We live in a strange world

There was a time when the Guinness Book of World Records meant something; we as children used to look at the p­ictures – shortest, longest, tallest, smallest, biggest; all evoked a sense of wonder. But along with that there also came a sense of pondering – how does the man with the longest nails eat food or carry on with his day-to-day life? Or what is the point of a record which says longest “walking backwards” world record. Some of the records are so silly and useless and that is one of the reasons why this “world records” today hold no meaning and relevance.

One such man, we all Indians should salute is S Ramesh Babu from Karnataka. He is actually a brillaint man; a Scientist with Ph.D. from IISc Bangalore. He is 60 years old now and continues to make records. He holds 61 Records in all, including 52 World Records. Most of them are so silly and superfluous that you cannot help but wonder why this Ramesh Babu is so obsessed about making such meaningless records?

Look at the world records he holds - record for the Longest Lecturing (26 hours straight) with minimal breaks,  record for the world’s Largest Human Logo formation, record for flying a kite with the longest thread,  record for fastest autographing on Photographs in one hour, record for  “1 Hour Non-Stop Solo Football” (solo and football?); he also holds record for non-stop solo carom playing (we thought it needed a minimum of 2 players?); fastest 100m skip running, fastest car driver, fastest badminton player, fastest table tennis player, fastest Frisbee player, fastest kite maker, fastest carom player, fastest basketball player, fastest throw ball player, fastest vegetable cutter… the list seems endless. Oh, he is invited all over India to give inspirational talks and motivate others to break and make world records! He is also preparing for his next - Longest Non-Stop Volleyball Rally.

This trivializing the very concept of “world records” is what has made the concept itself irrelevant. Maybe we should browse through the Limca Book and Guinness Book for a few laughs!