Esoteric

Esoteric is something private, understood by a select group. "Understanding" over here carries different meaning by the same virtue. Why is something esoteric something relevant, something revered though not understood. I don't understand Shakespeare, Plato,Aristotle, but I revere them , I consider them esoteric,however, I do so because I know that my incapacity to understand them, doesn't make it banal. Nevertheless, at the same time we know that we don't understand it and thus caught up with this perennial paradox , "obliging deference to an object we don't understand".

I guess the answer lies in the question itself. To "understand" that everything is not to be "understood" the same way , is too very difficult to "understand". By our instinct, we tend to view things in a simplified format, whereas whatever lies in front is not always expressible in the same ink. By trying to define things in concrete form we try to have a reductionist effect on the idea itself and therein lies the difficulty. These ideas are just "ideas", non- reducible to concretes, and an "esoteric" group "understands" that.

An example would help me clarify. Consider these two definitions:

Truth- Any act or behavior that conforms to available evidence.

Truth- Central idea behind existence, rather existence itself. Something that keeps changing, striving for itself, and never alone but always dual.

Former tends to reduce "Truth" to a very small dimension of understanding , whereas latter begets thought and thus paves way for understanding , thereby never reducing it. Thus , I find , to understand things that are esoteric we need to avoid reductionism and which answers my question as well, this paradox of "understanding" something which is not really understood is perennial, simply because it cannot be reduced to a set of words.

An unfinishsed drama. Act I

It was going to be an excruciating affair, watching things from so close. I had been at the helm earlier, but this time I was the spectator, which made it disconcerting for me.

It was to start from the garden, and then lead through the different area of building. In the garden two men sat on the bench , sprawling their legs on the lush lawn underneath. They seemed to be lost in their thoughts when suddenly a lady, slim and slender, in her youth, came in, blithely, oblivious of the quietude prevailing.

The two men , having been robbed off their solitude so casually, rose in anger, only to be melt at the sight of her. Heat of anger melted the wax of heart and the liquid seeped in their soul. It froze within their soul, and so did the moment around them. But the lady, oblivious of the tumult of the poor souls around her, flit though the garden. Jumping over the lawn, running through the pavement and picking up the daisies on the side walk, splashing the placid stream lying in peace.A song emanated from her heart and she danced on that tune. She was beautiful , she was mine. All of a sudden she turned around, looking in my direction , as if she saw me, yet I knew that she can't, with a cursory glance, she moved in other direction ,with a faint smile sprawled over her lips.

Pain's in your mind...

Where else ? Science, helps in proving this maxim. Skin was being taken off my body and I didn't even grimace , but after I saw it , it started paining. Till the time I hadn't seen it , I couldn't even relate to it , while right after I saw it , mind came into action.

Now if "pain" is in mind only, doesn't that offer a unique opportunity to forgo all pain. It surely does. So next time you feel pained, just believe that its not, by believing that there is no pain mind wouldn't act to the "pain" stimuli and thus there will be no pain.

Imagine the potency of this weapon, no "heart-aches", "hunger-pains" ,"failure-pains". Its awesome. Without any spending on the "pain-alleviation" programs , all the pain would be gone. The only glitch that appears over here is that of the "simplicity" of the scheme marring its significance. I even have the proofs from the real world. Our celebrities, the ever happy people, how do they keep that attitude? MJ took pain killer, Heath Ledger took pain killer, most of the Celebrities take pain killer , and you see the effect , there is no pain. Either they die or they live pain free.

JAM, what did I just say? "either they die". Oh yeah! I guess that there has to be an added caveat, "blowing away all your pain could kill you". This looks to me an indicative of something , I guess of life itself. Pain , acts as your alarm , indicating something is not right. And then we react to that, attempting to ameliorate the pain. When we do that , we actually serve to expurgate the insidious root of pain and thereby reclaiming normalcy. Makes sense, for if you were not to feel pain while someone is trying to take your head off, you would be off to the "last ride" without any knowledge of it. Pain affirms life, of its vagaries and uncertainties and motivates our attempt towards betterment.

All right then, Pain's in mind, but we need it , most of all , for life itself.

Gulzaar - A poet unmatched.

My earliest introduction to Gulzaar was when I developed some sense of life. Until then , it were general melody songs that fascinated me, with Mukesh being my favorite singer. It was often said to me, as long as you are kid you would like Mukesh, but not after you have grown up and it proved very true. For Mukesh was seamlessly supplanted by the likes of Kishore, Asha etc.

But, what gave worth to that music? For me , it started with Gulzaar. His words were like crafted pearls, woven into a long thread finely and yet effortlessly. The fascination started with the admiration of, a mellifluous Lata humming Tujhse naraaj nahi zindagi. And then it was an unending chain of lyrical gems from Gulzaar that drove me to a higher plane. Few remarkable ones were , Mera kuch samaan,Tum aa gaye ho,O manjhi re,Humne dekhi hai,Huzzoor iss kadar,Tere bina zindagi se.

The greatest quality of his songs are that they do not appear to be the work of a contrived genius , but rather of an accidental genius , writing out of careless regard of words,with most of his songs looking into the simple and ingenuous yet unnamed facts of daily life.The variety of lyrics that he has provided could be hardly believed by a casual onlooker. It ranges from such deeply abstract , "Humne Dekhi hai" , to childish hum "Lakdi ki kaathi". I think "Masoom" is symbolic of his eclectic variety. Nonetheless, his song in parichay ,"Musaafir hoon yaroon" , appears as restless yet composed as a lost yet untiring traveler.

However, in non-films category as well, he hasn't been any less active. His album, "Sunset point" , has several gems embedded in it. He narrates the story in his rugged yet silken voice and along with it moves the entire series of events. One of the particularly beautiful piece from that album is ,"Kacche rang utar jaane do", sung huskily yet deeply by Chitra.

In the contemporary period , he has written a whole basket of varying songs. Ranging from "Bidi jalai le" in Omkara, to Oscar winning "Jai Ho" in Slumdog millionaire. Once you have known his quality of work , you could instinctively tell which of the song could be Gulzaar's, but he nevertheless doesn't fail to spring surprises, like "Jabaan pe laga namak ishq ka". Whatever he writes, there is a sort of implicit guarantee associated with it, the guarantee that the song would be a piece of woven literary blanket, where words would play with each other and yet send out something so deep and ingenuous.

To Know more about his songs and his works, you could browse here,

http://www.gulzar.info/

A zero sum game

For a game there has to be participants, and for the sum to be zero there must be something that would be added. Former is you , but what is latter?

Inasmuch I understand, the components that are to be added are your deeds and their implications , with a positive score for every "success" and negative for "failures". Although , failures are predominant candidates, success pays irregular and unexpected visits, however, when the "end" arrives, both positive and negative scores come at par and the resulting sum happens to be ZERO.

For an end there has to be a beginning, but what I see as the beginning and the end are only consequences of my reasoning setup. If being unconscious is the end and gaining consciousness is the beginning, it repeats for me everyday. Every sleep takes away my consciousness and every morning brings it back. This isn't something right, there is no "end", simply because there is no "beginning".

My consciousness plays truant over here. It forces me to see the world as it understands, but what it understands is something which doesn't seek understanding. Why again I get trapped into the circular traps of my mind? Why does it seek to understand more than what it is?

That which it is , I cant think of, and that what I think , doesn't confirm it. But does my thought fight it? It appears to be so . It fights my existence, it realizes in me sadness and happiness, it leads me to a structure, it plays the part of my guide . Where is my primal identity? It lies not in these words, not in success, not in anything, yet why don't I seem to find it?

Yet, If I find it , how will I recognize it without my mind? How will it be named? How would it appear? I may be asking wrong questions here, but answers are what I seek. Manifest thyself, if there it is , beyond my thinking. I find no answer, yet get a glimpse of it. It reveals itself in the "cuckoo" of koel on the tree nearby, that sings along with me , sharing ourselves. It manifests itself in the green pastures to which I run and the mud I roll in. In the silent whispers of the breeze that furtively sneaks in, and into the sleep that makes all a king.

My primal identity lies not in these words, but they seem to provide me the assurance of its existence. Of the assurance that there is no end, that there is no sum and that there is no game.

Its all just a long,endless, quietude.

Birth & Re-Birth

And I accepted another birth. Squirming, wriggling , and dying to get going. The stream in front giggled over the pebbles , which shone though the light that filtered through the thin layer of stream. Across the river, there was dense vegetation , verdant and lush. I sprinted towards the other shore, one jump was all it took. However, as I landed, darkness loomed over the area, lush vegetation had turned to dark logs. Bewildered, I turned around, only to find the other shore , as desolate as ever.

My claim to life was due, it had to be affirmed by the human in me.However, when darkness drenches the horizon, one can only be left wondering. Not me,however. I was freshly born , unencumbered with the conventional wisdom. I closed my eyes, and shut off the sensation of sight. It was no longer dark, darkness had no meaning now. As I moved further, assisted by my senses, I ran into dark objects, but they didn't deter me , for I couldn't see them. They were all same to me, symptomatic of objects, neither good nor bad.

I walked for , I don't know how long; there was no time. It seemed to be long since I started and yet it was just as near to me as the engraving on my mind. Suddenly , the clamor of surrounding overgrew the silence within. It was disturbing to an infant. How can he cope with it. It worsened. I was the source of common anger. I was the harbinger of change, a change that locked its horns with stasis. I represented something I didn't understand, yet I was never separate from it. Subject and object had colluded and now there was none. An arrogant person threw coconut on my head, and naturally it blasted into two. I stood unmoved, for I didn't know what was on. People around me clapped, there was jubilation all around.

I was unmoved, undeterred, for I was never challenged. My head became the slab for breaking coconut shells, it fell apart on my head, and I sensed a liquid down my nose. It moved into my mouth and I sensed "hunger", it grew, unfettered, unbound. It drove me mad. I needed more of it , my hunger killed me, it drove me down. I sought the public to use me for their fun and give me in turn the "liquid" that I wanted so much now. Laughter turned louder, clamor grew bigger, and the liquid poured faster. I drank it ; kept drinking it. And suddenly there was a deluge of the "liquid". I couldn't swallow it all and I puked. Clamor died down at once, laughter ceased. It was all silent again.I was losing all my senses and out of fear, I opened my eyes. It was still dark all around.

Instinctively I shut them back at once and shed my breath.
.
.
.

"Do you seek re-birth?", a faint voice echoed. I obliged, and here I was once again.
Stream gurgled and I could see the verdant landscape on the other side. I took a jump ....

Identity and Death

This piece of article intends to take a deep dive into philosophy of identity.

I just finished the book Zen and Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. A very difficult read and certainly one of those books which literally enchanted me and I had visions beyond comprehension. However, its something which that book forced me to realize that I wish to jot down. Besides the common fact that Quality is the undefined essence of life, the book questions the objective truths . What does a "person" constitute of ? If looked objectively , it would tend to list organic entities, hand, face, legs, mind and so on. But Objective view isn't the only view,rather its a skewed view. So used to believing ( through the senses of sight and reasoning) the individual as an objective entity are we that we get blinded by our own reasoning. Subjectively an individual is much more than the sum of his parts. He is part of a framework. But, what happens when he dies?

When your Friend gets a Girlfriend

Contrary to popular belief that marriage changes a man , these days , they are molded much earlier. I had never imagined during my growing up years that, it would be an issue worth writing , however, as it appears, it very much is.

Love , partly a euphemism for attraction and partly unexplained phenomenon stalks youth very indiscriminately these days. It changes the entire dimension of life for individuals and they begin to see and experience much than what they could or would have had with the bare eyes. Biologically , love is just a set of chemical reaction of hormones that makes one irrational for time being and changes the dimensions completely. I don't intend to get into debating this objective view of love , however, its the ramifications of this love that I am concerned about.

Very certainly it changes the perspective and life of individuals in love tremendously , but how much change does it bring to the friends of couples. Friends of couples have been given unfair treatment in this whole episode of love, although their role is no less important . This injustice can be observed both in day to day life and reel life. They are the catalysts of the relationship yet the are sidelined by the focus on couples.

I shall try to square this iniquity in literature at least. To whatsoever extent ,it does change the life of friends . The change however isn't overnight.It progresses in stages, starting with the guy being busy SMSing or blubbering on phone in aloof, portending an imminent expansion of group and alienation of the guy. Well , these poor souls bear this change with equanimity , but it doesn't stop there. One day it gets official and you have a new member in the group and whether you liked it or not, it has to expand. At this stage guy has to welcome the the inclusion of the new member in the group whole heartedly, and even make amends to his ways to make it comfortable for the new entrant. As days progress he gets used to the friend's ringtones and constant litany of "aur batao". It doesn't stop here,however, he is to be, from now, an advocate of his friend's girlfriend, to sort things out whenever there are signs of strains. This is an uphill task when none of them is ready to oblige and you don't know what is the fight actually for. However, even at the cost of looking foolish he tries sort it out.

And yeah, it doesn't end there as well; now things don't happen as they used to be, it changes diametrically. Plans have to accommodate the whims and fancies of new member. The plight of guy is pitiable when he has to act as the adjutant to his friend's girlfriend and her fantastic plans , for his friend's birthday celebrations and other such events . Poor soul, bears it all for the sake of his friend. And then, as the time progresses, things change irreparably, the connection between you and your friend takes a different dimension. Perhaps that's the course nature has attributed to it.

Amazingly, each of the guys in the group feels this twinge when one of the member gets a girlfriend, but all behave similarly in their own case. Its not that I wish to portray it as a nasty encumbrance, its that there are unsung heroes behind all these affairs and who have been completely neglected . Change is the only constant thing in the universe and hence people keep changing with time. So next time your affair crystallizes , don't forget to thank your friend, his sacrifices aren't less worthy than yours.

Amitabh Bacchan - A Liar?

Did Amitabh Lie? Seems to be an interesting question. Amitabh Bacchan, soul of Indian cinema in 70s and biggest Indian superstar of all time lied. He did. When and how ? Answer to former lies not on a date , but in a span of years and the very same years explain how .

Reality

Reality , an elusive yet pertinent question for any individual. What could we consider as real? The conception of world, that we have , is brought by our thoughts, which is the domain of our mind and thus points that reality lies in our head. Reality is what we think , and nothing else. Let's pause here for a moment and reconsider this suggestion.
If reality is what is in our head, then , whatever isn't in our thoughts shouldn't exist. It implies, if I don't consider an item , it doesn't exist.
Doesn't sound very true , for there are things beyond our thoughts that exist. Nevertheless, it doesn't play down the suggestion made above completely. That which exists outside of our thought's domain , is known to us as existing outside of our mind, this knowledge of existence beyond thought might as well corroborate its existence. Its very similar so as to say , "I know what I know , but I don't know what I don't know". And this gives the possibility of existence of that which is unknown to our thoughts.

From one of the books that I am reading currently, I found that there are two aspects of thought towards an object, Classical and Romantic. Under Classical thought , lies the answer to why and how. Alluding to maintaining a bike, author says, classical thought is like, being aware of the how and why of the bike, so that at any time bike is under your control. You can repair it for you know about it. Romantic thought, lies with the idea of just seeing things as it is. No questions , no altercations, no research. Just as it is. Like seeing your bike as just a mode of transport and not bothering to know whether it has a chain that needs to be greased regularly. Both variety are nonetheless thoughts and this shapes our vision.

However , the author goes on to describe that there is another important aspect that has been overlooked above. That domain which lies beyond thought. He names it as quality.
Quality is an undefined objective truth. Quality branches to classical and romantic version. Whereas classic version is concerned with reasoning, logic and definitions, romantic is concerned with uninterpreted. He says, romantic quality can be understood as that time lag which, although minute, comes up between sight and understanding. When an object is sighted, it is transmitted to mind and interpreted. There is a time lag. This implies that what we see was in the past and present is never seen. This is the romantic ideal.Thus we dont or cant define things as the romantic ideal suggests.
The classical ideal of quality branches into mind and matter. Mind , through its objective reasoning and logic identifies quality in the matter. Quality is that which exists, irrespective of the viewer's understanding, only that it is understood differently by different person.

However, a pertinent question that keeps nagging me is, whatever thought process we may apply in understanding the reality has to come form the mind itself and thus cannot visualize itself. It requires a vantage point which is beyond our minds. A lunatic isn't lunatic to himself, his world is defined in his thoughts and despite of what a "sane" person may think of him, he is still rational in his own world. If thought is that which defines our world , then one's world has to be exist in his thoughts only. There doesn't have to be an objective reality. However , mind rebels against that and points out belligerently towards the objective realities if the world. Its difficult to rise above one's own thoughts and have an opinion on this issue , however, certainly mind is not the absolute , and that which exists beyond it , which is thus not understood by the same definition, can't be detected by it. Thus, for objective reality there is always mind and matter, but for the subjective reality , I can't say. May be "quality", may be not.

Cricket - No Longer a Passionate Game.

We all foresighted this inevitable decay of the so called gentleman's game. However, in our necessity to have a venue which could act as a scapegoat for our daily mundane life, we ignored the onslaught on the cricket culture. Where did this decay begin after all? No such fine line is clearly evident , yet for Indian cricket this largely began during the late nineties when match fixing and other such crime came into limelight. That was perhaps one of the biggest blow to the passion that India had for cricket matches.

However, for a debacle its always a multitude of factors that contribute. Another such debilitating factor was increasing commercialization of the cricket, through endorsements and brand ambassadors from cricket world. When the players started earning unconscionable amount of money , it did affect the game and in particular, the passion of its supporters as well. On the same lines, number of matches played during an year too was increased substantially, which beyond a point, did affect the quality of game and dedication of players.

However, in spite of all these ,marketing prospects for cricket never dwindled in India and thus instead of reinventing its original passion, its underlying structure continually decayed. Now cricket transformed itself from a passionate game to just a game wherein huge amounts of money and advertisement flowed. With the growing pace of the world, Twenty -Twenty cricket, which was just biding its time in the background, arrived with full force. With such a high marketing prospect in India for this version of the game , Lalit Modi bragged the chance with both hands and started the Lucrative IPL. Players started to earn in billions, however, nature and quality of game decayed. Cricket matches, from being an important event into one's personal calendar earlier, became just an another reality show, with added drama and suspense.

Early exit of Indian team from ICC T20 world cup marks a seminal event in the history of Indian cricket. Too much of cricket and money had overwrought and and overwhelmed Indian players. Indian team appeared lackluster from the very beginning and their indifferent attitude worsened the matter. When India was losing against England, I saw Suresh Raina laughing at it. I don't blame him for his attitude , but his laughter appeared to me as a mockery of my passion and of all other cricket fans.

I know I am exaggerating the debacle of Indian team in world cup, and would certainly watch the game in near future. However, one thing has certainly changed for me. Cricket matches are just a thriller tele-serial , no longer a passionate game.

Incarcerated

As the sun fades, and darkness looms,
my cell stays the same, although pain blooms.


since how long has that calender not changed
though sun fades and moon wanes.


Time needs no clock here, time needs no time ,
time in this cell is all but time.

Why be an Atheist?

Why be an atheist? How could one be so sure of something, when everyone around us is not sure about anything, yet searching tirelessly. Why not be an agnostic and play safe? Why go to extremes? Be a jack of both the trades, just as they say,"believe in god , but tie your camel first". Following this line of thought ensures that we are no longer dependent upon that enigmatic concept of "god", yet we protect ourselves against what we don't know. Am I right?

Certainly not, I define my agnosticism as one which doesn't believe in any god and is unsure about the the truths of this world. I cont know , what I don't know, but I know what I see as the God around me is a falsity contrived by the society which has never been sure of anything but has always managed to create venues to base their "principles" on. Being an agnostic to such falsehood, is equivalent to believing in it. Biggest casualty is approach to life, you start to think of life as a planned event organized by some unknown, or believing life to be made of serendipity . Needless to say that all of us experience this contradiction , yet most of us never try to understand the nature of it , rather describe it as an aberration in planner's plan. Come to think of it and you will know that you think so because of your perspective created by people around you , who , most of them, themselves never questioned the way things were around them, and remaining few who got confused in the process opted for the conventional wisdom.

I would not like to be an atheist, I would not like to restrict myself to any fundamental creed. Nevertheless, If being an atheist means shunning the concept of God , as perpetrated by people around me, I would like to call myself an atheist to that extent, but no further.

Selling The Wheel - Review

" Selling the Wheel", is a management book cum novel , written by Jeff Cox. The central idea behind the book is the different variety of sales techniques needed at the different stages of technology evolution. He has demonstrated the different facts through a historic plot. A guy ,Max, chances to invent wheel, which was unknown during old Egyptian days. The way this technology then grows, matures and extracts different requirements is the central idea behind the book.

During the Initial stage when the technology has just born or just evolved, people are skeptic towards adopting it. This stage requires a CLOSER salesman. He is the kind of sales person who is very enthusiastic about new technologies. They are not team players and are after percentage in profits. They do not form closer ties with the customers and are not very concerned about them once the deal is done. The primary characteristic of these people is that they have the knack of closing the deal by resolving all the doubts and issues or by threatening to break the deal or so. During the crucial stage of closing the deal they pose the question to the customer and then stay silent, whosoever then speaks first loses. Generally customers brings out his nagging fears and ends up closing the deal.

However, as the technology grows, the demands of the customers change. After the technology has become somewhat popular , customers demand support for the way they could use the technology. At this stage a WIZARD salesman becomes indispensable. The qualities of s Wizard are that he is a technical person as well as a team player. He values rewards in the form of promotions , achieved through his performance. He is a team player and values his customers. He may or may not deal with the same customer twice, but he does seek to solve customers issues. He takes presentations for the large group of the customer organization and could convince all. He would write into journals and thus advertise about the technology by raising the talk about it in the technical circle. However, they tend to overlook some customer requirements and have strong inclination to technology than to exact customer needs.

As the technology matures further, customer starts demanding full support and product develops incrementally. The organizations have to be concerned that the incremental changes do not drive up the prices considerably. Also, the customer prefer to deal with the person whom they could trust and would act as their advocate. At this stage a BUILDER is required. Primary characteristic if the builder is a long term relationship with the customers and act as their advocate in their organizations. They ensure the customers demands are met and get the proper price for it as well . They are Teams players and would deal with the same customer again and again. They prefer staying in the sales itself.

In the final phase when the technology has become ubiquitous, the equations change. The organizations have to change their strategies and diversify the portfolios of their organizations. At this stage a customer doesn't require much guidance , but the best price . A CAPTAIN is required at this stage who would manage the crew of salesmen . The primary feature of his is that he is a team player. They drive out ways to enhance customer satisfaction and push up sales through advertisement and customer services.

After the technology has reached its maturity , its ready to be taken over by another technology and the cycle repeats. However, market is largest at the last stage , around 90%. while at the the first stage the market is smallest , around 1-2%. However the mrgins are much higher in latter case than former.

It was a great book which deftly projected the different type of sales methodology as well as the life cycle of technology. A must read.

Writeups - How effective?

Why do we find literary world to be so far away from reality ? Idealistic assumptions made in literary works envisions rational process for every action, but that seldom happens. Or to put more plainly, why do , whatever we write , differ so very much from the ground reality ?

Perhaps, a plausible answer lies in the question itself. Writing , assumes human being to be a rational animal , who takes rational decisions 24X7 , although, we all know , how rational we are. A person makes multitude of irrational decisions in his life, for which it has no answers.

A literary piece assumes the world to be made up of a known set of beliefs and patterns, or at least a world which is expected to run in that fashion. In doing so a write up restricts itself to its own limitation of incomplete knowledge of human life.

Nevertheless, literary media is far ahead of other forms of media in being closer to life and it has its own reasons for that. A literary piece doesn't require dependency upon others, its commercially cheaper to pursue, but the most important fact is that , our expressed thoughts, are primarily controlled by our language, and language acts as the guide of the unbridled ride which our mind is capable to take. Controlled by our language, thoughts get a direction to move on paper.

If a piece of writing is so imperfect by its own right, why is it revered highly? One plain reason, is that it provides alternatives to what we see around us. It guides our way towards alternative truths of life, and thus manifesting in itself the implausibility of a single absolute truth. Its for this very reason, I think one should write, howsoever imperfect it may seem to him or her. It always serves to clear up our thoughts and perception of life.

India - a mythical concept.

Our growth is accompanied by a set of beliefs that we nurture with time. One such belief was a universal concept of India as a nation. Imagining India to be a country formulated out of its own birthright. However, with time the building blocks of this belief eroded. What I found was ; India was a country formulated by the vested interests of middle classes of different regions located in topographical vicinity. India was just an incidental country formed out of the will of varied races to live in peace and prosperity.

And in doing so , India was no different from many other countries of the world. Why then did it hurt to realize this truth about India? Reason for that perhaps lies in the nature of freedom struggle that India undertook. India didn't exist , until revolutionaries came together and when they did come together, they provided and envisioned a uniform and single view of the country despite its vast cultural, linguistic, religious and social varieties. Considerable effort was made to drive home the point that "we" are one nation , and we should come together to face this oppressive regime suppressing our liberties. Literature played its part in enforcing this point,just as, "Jana Gana Man",took care of all the regions of the land. This redrawing of Indian political border, and uniting all of them under it , presented an illusion of a uniform India. I wasn't born in history , and thus I can't make objective remarks on the past, but it appears to me that , "India was united in adversity but is divided in prosperity".

Jingoism,parochialism, chauvinism, aren't new phenomenon to be observed. Mirage of human upliftment through education provides a mistaken belief of extinction of these terms. A non parochial India is an elusive dream, and will remain so , until the economical factors of the region balance out the inequities among different regions.

Shashi Tharoor in his masterpiece work on Indian history has aptly pointed out that India is a collection of minorities. Dividing lines are numerous, and yet it somehow manages to stay together. North and South, Hindu and Muslim, Bihari and Punjabi, Tamil and Kannadiga, the list is endless. And the truth is that it is a reality. Hence ,when those guys out there in Australia decry the attacks on Indian students as racism practiced by Australians, I would urge them to look in their own backyard and understand .Racism comes from the very notion of success and failure. Patronizing one person over another based on certain features acts as the roots of racism.

Why do I write such a wanton piece on India? Its because, its considered too sacrilegious a subject to be discussed, because its a sham to shout at the top of your voice to be an Indian , ignoring the hard facts in your backyard. I can recall what one of my friend, frustrated of racism against Northies in South India said, "India as a nation is a bogus concept. Administrative Jobs are popular because it empowers you over and above the fragile structure of Indian democracy. Common man like us will always have to bear this pain of racism." He was exaggerating for sure, but to what extent ?

Wonderful Wonder La!

A repetitive yet wonderful phenomenon en route holiday trip is the desire to peek out of the speeding vehicle, musing over the nothingness speeding in front. Sight of verdant and undulating landscapes drive the chain of thoughts. Slowly, the veneer of rationality erodes and an irrational peace sprawls over. Sight of world passing away from you, with haste, seeds a poem into the mind. All of a sudden, world seems to have grown beyond what we thought of it.


Trip to Wonder La wasn’t any exception in the way it started. And it wasn’t any different in the way it surprised me later. Surprise offered was peppered with an excellent breezy weather. Clouds hovered over the sky; however they seemed to be in no mood to come down too soon. Right after we stepped in an impulse of energy took control of us. Going ahead with the plan to go for all the high thrill rides we started with a comparatively milder ride. Our energy level had soared and we were raring to go for other rides. Every next ride that we took , exceeded our expectations and completely enthralled us. It was fun to open your eyes and watch the world go berserk around you. One of rides , which rotated and revolved and rotated and so on .. , off course, certainly drove you insane. Viewing world with all the angles affirmed my belief that world is not completely what we think of it , a lot of it is hidden and unknown to us.

After having successfully , won over most of the rides, the best or worst , as you may think, was reserved for the last one. Just after the ride started , I felt I was going to puke, and yeah, I puked at the next rotation , I saw the puke of lays and Tropicana in front of my eyes, and the next moment they sprawled over my face , and over few other unlucky ones' too. I hoped that the ride would stop, but it didn’t and I puked again. Hmm! Bad experience you may say, but I didn’t mind it much. Rather I enjoyed, of course not the taste.

After cleaning up it was time for wet rides but we were a hungry lot now. We took our lunch and I took care to have it lighter this time around, for no matter how much you enjoy puking, you don’t enjoy its taste. Wet rides appeared to be easier , but not actually. It hit you on your back, front, testicles, tummy, and what not . I guess no part of body was left unscathed. Next to come was wave pool, filled all around with couples. Riding over the wave was fun, jumping over the waves was relaxing. Once in a a while you would mistime the jump and , obviously, wave would gush into to your nose and that wasn't anything enjoyable. But if you got caught with it, you were to be ready for an another gush . There was no relenting sign from the waves. Analogies, generally run the risk of being misplaced, nevertheless , I would state it. Waves are like events in life, You take part in every event, jump with it, but sometime you may mistime it and then your are beaten out, but if you don’t get off after being hit soon enough , you are liable to be hit by another wave of life, the secret is thus to keep jumping and once beaten , getting back up to face next wave of life. Ahh!! Philosophy, thou are present all around me , and I leave no chance to take a refreshing sip of thou.


By the end of the day, paradoxically, we were more enthused, more active. After having a good time , we boarded our cab to head back home. We felt lighter and calmer while returning, as if all the burden , if there were any, has been dropped off and has gone for a ride. I peep put of the vehicle again, roads are dark now, but the world still speeds past me. Ahh! The phenomenon revisits me , and I am sure , it would visit again on my next journey.

Women and Feminism

Inasmuch as we men know, women are not us and thus it makes them "they". How could this riddle be solved. If in the order of nature a complement was required for everyone , and thus manifesting duality, then why did this duality become so perplexing. Throughout animal kingdom , male dominates its female counterpart. This hasn't changed to this date, while with the Homo Sapiens its been a remarkable shift since the times of fabled Adam and Eve.

Humans differ from animals , very remarkably , in their power to think. Human beings could read a situation, analyze it and then act as per their moral deductions. Can we , then, attribute the rise in the status of women in the society to the thinking power of men. It seems to be so . In a very recent debate about the post poll results , M J Akbar, made a point about BJPs failure, "BJP fails to understand why India is secular. It is not secular because it houses so many religions together. It is secular because the Hindus (majority) of India are secular". Drawing parallels from this can we deduce the reason for rise in the status of women in the society , "Men recognized ( by virtue of improved education and other conditions ) that women deserve equal space in the society ".
At least it must have had started this way, and slowly as the wave of change gained traction from different sections , women overpowered the authoritative men and came up in the strata. Even today in the orthodox societies,like ours, women are tethered by authoritative male . However, with the advent of time and educational quality of the large swathe of our population , the trend is almost sure to change , but the resultant effect is going to be quite unpredictable. It could very well be a new way with the mix of traditional value and individualistic freedom, as could be seen to some degrees in our urban populace.

But is feminism all about raising the say of women in the society. It seems to have skewed onto that notion. Women had their own space of favor and respect in every period of history. That still remains as its niche. However, with the growing lure of coming up on the front and be at the helm, feminism has ignored the women in traditional yet significant roles.

Speaking non-politically, in larger part of our society, women is an object of pleasure, care,warmth, love but not of authority. She is not entitled to choose her own way of life. Boys enjoy special privilege since boys don't get pregnant. Huh! what a sham!

But society, in pursuit of maintaining its framework needs to chain the women. What would happen to the existing order if women were to go astray. This specious argument reeks of chauvinism and racism , albeit wrapped in a wool of social concern . In a civilized society , if we could consider ourselves to be so, why can't women declare their own way and their own framework of society . Let the reins of everyone's life be in their own hands, and a society be formed of the individual will and not by forced subjugation.

Wishful as these Ideas may seem to be , for world is not yet perfect , not yet civilized to the extent to accommodate both the sexes with equivalent status, they are very pertinent .World would tale time to mature to the next level,till that time , there will be censures and rebukes on both sides of the conservationists and the feminists , until one day when feminism tips over its bar and stands shoulder to shoulder. Till that time we men continue to shamefully pride ourselves as better race.

Critique of a NYT article "Atheism and Evidence"

Stanley Fish's article http://fish.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/06/17/atheism-and-evidence/?apage=18#comment-84763 on atheism was in bad taste. He says,

The reasons you must give, however, do not come from outside your faith, but follow from it and flesh it out.

which at best appears to be a circular argument. If the above mentioned argument is supposed to be tenable , it seems to imply that reasoning is just a tool to bolster your faith. So, what are we left with in that case ? Faith as an absolute ? This specious argument tries to ensconce itself on the nebulous nature of interaction between faith and reasoning. Faith is not derived from reasoning, at least not in entirety , it is instilled by our environment and blossomed by reasoning , but reasoning goes further than that, it challenges existing beliefs by the way of observation and transforms or expands the existing faith , depending upon the effect of observation and deductions. Thus , we find that reason doesn't depend entirely upon faith , but rather draws in from its observations power and shapes faith.

Moving further he quotes that ,

I “believe in evolution,” Dawkins declares, “because the evidence supports it”; but the evidence is evidence only because he is seeing with Darwin-directed eyes.The evidence at once supports his faith and is evidence by virtue of it.

In stating this he has completely missed the bus. We don't believe in Darwin , because we have Darwin-directed eyes. We believe in natural selection because evidence supports it. If evidence points out that natural selection was not correct in entirety , then we would , based on evidence, change our belief.

Fish's argument above implies that , if you don't look with Darwin-directed eyes, all the evidence appears absurdity, but lets see why is Darwin relevant . He is relevant because he provides a pattern (faith) based on the observation (reasoning) and evidence, which is a step towards understanding the vastly non-understood subject, but what does Fish suggest over here, " I don't believe that the pattern (faith) by Darwin is right" . Fine , then, offer evidences, and if someone has better evidence we would mold our faiths accordingly and not be sulking about the "glasses" as Fish does.

He has seriously mistaken between the faith promulgated by reasoning and reasoning justifying faith. Reasoning doesn't always justify faith, it rather shapes faith. He concludes by stating that atheists (Richard Dawkins) must revisit their arguments, and in stating that he again misses the central point expostulated by Dawkins. In his book, God Delusion, Dawkins provides arguments/evidences against the faiths established by the reasoning given in support of GOD, while at the same time , he stresses on the fact that we don't know all and urges to draw our own conclusions by our own observations.In doing that he stresses upon reasoning through observation , effects of which could be the reversal of faith. There is a single important difference between the Reasoning of Dawkins and Faith of Fish, Fish needs more evidence.

Happiness and sadness

Is black and white overemphasized and given undue recognition which is out of place? Is duality the nature's de-facto? The precepts have evolved from times immemorial , and although we live in this colorful world, we have a hard time extricating ourselves from a definitive black and white. When the Chinese Ying-Yang incorporates both black and white , eliciting the nature's law, isn't it restricting itself. Any person on earth could testify that he/she experiences himself and his life to be made up of countless distinct colors, even imperceptible at times.

Goal. A Process of Constant Improvement. Review.

The Goal is a management cum novel styled book by Goldratt. In the book he brings forth the idea of arriving a solution to a problem by adhering to scientific method. The method shall entail a series of questions about the existing setup and then arriving at a near-best solution. In the book he very clearly shuns the idea of absolute truths and advises to practice science as process of discovering better truths rather than an absolute truth.

In the book he goes about narrating an issue faced by a Production manager at his plant and how he , with the help of others , through the process of constant improvement arrives at a better production capacity for his plant, and thus saves his plant from closure.

Towards this process of improvement the very first question which has to be identified is, "What is the Goal?" Once that is identified the next set of action shall be targeted towards identifying the factors that prohibit the realization of the Goal.
In the book, related to a manufacturing plant he identifies that the Goal of plant is to make money , and then goes about to identify the inhibitors for that . Towards explaining it he proffers new definitions for the very basic terms used in a production industry.

Throughput- Rate at which the system generates money through sales.
Inventory- Inventory is all the money that the system has invested in purchasing things which it intends to sell
Operating Expense - Operational expense is all the money the system spends in order to turn inventory into throughput.

Along with that he also explain craftily the concept of bottlenecks controlling the throughput and thus sales of an organization. He derives the inferences, by the scientific process of asking the questions and finding the right answers for them. Explaining it he derives the concept of having the slowest operation at the beginning while the most efficient and non-bottle necks at the end. This would minimize the operating cost and inventory as well.

As the solution of deciding the position of a bottleneck may not be possible in a practical scenario, he advises to improve upon the efficiency of the bottlenecks . The efficiency or the rate at which the system releases result would be decided by the efficiency of the bottleneck . Explaining this through a troop scenario, he establishes a constraint link between the bottleneck in the middle and leader in front and thereby achieving the minimum time to move the entire system together. Explaining the theory of these constraints he also elicits the inefficiency of a system generated by the extra work done on non-bottlenecks and thereby positing the maxim that an organization that works all time is non efficient and arrives at a general rule :

the level of utilization of a non-bottleneck is not determined by its own potential, but by some other constraint in the system.

In the entire book he stresses upon the fact of scientific temper of questioning and arriving at a solution. The motif being bottlenecks. In the end he formulates a general rule , but leaves it open to the reader to improve upon it.


1. IDENTIFY the system's constraint(s).
2. Decide how to EXPLOIT the system's constraint(s).
3. SUBORDINATE everything else to the above decision.
4. ELEVATE the system's constraint(s).
5. WARNING!!!! If in the previous steps a constraint has been broken, go back to step 1, but do not allow INERTIA to cause a system's constraint.

The narrative style of the book is very captive . The process of constant improvement is what the book's title says, and adheres to all through the book.

Declining Voters. Where is Election Comission?

Recent ad campaign for Voting in India , has been anything but effective. Voter turnout percentages have been in declivity and more so in the urban metropolis, the prime target of the campaign. More than that of the apathy of Indian middle class it marks a lack of trust in any political outfit and ideology. Indian voting ensues a choice to be made of bad among worse , isn't that as good as not-voting. At least the disillusioned middle class thinks so.

The failure of the entire ad campaign could be traced down to this very core issue of people's indifference towards the elected. Had the campaign enthused voters to come ahead and vote against those compromising candidates the result could have had been somewhat different. Instead of asking people to vote , ask them to get the unwanted voted out. Although its a negative approach to pursue, I am certain that it would send a strong message into the political circles , who have so grossly undermined the authority of political leadership .

However, an ad-campaign has its limitations. I still doubt , it would have raked up the numbers on poll days. As Malcom Gladwell has pointed pointed out in his book , that an advertisement has to have content that would relate to people, something that they would understand. And this political mumble jumble , ostensibly simplified by catchy phrases, such as ,"vote for change" is more likely to fizzle out.

Having said all of this, democracy cannot mature unless people vote, and towards this there ought to be a mass awareness and ownership. As a first step it is necessary get the folks into the fray and participate in elections. Election commission, which has so far done a very commendable job this year could take cue from its recent success and take a step further towards deciphering ways to increase the poll percentages. Election commission is entrusted with the responsibility to conduct free and fair elections . It is certainly not fair on part of the Election Commission to shirk this challenge , which would further add credibility to the institution.
What are the possible ways? That is something which needs to be found, discussed, debated, documented and analyzed. As Kiran Bedi has doled out one of the ways , "scrap the poll day as holiday and see the improvement". I do not completely endorse the idea , but let the people in charge discuss it, debate it and then come up with new ideas to ensure that the elections which they have made free is , actually "fair" in a wider term.

A diary entry

Its been while since I last brushed my strokes. On a dark night last week, I set off my home, with blood gushing into my head and my left testicles wriggling with pain. It was anger , and it moved me, it took me to distances far and wide. Tear would well up intermittently , but would be held back by the anger seething within my heart. I kept walking , until I could find a place to be at one with my own self.
A gathering of trees invited me to its bosom, to muse over the matter . My sense of anger rebelled against any reconciliation. This moment enveloped all the gloom and despair and sprawled it over my existence. Questions were springing up in quick successions, but the answers never appeared in near distance. Tired , I foundered the boat of questions into the ocean of my eyes. It brimmed with tears and ran through my face in serpentine paths,stuck to the chin , until it finally dropped off it , only to be lost in the ground beneath.
And when , I was defeated with myself, I felt a strong urge to land it all into the name of "GOD". Hand it all to HIM and drop he burden off my shoulder. The lure was strong enough to land into that well of falsehood. That pool of unknown and undefined invited me to surrender myself into it. I felt a vacuum of ideas, faith and a fear of unknown crept over me. I rummaged through the words known to me from the greats of the world, they inspired me , but none could lift me up. This moment made all of that meaningless. What was my faith then? Was I to look within me ? That was too cliche`d a term . Snubbing them all I rose and left behind all that I was carrying. It was so very simple and direct.

Days after when I remember that night , I wonder what was different that night. What was becoming of me. I feel sometimes an eerie sense of joy , a sense of unleashed spirit, a sense of unknown freedom. And then its so subtle that the moment I try to capture it vanishes. Its mystic and yet I cant use that phrase to define it.

Post-Modernism is the idea, where people don't dole out statutes for way a human being is to be , based on the conceived truths, but rather, focuses on why a human being acts in a certain way and suggests a way to improve upon that , based on the individual's milieu. It very certainly abjures absolute truths and seeks to identify individual truths. Bot of those could be quite different and at times poles apart. Knowing things from the prospective of why they are so in the first place paves way for a sustainable and amicable change.

The concept seems to be novel and very different, but again as an individual it still leaves the choice open , whether I wish to pursue it.

Enroute Redemption.

"He is dying there, relieve him of the pain! Expedite his transition . Shoot him!!", shouted Ark. Som quivered at the suggestion , looked around with alacrity . It was desolate, dark and dank. Evening drizzle had enveloped the entire barren expanse of land , and so has had death . Vrks was dying, bleeding profusely through his belly , inching slowly towards inevitable. He looked with wistful eyes towards Som, begging of redemption. Som didnt reciprocate his looks, and constantly looked in other direction with misty eyes. "Som, you cant alter the inexorable, go ahead! ", shouted Ark, holding Som by his hands.
Ark scampered through the overcoat of Som and took out the gun, held it on the forhead of Vrks and looked behind. "If you are not going to do it ! Someone has to do it, Som". Som turned around, took the Gun from Ark and shot Vrks on his forhead and threw the gun. "Come on Ark, Vrks rests in peace now".

Vrks lay there in pool of blood , with his redemptive gun lying by his side. As Som walked out of the scene , he reckoned that he had just shot his brother. What had led to this was an altogether different story, for now he lied there , devoid of soul, a material ball to decompose .

{To Continue ...}

Ideology and Us

Ideology, the one thing you would stand for , no matter what the rest of world thinks, is hard to come by . Whom would you associate your ideology with and what is the end result of those ideologies? Whether we accept it or not , in our daily life we live through a society. A society in which all of us perform our parts and are mutually interdependent upon each other. A novel concept in all likelihood shall be the one which would be understood by few and accepted by lesser few of them . How do you stand on with it then ? Do you snub that entire mass of opponents to your idea or do you c0ompormise and go together with them ?

What is it that we fear when we stand against society ? Castigation .Becoming an Outcast? If the fear is so powerful so as to override the ideology then probably the time for that ideology hasn't arrived. But if the fear loses its value and your principle shines bright , then you stand for it !
Death is not the biggest fear we have, nonetheless its not irrelevant as well. But between life and death , the death which wipes your existence and not the one which you have already met numerous times, lies a lot to loose and and an equally lot to gain. To what extent are we ready to lose to gain what we want to gain is a difficult question,but the answer is what we always seek . As a human being, that part of me which revolts against the society is my mind, but how do I trust it ? Is it an independent identity to determine its own future on its own ? Doesn't it need anyone else for its survival ? If it does then it doesn't have the authority to propagate ideas that don't satisfy the normalcy. It shouldn't give in to paradoxes. If its survival is dependent upon those ideologies which it couldn't conform , its creating paradoxes by not being subservient to those ideals that feed it , that keep it alive . However, if the same is not true, it is independent . It stands on its own . It stands on its own capacity and then expounds its own belief system unmutilated by the conventional wisdom of the society.
What do I conclude from the litanies above? I don't know , my mind isn't independent enough yet to conclude anything. It's an unruly slave to the conventional wisdom.

Bhutta waali

"Unless we have equality in our society , it will only remain divided and unstable. Howsoever elusive it may seem to be , communism is the only way to achieve stability", ranted a socialist during a TV debate. Being too pissed off of the nonsense being uttered I got off to ramble around. It was a cool calm evening of Darbhanga , which lasts for few days an year only. I wished to walk around the empty field, and for company thought of buying baked bhutta. There were too many options in terms of the sellers, I landed onto the one where a middle aged lady was sitting with a child around 10 years of age. She was baking bhutta on charcoal. Seeing me approaching see took out a bhutta for me , I felt the toughness of corn and retorted, " no , this is too hard". She smiled back, "babu! take this one, its tender and sweet!" I protested , "No! I want other one!", perhaps to show who the boss was! " . All right ! she brought out another one and started baking it. A quaint smile was sprawled all over her face. It was a caring smile, a peaceful smile, a smile found on face after achieving the satisfaction of a victory. What victory did she had today ? I wondered.

She was meanwhile tutoring her son as well , as when to pluck out the maize off the field. When is the best time to get it off the field and he seemed to understand it all. That scene of a child getting the knowledge of survival from her mother seemed like they way Krishna taught Arjuna in battlefield. Although the child here was not confused as Arjuna was.
In the process she kept negotiating with other buyers as well , and perhaps indicated her son to follow her in the art of negotiation. My bhutta was ready meanwhile and I handed her a 20 Rs. note . I was a bit lost into the calculation as to how much would they earn in a day. At most 100. Not more than that. But there was no sign of pain on their face, as pain has forgotten their address or may be they have grown inured to the daily challenges of life.

Well I took the change and bhutta and went ahead thinking about it. About the disparity. About the honesty of the poor even though they have everything to loose. How much they charged for a bhutta? I saw that the change was 7 rs. She must have charged 3 rs. It just then that I remembered that I had given her 20 rs. note. She should have had returned 13.
Did she cheat ? Or had she mistaken. I thought of lambasting the lady for this, just when the face of child and his mother came in front of me. How much will she gain my cheating me of 10 rs., may she will be able to give him a better food for the day. Or may be sweets tonight. I couldn't decide what should I do ? Also , I was apprehensive that she might refute my claims of giving her 20 rs note. All my assumptions of poor's honesty was drowned. It was not that I would have minded loss of 10 rs .

After some minutes of debating with myself I decided to get the money back . I went to her and told that I had given you 20 rs. note, expecting a refusal from her side. However, she immediately apologized, beat her knuckles against her head and returned a 10 rs. note to me, still smiling the same way. I felt sorry for her, though it appeared reverse.

I don't know why I went back to claim my money. I don't have an answer to that. Maybe I didn't want to dole out alms to her or may be I was too cynic with the thought that she might have had cheated. I went with bhutta to the field to roam about, only that I had more companions now, her persistent smile and my heavy heart.

Growing up with media.

Its an amazing coordination between genes and environment. Both look out for the best compatibility of situations , thereby influencing each other considerably. How much of a person's traits and beliefs are personal or environmental , cannot be said for sure. In the same context it would be interesting to observe the role that media plays in our lives.

Media is the conduit through which the voices (influential and powerful), ideas, thoughts, beliefs percolate down the social structure. If I consider my own childhood to be an archetype ,I would consider media as my second parent. It is true that I got my values and beliefs from my parents and guardians, however its nonetheless very true that I got another set of guided support from the movies, soaps, etc. They shaped my thoughts in a certain way , which is quite irreversible now. The real damage was that of perception, caused by the truths perpetrated by them , with elements of untruth embedded. To name the few conceptions that I have grown up with and nurtured from them was of a black and white world, afterlife horrors, sex and death as taboos, "and they lived happily ever after", definitions and requirements of love, narrow nationalism, "us" and "them" line of separation and so on and so forth. I don't intend to say that it was solely there "gifts" to my inquisitive mind, my own personal inclinations too molded the facts and accepted it. The real issue was that the underlying falsehood was wrapped in a glittering , shiny wrapper of truth which made me accept the whole package as sole truth.

Needless to say that all of those leanings that I grew up with suffered serious jolts. It shook up the very foundation I was raised on. A person may say that he follows no principles in his life, but then again that is his principle. And so as these "maxims" were eroded with time, my underlying base got too weakened to be referred to. I gave in to confusions, indeterminism, agnosticism. Although, I have discussed it in the terms of my own growth , I very confidentially presume that the story won't be too very different for you. Particulars and durations may differ, but the underlying facts would be the same for most of us.

However, as every dark cloud has silver lining , I understand that by employing our own brains, our own reasoning, our own rationality, we will expunge the adopted "values" and shall create our own "values", the one we truly believe in. It appears difficult and confusing, not very different from the former, but the fact that its you who are at the helm of the affairs now, compensates.

Beauty of writing.

Why write? Whats so special about writing ? Should everyone in his capacity write something? Is writing as essential as other cognitive processes . An old Chinese proverb says , " The weakest ink lasts longer than the strongest mind". No doubt we all would agree to this mandarin quote, however , its not only due to the longer lasting capacity of ink that writing is important. There is an another important factor .

Human mind has an amazing capacity to change tracks, parallelize as well as diversify. Also it has a strong capacity to visualize abstractions. However, the same agility that provides it great resilience also proves a bane to the clarity of abstract concepts. Till the time it becomes clear it remains a mess of ideas, concepts intermingled and mixed. Once these thoughts get out of the realms of the mind and land onto the paper, it starts getting clearer. Problem solving techniques too stress upon the utility of writing. Once you write the problem down and visualize it , brain gets channel in a straight direction , stops wandering and acts on the problem. It wouldn't be wrong to say , to write down a problem is like half solving it.
However, besides problem solving there are several benefits. Even writing down your day to day problem on a sheet of paper helps you to get a better view of it. Several novelists like Ayn Rand wrote intensively in the newspaper articles before she started with her book in order to gain clarity and give structure to her thoughts. Thoughts are like an unbridled horse , free to prance in any direction, but writing provides a direction to the thoughts.

Its not necessary that whatever we write will be perfectly structured but the fact that we can always come back to it and realize where did we waver gives us a proper self analysis. A very small experiment shall be worthy of emulation. On a day , when u are taking leisure, take a pen and paper and start writing. Don't worry about whats coming out on the paper. Go on writing incessantly for some time . Stop after say 10 -15 mins. You will be amazed to see what you have jotted down. What happened was as we start writing while being consciously aware of the process itself mind wavers in every direction . Probably whatever you write wont be congruous in the initial stage. But slowly your subconscious instinct takes over you, and then your subconscious self writes , and its always amazing to find the results. This technique is largely used in psychoanalysis to identify what lies in the corners of mind.
Verily you would agree with me now that writing is as important as reading and visualizing or thinking. However, the good thing is that you too can realize it by just starting it right now. Go ahead. Happy writing. May the beauty of it manifest itself to you.

On a nostalgic note.

Next song popped up on my lappy. I knew the song, It has been long since I had listened to this song. "Hum to hain pardes mein, Desh mein nikla hoga chaand". Nostalgia overtook me, in a flash.

Images conjured up to my mind. I am lying on a chowki , all alone, bathed in milky moonlight. May be I am not all alone , I am accompanied by the moon and the serenity surrounding me. Gentle breeze sways over my sweaty body and sweeps all my worries.

In lethargy

Boredom, lack of purpose, lethargy, banality, unexciting, all these adjectives tend to mark only one point. That you are not liking what you are doing . Jump a wall , walk a mile, hum a song or do everything wrong. Plethora of options , yet lacking in motivation. Any possible road appears to be overused, mind seems to be overwrought with nothingness. What pleasure does this state of existence give ? Hard to tell but impossible to ignore.

Whither go you?

Rush now! This drizzle ain't gonna stop soon. Why does it have to rain so much in Bangalore ? I am already down with cold and getting wet in this drizzle is certainly not helping me out.

Everything's so wet , dirty and cold. Goddamn these roads. Potholes filled to the brim and rain water splashing onto my pant. Get home fast , its horrible . It sucks boy! I cant see the road ahead clearly and I shiver of the chill that runs down my body. A dry comfort at home would be so good to have now. These goddamn cars, why do they have to overtake on a rainy day, all of them seem to have connived to ground me.

Ah! here comes the hotel. I feel hungry. I should have dinner before rushing any more. I wish I were in home as soon as possible , but as there would be no food back there , I should have my dinner first.Dinner tastes good but waste of time beats against my mind persistently. I am still shivering with cold. Rush to home , how good would it be at home now , in my blanket .

I leave after having my dinner and after a mad driver for few minutes reach my house. Feels good to be back home. Its warm and cozy. I shall take leisure now, the beauty and warmth of my home. Boy! its heavenly.

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I have been lying in here for two hours now, blanket's too hot now. I get restless and look out of the window. Its still raining outside. The rain outside looks so pretty . Its chill and coolness entices me for it. Ahh! how I wish to be out in the rain

Just an another day today.

Just an another day today. Air is dry and Sun is blistering. Wearily I prepare to leave for office. My mind is full of questions. Questions of what? I can't say for sure. I guess that is what give so much intensity to the question. I just reckon the to do's of the day , but that doesn't hold my attention for long. Very frequently the question bangs against my mind. Who am I? What am I? How do I know myself? What is my Identity? How do I travel into the realms of the unexplored domain of mind and search myself. I am my mind, my reason, my logic. But then why doesn't it manifest itself. Am I not an animal, striving to fulfill its needs but could never see the peace within. If my mind is me, why does it thinks against me? If my mind is me why doesn't it seek life? How could my mind turn a traitor against me, thereby against itself. Its paradoxical. Is it self destroying? If so it must have been destroyed by now. I know that it seeks existence, but then why is it that it acts against life.In the Upanishads it is said that our goal is to realize self, its self that gives identity to this world. Where has this self gone? What leashes this valiant mind and subdues it ? What does it fear? What does it want to be? What does it wish to avoid? With the net result of further confusing myself, I leave house with a hanging face.

On my bike now, driving to office. Gentle breeze blows against my face, dead leaves fall off the trees and spread in front of me. Its the spring time, the time when old sheds itself and gives way to new. Lost in these I gaze at the dried branches of the trees around. Barren as they are, yet hopeful of new life. I take a look around me and find multitude of people buzzing. Are they too dead , ready to give way to new life? It seems truer to me in my own context. But to what life have I paved the way?

Wheel rolls at 60Km/ph and I am at office now, weary of beginning the day. It has to begin but. For until I am the dead leaf of the tree of life, I am alive. Till then I know that my mind is alive as well. The struggle between me and my mind shall continue this way, hoping that some day they may reconcile and move together. Digging deep I hit upon a plausible reason of conflict. My mind is a free entity but I am the product of others mind and so are they. I am the part of that long chain of blinded people held together with ignorance. My mind tends to act as my liberator but I tend to be bound. Could they ever come together? I don't know? But a strong conviction that I have in unison with my mind is that knowledge will liberate me and will bring us together. Knowledge is what I should seek for it holds the promise of liberation for me. I could be right this time. It holds the promise for me. Knowledge. It guides me to a purpose. Cautiously optimistic as I am, I feel good about it, but that traitor knows something that I don't and smirks at me silently.

"Slumdog Millionaire". How true in its Intentions?

Slumdog millionaire was just an another movie depicting the tenacity of human survival against all odds. However, its not very unusual about the western world to lap it up, and shower it with numerous awards. It would have had been interesting to see how the same movie would have had fared had it not been based on Indian context.
Slums in India represents a spirit of survival despite all odds, nevertheless, a middle class worker, who toils hard to make ends meet, is no less a symbol of human spirit. One spirit cannot be said to be better than the other one, as both vie for the same goal, existence. However, a movie or a narrative based on that scenario wouldn't draw accolades. As an artist you tend to go to extremes, and the easiest shortcut is placed right infront of you. poverty and filth of India.Every country has its share of issues, so does India.Doesn't this question the ethics of the artist? Isn't he seeking the shortest path to success?
Can they do a self check and ask themselves, what their motive is.Fame or Art?.As of now It seems former is truer.

An allegorical act

Like a rodent it maneuvers to manage its fodder. Hiding and slithering through the surreptitious hides, it arranges the food for itself. How was it supposed to know the difference that the brains created. A motley collection of wayward thoughts, a precarious sense of achievement and a gloomy sense of loss. Despite of all the chances that it had , it stayed far away from achieving the impossible.

An excursion to remember

It was to end the way it had started. We were devoid of all enthusiasm and energy. It was all drained out. Even the start wasn't a convincing one. Despite of all odds we managed to go ahead with a fragile plan. Weather was chilling us when we began, just as the way sweat was drenching us few hours later.As we moved ahead mist engulfed us into its bosoms , wind started howling into our ears and the earth shaked us from beneath. Eyes were moist the face was frost. A stream dripped off the nose and road ahead was lost. But We were in motion, oblivious of ourselves, but nevertheless in motion.

Just then a strong beam of light emanated from the front. It was the ray that came out from heaven itself. It blinded us all for a moment and we didn't knew when it went past us. It was all back to normal again. The mist had disappeared and the azure sky loomed large in front of our eyes, It was not the sky however, which was to be conquered, it was that hill in the near distance. Zenith had reddened with the sign of an imminent sunrise and encircled us . The redness of the circumference appeared like a fiery tiara on the head of the hill.

To be continued ...

Jattan

It was power cut once again."Jattan! It seems out phase only has blown up, no one else is at home now, go to the main pole and get it fixed now. Its too very hot today."

Ram Jattan, a pseudo servant serving his master , in gratitude of a government job of peon arranged by his master , ten years ago, was completely unaware of the process to fix that blown up phase. He though at once of refusing but his inner self chided him at this thought. This mere idea of insolent behavior on his part was utterly unacceptable to his self.He had seen other people fixing it by poking their stick at the wire junction on the electricity pole, but, he had never done it himself, and more so he wasn't sure if this would work as well. However, bound by his obeisance to him he decided to give it a try. It was getting late anyways and he had to go back to his home as early, as he had to go to railway station early morning tomorrow to fetch his sahab's elder son.

A letter to editor.

Sir,
Referring to the editorial by Mr. Harish khare, I would like to second the concern raised by him. These tendencies towards a "fascist" rule supplanting a democratic rule must be avoided. The bourgeois class of India has no faith left politicians post Gandhi/Nehru era, and it just serves to disseminate those tendencies, however, the way out is for them to take part into the mainstream democrcay , rather than standing on the sidelines and intermitteltly raising slogans slamming the system. Politicians come from our society itself and they are as good as people themselves.
Its time that the self-indulgent middle class looks beyond its immediate personal interests and be an active participant in the building of the nation.If the voices are to be raised ,they should be raised for a more efficient, inclusive and non-corrupt democracy. That would serve the purpose better than cutting itself out and giving rise to fascist tendencies.

Indians and their gods.

"God is an infinite source of energy", said a plank put up by our physics teacher. During those adolescent days, when questions had begun to unrest the soul, it seemed as a perfect haven for peace. Being born in a Brahman family, I was close in quarters with this idea. Daily prayer after bath, reciting chalisas to elders, listening to the daily litanies of elders shaped my faith. It built in me a notion of an unknown supreme power moving along , to whom if I paid daily reverence through my prayers and right conduct , I shall be rewarded with His blessings. I am the story is almost the same for almost all middle class Indian households, more so in middle and lower middle class.

Bombay attacks response - A sham or a sincere outcry?

Mumbai has been under attack once again, no, not by Raj Thackrey and his goons, they are hibernating for some time now, rather its an attack by other terrorists , purportedly , sent from our neighboring country, belonging to a certain “difficult to be pronounced” militant outfit.

Newspapers, TV channels, Ministers are on a roll, doling out their condolences to the nation and pledging to avert this next time. I guess they are pledging to take the vow of eradicating it if it happens again. That’s not a small gesture on their part. People have been held hostage in Taj and Oberoi, however, their round the clock status is reaching us every moment. Thanks to our “responsible” media. All the technical as well as political aspects of this attack is being vociferously debated on News channels by hyperactive hosts. They are fighting a parallel battle as NSGs are in Taj and Oberoi, in terms of who could pose the ,most difficult question, most witty remark and shout at the top of their voice. In their small TV studio they seem to reach a final consensus which they believe represents Indian masses. All the future “to be done” steps have been finalized by them together with some eminent dignitaries. Huh!
Enough of this sham! Put it off!

With the Indian masses it has been always the same. At any time when their vested interests have been hurt , their has been a huge uproar. Responsible citizens would come to the fore and criticize the government. They will light candles to commemorate the dead. They will gather together to pass there message to the government. And everyone will shout at the top pf their voice, “ System needs change”.

My intentions over here are not to rebuke any such person who mourns for the dead. I too sympathize with the victims from the very core of my heart. However, I am pointing to the other problem. The problem that the Indian Middle class doesn’t budge until and unless it hits them directly. Our country isn’t an affluent country and a vast swathe of population is still very poor. Around 35-40% of them are facing acute food shortages. But these problems don’t attract their attention.They are not vehement in their demands of change at that time. Where were these eminent citizens lying when Raj Thackrey and his goons were committing atrocities on the poor mass of Bombay , in which few succumbed to death as well . There wasn’t even a single public demonstration. Where was this public anger when vast swathe of farmers committed suicides in Maharashtra and in several other areas. There is no uproar from our eminent citizens when our country is ranked 66 out of 88 countries in GHI (Global Hunger Index). 17 Indian states have an acute food crisis, but they never gathered the attention of our “sincere” and “concerned” middle class. With every passing day I seem to concur more and more with Pavan and his findings. This Indian Middle class, is so much engrossed into its own vested interests that it will only serve to destroy what has been earned by our forefathers.

Put this pretense of being “concerned” citizen to back burner and go and have your drinks. You were never concerned for the nation.

Nehru - A Revelation.

Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, our first prime minister of sovereign India , has been my object of study in recent weeks. It was a rewarding experience to go through his autobiography. The rewards cannot be materialistically listed by me, but one of the primary gift that it had for me was "revelation". Revelation of Nehru himself, revelation of an India before the years of Independence, revelation of Gandhji's ideals and his social standing in that era, revelation of socialistic values , revelation of the bourgeois nature of our Independence movement, revelation of liberals etc .. the list would be too long to put in here.

His appeal primarily lied in the fact that he had a wider view of the world while at the same time he had a cognizance of the plight of peasants. He bore an open mind towards Industrialization and socialism , unlike Gandhji, and more so he was a staunch supporter of Poorna Swaraj from the very beginning. It was rather he who bought this idea into forefront.

Throughout the book , he has questioned existing order of our country then and he also drew himself into the ring of debates. He had been in gaol seven times till 1935 and it was during his last jail visit that the got into writing his autobiography. This book , I feel to be important to me as it revealed to me an India before that D day of 15th August. It revealed to me an India that existed before it , and the importance of those days which led up to that momentous night.

He was an avid reader of books , and it is through these roots that he gained an impartial view of the world and thus could identify strongly the position of India. He had largely differed with Gandihjee on several issues and has revealed it thoroughly into this book .
Throughout this book his soft spot towards animals and nature has been amply demonstrated during his stays in gaol. He made friends with many of them and those were his chief companions during his stay there.

Besides these, going through several topics that he has dealt with in his book would convince you that he was a visionary .Even when the country was creeping under the mighty British dominance , he saw India in future. He saw the future of country and its social upheaval. He was largely against the existing social order of country, opposite to Gandhijee, but he thought gaining independence was of foremost importance at that time for our country and other changes will then gradually follow .

His sacrifice and diligence towards that single cause moved me very much and I can certainly say that I know him better now as a person. This is always the case if you read autobiographies. The enigma created by mass disappears and you know the person in its pristine form. It was a pleasure knowing this man , after I have already read about Gandhijee, and I hope that the ideas that he had so strongly endorsed encourage us to look beyond our own personal selves to the greater social good and in the process an upliftment of personal soul and knowledge and experience.

Paranoia

You wouldn't believe me if I tell you the truth. No! Not because you are a liar , rather you are an epitome of truth and anything resembling it, however,you have become so very much inured to it that its presence doesn't seem possible. Its paranoia , really, it is so. I am typing this blog here sitting in office , fearing that no one catches me doing this. Driving to office poses a challenge in keeping the fear of being hit , subdued. And then when I reach the outskirts of my workplace a mild fear of collapsing building and collapsing economy slithers into my mind. I bet it does with you too, only you have got too inured to it.

Aravinda and Pavan

Who are they ? Well I am sure you know Aravinda Adiga much better than Pavan K Verma. Reason. Former has just won the prestigious Man booker prize for his book, The White Tiger , while latter is the author of a critique of Indian masses "The Great Indian Middle Class". Last week, I had been reading these two and I almsot felt like I am reading the same book. One treats the same issue in an aesthetic manner while the other takes us through some glaring facts.

I will discuss them individually, however.

The White Tiger.

An epistolary, highly criticized, facile English book by a novice author. I had my own misgivings about this book after having read so many bad reviews about the authenticity of the tale and blah blah. However, I took a chance and it paid. For this is an awesome book by an Indian foreigner, who has critically or rather cynically taken up the case of lower strata of Indian society. He portrays a devilish picture of Indian rich class and sad and gloomy picture of a Indian Poor. He has portrayed with craft and ingenuousness of Balram Halwai, the protagonist, the hardships of a poor man and the exploitation of poor by rich and powerful. He has been utter;y cynic in his description of a parallel India that exists and is untouched by the boon of developments. All the rhetoric of Indian economic upheaval are nothing but a lie on their face. He has taken liberty to create self conceived notions of poor people and his metaphor of Village as Darkness would but only enrage many. He could be vindicated on the ground that he has taken up a work of fiction, and in fiction you need to go to extremes to draw out the contrasts.

However, the base story wasn't something which an Indian reader would feel as a novel one. They see it around themselves daily. Maybe foreign readers would find this very surprising, considering the image of Indian they have post Globalization boom. It was the narration which was interesting. The base lacked in originality and authenticity however the topping was good.

The Great Indian Middle Class:

This book is by an erudite author, backed by his IFS post in Indian government, which leaves no opportunity to look for any trace of an inauthentic book. Rather , its a revelation of the way things are around us. The country is doing well in economic terms , but how much share has the 40% of the lower strata of this country have had? He asks this question on your face, and along with that he brings out beautifully the central theme of Indian Middle Class. How it has evolved, what are its inner landscapes and how it has continuously failed to read the writing on the wall. He appreciates the tenacity of ,middle class as successful entrepreneurs, labors ,winners despite all odds, however he shuns them for their inability to look beyond their own personal gain. He shuns the short sightedness of this class and ridicules the way they have got inured to the pandemic poverty around them, forgetting even that it exists. This book beautifully discusses the transition of middle class and their ideologies from pre -independence to post independence to the era of economic liberation [1991] . How has this particular class ,which always looks for an ideology to live by , in lack of it, has become a consuming giant , not looking beyond its own personal interest. He also points out that in a country which is still so vastly poor it doesn't make sense for the middle class to be so ,lost in itself. If they don't see the writing on the wall now, it could lead to a deeper chasms between two classes and also a breakage of social fabric and more so in his own words ,

"If it [the middle class] does not [look at it] , the India of today will be the envy of amoral,cynical,economically lackluster and debilitatingly divided nation that can emerge tomorrow. the harvest of an opportunity lost, a heritage wasted"

Personally , I liked the starting the book a lot , wherein he raises a pertinent question that when at the stroke of midnight India became free , Nehru delivered his speech in ENGLISH, certainly not the language of common masses. He has very beautifully brought forward a relevant point about the Indian freedom movement and freedom. Quoting him over here,

"On 15 August 1947 the bells of freedom tolled for all Indians, but they tolled specially for those who inherited the paraphernalia of giving shape to independent India"

A ride to ....

A gift for you on your birthday; a constrained choice of options and possibilities. What shall I gift you? Shall I weave a dreamland for you or shall I net a fairy tale? I wish to take you to the land unknown, my pen would love to do so.
Come! Lend me your hands! Hold my hands tight for it will be a long flight into those lands. We are out on a long journey. Hearken now the gurgling of waters in the stream flowing down, the chirping of birds and the whistle of the wind welcomes us. Moon shines there , half naked, in the sky. Feel its silhouette on your face. And now hold my hands tighter for we shall go further now to those distant parts , where no one knows us.

Clouds shroud the moon intermittently and so does it do with your basking face. Open up your hands wide and feel the wind on your face, allow it to dissolve you in itself. Watch trees there, reveling in joy with the wind. Come ! we too shall dance with joy and forget the why.

And now the night has grown darker as the moon has faded away. Wind moderates into a gentle breeze. Lets rest now for a while. Put your head on my shoulders and hear our breaths racing against each other, listen to the beats of our hearts creating a symphony by taking turns. You lend yourself to me and I take in the whole. Your warm breath soothes me and makes the cold night bearable.

A symphony arises out of our union and falls on our hearts , spell binding it. Mind goes numb and we get lost into each other. The journey isn't drawing to close however we get lost, never to be found again. And in one last moment of sense I kiss your eyes and whisper into your ears , " Happy Birthday".

A lonely night

Loneliness is the poverty of soul. I have had heard that somewhere, and was observing now. A silent roar was running through my body producing a deafening silence. Things are moving in front of my eyes in one moment, and in other moment they are still. A chaos was running through my room , things were falling apart. Strong wind gushed into my room and it became pitch dark. A thunder growled heavily and I cowered with fear and closed my eyes and ears, and shrieked. Calm down! Peace!

A cultural miss

Being born in Bihar, brought up in present Jharkhand and growing in Karnatka , I have always had an implicit phrase imposed on me that I have had a "cultural miss". I feel alienated to all these cultures that I have lived in. While at my hometown I am being looked as an outsider with an inside root.And while I am in Bangalore I represent a Bihari culture in their eyes. Its difficult for me to deny any of these remarks put upon me, all these tags are stamped on my face by people around me.

My moments

Every few moments
I get a sense of being alive.

At times its the sight of beauty,
and mostly its the call of duty,

Beauty lends itself in munificent ways,
from a charming lady to bright sun rays.

Pulses rejuvenate at the sight of it,
defying any morals that may defy it.

Call of duty, puts all aside;
forced to take strident and long strikes.

What lies then in between those moments,
a lethargy, a tardiness an unnamed power, which clips me down and bringeth the silence.

Ahh! questions comes back looming large.
Am I in search of the peace or do I possess it in those moments.

Or its just an another view of the moment.
I may never know this, and for the moment I shall be the moment,
that lies in my laps.

My pen and me...

My pen swings out of desperation to weave a blanket of words.A blanket that would engulf me into its majesty, hide me in its bosoms, away from all the joys and sorrows , and would take me to a land that promises nothing yet delivers all.

Rudderless boats would get a complex from the wandering course that it takes. Its ramble is hard to be put together in a logical chain. Weave a cozy blanket of love, a poem of beauty, or an epic of duty. Its aspirations are boundless, higher than the sky above and deeper than the faith.

A story to tell, a joke to spill, a night to glorify , a dress to be revered , all seems possible with it. They just wait for their turns, who knows which way shall this philanderer turn the next moment.

Aimless and directionless though it is, however, a solvent of time couldn't be better. A loving friend mostly , a boring pal at times, a critique more often and an element of envy in some moments. It never leaves my life free of its influence. Come O! friend , lets move to where we take each other.

A paean for her.

A dusky beauty, on my laps.
Squirming her body, and fluttering her flaps.


Squirrel eyes and elephantine ears,
laughs at what she sees and all that she hears.


Intermittent though is her smile,
appears to be a laughter wrapped in frivolity.


Pedaling of legs and beating of hands,
weariness of days and waking of nights.

A tryst with nature on the way to ...

It was cold inside , and tired of the continuous boredom I came out of the chamber. It wasn't hot outside, although it was humid. It was around afternoon and skies bore the signs of an imminent shower. A deafening silence prevailed in the surroundings, although there were many things in motion, which either didn't produce any noise or may be their noise was smothered by the gloom in the air. Feeling calmed, I sat at the opening to marvel at the picturesque nature lying in front of me.
Everything has been soaked in rain and bore the wetness. The panorama had a large field in front and a narrow street laid down by its side. Sun shone furtively through the clouds and embellished the scenery with its dusky shine. There were men moving along the track waiting impatiently and helplessly for the signal. In the near distance a crow perched over an electric pole and croaked intermittently. Its harsh noise served as an indication that the world was still moving. Perhaps, it served as a placeholder of human commotion for the moment and thus added to the vitality of the scenery.