Boxing Finals

59er David Colaco and late Dossu Pagdiwalla 

battling a boxing final..

I never reached the finals of any school boxing competition, the best being the semi finals, where my six foot frame was given a hiding by a five foot dynamo called Neelam Lakhaney (also Savage House).

It is very strange, but a few years ago Neelam surfaced on my internet radar but then vanished. Had I been dreaming?

When planning our 50th year reunion, I searched all my mailboxes to find the correspondence that had transpired between us, but I did not trace it.

On the other hand, another Neelam Lakhaney took great offence to how I had addressed our Neelam in one of my blogs and was ready to fly at me over the internet.

But I digress, as I was intending to talk about the Boxing Final's evening.

Those of us who had not made it, got to school early so as to get the best place on the first floor overlooking the boxing ring. The boxing ring was always professionally made up and looked resplendent. I wonder who supervised that. Mr Morecroft?

The air was filled with excitement as we watched our House representatives who had made it to the finals, fight FOR US! It was as if we were in the ring with them, trading blow for blow with the opponent!

The air was always charged with excitement as we watched each fight, shouting for OUR Fighters.

If our guy lost, we were ready to blame the judges. The atmosphere was absolutely electric, right through the evening for a few hours well into the dark. We shouted our throats hoarse.

It was the late night that we enjoyed and it is these evenings that are deeply ingrained in my school days memory!

And now there are two again

For many years, from the mid 90s, there were two Cathedralites in Finland, Prof. Ajeet Mathur and myself. Ajeet lived in Tampere, and me in Oulu (from 1984).

We used to hold reunions at my home whenever Ajeet had felt the need for some company or needed Annikki or my advice on something. (We authored a paper on E-Governance together and I read most of his papers before publication as a critique.)

Ajeet left a few years ago and is now a Professor at the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad.

That left me as the sole Cathedralite on Finland.

After my retirement, I have been running a small service apartment business with apartments in Oulu, Tampere, Espoo and Helsinki.

Oulu is where I live and is a high tech city. Tampere is the industrial hub of Finland in Central South Finland. Helsinki, in South Finland, is the capital city and adjacent to the county of Espoo, which is also famed for higher engineering as it is the home of Otaniemi, the Technical University of Espoo.

The service apartment business is a sort of social service cum hobby. The main clientele are young engineers from various Indian MNCs as Wipro, TCS, Aricent, NSN Bangalore, Hughes Systique and many others.

Recently, I had a request from two engineers from a company I did not recognise. I was able to place them in separate shared apartments in Edpoo.

On my visit to Edpoo, after a hectic schedule, I found my way to the apartment block where I had placed thes guys. It must have been past 10 pm when I reached there.

I found both of them in one of the apartments as they had been dining together. Introductions over, as is customary for me, I pry! Both of them were from Mumbai. "Which school?" I asked, and Ashwin promptly came back with the answer - Carhedral!

I could not believe my ears. Another Cathedralite in Finland. Our Alumni Association was back in buiness.

For the next couple of hours we shared many a topic and I was able to show Ashwin and friends what Cathedral School had meant to me, my association with the school, our fabulous 59er Mother of all Reunions, and much more.

Ashwin has only passed out in 2003, so he probably could not quite fathom how we had kept our spirit so alive. I think he will learn as the yesrs go on.

I have visited Espoo a couple of times siince and made it a point to visit him. He has now moved to his own apartment. I will try to meet up with him on future visits to ensure that our Finnish Alumni Section is kept active.

Great to have you in Finland - Ashwin.

How to get elected

When I got elected as the President of all Residents in St. Stephen's College in 1961-1962, I was the first 2nd year student to ever hold that post.

I do not know whether anyone else has achieved that in the last 50 years. (I got elected because of a wonderful band of 1st year students - Rajen Mammen Mathew (now Padma Shri); Ramu Katakam; Azar Siddiqui; Suresh Mehra; a great set of guys from my second year; and the support of a few well respected seniors.

That was my winning strategy with the Seniors giving me the respect factor; my year group standing firmly behind me: and the freshers working their guts out at all levels.

What more could I ask?

The reason for bringing this up here is that I learnt a lot from that experience. I have helped many people get elected since.

I share this with you now, as a very dear friend, a classmate, is standing for elections for the Mumbai Muncipal Corporation, and I would like all of you to work to get him elected.

Captain Vijay Shivdasani is 69, retired from the Indian Navy after captaining the aircraft carrier, ran his own business in Hong Kong, and has been doing literally hundreds of things in Mumbai since returning.

He walks tall, still plays a great game of tennis, and is honest and dedicated to the core.

You may be 1000s of miles away, like me,and feel you can do nothing.

But you can create a viral pitch by activating just 7 friends, who in turn can activate 49 more. Within just 1 week we could have an honest man doing things in Mumbai.

The vital step is NAME RECOGNITION. This is very critical. Almost 70% of people going to vote have no clue whom they will vote for 24 hours before voting day.

Just a phone call to a friend telling them about Retd. Captain Vijay Shivdasani and asking your 7 friends to spread the word to 7 more each, has a viral effect when it comes so close to election day.

Reaching the correct voter bank.

I did not know how to reach the bulk voter bank in South Colaba, but one of our contacts, former Cat Alumni President Rajiv Bhatia, was one step shead of me. He had been helping a fisher girl from that area. He has put her to work to reach as many of that group as possible. The effort will be renewed now that he knows that someone 7000 km away is also pushing for Vijay.

Just like the fisher folk, the small shops of South Mumbai are thronged with shoppers. There must be a pitch to get Vijay's flyers in each of those shops.

I would like all of you or your relatives or friends, to take this up with your favorite shop in South Mumbai. The effect will be seen in the result.

Then there are large apartment main doors. A flyer pasted on each main entrance has a remarkable effect as every resident bonds with a person who is visible every time they come home.

Then there are the Community Centres. A flyer in each helps each community trust a person who shows appreciation for their community.

Grass roots exposure in schools, colleges, cinema halls, religous establishments, hotels, restaurants, clubs, buses, in the local area are all important places to place flyers as they get the highly mobile population informed about Vijay.

(Remember that flyers could be in English, Marathi, Gujarathi, Hindi, Konkani, Malayalam and Tamil.)

So let us get started and get Vijay elected! D-day is 16th February 1 week from today.

Let it RIP, let it THUNDER!

Your contact is vital

Two Elivises in our class, Vijay and Percy

I have a very important task to reach all Cathedralites world-wide to ask them to rouse their friends to vote for a Cathedralite in the coming election on 16th January.

It is not often I ask for any assistance. Now I do, for my friend.

If you know someone in South Mumbai, please ask them to vote for retd. Captain Vijay Shivdasani, my childhood friend, my school classmate, a good friend till today (like you), totally a man of integrity, a man of decision, and, like me, a man with enormous energy to accomplish things. At 69, he still plays a mean game of tennis, walks tall, and has a schedule which puts me to shame!

I do not ask this lightly. If each of you can rouse 7 voters, just 7, then we will have a viral success that you will be part of with pride in your accomplishment.

Remember that I am 7000 km away but care enough for our CITY to stand up and support one honest candidate.

Please forward to all your friends. 

Call Shivi if you want. Just tell him that I asked you too. He will listen and act on whatever your request.

He is the hand we need up guide our city - Mumbai.

Please note: the Bombay Municipal elections are  to be held on 16th February.

Thanks.

A submission by Vijay and I stand by every word he says:

CAPTAIN VIJAY SHIVDASANI

captainvijayshivdasani@gmail.com; 9833622312

                                A NOTE BEFORE YOU VOTE

 The main reason people do not vote and that there is so much cynicism is because many parties are tainted by rampant corruption, numerous scams and poor performance in governance. You and numerous other thinking voters like you do not find a credible educated candidate of calibre because such people shun politics. For these reasons I have decided to offer myself as an Independent Citizen Candidate – to do the best for Mumbai where I live, for South Colaba where I was born and for Navy Nagar where I spent many years in uniform.

I am a family man, groomed at one of the best schools – Cathedral School, Mumbai, and am alumnus of the National Defence Academy, Khadakvasla. I successfully completed an advanced navy post graduate study at the Royal Military College of Science, UK.

As a serviceman, dedication to my country and men is paramount. The motto, Service Before Self, was deeply ingrained at an early age. It has been uppermost in peace and war. I have had the responsibility to sail and command numerous warships, been the Commander of an operational aircraft carrier, the Operations officer in the 1971 war and Head of the Alma Mater – the Navy’s Signals Establishment, Kochi, where thousands of personnel are trained each year.

Working recently in Mumbai, as head of an NGO, Founder of a Charitable Trust, an active member of the Nariman Point Association and A Ward Federation, I sincerely believe I have the experience, knowledge and educational background to improve the standard of living and lower your taxes by better governance decisions and without corruption.

After retiring from the navy I lived and worked in Hong Kong. It is a modern efficient island city where despite limitations of space, every civic system works – ferries, roads, mass transportation and traffic, drainage, hygiene and healthcare services, municipal education, sanitation and water supply, the rule of law and police, clean green open spaces with low levels of pollution – all these are of a world class standard. This is what I would strive for in Mumbai. This is my Mission.

I am often asked what an independent citizen candidate can achieve. As the saying goes – never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world – indeed it is the only thing that ever has!

So do cast your valuable vote for Corporator for

Vijay Shivdasani - a Captain and Gentleman

Reason for being a top school

I was informed by one of my best and learned readers that his comment about why our school is at the top of the charts was missing. I do not know how that happened.

From Cathedral School, Mumbai

>

However, I reproduce here what 49er Yezad Kapadia wrote:

Quite some time ago. I had clicked on comments  and sent the comments.

Although there are various factors at play, I believe a lot of credit should go to the Founding Fathers for their vision and the sense of purpose with which the School was founded. The value system endowed at that time prevails even now. I guess the same reasoning applies to the the Public Schools in England too.

I have worked for the House of Tatas. Fortune magazine has estimated that the average life span of a corporate entity is 17 years. There are at least three corporates/entities in the Tata stable (Tata Steel, the Taj Mahal Hotel and the Indian Institute of Science) which, after being around for more than 100 years, are world class! I can only attribute this to the vision and the sense of values of the Founder. We all know what a great man he was. Very few know how great!! 

This comment is specially interesting as most of our family companies are also of thatbreed of over or near 100 years. The Malayala manorama is now 123 years old, MRF is over 70 years old and most of the plantation companies as Badra, Devon, Balanoor are in their 80s.

To last just 17 years for a corporate seems a bit astonishing!

What makes it happen?

I was thrilled to read that our alma mater was rated as the best school in India for this year.

Last year, I was a little disapointed when  saw that we were not in the top postion, which was held by a Delhi school.

Our School - by 59er Hasnain Chinwala

I thought to myself - WHY are we No. 1?

Is it the Management, is it the staff, is it the students, or is it the alumni?

If I look back on my life at the school and my times in other schools, we did not have playgrounds, we were cramped in the City Centre, and yet our lives were full of everything.

Our staff, from around the world, those days, were simply of a class well above others.

But then, now comes the rub!

Which has been the best Class EVER in the 150 history of our school.

Having written about this school for the last 15 years, in my mind, there is no doubt.

It is the 59ers, as is embodied in the song written by a 59er Ratan Singara, called "THE CLASS ACT". (Click on the image to see an enlarged version of the song.)

If you look at the 50th Year Golden Reunion organised by our class last year, it is going to be a very hard one to beat.

This picture taken outside the St. Thomas Cathedral on November 14th 2009, shows most of our 50th Year Golden Reunion Group assembled from around the world.

This reflects on how wonderful a class we were and are!

Reflecting on the past, I would say that what made our school exceptional was the combination of the staff and the students. That made our school No. 1, 51 years ago.

Maybe someone could enlighten me as to why our school is still No. 1!

A wonderful evening in Helsinki

49er Yezad Kapadia and Rayo

Annikki and I went to Helsinki to meet a cousin and her husband who came for a holiday in Finland. That is reported on my Jacob's Blog.

During that visit we were invited to the house of Ruki and Devinder Kishore. Devinder is a Direector in Nokia and his wife, Ruki, is the daughter of 49er Yezad Sam Kapadia (known to me in Finland as Yesh).

As Annikki's sister, Anneli, lives near Helsinki, I sort of asked Ruki whether I could bring her along as Annikki was anxious to spend as much time as possible with her sister. She graciously accepted my request.

What an incredible evening it was!

Besides Ruki and Devinder, Yesh and his radiant wife, Rati, were there, as well as Jeroo, their other daughter who lives in New Zealand. Also present were Arjun and Varun, the two sons of Ruki and Devinder. They are so incredible loving kids.

The hosts, Devinder and Ruki, in their gorgeous Helsinki home, dished out a meal which showed of Ruki in the glory as the yrained chef she is. Every dish was made to perfection. And it was topped off with a delicious home made kulfi!

The atmosphere was totally Cathedralite in that a 49er and 59er meeting in a strange land showed how close our Cathedralite families are, even if a decade spans our life style.

Yesh is so remarkably fit and well that he puts me to shame, and I rather pride myself on my physical condition.

Thank you Rati and Yesh - as you showed me what a beautiful family you have around you.