Ravivar Sakal With Ajoba

The idea of this post germinated last weekend through a healthy chat-session-on-a-Sunday-morning-over-breakfast with one of my Ajobas on varied issues: including Social Networking (are we really networking?), Cricket (should Cricket=T20s today?), Investment in shares and The importance of exercise in today's sedentary lifestyle.

Needless to say I dominated him on the networking issue; Cricket was a clash-of-generations - he sticking to the Test form and I to the T20 form, each of us having valid reasons to support our choices. It was hardly a dialogue when it came to Shares and the Financial market, thanks to my limited knowledge in it contrary to Ajoba's. The discussion on the last subject veered into a completely different avenue, ultimately leading to the sub-topic of this post - Patents.

Ajoba was quick to point out -

First it was the 'Basmati' (Special type of Rice)

Then it was the 'Haldi' (Turmeric)

Then they were eyeing the Yog! (a.k.a. Yoga)

"Hats off to Uncle Sam!", exclaimed Ajoba. "They rule the world! During the time when those guys were trying to acquire the patent on Yoga, a certain news channel had been airing the news about the same since morning under the nonsense "Breaking News" banner. US companies had realised that there is a big money in those yogic contortions - say about $3 billion, each year :-) News sources said that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has issued around 150 yoga-related copyrights, approx. 100 patents on yoga accessories, and approx. 2000 yoga trademarks."

Great! What say?

Ajoba also said, "The Americans know how to make money in everything. For example, they introduced CMMI-types certifications so that they can make money while having fun watching the third world countries die to get certified. I secretly admire this quality of the world's greatest traders, salesmen & the businessmen."

"India has been giving away its knowledge to the world for free or at the dirt cheap rate. Yog (he hates it being called Yoga) is known to cure diseases which the modern medical science cannot cure; and that too, with simple breathing exercises. Indians believed that the knowledge should be given to the 'right persons' for free. We gave the ZERO to the world, for free!"

_____

After all this 'Dnyanat Bhar' from Ajoba, I believe that it's high time that we patent our own ZERO. Wow! What a great idea! India will own the world! No one will be able to count! Intel & AMD will have to reinvent their microprocessors! Anyone who wants to count beyond 9, will have to come on his/her knees to us for permission. Woo Hoo! :-D

…and we will proudly say, "We have contributed 'nothing' to the world!" ;-)

The chat-session-on-a-Sunday-morning-over-breakfast ended with a nice laugh :-)