Tides of Thoughts

  Corporate Chanakya on Leadership by Radhakrishnan Pillai My rating: 4 of 5 stars The author tried to connect Kautilya's Arthashastra with modern management scenarios. This is an interesting book that can be helpful for people who are starting their leadership positions immediately after college. For experienced people working in corporations, some points sound theoretical & bland. Overall book is interesting as it tries to connect old theories and practices with modern management. View all my reviews

Shared Roots: Tales from the Indosphere by Ratul Chakraborty My rating: 5 of 5 stars This is an interesting mix of fiction and travelogue. While the fiction part takes us to Cambodia and India in the medieval periods, the travelogue takes us to the ruins of Angkor Wat and Siem Reap. The collective efforts of Srivalli Rekha , Kavita Krishna Meegama , Srinidhi Balasubramanian , Swetha Prakash , Vaishali S, Sunil Kumar, and Pranshu B. Saxena give us an enchanting reading experience of the rich shared heritage of India and Cambodia. View all my reviews

  Darwin in the Boardroom - Doesn't it sound interesting? I started writing about how corporate and business organisations are similar to natural processes and phenomena sometime in 2020. I shared 2-3 of them as blog posts also. As the number of analogies between nature and corporates grew to more than 5, some of my friends suggested making it a small book since the analogies are relevant to the growing corporate world in the country. With their encouragement, I made 10 analogies and compiled them as a book bridging the concepts and traversing through the vast nature and corporate world. It became a small book of 23-24 pages when converted into a .epub file. (I would rather call it a handout). It even went through two edits and I even wrote a foreword too, but it never took off. Why? I tried getting some interactions about this to understand whether people are interested in reading the concept or not. Then I realised that I have been working on a very niche aspect of merging scient...

Forests and Faeries by Srivalli Rekha My rating: 5 of 5 stars It is a nice collection of stories for mid-graders interested in thrillers. The stories bring back memories of the folklore we heard as kids. The choice of words by Srivalli makes the reading more interesting. When I read this for my niece who is in her third grade, she was fascinated with the characters and their narrations. View all my reviews

We all know about the famous incident of the liberation of Ahalya from the curse of Gautama by Rama in Ramayana. Right? When I asked what Sage Gautama's curse was to Ahalya in Valmiki Ramayana, I was not surprised by the answers.  It went with the popular belief that Sage Gautama cursed his wife Ahalya to become a rock. Most of us might know the background of the curse, but let me refresh the memory once before dwelling on whether the curse of becoming a rock is a myth or true as per Valmiki Ramayana. Sage Gautama was a great sage who did a lot of penance and was full of knowledge and wisdom. Ahalya was the wife of Sage Gautama. Ahalya was referred to as "Ayonijasambhava" in Valmiki Ramayana meaning that she was not born out of a mother's womb. It was mentioned that Brahma created Ahalya with all his artistic creativity making her the most beautiful woman. Having said that, Indra had a lust for Ahalya. One day, Sage Gautama went to bathe at a nearby creek. When Gauta...

అల్ప మనుజుడు వాడినేది అడిగేది నవమి నాటి నష్ట జాతకుడు వాడినేది కోరేది... కోరికల చెరలోనున్న కైకేయి మాటలకు కానలకు పోయినవాడినేది అడిగేది...  తరుణి అని ఘోర తాటకిని చంప వెనుకంజ వేసినవాడినేది కోరేది... ||వాడినేది అడిగేది|| విశృంఖల వాలికి వరములిచ్చి వరియించినవాడినేది అడిగేది.  తాగుబోతు మాటలకు తనను నమ్మిన ఆలినీ విడిచినవాడినేది కోరేది...||వాడినేది అడిగేది|| వర గర్వమున విర్రవీగిన రావణుడికి మోక్షమిచ్చినవాడినేది అడిగేది... జానకిని రక్షింప జూసిన జటాయువుని రక్షించలేనివాడినేది కోరేది... ||వాడినేది అడిగేది|| దీనిని "నిందాస్తుతి" అంటారు. ఇదేమి కొత్త ప్రక్రియ కాదు. రామదాసు కీర్తనల్లో "ఇక్ష్వాకుకుల తిలకా..." అనే పాట, సిరివెన్నెల సీతారామశాస్త్రి గారు రాసిన "ఆది భిక్షువు వాడినేది అడిగేది..." పాట ఇదే కోవలోకి వస్తాయి.  వాళ్లంతా మహానుభావులు. వాళ్లంత పరిజ్ఞానం లేకపోయినా నాకు తెలిసిన రామాయణంలోని కొన్ని ఘటనల ఆధారంగా రాసింది ఈ నిందాస్తుతి.  ఈ నిందా స్తుతి ఒక విచిత్రమైన ప్రక్రియ. పైకి నిందిస్తున్నట్టు ఉన్నా, నిందించే సమయంలో కూడా దైవ నామ స్మరణ చేసుకోవడం దీని లక్షణం. ఇక్కడ దేవుడ్ని నింది...