I writing this blog after a long time. The reason
for that is not due to lack of time or laziness. I was busy engaged in some interesting
passion which I could not indulge so far in a big way.
It starts with my retirement. Retirement is one milestone
in life where a people are scared off
for various reasons. It could be due to loss of power, position, re-location, loss
of facilities etc. Among all this, one of the most important issues related to
the change in life style as well as the sudden dip in attention and work
schedules. These issues are having more mental impact when the position and
power held were higher.
In 2019, when I retired many people asked me, 'what
are my plans after retirement ?. ' Will
you be taking up some consultancy or auditing job ( BIS was offering part time
auditor to retired qualified employees ) or any private job. The fact is I was
offered an extension in BIS for six
months in the same level ( I was holding Joint Secretary level ) which I declined and the two offers
I got after retirement from private . I refused all of them because I wanted to
pursue my passion which was pushing me..
Through out my life, I was
fascinated by the photography and videography and I wanted to do lot travelling
further andshoot lot of videos .As a matter of fact, in the last 3 years I travelled a lot
and bought a basic camera and gathered lot of information about Photography
& Videography as well as Camera
Techniques. I spent hours together on Lenses, Camera Gadgets, Video
editing, Camera movement, Audio editing, Lighting, Camera Angles and Video
editing software.
Basically It has 3 advantages hidden in this hobby.
The first one is, this hobby enables you
to open up your creativity and creating an art brings lot happiness and
satisfaction. When you create an art or when you learn some mistakes you committed
while you edit your videos keep you
updated with not only continuous knowledge but keep you engaged..
Of late I realised, I made plenty of
mistakes which could have been avoided if I had this knowledge. Also I realised
costly cameras or lenses are not the important aspects, but the knowledge
of camera, the way you look at the scene and capture the scene , the way you recreate the same
with your own perspective would make
the difference.
Since I cannot go back to all those places I visited earlier, I decided I should transfer this knowledge to people like me who loves travel and photography. That is why I decided to make complete series of learning photography with all tips and techniques and make it available to Public. You can learn this videos free in Youtube Channel Travel videography for seniors or my Instagram id - senior_citizen_photography.
I have created 39 videos organised in 9 chapters on basics, advanced techniques, tips for photography and videography, editing, lenses and gadgets etc…
An artisans programme was to
start in Coimbatore (2015) and everyone stood up for prayer. The record player was tested earlier but right at the of nick of
time, it did not function. Everyone was standing in silence. One second, 2
seconds and 3 seconds. Nothing happened. I could see some of my colleagues frantically
trying to do something. Many of them closed their eyes for prayer hence it was
not known to them what was happening. Few seconds passed.
Some started looking at me for the signal to sit. I then looked at my officer who was on the PR desk
and signaled to render a prayer song. She took up the challenge boldly without
any hesitation and she did it. Everyone involved in organising the programme were relived.Some
of them thought, the prayer was organised in that way. Only we knew the
story behind the curtains. The incident remained unfazed in my memory.
BIS through these programmes had definitely helped
large number of artisans in improving
their technical knowledge in the area of melting, making solder and soldering,
reducing the loss, reducing pollution and
creating awareness on Standards and Quality apart from Hallmarking. Shri Tirupathy Rajan, an Expert
and Shri K.Anbarasu Sir then DDGS were always there to support these programmes.
We tried to organise many programmes as much as possible because unlike other programmes, these were improving thetechniquesdeployed by the artisans in
melting process and also for improving the work environment morethan the purity of gold. That is the truth.
THE
STORY OF First Foreign Post office Certification
This photo was taken during the
award of first foreign Post Office Certification in India as per IS/ISO 9001 by
BIS. Seated next to me on the left is Shri K.Kadirvel, my colleague &
co-auditor and on the right side is Shri
Mahesh, then Director of FPO at Chennai. I was then the Head of Management System Department at
Chennai and was the Lead Auditor for this project.
It was just a phone call from the Director of the foreign post office
that culminated to this great event at
the end. He sought guidance on the
benefits of implementing ISO 9001 in a service organization. Shri Mahesh, wanted to implement this system for the first time in the country in
his department. Later on Post office as a whole implemented the ‘Sevottam
certification’.
On the phone, he made two queries
to me:
1. What is the benefit of this
system to a Public Service industry ?.
2. Would an a organization like Post
Office get any tangible benefits where Government
and international protocols have to be followed mandatorily followed and there
is very little scope for modifying the existing
the process?.
After listening to him, I asked for
a meeting with him and for a short visit
to witness their operations. He readily agreed and I spend some time studying
the operations in detail.
The operation is not very complex: When
any person, anywhere in India wants to
send a cover or packet to be delivered
to another location in a different country, it can be given at any of the Post office in India and pay for the stamps.
These packets from each zone is
collected to the nearest zonal foreign post office to repack after sorting.
These bags are then moved to their assigned Gate way stations. ( Kolkatta, Bombay
etc.) From there as per the country sorting, it is again regrouped and transported
either by air/sea/rail/road to destined country.
As per the mutual Postal agreement with other countries the packets finally reach
the local post office of the concerned
person and gets delivered. All these operations are completed in 15-20 days
very efficiently.
During my observations of operations on that day, I found two areas of
opportunities for improvement.
1. A case of misrouting detected on an article but delivered
within the time frame. So the customer did not even know about this mishap. This was
a process error which could have been avoided and would have saved lot of time
for the consumer.
2. In the other case the stamp duty calculated for the packet was slightly
more than the required amount by the collecting post office. The customer did
pay the amount asked by post office and normally overcharging or undercharging is
not known to customers. Post office charges are comparatively very less and
people in post office are very courteous and customer friendly. The excess amount was just 10 rupees and this human
error was not very serious. But
it was a service defect which could be removed.
So I told him, the implementation would help you to
identify service defects and set targets
to improve the efficacy and efficiency of the entire system. After the
discussions, on that day itself, he ordered
to return that Rs10/- to the
customer and apply for application for BIS certification.
I realized on that day my marketing
skills. I never knew till that time I can do this specialized task, even though I studied Management (PGDBM).
This photo
was clicked at the inauguration of proposed Kochi office on the land donated by
lease basis with Kerala Government in Maradu Municipal
Corporation on our constant persuasion, Kochi after the shifting of office to Kochi from Trivandrum. The land overlooking the backwaters was
inaugurated by Shri K.V Thomas, then Honourable minister for Consumer affairs
along with Late Shri Sunil Soni, IAS, former DG, BIS and other dignitaries including
former State Minister Shri K.S Babu and Maradu Municipal office bearers.
This was my last assignment in Kerala and after the inauguration of this site, DG had a personal discussion with me and asked to come to head quarters. I have shown my disinterest in working again in Certification or Laboratory departments as I spent all my time in certification since joining. I requested him to consider posing in other departments. He then created a new department called SPPD( Standards Policy and planning ) and I was shifted to that department as head. He wanted me to have fresh look on some of the existing systems and was aiming for a complete transformation. This department from scratch was established under my supervision and the role of the department was to assist Standards Formulation departments and DDG(Standards) similar to Central Marks Department(CMD) in Certification. I served little more than one year before being shifted as Head of Management System Department for another important assignment. In the MSCD department I was there for one year and later shifted to Central marks Department-III when transformer was brought under compulsory certification and after one year I was promoted as Deputy Director General.
KERALA WATER Manufactures Association [ KBWA ] meeting at Kochi@2013
One
of the regular meetings with Kerala Bottle Water Manufactures Association in Oct 2013. Shri M.E Mohammed then President of
KBWA seated next to me seems busy examining the water bottle for its compliance to the norms. The interaction with KBWA
was always very productive and progressive.
Most
of the Packaged drinking water units were
located close Ernakulam centre at that time, and my officers could travel
faster and return back on the same day due to the proximity of these units.
This helped BIS as well as the industry to serve better and this was expressed
explicitly by the association when we shifted the office to Kochi.
The
association organised meetings to disseminate information to their members when
there is some change in standards, procedures and rules.
When I superannuated, many offers
came in my way including the extension offer from BIS. But I was firm and clear
in my mind that I should do what was burning in my heart. To help the Stuttering/Stammering
children and that my son also said we will do it when I shared this idea with
him long back.
In 2019 the pandemic started and my
launch of the trust by name Lets-Talk got stalled, but then we decided to
launch a You Tube channel named Lets-Talk.
I got a logo designed by Mr. Thomas of NIFT who did it free of cost as a
support to this cause.
In the many of the inspiring videos, he narrates his life
experience and path he went through to
reach the his goal. He is now serving as a Senior software Engineer in
LinkedIn and prior to that as a software
architect in Samsung Ecommerce. He shares
his various experiences and solutions for the benefit of other
stutterers..
So far Lets-Talk released many
videos and some links are given below.
1.Simple tip to reduce stress -Opening Up: https://youtu.be/C4F_oJEQsZo
18. Open Mike event at Chennai : https://youtu.be/o3Ipjctvvug
When the number of videos were
going up, we felt it was necessary to keep all these videos available at one
place so that it can be accessed by all at any time. That is how the website
was born. A feed back form where anybody can directly interact and seek assistance.
Have a look at this by clicking the link.
This book was released on 21 January 2019. marking the culmination of series of efforts to transform
the existing processes involved in
Management Systems Certification which included introduction of IT
enabled Audit time calculation, Assisted auditor selection for competence requirement, Distributed forms
management, Delinking travelling charges from certification charges, Discounts for
corporates and Multisite units, Revision of audit fee and honorarium amount to external auditors. All documents underwent revision and
digitization in line with latest changes
in IAF guidelines, new BIS Act and standards and simultaneouslyenhanced accreditation scope and areas of accreditation.
Development of an Intranet based module (internally) helped all auditors and MSCOs to work more uniformly and efficiently. This also helped to
disseminate any changes in information related
to procedures, guidelines, forms and auditors.
7 more new systems such as
MDMS, RTMS, SAMS, EOMS, FSMS coupled Milk certification, QMS and BIS standard
coupled RMC certification were introduced. Always advocated for introducingnew concepts ofcombined standards to derive more benefits to
consumers as well as clients.Milk
certification with FSMS ,RMC with QMS and BIS codes were introduced with these
ideas which could beat the competition, if properly marketed. Changeover to
most of thestandards took place during this period such as 9001, 14001, 45001,
13485 adding burden of organizing a
series of training programmes to all auditors and auditees.
The acute shortage of
auditors for integrated systems was greatly reduced by removing the obstacle of
travelling charges. This was done after careful and meticulous calculations resulting
the availability of all auditors to all
regions without any hindrance. But the shortage of auditors continue to haunt.
In order to quicken the process of auditor enrollment, the entire system of
enrollment was reorganized by automating the application to enrollment
includingonline examination. Along with
this dialogues were initiated with many other public sector organizations,
Government Departments and large multisite organizations for expansion.
At this Juncture, we
decided to expand the auditor base and it was necessary to have reference book
with all updated changes to have all
information at one place for new as well as existing auditors. This made me to
write this book. Organized in to 40 major
chapters under6 sections for easy
reference, thebookalso incorporates guidance samples prepared in consultation
with many senior officers. Later this bookwas digitizedand incorporated
into the new website launched by BIS which I was in charge.
Varghese Joy Former
Scientist-G & DDG Bureau
of Indian Standards
Thursday, May 6, 2021
A JOURNEY TO CALVARY
This is not to be seen as a another Holy Land video, but to be seen as a common man's view and his understanding of Jesus in his journey towards Jesus. While taking these video clips I did not have any idea of making a film like this. Like any other travel, I took these video clips and kept it with me. After retirement my interest in photography resurfaced and I started learning more on camera, photography, videography lenses, camera angles etc. etc.( It is full life time subject ) I spent huge amount of time in understanding these in the last 2 years ( Pandemic period) and continue to spent lot of time in learning this hobby. Now I started learning film making, screen play and other techniques apart from editing and lenses and gadgets..
Then I started making videos of my earlier trips in the new software knowledge I acquired and that is the time I made some episodes of this Holy land trip also. I used to send some of clips to my younger sister (Daisy Daniel) and she told me once to make a full video of this visit and this prompted me to do this. It took six months for me to collect and re-organise the clips, edit, color grade, rearrange, compose and prepare transitions, make title videos, audios, music and compiling.. As a matter of fact I had spent lot of time in understanding video editing, You Tube operation (As I have not done you tube earlier )and today when I look back I feel it was really worth doing this series.
This is an organized video in chronological order with narration of my own understanding on the real life experience of Holy Land visit. All tour operators show you the places according to their convenience and not according to Bible history.
Viewing this clip before you undertake the trip would give a fair idea of the places of visit and where you should spend more time. This will also provide some information on the importance of each place in biblical context and some explanations and interpretations of my own.
One benefit of making this is the direct benefit to me itself. I am the person whos is most benefitted compared to anybody. My understanding has greatly improved by knowing the places he preached, the context, the culture and geography etc... in more deeper way. Initially I made different episodes with text ( Without audio narration) and later I added my audio narration into this.
Although it was the first attempt after understanding software to some extent, the each episode was created in different style (without any temp plates ) with my own idea. You can see and appreciate the differences if you are a video maker by closely watching each episode with its style, techniques of presentation, text presentation and transitions. Lot of time was consumed in generating new ideas for each clip and the techniques used and interpretations are purely my own.
Truly, I tell you, I made this video putting my full heart into it and while making some episodes I cried in my heart feeling the pain of Jesus. That led me to make the last clip - The trial of Jesus - with my own experience of standing in the court . I don't know how many times I have seen these clips, but I feel like seeing it again and again and some times I wonder how I could make this series. Definitely I believe there is a hand of GoD which has driven me to make this.
I am sure I would have many mistakes as I am not a professional video programmer and many times I had to run different modules and redo/ revise it for number of times to get some perfection I wanted it. In the process I might have overlooked some errors like spelling mistakes which I noticed later could not be corrected, as it will involve huge amount of work again. Pardon me for this.
I am quite sure this video will benefit many including my own generations in future.
Lets-Talk Channel is trying to extend free support to those who stammer or stutter to face their challenges in life by creating an awareness as well as with the help of those who conquered this issue in their life.
My son Vivin Joy started speaking normally in the beginning. After admitting him into a play school, everything was normal for some time. But then one day he started to stammer when he came home.
Though we stopped that school and put him in a different school, his stammer remained with him.
Today he is 31 years and a software architect in a leading mobile firm and leading a team of engineers at work. As he is able to conquer the fear of stammering today and able to lead a normal life, we would like to share our experience of 3 decades with similar children to enable them to face these challenges.
This channel Lets -talk try to reach out children or parents who stammer or stutter and support them free of cost to equip them to face this world.
In this video we are explaining the techniques to handle shame or guilt of stammering.
We reached Rotourua city in New Zealand by rented car after driving around 300 kms from airport. My son was in the driving seat and I was sitting next to him. Though i was sitting next to him, I was of no use as a navigator, but the inbuilt google map of the car was of immense help to us.
As we reached the city, we decided to have lunch. My Son and Daughter in law with their expertise located an Indian restaurant by googling. But parking is a serious issue in New Zealand and after 2-3 rounds around the hotel, located a local roadside parking place. We saw the Parking board with the symbol P15. Though I did not understand the number on the board, I presumed that it was only some serial number.
When we
returned to the car, we saw a penalty slip from police on the car for 20 Dollars. The fine was imposed for parking beyond 15 minutes which was indicated as P15 on the board. In this country P15, P30 and P45 indicates the free parking time. Interestingly no policeman was visible. The overtime parking was detected through the motion sensors.
We thought the penalty could be paid while handing over the car but that office had no intimation about the fine. We were then informed that to pay the fine through the internet. We thought we will pay after we return to India.
We returned to India and during the travel we lost the ticket somewhere. Without ticket number , it is not possible to pay the fine. I asked my son, should we pay ?, Because, in all possibility we may not go to that country again. But then he said it is very much essential to pay otherwise they can block us renting a car in any other country by blacklisting. Then with lot of efforts and help from rotourua police through mail, we could get the details and pay the fine.
This photo was taken in Tiger Kingdom, Phuket,
Thailand. The Tiger kingdom is a place where many tigers are caged and open for visitors. With Special permission, visitors are allowed to touch tigers in the cage under the supervision of their care taker. Even though it is under supervision, a tiger
is a tiger and no one can predict the behavior of any wild animal.
My wife and
son are ardent animal lovers and they wanted to take this opportunity to touch the
animal by paying additional fee.The moment I looked into the staring eyes of a fully grown tiger, memory of horrific incident happened in Bangalore National Park ( It
was known as "Bannerghatta National Park") came to my mind.
Those days Bannerghatta was considered quite far from city though It was
only 22kms away from Vidhan Soudha. We with our first son ( aged 3 years ) visited the park just two days before the incident.
The Park had a van ( windows secured with iron grills)
to take visitors around and everybody try to get the window seat for a better view. The van with tourists goes around the park where lions are allowed roam free. For most of the lions the tourist van is a routine scene and do not even pay any attention. The van has a peeping window at the top and the van supervisor allow one person when he feels it is safe to allow.
A similar van was used by the park keepers to distribute meat to
these wild animals.So every time when the van arrives they expect the food.
The incident took place when the grandfather of the child raised her through the peeping window for a better view. In
split of a second, a lion from behind
jumped on to the van and grabbed the
child and went away. The grand father wanted to run behind the lion mulling the child away but prevented by others in the van.
Since this incident happened just 2 days after our visit, the memory of that could not be erased even after so many years. With this at the back of mind, I was sacred to
go inside and decided to wait outside. They went inside and taken some photos. Visitors are not allowed to go in front of the tiger or touch the head.
I was relieved only when they returned safe. Tiger kingdom - an unforgettable visit.
I have created 39 videos organised in 9 chapters on basics, advanced techniques, tips for photography and videography, editing, lenses and gadgets etc…
