What New Year Resolution do we want?

Midnight of 31st, the compulsory wishes flow, it may be symbolic, but as along as there is a warmth in winter who will complain? Of the messages I got today, one series in particular interested me - HAPPY NEW YEAR 2015 written with 'Hindu' inscribed in the letters.

Are we heralding a 'Hindu New Year', the question I ask myself and how will it define what future we are shaping for our nation? While a section of our society plans a movement from 'Hindi, Muslim, Skih, Isaai, aapas mein sab bhai bhai' to 'Gharwapsi' and from celebrating 'Gandhi Jayanti' to 'Godse Jayanti', what is expected of the others? Who are these others who are re-writing Mythology as History? What are their numbers? To what level of intolerance will they go? & more pertinently, how many of us will adhere to these views or dangerously still be blind to this transition in our society?

2014 was the year we saw a massive mandate in the name of 'Achhe Din' but this was also the year where fundamentalist Hindutva came out of with a full-fledged Bhagwa drive to saffronise not only our policies, but also our history and thought. The government of the day has been a mute spectator to this undercurrent that is assuming the shape of a wave which will define this nation for the years to come. Appeasement was bad, but Hatred would be destructive. And in the process of this intolerant Hinduisation, we may just be breaking the basic fabrics on which this religion has stood to the glory which the nationalists tend to infuse us with.

Will the tolerant Hindu be able to withstand this militant thought that threatens to destroy it or will mark the advent of the militant Hindu? Exaggeration in celluloid is entertainment, in reality, it assumes the shape of a dangerous propaganda. Reducing all the 4-5 centuries of Mughal rule with a single word 'invaders' is not the correct route. All it takes is a single drop of poison to make the entire glass of water poisonous. The venom in our thought we are sowing today will one day become a hydra that will swallow us with a disdain it reserves for the races doomed in their pride.   

Who Am I?

Who am I?

Born in bones,

A nameless soul,

A ray of hope,

Unknown to gods,

From the seed that was sown.

A Muslim, a Hindu,

Or destiny’s child,

With no surname,

With none of blame,

Cry is my Joy,

Awake in my dreams, ignorant of the blind.

You call me,

Give me a name,

I only smile,

I cry in futile,

Untouched by religion,

Immune to hatred, absolved of your shame.

The K-dilemmaa

There is no solace for Kashmir...Why?
Simple reason: the tussle between BJP & Congress seems to be more bitter than the one with the country across the border.
Rajdeep Sardesai's favourite dialogue in The Big Fight used to be 'Hamam mein sab nange hain', only this Hamam is used as the orgy of politics. While Indo-Pak clamour, the bullets continue to destroy the lives of people across the borders. Kashmir gets united in misery, while politicians feast in oblivion. Why should patriotism be so insensitive to humanity. Jingoism feeds only the obese, starving the unimportant fragments of race.
The leaders continue to herald newer and grander era of Good Times, the 'unaffected' continue to look upto them for 'salvation', the 'dispensable' continue to be lost to unwritten history.
Who started the war? Who retaliated? The mirror doesn't know...Acts of aggression always manage to bleed the skin of humanity. & this is nothing but a mere bruise on the ego of the Greater Gods.
When will we ever stop looking at people as theirs and ours? Cattle is branded by their owners and similar is the fate of Kashmiris. We are saddened by their casualties but never pained...
The question of anonymousity, secession, PoK, Azaad Kashmir leave the anonymous casualties of this war without hope, without remorse.
 While it's convenient to blame leaders from across the border, the shameless cross-firing that the Gov and opposition has indulged in this 'game' very much establishes the importance of Kashmiri lives in comparison to the talk of hard-soft government. The entire state is nothing but a mere pawn in a game of chess that is being played by as many players as their are squares on the board.
Let's for a shed the overcoat of nationalism, let for a moment humanity take precedence over jingoism, let patriotic RIP....let's be human again

Thank You Mr. PM

Not a supporter of the person who seats himself on the chair of PM, never will be one. But to not to acknowledge the initiative of Clean India is not only unfair to him but also to be blinded by political myopia.
Whether the step remains a short lived euphoria or will make a real contribution is to be seen, but well done Mr. PM for taking the step. From the eyes of an armchair critic and a cynic, I do not know how far will it go to change the outlook of the people, but you have definitely taken a 1st step, we need to move ahead. Very rarely do we witness an event where a leader leads from the front with a greater vision - you have done it. & nothing can take the credit away from you.
Whether things get lost in the maze of files, whether the whatsapp messages slowly fade away, a message has been delivered. Even if for a day or a week, we make that effort to participate in this drive, it will be a welcome change.
Some of the silent problems that India faces, problems of hygiene, accessibility to water, toilets - have lost to issues of corruption & misgovernence, growth & foreign policy - Thanks Mr. PM to bring this back to public conscious. The previous govt. did some thankless work in RTI, MNREGA and Right to Education, & you have moved a step forward. This may not bring you votes, but will go a long way in improving the general dignity of the living.
Mr. PM, you will not still & never get my vote, but you have my thanks for an initiative that perhaps after Gandhi, none has dared or cared to take...

Will the Journalist answer?

Dear News Media

& the wave stuck...a different person, a different setting but the same unrepentant demeanour, the same swagging arrogance.
When Rajdeep Sardesai was slapped, the echo reverberated till home and for long. Most rejoiced, few were aghast - & media paid a silent obituary to journalism.
I've grown up watching Rajdeep on NDTV, have loved him, respected him and pondered pleasingly on the Old Monk tweets. It was sad & it hurt badly. But why did the media remain a mute spectator? Some over zealous hooligans on rampage, and Times NOW celebrates the Rockstar! Where was the front page of newspaper that can zoom in possibly anywhere & everywhere? Why did 4th estate crumble like a house of cards?
That journalism had made way for 'news products', we knew, but to be so blind, so un-acknowledging to the events at Madison Square shows a complete surrender. Those involved in the incident were part of a blameless mob, but where were you, the respected news channels and publications of the country?
I represent perhaps the last generation that grew up to respect journalists, I represent a section who considered the 8:30 pm news on DD sacrosanct and boring, I represent a community that took the headline to be the truth and only the truth. You have no right to let us down. A respected member from your field is attacked and you do not even blink an eyelid. & here we are not even talking of Assam floods? If you can't stand up for your own, what is the guarantee you will ever stand up for the oppressed or even the celebrated common man?
We don't understand your compulsions to make money, we don't buy your point of becoming a Talking Tom to your masters. We want news, not tailored interviews, not advertorials, not a tool of propaganda.
Please free the journalists that you have archived in your galleries. Let them report and not be coining fancy terms. The nation needs you...

The curious case of changing Times

Selective activism has been in vogue. & why not, charity afterall is only cleavage deep. That TOI, one of the least respected and most popular newspaper has learnt this over the past few days shows the way.
Keeping objectification of woman aside, we forget the objectification of humanity that this pick & choose method of activism does. A tabloid known for its raunchiness (sic entertainment) picks up an actress in a paparazzi act, and behold the nation has found a cause to take up. To add, in the free time, we get over passing all the entertainment (sic sleazy) content on whatsapp. Who anyways has heard of the widows of Vrindavan, they are the art film material anyways.
There is a reason a TOI triumphs over an Hindu - because we let it. A GK quiz question - who is Irom Sharmila? It's because only blockbusters sell - whether in films, in politics or in activism - & so do they fade out. Life as a struggle continues for the rest.
Our gods may have come from the depths of the outer space but our monsters are native & indigenous. TOI did what it does to survive, remain contemporary to its audience. This controversy besides, it will continue to do so and flourish till it decides to go the way of an idealist journalist.
It is a forgettable experience of reading about crotch, nipples and vagina in a newspaper and hopefully forgettable will be the activism around it. That TOI is the national commode daily is common knowledge, that we will continue to zoom further in the zoomed about images of cleavages is an existential (sic ugly) truth. Let Irom Sharmila be googled till then, let the widows of Vrindavan be sent back to wherever they don't belong. There is a blockbuster activism playing around now, next change will be another one. Till then, the nation wants to know...nothing.

The Midas who became the PM

Ages back, there lived a King called Midas and whatever he touched turned to gold. & yet the story didn't have a happy ending, for Midas got greedy for more and starved himself. The boon turned into a curse.

Midas is bygone but the greed lives on in many forms - of gold,  of religion, of power and more. The e new incumbent to the office of PM of India is said to have a Midas touch, hope he doesn't carry his greed. He has been the architect of a remarkable campaign that swept the Congress out of power to get a thumping majority (30% of a fractured mandate). He has also been credited for being the Champion of Gujarat and the Champion of Gujarat! In an age, where divinity has been trademarked upon, Mr. PM may give some lesser known and well-known Gods a complex in terms of the mass devotion he has generated. Rambo to NaMo to Har Har Modi, the man has assumed so many titles in his race to get to that one coveted title - of being the PM of India.

Carry on Mr. PM, for whether we are with you or against you, under your watchful eyes, we would be 'ruled' by you. But touch your heart, if it is not Gold yet, and rules us if you may, but like a 'Sevak' and not a 'Swayam Sevak'. With one stroke, you got the most decisive mandate the nation saw in decades but also its the most divisive one. You swept the marginalised (the old, minorities, outcastes, poors) aside, but do not abandon them. Because today when you grow with the majority at your command, there is a silent minority that is as human as you would have been once.

You achieved a heartless victory in more than one way. You faced hatred, but the love you got smells of poison. There is a beast in each one of us, you have managed to unleash it, now try and reign it. I do not fear your supporters, I fear for them. Their arrogance, and hatred for opposition, stems from some form of a demonic worship - don't sacrifice them at your altar.

Mr. PM, whatever the few of us might think of you, we respect the office of PM - a position you have in the past conveniently mocked at with the disgrace only an usurper can leverage. Now you sit on the chair. Embrace its dignity. I will never respect you as the person you are, however I respect the chair you hold. Do not touch it by your Midas touch.

Wave or Plague?

Let's reject Dynasty this time around. Let's reject corruption this time around. Let's reject all the adjectives by bloating them out of proportion. Bharat's Hindus have arrived, and arrived in style!
2014 has been called a historic mandate, an election never seen in decades, an expression of people's anguish against a government conveniently labelled inept and corrupt.
Was it a landslide, I beg not to differ. Was it an informed decision, I do beg to differ. I 'beg' because that's what the 'not on our side' have been reduced to. I 'beg' because, I see something my fellow countrymen, Hindus, Hindi-speaking public failed to notice.
60 years, we have waited for growth, I do not know, my memory at my age does not travel that back in time. But we believed in it. We realised we were born Hindu, and we need to be proud of the heritage. In a nutshell, modified our belief system as different from our parents or their parents before them.
Democracy became a majority rule and not a representative rule. Secularism attached itself to pseudo and communalism metamorphosed into Nationalism. Gore was either glorified or brushed aside, Hindutva was rationalised for growth.
Strategy was formalised to win the elections and not for a vision for the nation. I may crib and cry on the propaganda that swept the nation in a wave but why did we get into it surfing merrily. For all it didn't appear to be a democratically fought election but a wrestling arena where we the audience bayed for blood.
This was a bigger canvas and a dangerous one. Everything was fair and justice was the word of the meek.
We talk of a wave that was there, I fear it was Black death - a plague we the nation happily fell for. If the Parliament has the concept of collective responsibility, so should we.
I am a proud Hindu, and no one defines the concept for me. I am a proud Indian, and no one sets a benchmark for nationalism for me. As a majority, I have never felt the threat by a struggling minority. As a human being, I could never forgive the people who presided over pogroms. As a pro-developmentalist, I could never justify the concept of the greater common good.
In this new modified India, am I an outcast? When people around me, near & dear ones talk of going saffron, why do I feel alarmed? It is just a colour like green afterall.