Indicast Podcast Network - Mother Feed

For the last decade or so, Dubai invoked awe and admiration for the pace at which it could lead a creative growth which was not limited to building sky scrapers, but other garnishing like man made islands, artificial arctic like winter, etc. All these developments were funded by the Government through its investing arm, Dubai World which announced that it could not pay off the $59 billion loan to the banks. The stock markets came crashing down. While that happened, we also talk about the companies from India which are raising money to carry out their expansion activities. The recovery has begun.

Some would say 17 years is a long time for a report to be publised especially if its a judgement coming from the Supreme Court for a genocide like a riot which killed 2000 people (reported figures) in the Babri Maszid riot (read: pogrom). 26/11 is one year old now and Maharashtra has set up a Special Task Force called Force 1 for combating any terror strikes. In another news, pilgrimage places are becoming sex hot spots. The biggest exam in town, CAT goes online and sends servers crashing.

When two Sachin fans get together to talk about Him, you might expect a rather one sided conversation, but Aditya surprised me with his take on the recent unintended controversy that Sachin kicked off in the midst of his 20 years of international cricket which was spiced up a little bit with his seemingly innocent and matter of fact remark about Mumbai being a part of India and that it belongs to everyone equally. In other news, in the assembly elections, MNS MLAs beat up Abu Azmi for not taking his oath in Marathi. In Bihar, relief cheque from the state government to certain mishap victims bounced.

A poet, a journalist, a sportsman, a publishing editor of Indias premier newspaper, a photographer, a traveler, a film maker - all in one lifetime and still going strong. If this were a quiz question, one needn't require any options to choose from. The name that comes at the top of one's mind is that of Pritish Nandy. In this point blank chat with Aditya, Nandy gets candid on his colourful career so far right from his schooling days where his poems would get him plaudits from accomplished writers and female fans to his stint as a successful producer of cult films like Hazaron Khwaishein aaisee.

'Shashi Tharoor Jeetega Zaroor' was the campaign slogan that his supporters chanted when a precocious Tharoor was running for the president of his college union. He won then and three decades later, in 2009, Dr Shashi tharoor won again, this time as the Indian Minister of State for External Affairs and a member of the Indian Parliament from the Trivandrum constituency in Kerala. In this podcast, Dr Tharoor talks about his experience as a diplomat at the UN and the eventful transition to Indian politics. In his beautiful and typical story telling style, he shares anecdotes about how he not only connected to the masses on the Internet but more importantly went the extra mile to win the hearts and minds of the labour class. He also shares his views on the unintended controversy that Twitter gave birth to.

Scams are back. Three guys from the 1983 batch of Wharton Business School have been accused of orchestrating one of the biggest hedge fund scams in a long time. This is a text book case of Insider trading. But not all news is sad news on the Wall Street. Most companies have posted Quarterly profits. In India, Lakshmi Mittal, the CEO of Arcelor Mittal threatened to quit all his projects from Orissa and Jharkhand. Ritika has strong views on the whole issue of land allocation for such projects which causes a lot of friction between the locals and the state government. In some sad news, Ranjan Das, SAP India head died of a massive heart attack.

The General Elections results are out and Congress is back in power in major states. Aditya describes his experience of watching Rahul Gandhi deliver a speech in Adityas home town, Panvel. In other news, Rajdhani Express was hijacked by Maoists but the only relief was that no one was hurt. In education, Kapil Sibal makes it even more difficult to get into an IIT college in India. ISRO and IAF are fighing a healthy battle to send a representative into outer space.

Happy Diwali Folks. In this unusually lighthearted episode, we talk about Adityas voting experience in the recently concluded state elections. Then we move on to talk about a very serious issue of Obama winning himself an Oscar. Or was it a Nobel? In Sports, Serena Williams posed nude for the body issue of ESPN magazine. Somewhere in India, a couple was asked to tie a rakhee because the Village Panchayat did not approve their love.

This episode of BiziNation is dedicated to the Internet. Lately, social networking sites are showing signs of finally making some money USocial, an Australian site is selling friends to companies who can send targeted messages to its audience. On the Operating Systems front, Microsoft launched its new OS with an a very questionable but an effective ad campaign. Yahoo! is spilling $100 million on advertising in the traditional media, a sign of growing desperation. Google on the other hand has launched an ad exchange program on the web much like the stock market in the physical world. Also, back home, an IIT entrepreneur launched Phokat Copy, a service which subsidizes photocopies for students in India.

What can bring china's internet to a screeching halt? - Lesbians or just the myth about a lesbian city. In other topics we talk about Kindle coming to India, Microsoft, Paypal killing a user account, Microsoft office - Starter Edition and snow leopard eating up user data. This week's news update include EU giving a go ahead to Microsoft's browser ballot solution.

We start our 101st episode by talking about how the Indian cricket team was knocked off from the Champions trophy in the second round itself. But we were a bit more fascinated with Kirsten who wanted to use sex as a weapon against other countries, but failed. In other news, 100 Indian pilots demand for VRS scheme and our PSUs are draining Rs. 31,000 crore every year. ISRO brings a smile to all our faces by launching 7 satellites in 1200 seconds.

The 3G adoption in India isnt going anywhere with only MTNL and BSNL in the market but that isnt stopping MTNL tying up with Dell to put out a 3G Netbook. After launching a subscription MP3 services, Hungama has announced a Rs.10 per download service on their website. In other news, we talk about Google SideWiki, Google Chrome Frame, Microsoft suing malvertisers, and a few updates from previous episodes.

Indicast's much awaited episode #100 is here and it's in video as promised. Gul Panag was kind enough to join us in the fracas and add to it! The episode is probably the lengthiest episode of Indicast but it's worth every minute.

The last week was an exciting one for Indian sports. Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupati went head to head in the US Open. In billiards, Pankaj Advani made history. In cricket, India beat New Zealand in the tri series being played in Lanka. In other news, in real estate, a 3000 Sq feet house in Mumbai was sold for a paltry Rs. 38 crore. An Hitler ad was taken off air because it was derogartory (to whom, we wonder). The political party, RSS changes its stand on BJP.

There are no free lunches and so removing money from an ATM other than your bank's will now cost you but the first five in a month are free.Listen about how banks in Australia charge ATM interchange fees to customers. Sad news for all Reader digest fans as the company declares bankruptcy in US. Biking fans in India welcome the entry of Harley Davidson. Maverick CEO Michael Leary of Ryan Air teaches a few things about running a profitable airlines in time of slump. Spicejet does better than its full service rival.

This episode is about how businesses are adapting themselves to the changes in their environment. Levis has launched an EMI scheme to make your favourite pair of Levis jeans affordable to you. Launch of world's first digi novel is a testiment to how the publishing industry and authors are using novel ways to face the challenges thrown by the new media of internet. We talk about google being at its innovative best. India's biggest and favourite insurer LIC is no longer shying away from the equity market. PG comes to the rescue of the Olympics committee as sporting events feel the heat of recession.

With Force India finishing second in the Belgian Grand Prix, the news was awash with the first "Indian" team to have made it big in the Formula 1 circuit and Aditya in his sarcastic way opines about the so called Indianess of the victory. Back home, the government has rejected to invest in the 2011 Formula 1 track that Vijay Mallya is aiming for on the grounds that Formula 1 is not sport, but entertainment. In other sports news, we had Sania Mirza advancing in the second round of the US open while our cricketer, Harbhajan Singh drove his new Hummer in Chandigarh without a registration number and got fined. In politics, BJP is imploding and Aditya gives us his take on it.

This episode is dedicated to Ladakh and it's magnificent beauty. It is said that this is the only place where you can get a frostbite and a sunburn at the same time. 14 of us did this trip on bikes and a car and it was memorable. In this episode, we end up talking about why it is one place to be visited before we die. In other stories, we had the unfortunate event of Swine flu in Mumbai, Pune and Delhi. Ganpati is here and we belive that over the years, the Ganesh Chaturthi festival is losing its sheen. What do you think? And thanks a zillion to all our listeners who are contributing your bit to the Smiletrain initiative by donating.

The IT sector first quarter results are out and the Sensex finally has something to cheer about. TCS is leading from the front reports better than expected profits. Anil Ambani's Reliance Big Entertainment is taking the Hollywood path by signing a deal with Steven Spielberg's Dreamworks. The Ambani brothers are at it again!! Straight out of a scene from Bollywood hit, Deewar,they are fighting for the gas in krishna Goadavri basin. The 2 brothers fight it out in the legal battlefield.

Omar Abdulla, the youngest CM of Jammu and Kashmir resigned from his post after being accused of being part of a sex scandal sometime back in 2006. Our illustrious politicians have many crimes to their name, but if Omar is proven guilty, it'll be hard for him to comeback considering that it's not murder or burglary. In another news, our Power minister, Sushil Kumar Shinde has optimistic hopes of 'Power to all' by 2012. In Sports, the 37 year old Lance Armstrong finishes on the podium of the Tour De France, but we have a new winner. And the Indicast team is going to Leh for the trip of our lives. Thanks for your support. We'll hope to update you from Leh if possible.