Your Friendly Philosopher & Guide

Skanda started chatting with me on Yahoo messenger just as an acquaintance and we became good friends in a couple of days. After 4-5 days of chat, he told me that he liked my blogs and hence placed an order for one of my services on Indiatimes. All this time he thought it was delicate to ask me about the pending order. And I had the slightest idea that he has placed an order for a reading on Indiatimes. The moment I came to know about the order, I immediately logged into the order interface and found nothing in it. I asked him, when did he place an order, and he said, should be 4 to 5 days. And in my interface there were no pending orders. I confirmed with him – did he choose me as an astrologer, and he sent me the order confirmation mail he got from Indiatimes.

In fact he had placed an order for Ask 1 Question + Life predictions by G. Kennedi Rs 1500. And I don’t provide this service on any of the websites.

I asked him to send a mail to Indiatimes to ask about the status of the order. And to my shock, Skanda received an astrological reading the next day in his mailbox. There was no mention of any astrologer in the reading, and the reading was computer generated. Skanda is a male, and the report said – your husband will be so and so….(I will have to eat my words if the computer thought Skanda was a gay).

I never got the order in my order interface, I never did that particular service, the client placed an order specifically for me and paid 1500, and the client got the computer generated reading.

If Skanda had not been in touch with me on Yahoo messenger, he would have never known that the reading wasn’t done by me, and at the same time I would have never known that a person called Skanda placed an order for my service!

There were too many mails sent to and fro, and Indiatimes forwarded the order to me after Skanda warned them of slapping a legal notice. Indiatimes escaped saying there was a technical error, and the order went to some other astrologer. I don’t want to name the astrologer – but whoever it is – it isn’t wise to send computer-generated predictions to your clients, who pay you through their nose.

Well this was the point of misunderstanding between Indiatimes and me. And now I have got a couple of orders from Indiatimes, which I don’t normally do. I don’t get into life predictions – because if I get into typing that – it will at least take 4-5 hours for me. And I am totally against sending computer-generated predictions. Secondly I don’t honestly think that there was any technical error as far as Skanda’s order is concerned. May be this was the first time they got caught – thanks to Skanda.

It is easy – recruit an inhouse guy, use other astrologer’s name, generate computer predictions, and send them to the clients. Who on earth will ever know? Well this is just an assumption and a strong possibility, which cannot be ruled out.

My teacher would say – when you have money, fame, luxury, and power on one side, and dharma (righteousness) on the other side - always chose Dharma! And I thought I would stick to his words.

I still can keep my mouth shut, do the orders as they send to me, and bask in the money and success that a brand like Indiatimes can bring. But then – I can’t and I have decided to walk out.

I haven’t sent any mails to Indiatimes yet to remove me from their panel. I thought I would post this blog first, and then send a mail – so that I don’t decide against myself.