For the Love of India: The Life and Times of Jamsetji Tata

In brief 

This book is a biography of Mr JN Tata. It provides an insight into his life, his works, his projects, also his family.

In detail 

I should have read this book a long long time ago, infact I am ashamed because all these years all my awareness about the history of the Tata conglomerate was a tatty one.

Some books are to be read by school kids just to get them inspired. One such book is this. Sad we do not have this as part of curriculum, atleast I do not remember having one in mine.

This book contains excerpts from various people and various conversations that had some association with Mr JN Tata. I simply loved the one between Mr JN Tata and Swami Vivekanand.

Take away from this book

You get to learn more about the founding father
- who worked selflessly for the upliftment of people of India.
- who brought industrial revolution to India.
- how well read and grounded Mr JN Tata was.
- how he touched the lives of each and every Indian in one or the other way.
- his projects, be it Empress,Swadeshi,Tata Steel,Taj Mahal hotel, IISC
- his will where he pledged part of his wealth to his countrymen, for bringing up IISC.
- what a visionary he was, his plans for hydroelectric plant to reduce combustion in the late 1800's. (yes please).
- his pension, gratuity schemes in the late 1800's
- his travels in an era where a month ship travel was all needed to for a return trip to America.
- his shipping company which he planned to take on rival British company.
- his contribution in Swadeshi movement.

Also you get to learn about the "A-Team" which he built. At the end of this book all I can say is, I am so so proud, Mr JN Tata was born in India.

A excerpt on where Mr JN Tata studied and what transformed him - " The teachers at the Elphinstone Institute not only informed but aroused curiosity and awakened young minds to make their own studies and discoveries through life." 

Take a bow!
Cheers, (less)

Shuttle driver #13 - Driver who drove us down a memory lane!

So, now that we have a regular cab/shuttle fixed on our route, we are no more worrying about daily changing drivers and vehicles!

Our routine driver took a day off and instead sent across one of his friend. His vehicle was none other than the legendary Toyota Qualis. The production of Toyota Qualis stopped around 2004 or early 2005 which is almost a decade back.

So whenever we encounter a Qualis as one of our shuttles all of our cab mates get very curious and start asking questions to the driver.

The questions range from how many kilometers has the vehicle done, is the engine opened for repair once or is it still sealed, how many times the clutch plate has been replaced, how many drivers/owners etc etc.

So this appeared to be the second case where the qualis was driven by a single owner since purchase. Yes please, I was surprised when he said that. But appears to be true.

Here goes the answers to the questions what we generally pose.

- Single owner
- Date of purchase - December 2004.
- Original kilometers - 7,37,000 - yes 7 lakhs 37 thousands.

What was the icing on the cake was, that the driver told that, he used to do pickup/drop for Symphony Services located at Cessna business park in the year 2005. Well, back then foundations of other buildings were being laid was I guess, this was the only operational unit out there.

Back then there were no flyovers and underpasses and only congestion could have been KR Puram or Kundalahalli Bridge. On a very good day, Marathahalli to 4th block Jayanagar took 45 minutes only.

It was all retro rewind with this driver! Since he is a replacement driver he will off after couple of days.

Cheers,

PS  - I am still surprised on how a person could drive a same vehicle for 10 years without an upgrade. may be he has other vehicles back home!