received a pleasant email surprise that brought smiles and relaxation. There was an email from Sirisha, daughter of my very close and best childhood friend - Ramchander. She has sent friend requests with messages to my wife and me. Both of us are very happy to hear from her and her effort to keep in touch. We gladly sent out our replies, that late in the night.

You can see Sirisha in the above picture! She is standing to the left of my son Srikanth who is with a garland. She is now grown up and an Engineer, working for a MNC. Our families are in the same city and not far from one another. But unfortunately I and Ramchander are only able to meet on fewer occasions these days, it used to be everyday, every morning and every evening in the leisure filled past. After we got into different jobs, our meetings mostly gave way to letters, phone conversations and with the onset of Mobile phones it reduced to SMS. However long the gap may be between our personal meetings, the friendship, the affection and the conversations are just as before and seem to be never ending.

These days when everyone is too busy to spare time too often for socializing it is no surprise that we are so happy interacting with Sirisha on orkut. Certainly another means to keep all of us close and happy in this busy world.

General Elections '09: Voters are wise & the winners!

I am very happy with the results of General Elections-09 of the Lok Sabha and AP Vidhan Soudha, which were declared yesterday. The voters in the entire country have voted wisely for stable governments and are the ultimate winners. I was afraid of a hung Legislative Assembly and hung Lok Sabha and the ensuing drama of coalitions, horse-trading, struggle for power, ministries, Chief Minister & Prime Minister positions.

Congress retained power in the State winning 157 of the 294 seats. They have won these seats against a united opposition and a new party with Cinema glamour, whose main aim was to dislodge congress from power by any means and at any cost. They criticized every action of the government on day to day basis, for five years. They have two newspapers working for them whose sole duty is to criticize the government and its policies through stories and cartoons and praise the opposition for whatever they did or said.  They offered all sorts of sops and freebies to win votes. They offered Color TVs, Rs. 2000/- a month for a large section of voters, food grains and oil for a family for just Rs. 100/-, free cooking gas and so on. These freebies are so attractive to the voters, yet for reasons best known to them they chose congress and brought them to power again. During the campaigning – road shows and rallies of Congress and other opposition parties, specially by innumerable film stars, crowds came in thousands to hear them. They watched them twirling their moustaches and striking their thighs, they heard their cinematic dialogues of anguish, anger and pleading in rhythmic style and finally ignored them and their parties on the day of voting.

At the center, Congress/UPA has won 258 of the 544 Lok Sabha seats. They just need the support of another 14 MPs to form government and many are willing to give this support. If Congress was not in such a comfortable position a Third and Fourth front each being supported by innumerable miniscule parties were getting ready to claim power. Each of these parties was talking of making their leader the Prime Minister. With such greed, with different political views and no specific program to run the country, such a possibility would have been disastrous for the country.

Now that the elections are over and have resulted in stable governments at Center and Andhra Pradesh, I hope the opposition and the media will cooperate with the government in doing its job and business without hindrance and unnecessary N O I S E! 

Jaundice turned me into a glutton!

After completing my IV Year, II Semester Engineering exams I came home during summer holidays and fell sick. I was given treatment for viral fever and subsequently for Malaria. The fever came down but I was unable to eat due to loss of appetite and a feeling of nausea. After ten days my brother noticed that my eyes had a yellowish colour. Suspecting it to be Jaundice, my father consulted Dr. Manikyachary, a relative of ours. He examined me and confirmed that it is Jaundice. From then on I was totally under his care. I was put under fat-free diet, just rice mixed with lean butter milk for lunch and dinner and Idli for breakfast. As days passed a few items like boiled potato were added to the diet. It took almost a month for the Bilirubin levels to become normal.

During this time relatives called up to see me. Most of them were from out of station and visiting us after a long gap. They had to be entertained with sumptuous food. And all these foods I was missing. Though my mother was comforting me that I can have all this and more once I am normal, I was feeling bad. My loss of appetite had turned within weeks into craving for tasty food. I was just waiting for my Bilirubin levels to become normal. The day I was told that the Bilirubin level is normal I insisted on having spicy chicken fry. My mother wanted me to avoid oily food for few more weeks from fear that Jaundice would relapse. I cried and won the argument for the day and got the chicken fry ordered from a speciality hotel. I continued to argue, demand and have a variety of food for another fifteen days until I left for college for joining my final year of studies. 

Went to join College, got admitted into Hospital!

In those days there were just 3 Engineering colleges in Telangana with 400 seats. I could not get admission either at Hyderabad or Warangal. I applied in a number of Engineering colleges in other States. I first got admission at Annamalai University - Engineering College, Chidambaram, Tamil Nadu.  Then I started getting admission letters from few other colleges but Annamalai University College was chosen and I joined there. After being there for few days, I left the college because of ragging and as lecturers were mostly teaching in Tamil. I gave excuses and collected my certificates and returned home. Subsequently when my father took up the matter with the Dean of the college, he assured to address my problems and appoint one senior professor as my guardian at Chidambaram. But I refused to go.

Offers of admission from other colleges kept coming, including BITS, Pilani. My parents were worried about me as I could not settle down at a good college in a South Indian place, they were in a dilemma. Then they decided to send me to Manipal Institute of Technology, Manipal, where my brother was already studying B.D.S., at Kasturba Medical College. That way I and my brother would be together for three years and I will have to continue another two years on my own. The Medical College and the Engineering College are almost side by side and the hostels are also not far off, this gave them the confidence that I will be happy with my brother and that this is the best place for me.

I started for Manipal along with my father and brother. We started from Hyderabad by an APSRTC bus to Bangalore. On the way, after having dinner at Kurnool and while approaching Anantapur I developed stomach pain. As it was mild I did not tell about it to my father or brother. We got down at Bangalore early in the morning and as I was guarding our luggage, father and brother went to get tickets for our onward bus journey to Mangalore. I was not able to stand straight because of the pain. However if I lean forward a little; there was relief. When my father and brother were returning with the tickets they noticed my condition and I told them of the problem. They asked me whether I would be able to travel another 320 Kms. up to Mangalore where we can see a doctor. I assured them that I would be OK. En-route I was not able to have much for breakfast or lunch. And in the bus I was made to lie down on two seats and rest. We reached Mangalore in the evening and immediately took a taxi to Udipi which is 53 Kms. away, where my brother knew a good doctor. We checked into a hotel at Udipi. My brother brought Dr. Ullal to the room, he examined me and said that the problem could be Appendicitis but he would be able to confirm it only the next day and put me on medication. Brother went to Manipal which is 6 Kms. from Udipi, checked into his hostel and later returned to our hotel with his friends. The next day evening Dr. Ullal confirmed that it is Appendicitis and referred me to Kasturba Medical College Hospital at Manipal for surgery. Father, I and brother along with his friends reached KMC Hospital by 6:30pm. This is how I got admitted into a Hospital at Manipal instead of College.

After re-examination and preparation I was taken into the Operation theater at 9:00pm. After the operation when I woke up from the affect of anesthesia the pain was gone. On the eighth day when the doctor opened the dressing he found the surgical wound unhealed. So they waited for few days and then opened alternate stitches to examine the wound. Two days later some complications developed and then all the stitches were removed and the opening was squeezed to let out the fluid that had accumulated there. After waiting for a couple of days for the partially open wound to dry up, superficial stitches were put. I was discharged from the hospital asking me to come again after a week for the stitches to be removed.

I was in the hospital for 26 days, mostly lying on bed with meager diet and sponge baths. I was weighing 65 Kgs. at the time of admission and 56 Kgs. at the time of discharge. I virtually learnt to walk again. I was not able to hold a glass of water without my hands trembling. Knowing of my condition in the hospital the Principal of my college, the hostel warden and few college students including some would be classmates visited me.

My father stayed with me until I joined college and I settled down at the hostel. The college authorities gave me a room on ground floor in VI Block and close to the Andhra Non-veg. mess. I had to put in a lot of hard work to cope up with the classes I had missed due to hospitalization.

This is how vegetables have come to our kitchen, over the years.

I did not have anything to do with vegetable procurement until I opted for voluntary retirement from service and started having ample spare time. It is now 7&1/2 years since I retired and in this period I have either accompanied my wife or I have on my own gone for shopping vegetables every week or more frequently. But I distinctly remember how we procured vegetables right from my childhood.

Since my childhood and for several years at Kothagudem, vegetable vendors passed by our bungalow at dawn on their way to the market. We had to look at their basket/Kavadi or ask them what they were carrying and buy our requirement. They were always in a hurry to reach the market but at the same time happy to sell en-route as it would lighten their burden. The vegetables were always fresh, just picked from the farms. Raw or cooked; they tasted the best.

We were also growing a variety of vegetables at the Kothagudem house during these years. Most common among them being, Bottle gourds, Snake gourds, Ridge gourds, Silk squash, Broad beans, Brinjals, Tomatoes, Pumpkins and Leafy vegetables. The care-taker of our 5-acre Mango garden on the way to Paloncha also used to get some vegetables he grew in our garden once or twice a month when he came to collect his wages or on some errand.

During the same time at our house in Secunderabad, there was a female vendor-Venkatamma coming with vegetables everyday in the afternoon. She used to come alone with a huge basket of vegetables and as years passed by she started getting an assistant, both carrying smaller baskets and in a rickshaw. She knew the entire family very well; she came every day to ask whether we needed any vegetables. She never allowed any other vendor to approach us. Told in advance she brought any vegetables of our choice the next day. Additionally she was also bringing us fish and crabs from time to time.  

After Venkatamma stopped coming, my wife and sister-in-law started getting vegetables from ‘Secudnerabad-Monda market’ once a week. After my retirement I began taking my wife to the Bowenpally Market yard for Vegetables and provisions shopping. This market was less crowded with ample space for car parking.

Shopping in these not so neat markets came to an end with ITC starting ‘Choupal’ an exclusive fresh vegetable outlet at Tar-bund crossroads, about four years ago. With a variety of fresh vegetables and un-seasonal cold storage vegetables and fruits on sale it became very popular. We went there once a week till about six months back with occasional purchases at ‘Food World’ and ‘Fresh @ Sindhi colony’ which are located very close to our house.

Now since six months we are having the best vegetable shopping experience at SPAR, located close to Somjiguda circle. There is ample 2-level car parking facility, the entire mall is well air-conditioned and apart from the sale of vegetables and fruits there is a well stocked departmental store.

Vendors selling day to day fresh vegetables at our door step would have been the best option but such vendors no longer sell fresh vegetables and the pricing is much higher than these grand malls and they cheat with the weights.  

God’s miracles are mostly - making people help people!

The other day I was stopped by somebody who was trying to reach an address at Chenoy Trade Center, Secunderabad, and was lost. When I gave him the right directions, he annoyed me by stating that he has already been to that area and there is no building by that name. What followed perplexes me and the gratitude expressed by that man astonishes me.

Five days a week, I and my wife go for an early morning walk at the Parade Grounds. On this particular day, we returned home from the walk by 6:15 am. Instead of having a cup of tea on return, I went out on my Motorbike to post a letter at the post box located near the Gandhi statue on M.G. Road. On my way back I was stopped by this man at the Coupons Mall at Paradise, who gave me a slip of paper containing an address and asked for directions. He was looking for an Advocate’s residential address at Chenoy Trade Center which was within a Kilometer’s distance from where we stood. I gave him the instructions to reach the place and it was rather easy to describe the route as he had to take two essential turns along that road to reach the place. He rather reacted oddly stating “Sir, I have arrived from Nizamabad at 3:30 am and for 3 hours I am walking these roads in circles and I have been to the area directed by you, there is no such building there”. This reaction from him when I have sincerely given him the correct instructions annoyed me. I simply asked him to get on my Motorbike. He was taken aback; he just stared at me and sat on the vehicle. As I took him to the address I could feel that he was a worried man doubting my motives.

I stopped within the Chenoy Trade Center complex and told him that we have reached the address. He got down from the Motorbike but even then he did not seem to believe me. At that point, the Security person there approached us and I told him of the address we are looking for and he pointed to the apartment of the Advocate. It was at this juncture that this man became extremely happy and teary-eyed and instantly kneeled and touched my feet in gratitude and said “You have appeared as God and helped me”. I was stunned at the way he expressed his gratitude. What I did was in reaction to his rude behaviour of not believing my correct instructions and perhaps a little pity but not for any appreciation from him.   I just smiled and left.

For a man lost in the big city for over 3 hours and with no one to give him the right directions his chance meeting with me who gave the right directions is normal. But me getting annoyed with his reaction and dropping him at the doorstep of his destination while I was anxious for my morning cup of tea is perplexing.

The whole day I was happy simply because I brought happiness to another man, a stranger in trouble.