There are many of us who remember a turning point in our lives.

It could have been a sentence in a book we read, or a speech we heard, or advice given by an elder or teacher in school.

Last month, while driving through England, Scotland and Ireland, we stayed at nearly eight different places, some of them economical hotels and others Airbnb’s which were homes given on rent for the period of stay.

Some of these hotels and homes were tiny, others spacious, some had fancy sitting rooms and kitchens, others, bathrooms so tiny that one could have a bath, only if you didn’t move or turn around, and god forbid, if your soap fell down.

Something that is happening because of the latest kind of communal thinking is that of losing friends we made and kept for many years! I truly believe, only the renewing of those old bonds will destroy the sad polarization happening here!

For years we have looked at each other as friends, while today it seems we’ve been handed tinted glasses to put on.

Even as India bade a tearful farewell to a giant of a man, let us not bid adieu to the values the Tata name so firmly established in the country. For many decades people swore by the brand name of the Tata’s. Nobody thought of them as just another billionaire company amassing wealth. That feeling is not there for two other companies, owners of which speak the same language the forefathers of Rattan Tata adopted.

According to newspaper reports, the sale of SUVs has nearly beaten the sale of other cars in the country! Some years ago I looked at the blueprint of the car that lay on an automobile engineer’s table. “It looks like a second world war ambulance,” I said.

“We know our people well,” said the engineer simply. “For we Indians, big is the ultimate. Big houses, big rooms, big TVs, big cars, big everything, it doesn’t matter whether those big houses are difficult to maintain.”