Spot Betting NOT fixing

The spot fixing sting has caused a minor storm in the world of cricket and loads is being written about it. What I am going to write about is not "fixing" but "betting". Recently a channel was running a contest, during the Champions League, "Guess the commentator for the 11th over and win a XYZ"

This was about an off field entity but then I remembered some other contests that I had seen while watching matches, "Guess the score at the end of the 50th over" , "Guess the number of 4s/6s being hit in an inning" , "Guess the number of dropped catches in an inning" , "How many players will wear shades during an inning"

I know that these contests offer a prize(fixed value) and do not ask for any money to enter them (other than the money earned by telephone companies!) but still what is to stop the contest organizers who are known to the cricketers, probably friends with them , asking them to score one run less or more? Will it affect the outcome maybe maybe not.

If these contests are acceptable why not betting? As long as all people involved in the bet are aware of the risks, why is it illegal? In fact the risks involved seem quite similar trading in the stock market. Like the evil of fixing there is always the risk of insider trading but that does not mean trading stocks should be made illegal, does it? Wouldn't making betting legal reduce black money in the market and generate higher revenue for the government?

Maybe I am not aware of some other problems in legalizing betting, but then why are such TV contest considered legal? either ban both or allow both.

A random Poem

Just penned this random poem while traveling, but haven't yet thought of a name for it yet. suggestion welcome :)

On the empty road we travel

Together yet alone

Lost in thought,

we contemplate the shadows

Knowing our destination

but unsure of the way.

Dabangg Movie Review

Dabangg which means someone who is well known over an area and has control over the said area due to his fearlessness and power.

As already seen in the trailers, Salman Khan as Chulbul Pandey is Dabangg in a small town in Uttar Pradesh, where he lives with his mom, step father and half brother. The emphasis of the story is on the "half" brother & "step" father!

Enough about the movie, there is no point writing about it as the haven't made a movie but a 2 hour video of how best to use Salman Khan as a marketable "HERO" in a Hindi movie. to support him, Sonu Sood is the bad guy & Bhabhi dear aka Malaika Arora-Khan shakes her unbelievably slim hips and looks too sexy to be a mother! All others

• Vinod Khanna
• Dimple Kapadia
• Arbaaz Khan
• Sonakshi Sinha
• Mahesh Manjrekar
• Mahie Gill
• Tinu Annad
• Anupam Kher

are present just to fill up space. What a waste of a 90% brilliant cast! 90% of the punch lines have already been shown in the trailers and the movie has no element of surprise whatsoever.

However thanks to the spoilt brat of bollywood the movie will rake in all the moolah! Salman Khan emotes with a bored look that says I am too good for all this, struts his stuff with an exaggerated swagger and manages to bulge enough muscles to show off a shirt getting torn of his body Hulk style. In his action sequences , he tries to imitate Rajnikanth and dances the way (I assume) he would dance in his bathroom with no one watching and honestly speaking his dance is the most entertaining bit of the movie.

All other have been thrown its of dialogues and pieces of screen space and so their performance cannot be commented on. The music works same as the movie. Play it to get in touch with your tapori college day roots!

My advice is, leave your brains outside the cinema hall, watch the movie (preferably in a single screen) and then forget it! For me the movie was entertaining BUT nowhere near the fun that was WANTED!

My rating : 3/5