Suits, Deals, Oxford, et. al.

Have you ever watched Suits - an intriguing, fast paced drama depicting daily life of high profile lawyers in a partnership firm?

Imagine yourself as being one amongst them solving intricate cases and negotiating on behalf of your clients.  Though this is just a television serial and that the real life is very much different from reel life, imagine the job satisfaction after negotiating a key merger deal for your client or finalizing legal structure to enable corporate to minimize its tax pay-outs and maximize its profits.

Does looking at boring and long documents, mulling over interpretations of complex laws and not calling off a day until you have finalize the clauses of the agreement interest you?  For me, it's an adrenaline pumping work and makes me excited.

Law being my first choice of subject, the place which comes to my mind to pursue legal studies is Oxford.  Considered as mecca for law studies, it is a dream for every individual to spend few years of his / her life at Oxford and learn law.  

Oxford is rated as the best place to learn law and offers various courses and alternatives for students inspiring to pursue career in law.  One of the post graduate courses which I found interesting is Masters in Law and Finance (MLF). 

MLF has been recently launched in October 2010 and is jointly taught with the Said Business School.  It offers legal students an opportunity to integrate study of finance with advanced legal study.

Having studied law and finance in India and worked mostly on the related deals, MLF is the obvious choice for me.  It has 45 seats available in each batch and it's a challenge to get in with probability of getting the admission less than 20%.  The batch size of 45, 10 months duration, 29 years average age of its students, optimum background of work and study amongst the student fits well with my criteria.  The course also provides varied electives such as economics, taxation and competition.

MLF is surely my best bet for further studies in legal field in a country which is rich in knowledge, heritage and culture.

Source: 

1. Oxford: http://www.law.ox.ac.uk/

2. MLF: http://mlf-2.oxford-law.dev3.oneltd.eu/

3. British Council: http://knowledgeisgreat.in/

Disclaimer: This post is part of Indiblogger's Knowledge is Great contest wherein Indibloggers were invited to blog about any subject of their choice which they would like to study in UK.  There are some prizes to be won in this contest based on pre-selected criteria.  To that extent, this post may be considered as a paid post.

Making India Read

How much does childhood impacts the person you become?

How much impact the books you read while going to school make once you step out in the world?

How much influence such books have on your thoughts, beliefs and actions?

I am sure almost all of you shall agree that the books we read during our school days have a long lasting impact on how we grow up as an individual.  Books are the medium through which we see the world around us.  Irrespective of whether it is a novel, comic strip, biography, short story or mythology; all this plays a significant part in our upbringing.

Now imagine a scene where you as a child do not have any book to read.  There is no one with whom you can discuss about the stories you read last night before going to sleep.  This is where Pratham Books, a not-for-profit initiative by Pratham, started in 2004 with an objective of book in every child's hand, decided to make a difference.

Rohini Nilekani, who is the founding member of Pratham Books and the chairperson, spoke last year in TEDxGateaway held at Mumbai about the efforts taken by Pratham Books to achieve its objective.  Franklin Templeton Investments partnered the TEDxGateway Mumbai in December 2012.

There are children which goes to school but do not have anyone in their family who can help them in reading.  To ensure that their school education is not wasted, it is necessary that they have resources to practice how to read.  Pratham Books decided to provide this resource to such children.

Books published by Pratham are available at very low cost at various places / schools / library in remote areas.  Pratham Books partnered with willing authors, readers, teachers to expand their presence and offerings.  Over the last 9 years, Pratham Books have published 1573 books in 11 languages and distributed 10.3 million books all over India.

Last year, they also carried out a special initiative on International Literacy Day, wherein across 28 states of India 419 school teachers read their books to approx 20,000 children.

This is a great initiative undertaken by Pratham Books having a long term positive impact on the future generation.

PS:  I recollect receiving tweets from Pratham Books last year about their initiative on International Literacy Day and inviting me to contribute by reading for children in my locality.  I was not aware about the work Pratham does in this field and use to ignore those tweets.  Now since I know the noble cause for which they are contributing, I shall surely try to contribute to the extent possible and I feel we all should do that.

Disclaimer: This post is part of Indiblogger's The Idea Caravan contest wherein Indibloggers were invited to view the videos of TEDxGateway Mumbai held last year and blog about the various ideas presented in those videos which are destructive and path breaking and can lead to positive future impact on the society.  There are some gifts to be given to all bloggers whose post gets selected and prizes to be won in a contest.  To that extent, this post may be considered as a paid post.

Indiblogger - Reliance Digital Experience @ R Mall Mulund

Indiblogger invited its members to visit the Reliance Digital Store across Mumbai and share the experience on the blog.

There is a newly opened Reliance Digital Store at R Mall, Mulund West, quite near to where I stay and I seize the opportunity to visit the store and feel the experience.  While I am a regular visitor to the R Mall, I never got an opportunity to visit any Reliance Digital Store before this.

The store is located in quite a busy area and in one of the oldest malls in Central suburbs.  The store as such is not big, but has a good variety of products under one roof.

I visited the store on Sunday morning.  I was promptly taken to the store manager who took my indiblogger invite printout and told me to have a 'Reliance Digital Experience'.

The crowd had not yet started and I had the pleasure of roaming around the store leisurely taking pictures.  The store seems adequately staffed, always eager to help you out in choosing the products.

Shoppers having a look at product displays

Wide variety of Windows 8 laptops on display

LED Screens inviting attention

There were wide range of LED / Plasma screens to choose from.  There was also a large Sony 3D television in display which was quite popular amongst shoppers for 3D experience.  There was a separate home theater experience section, but was closed at that point of time.

One product which made me curious to fiddle around was the Sony Internet and video player.

Awesome player - I wanna have one!

There were no keys and buttons, just a touch screen on the right bottom with couple of options.  The instrument was glossy and very attractive.

The latest models of Samsung Galaxy Mega phones - 5.8" and 6.3" were also on display.

The latest smart phone

Other mobile phone options such a new touchscreen Blackberry Z10 and iPhone 5 were also an interesting experience.

Overall experience of the store was good.  Nice layout and arrangement of various products, helpful staff and prime locality.  I did not purchased any thing on that day and hence can not comment on the ease of billing and payment.  However, I did noticed that the payment counters are at the other side of the store far away from exit, which seemed strange to me.

Disclaimer:  This entry is part of Indiblogger Store Experience, wherein Indibloggers were invited to visit the store and share the experience on their blog.  There are some goodies / gifts to be given to all who blog about the experience and prizes to be won in a contest.  To that extent, this post may be considered as a paid post.