KOHLI AND PUJARA HOLD KEYS TO INDIA'S SUCCESS..........

I am sick and tired of repeating myself but have little option in reiterating my statement about Messrs Kohli and Pujara being the corner stones or bulwarks in team India's success against a struggling English team in the test series that gets underway in Nottingham later today.........
Saddled with a largely under performing and half baked bowling attack headed by a dithering and profligate who still seems uncertain about his role in the side despite having represented the country in 55 odd test matches; the onus will certainly be on India's batsmen to put enough runs on the board every single time so that the bowlers can come to the party...........
And that is precisely why Messrs Kohli and Pujara will have to perform out of their skins in seemingly hostile and unfriendly conditions in order to give their team a fighting chance of salvaging a tattered reputation following their 4-0 drubbing when they visited English shores the last time around.........
One may do well to recall the fact that Kohli had a less than stellar home series against the visiting Englishmen in the 2012-13 season; the Englishmen repeatedly set fields abounding with close catching men on either side of the wicket and enticed Kohli into their well set trap by bowling juicy half volleys well wide off the stumps........
To his credit it must however be said that Virat Kohli did show the guts, gumption and wherewithal to better the Englishmen at their own game in the concluding test of the four match series in Nagpur and notched up a memorable century that ended up embellishing his growing reputation and credentials as one of the finest batsmen of this generation........
On the other hand Cheteshwar Pujara emerged as the finest Indian batsman during the same series and ended up with a whopping 438 runs at a phenomenal average of 87.60 and his sojourns at the crease included two centuries with one of them being a monumental and memorable double century at Mumbai's iconic Wankhede stadium..........
What makes their task even more difficult this time around is the fact that they will be confronted with alien conditions where the ball will disconcertingly swing and seam around depending on the over head/climatic conditions and also be confronted with a pace bowling attack that has it's tail up despite losing the recently concluded home series to the Sri Lankans by a 1-0 margin............
No, I have not forgotten or overlooked the presence of Messrs Dhawan/Gambhir (if Dhawan does not completely recover from the injury sustained during a warm up game), Vijay, Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane, but then I am a staunch realist and cannot for the hell of me see any of these batsmen getting the better of marauding English pace bowling attack and notching up huge scores.........
As for captain Dhoni, the less said the better, the fact has been conclusively established that he is far more comfortable in the shorter forms of the game and struggles to come to terms with bowling attacks and conditions that cruelly expose his abject lack of footwork as well as the pronounced inability to deal with balls that swing or seam away at the last moment.......
And that is precisely why I conclude that Messrs Kohli, Pujara and their sparkling efforts at the crease are the keys to team India's success and if either or both these batsmen fail to get going and set the stands alight, we might well be confronted with the sorry and ignonimous spectacle of yet another 5-0 whitewash.............

77 YEAR OLD LADY BRUTALLY MURDERED FOR PERSONAL GAIN...........

Our national capital (New Delhi) certainly seems to be living up to it's dubiously acquired distinction of being South East Asia's "crime capital" what with it's residents penchant to murder almost destitute 77 year old women for personal profit........
A 77 year old woman who reside on her own in a modest dwelling in outer Delhi's Narela area was found murdered within the same by neighbours on Monday morning.........
Shanti Devi's lifeless body was found when a concerned neighbour who had not seen her moving around the area in her customary manner deigned to check up on her; local police personnel suspect that the 77 year old lady was murdered in order to extricate the large amount of cash she had withdrawn from her bank account on Friday morning........
According to police sources, the Rupees 2.5 lakh that she had withdrawn from her bank account as well as some property related papers were found to be missing when they carried out a minute search of the humble dwelling in Delhi's Bagmer Village..........
Shanti Devi's partially decomposed body was found on her bed with a dupatta wrapped around her scrawny neck in a manner highly suggestive of strangulation, her one room dwelling had been completely ransacked by her alleged murderer or murderers who made away with the afore mentioned sum of money and property related papers..........
According to neighbours the old and infirm woman had been living on her own in the same dwelling for the last twenty years or so ever since her husband had left for his heavenly abode; they also alluded to the fact that the said lady also owned a plot of land in addition to the house in which she lived and that she planned to bequeath the same to her grandson Sonu who resided in Haryana's Rohtak town..........
In the same breath they also mentioned the fact that the aged lady's brother-in-laws family was vehemently opposed to her prospective plans of making Sonu the sole inheritor of all that she possessed.........
Local police personnel suspect a long standing property dispute to be the trigger behind the gruesome murder but are also investigating the role of a yet to be identified local youth who allegedly accompanied Shanti Devi to her bank when she withdrew the large sum of cash on the fateful Friday morning.............
A case of murder by person/s unknown had been registered at the local police station and investigations are on in order to identify the culprit/s and bring them to book at the earliest.........

13 YEAR OLD LUCKNOW BASED BOY RAPES 6 YEAR OLD GIRL FROM SAME LOCALITY..........

What is it with India's teenagers and their growing inclination to inhumanly rape and sexually devastate victim's either of their own age or then considerably younger to them.........
A 13 year old boy brutally raped an innocent, naive and gullible 6 year old girl in a modest settlement located off Lucknow's Ring Road area on Monday afternoon; the sexually deviant and seemingly obsessed rapist only let his victim escape from his clutches when she started bleeding profusely from her private parts...........
Though initially shocked out of her wits at her daughter's pitiable condition, the victim's mother soon recovered her composure, rushed her daughter for the badly required treatment at a nearby government run medical facility as well as lodged a police complaint against the alleged rapist who is said to be absconding ever since he committed this heinous crime........
According to her friends, the victim was merrily playing on the street with a gaggle of friends when she inadvertently happened to stray or rather wander off in the direction of a shop owned by the victim's family; the 13 year old accused who was manning the shop at the time lured her into the shop on the pretext of giving her a Cadbury's chocolate and then proceeded to sexually violate her.........
As mentioned her, he only let the victim out of his demonic clutches when she began weeping piteously as well as copiously bleeding from her nether regions; the harassed and grievously wounded girl somehow managed to wend her way home and inform her mother about the sordid episode........
According to police sources, the victim's father is a nondescript daily wage labourer and the accused lives in the very same slum locality as the victim; the police officials also exuded confidence about their ability to nab the accused post haste and produce him before a designated juvenile court............
Time to speed up the process of making the long overdue amendments to the current or existing laws pertaining to crimes committed by juveniles methinks as the same could prove to be an efficacious deterrent in arresting this disturbing and steadily growing trend........

DELHI BASED WOMAN SHOT DOWN BY BIKER IN BROAD DAYLIGHT.........

Women of all ages certainly seem to be getting off the wrong side of the bed every single day of their lives what with them being shot down in cold blood in broad daylight while returning home from work.........
A 40 year old woman was shot down like a wild beast in south west Delhi's Najafgarh area while on her way back home from her workplace at around 12:30 pm or so on a balmy and bracing Monday monsoon afternoon.......
Vidya (the victim) had legally terminated her marriage of many years very recently and was currently residing in the capital's Dichao village area along with her ailing father whom she used to attend to........
According to police officials who were summoned to the crime scene by a conscientious Delhiite, Vidya was on her way home after having completed her day's work at around 12:30 pm or so when she was callously and seemingly insanely shot down by an unidentified biker who subsequently made good his escape from the spot.........
Preliminary investigations have shed light on the fact that VIdya was involved in a long standing property dispute with her very own brother Khalendra and also that the very same Khalendra was vehemently opposed to his sister's legal separation as well as her living with their parents..........
Police officials have since launched a massive manhunt for both the elusive Khalendra and the yet to be identified biker as the needle of suspicion not only points at them but also because they are of the informed opinion that Khalendra's sustained interrogation would go a long way towards solving this seemingly barbaric crime........

17 YEAR OLD DOUBLE AMPUTEE PASSES SSC EXAMS WITH FLYING COLOURS.........

Fellow Indians meet Pune based Sahil Shaikh a 17 year old double amputee who is a living embodiment of the never say die nature of the human spirit and a source of inspiration to 130 crore plus Indians.......
Sahil appeared for his SSC exams a little earlier this year and surprised everybody including himself by clearing the same with a rather modest 55%; but his real triumph lay in the fact that he had written or then answered every question posed to him by holding up a pen with the thumbs of his two feet as he had lost both his hands in a tragic accident a little over four years ago........
It was on this fateful day (July 5) exactly four years ago to the day when Sahil who was preparing or then rehearsing for his role as one of Shivaji Mahraj's "mawlas" or trusted aides when the iron rod being brandished by him came in contact with a high tension wire and both his hands had to be amputated from a little above his elbows as he had suffered more than 60% burns on them as a result of the contact with the high tension wire...........
His parents had forsaken all hope and even began treating Sahil as an invalid and a burden that had to be borne; but Sahil who was made of much sterner stuff refused to give up hope; put mind over matter; steeled and trained himself to write with the aid of his thumbs (thumbs of his very own two feet) cleared his SSC exams in his first attempt and thereby made every naysayer who had marked him down as a failure and burden on his parents eat their words and utterances.........
Despite many a Shivaji Maharaj Mitra mandal coming forward to felicitate him on his sterling achievement :Sahil remains modest and his eternally smiling self; "anybody and everybody is inherently capable of achieving what I have achieved he says, all you need to do is to keep believing in yourself, hold your head high and most importantly never ever let the legions of doubters and naysayers cower or subdue your indomitable spirit"...........
"Keep believing in yourself, remain resolute and steel yourself against the barbs and utterances of pity and you will surely end up reaching the stars and moon as I did", the indomitable achiever and living embodiment of the triumph of the human will signs off..........
Ladies, gentlemen and fellow Indians, I give you 17 year old Sahil Shaikh; a proud yet simply unassuming Indian who is a living example for every able bodied Indian who keeps doling out countless reasons for their abject failures instead of girding their loins and reaching for the sun........

NEWLY BORN GIRL CHILD FOUND ABANDONED IN GARBAGE DUMP.........

Woe befall a so called "civilised" society that forsakes newly born girl children without as much as a backward glance........
A newborn girl child was found callously dumped in a dustbin/garbage bin in a south east Delhi locality early on Saturday morning........
According to senior Delhi Police officials a group of street urchins and children of local residents of the are noticed a bag lying atop a heap of garbage in the Madanpur Khadar area slum colony........
The kids then proceeded to inform their panic stricken parents who surmised that the said bag might contain a bomb that could prove to be injurious to their safety and duly proceeded to inform the local police about the abandoned bag found by their children......
An alarmed and chastened bomb disposal, dog squad as well as other police personnel from the Jaitpur police station made a beeline towards the said spot; sealed or cordoned of the entire area and then proceeded to isolate and make their way towards the bag that supposedly contained a bomb within it..........
Officials from the bomb squad lifted up the bag from it's original location and begun a minute and painstaking examination of the same only to find that the said bag contained a few clothes under which the newly born girl child had been confined and contained........
One of them proceeded to extricate the now wailing girl child out of her confines and rushed her to the city's super speciality AIIMS medical facility where she has since been admitted and is said to be doing quite well.......
In the meanwhile the concerned police personnel have begun heaven and earth in an effort to trace the elusive parents; they also have sent the bag to a forensics laboratory for tests in order to gain some inputs about the identities of the parents of the abandoned girl child........
Doctors attending on her have said that the girl child who is only a few days old seems weak and undernourished and will be shifted to a Shishu Vihar within the next week or so once she gains a little weight and stabilises if her parents fail to trace her parents by then.........
Like I said earlier, woe befall a callous and indifferent society that gives birth to children out of free will and choice and then dumps the same without a second glance if the said child is found to be a female.......

TENDULKAR AND WARNE TO CLASH SWORDS ONCE AGAIN............

The iconic and universally worshipped duo of Messrs Tendulkar and Warne will renew their legendary mutual rivalry one more time during the course of a 50 over a side cricket match being held to celebrate 200 years of existence of the iconic and revered Lord's Cricket Ground........
Come 3:15 pm; Saturday afternoon (Indian Standard TIme) and the two players who have lorded over the cricketing firmament for two decades and more will lead their respective teams the Marleybone Cricket Club and Rest of World XI.........
Tendulkar will lead a MCC side comprising of such superstars and icons of the game like Rahul Dravid, Saeed Ajmal, Brett Lee, Brian Lara, Daniel Vettori and Shivnarine Chanderpaul; while Warne will enjoy the rare honour of leading a side choc a bloc with proven talents like Pietersen, Afridi, Sehwag, Muttaiah Muralitharan, Yuvraj Singh and Adam GIlchrist........
Former English stumper Ian Gould and former county cricketer Richard Kettleborough will be the two officiating umpires while Michael Gough will don the television or third umpire's mantle and for the first time since 1987 avid fans of the game will be allowed to watch the game from close quarters in between the perimeter fence and boundary ropes on the Grand Stand side of this hallowed piece of cricketing turf.......
I for one am licking my lips in anticipation at the prospect of viewing one more titanic struggle between two of the finest cricketers to have ever graced the world stage and do hope that the same holds true in your case as well...........