One of the recent off-bit topics I’ve read, this one book about ‘Mumbai Mafia’ has been the most interesting, well-researched and well-written. Here is an excerpt from Dawood Ibrahim's journey from “Dongri to Dubai”, and the six decades of Mumbai mafia.

Many of us pass years before final decision to visit this nature's feast adored by a human ( 2400 years ago) Kanheri Caves just near Borivali, Mumbai. It took me 50 years to reach this point, since my first visit to this city in 1965.

Mumbai and caves!

Mumbai was built on seven islands. As old sediments around coastal areas of Kandivali shows us, Mumbai was inhabitable since the stone age. It was mainly occupied by Koli fishing community.

I recently conducted a social study of the status and condition of old-aged people and the old-age homes in Gujarat. This is a combination of the outcome of the study and the book review of a Gujarati book “Vrudhdhata Ni Samasya” by Dr Hiteshkumar N. Patel.

Our mind is nothing but a flow of thoughts, just like a river with flowing water. One’s personality is shaped by one’s thoughts. If our thoughts are good, we feel happy and radiate confidence and charm around us. Paying attention to managing one’s thoughts is a must. But, how to do that?

While alive, we feel the life to be full of problems and troubles. We remain stressed around even trivial issues. We keep searching for the problem-solving methods. Here is one answer.

Anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.

– Gautama Buddha

We all know ‘Anger’ does not do any good to anybody. Almost all of us have dealt with it very closely, either as the recipient, the 'perpetrator' or often both. Then why do we fail to stay away from getting angry every off and on? Let’s take a deep dive into what anger is all about and if there is anything we can do to stay away from getting angry at all.

When you are young and earning reasonably more, spending becomes an inescapable habit. There is no brake that can stop your consumerism from growing bigger when you have a credit card! Well, ‘financial discipline’ is the first condition for happy living and enjoying a tension-free, stress-free life. I thought I must show the ideal way with a few handy tips.

I know the title create some ambiguity around its meaning. Here’s the story: the author was a medical student studying at Surat during 1969-1974. Being an offspring of a middle-class family, all his parents could send him every month was Rs. 100 (One hundred). No doubt, this was more than 25% of his father’s salary and the rest 75% was to be spent by remaining nine members of the family. So, I used to receive Rs. 100 by MT (money transfer) at Bank of Baroda, Vanita Vishram (Surat) branch. Now this amount was exhausted in total on day one itself – so the remaining 29 days of the month had to be spent without any money – ‘zero balance’ stage, for all five years of the under graduation. This makes the story titled "Life without money - 24 hours x 29 days x 60 months"!

An  Adivasi girl Sangita at Nahari Hotel, Pangarbari (near Wilson Hills, Gujarat) teaches us the Indian culture and way of welcoming guests!

On 15-Jun-2016, my friend Sanjay Mahant and I visited a scenic hill-station in South Gujarat – Wilson Hills (near Dharampur). We wandered during the noon enjoying the view of the hill-station and chitchatting. We just did not think of the time while experiencing the pleasing wind and nature.

This is a rare story of how a person from Valsad (Gujarat) turned into someone serving Aadivasi (tribal) girls far away from his home in the interiors of the Dharampur forests.

Naresh Ramanandi, my friend Sanjay Mahant’s brother-in-law, is a dedicated follower of Shri Rang Avadhoot Bapji of Nareshwar. Bapji once told I shall take rebirth as an Adivasi. So in search of Shri Avadhoot Bapji, Nareshji opted to reach this area and thought of some service activity.