While Ramgarh’s people condemned Operation Blue Star, they were cold to the mutineers as well, recalls Mahendra Kumar
The news of the soldiers’ operation at the Golden Temple
in Amritsar came to us regularly, but from unconfirmed sources. At the time of Operation Blue Star the broadcast and print media were much less active than they now are. For the most part people depended on the BBC or the AIR, or waited for the next day’s newspapers from Ranchi and Patna. Rampur’s former member of the legislative assembly, Yamuna Sharma, still remembers the day – June 7, 1984 – when it had looked like all was finished.
Ranjit Mishra, who was just 20 years old at the time, recalls the unnerving calm that pervaded the Sikh Regimental Centre. It was around 7:30 A.M. of June 7 that the people of Ramgarh heard of the soldiers’ mutiny. They were rebelling against Operation Bluestar. People had begun collecting outside the regimental centre on the national highway, stood on the roof of houses nearby, and even on tree tops to catch a glimpse of the goings on inside its premises. Some 400 to 500 armed youth had made it till the highway, hopped into which ever vehicle passed their way and started moving towards Hazaribagh. It was only then that people realised that they were all rebellious recruits.
Numbering some 1,500, they had broken into the armoury and killed the centre’s commandant, Brigadier S. C. Suri, after they were stopped. Pramod Aggarwal, a businessman, was on the crowded highway when the recruits came, and he remembers how within minutes it was deserted by the general public. For, though they harmed nobody in Rampur city the recruits’ approach was excessively aggressive. All were armed and firing blindly. Clearly, they were ready to kill and get killed. Since television had not yet arrived, news of successive developments was slow to travel. Recalls Yamuna Sharma: “Mr Narayanan of the Intelligence Bureau, who was posted in Ramgarh at that time, got all the news that was unfolding at the centre. He was informed of mutinous gatherings outside and instigating speeches. Mr Narayanan’s network was so live wire that he was the first to learn that the commandant had been killed.
One thing was very clear: the rebelling recruits had nothing against the ordinary citizen. They just spoke of going to Punjab and of their religion being in danger. Between Ramgarh and Varanasi they looted several petrol pumps for fuel, and in nearby Kuju ransacked a small hotel. Says its owner Trilochan Sharma: “Around 40 youngsters trooped inside my hotel and began plundering the food. When I protested, one of them pointed his rifle at me. The workers ran away and I had to beg them to spare my life. However, barring stray incidents the only thing those recruits wanted was to reach Punjab as early as possible.”
Though people were against Operation Blue Star, they had no sympathy for the mutineers either. And the people of Ramgarh made it plain that they condemned the rebellion.
The news of the soldiers’ operation at the Golden Temple
in Amritsar came to us regularly, but from unconfirmed sources. At the time of Operation Blue Star the broadcast and print media were much less active than they now are. For the most part people depended on the BBC or the AIR, or waited for the next day’s newspapers from Ranchi and Patna. Rampur’s former member of the legislative assembly, Yamuna Sharma, still remembers the day – June 7, 1984 – when it had looked like all was finished.Ranjit Mishra, who was just 20 years old at the time, recalls the unnerving calm that pervaded the Sikh Regimental Centre. It was around 7:30 A.M. of June 7 that the people of Ramgarh heard of the soldiers’ mutiny. They were rebelling against Operation Bluestar. People had begun collecting outside the regimental centre on the national highway, stood on the roof of houses nearby, and even on tree tops to catch a glimpse of the goings on inside its premises. Some 400 to 500 armed youth had made it till the highway, hopped into which ever vehicle passed their way and started moving towards Hazaribagh. It was only then that people realised that they were all rebellious recruits.
Numbering some 1,500, they had broken into the armoury and killed the centre’s commandant, Brigadier S. C. Suri, after they were stopped. Pramod Aggarwal, a businessman, was on the crowded highway when the recruits came, and he remembers how within minutes it was deserted by the general public. For, though they harmed nobody in Rampur city the recruits’ approach was excessively aggressive. All were armed and firing blindly. Clearly, they were ready to kill and get killed. Since television had not yet arrived, news of successive developments was slow to travel. Recalls Yamuna Sharma: “Mr Narayanan of the Intelligence Bureau, who was posted in Ramgarh at that time, got all the news that was unfolding at the centre. He was informed of mutinous gatherings outside and instigating speeches. Mr Narayanan’s network was so live wire that he was the first to learn that the commandant had been killed.
One thing was very clear: the rebelling recruits had nothing against the ordinary citizen. They just spoke of going to Punjab and of their religion being in danger. Between Ramgarh and Varanasi they looted several petrol pumps for fuel, and in nearby Kuju ransacked a small hotel. Says its owner Trilochan Sharma: “Around 40 youngsters trooped inside my hotel and began plundering the food. When I protested, one of them pointed his rifle at me. The workers ran away and I had to beg them to spare my life. However, barring stray incidents the only thing those recruits wanted was to reach Punjab as early as possible.”
Though people were against Operation Blue Star, they had no sympathy for the mutineers either. And the people of Ramgarh made it plain that they condemned the rebellion.
online ads are on a decline since the past few months. Positive for the surfer, given the irritant value that comes combined with pop up ads. According to ComScore’s AdMetrix data, internet surfers were exposed to 12% less display-ad impressions per page view than they were a year ago. Whether it’s a conscious decision of the advertisers present on the digital media or just a mere coincidence, the fact is that the falling growth rate of the online ad industry is good news for advertisers! Surprised? We called it, dumb meets dumb. Well, a study conducted by Dynamic Logic, Starcom and DoubleClick in 2007 found that a 15% increase in ads on a page results in about a 10% decline in click-through rates. Well, if that is not a positive correlation, read on to get confused a bit more.
the various IT companies. A study titled ‘IT opportunity in the SMB sector’ by Zinnov Management Consulting reports that this segment in India spent nearly $6.6 billion during 2007-08, which is 30% of the total expenditure on IT in India during the year. Indeed great news for the IT sector, but what about a time when funds are quickly drying up? Indeed, for the SMBs, it is getting difficult by the day to maintain the expenditures for keeping pace with speed at which technology is getting upgraded, reinvented and reinnovated! And that’s where Cisco Capital comes in, to help solve the financial problems that the SMBs are facing to buy/utilise latest in the field of technology. Cisco Capital is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Cisco Systems and therefore a captive financing arm of Cisco. It however also deals directly with high-end enterprises and high end customers. It was incorporated in 2005, with an initial corpus of $150 million. It is dedicated to providing financing solutions and options to Cisco’s channel partners and its customers. In an exclusive interview with 4Ps B&M, Gautam Munish, Country Manager, Cisco Capital, discloses how Cisco Capital helps organisations derive maximum from investments in technology...
need to maintain steady economic growth of 7-8% to lift millions out of poverty. Unfortunately, for countries like US, who are staring at prospects of economic degrowth, the challenge seems to be with respect to millions that are not in poverty yet. The challenge increasingly would be how to keep them there; as companies, one after another are sounding the alarm about not so impressive times ahead.
The word component is the domain of the Copywriter and the visuals, the Art person. Interestingly, although their combined creativity, skills and craft went into the making/creation of the ad, they functioned separately. This meant that the Copywriter wrote his stuff and handed it over to the Art person – usually with some guidelines – who then proceeded to visualise it in an appropriately meaningful manner. The duo also (frequently) came from different ‘social’ stratospheres. The Copywriter, usually, came from a Convent/Public School background, was fluent in English and totally comfortable with both the command and nuances of the language. He was also heavily into what this world offered – theatre, poetry, literature, cinema, cocktail parties… this invariably made him the ‘spokesperson’ of the creative team and the front guy during briefing, interaction and presentations. The Art guy, a hugely gifted person, normally was an Art School/College product, not terribly comfortable either with the English language or its fancy manifestations. He/she was happy to do the work assigned to the best of his/her ability and go home, quite content to live in the shadows…
who was shot down by a policeman in the Exarhia district on December 6, 2008, fortifies that he was killed by a direct shot and not otherwise. And the rest is still 'not' history. Within the first one-and-a-half-hour, the Greeks were on the roads of Athens, protesting and burning Greece. Later, all cities of Greece were engulfed in demonstrations and riots (similar to one in 1985). The noteworthy point is that this riot was just not confined to Greece and its vicinity, but spread across the whole of Europe (Paris, Rome, Berlin, Frankfurt, Madrid, Barcelona, Copenhagen et al).
the hottest tourist destinations in southern India. Now called the Salarjung Museum, it is fabled for its priceless artifacts, statues, jewellery, startling paintings, gorgeous chandeliers and yes, scores of chiming clocks. When they chime all together at noon, they create an ambience that is magically musical. Nizam’s Hyderabad was the largest princely state of India. And yet, though the clocks remained, time ran out for the Nizam’s in 1948.