Enjoying myself at the sight of discomfort of others. Not a nice thing to do I know. But it’s been fun nevertheless watching bears squirm on TV after the events of last week. Election results truly were a Black Swan event for all those who were caught short as the markets froze after hitting 2 circuits -  ending up more than 17% on Monday with the ‘mighty’ sum of 300cr traded in about 45 seconds before exchanges had enough!

For a change Indian voters have given a strong mandate(relative to electoral results of the past 2 decades) and there are significant opportunities for UPA government to redress all the wrongs of the past 5 years of inaction. With a more confident Rahul Gandhi now steering the Congress party the space occupied by regional parties might well compress in the future -  particularly in the Hindi heartland which have been held hostage by divisive politics of religion and caste for the past 2 decades. Hopefully BJP too will finally and firmly reinvent itself into the Vajpayee era pro-development party while keeping it’s strong Hindu identity intact. There is enough political space for a right of centre national party with Hindu leanings that keeps in check a left of centre Congress party. Especially since the Congress has in the past shown its tendency to appease minorities for the sake of holding on to power. But there is no place for the politics of hatred and Taliban like narrow mindedness that zealous pro-BJP fringe outfits have demonstrated in places like Orissa, UP and now Karnataka.

In sports the IPL II season wound down finally last week and 3 ageless warriors held center stage for the umpteenth time. Hayden showed that he still thrives in big world stage competitions by scoring the most runs this season. Adam Gilchrist showed Delhi(which I thought was the best team)  in the semifinals that he’s still the most destructive batsman in the world on big match days. And our own Anil Kumble demonstrated throughout the season and in the final what a inspiring captain can do to revive a team’s fortunes . Maybe in hindsight India could well have done even better if Anil and not Sourav Gangully had taken over after the Sachin Tendulkar & post match-fixing fiasco era of captaincy.