From the Ivory Tower

Shame

2011-08-16T09:42:00.001+05:30

What is it about frail old men that so terrifies governments? Why is it that the sight of an aged person leading a protest sends shivers down the spines of even the most battle-hardened of politicians? Is it some primeval emotion wherein we are bewildered by relevance of the past generation, a generation we believed in our hearts we have supplanted?

Today, barely a day after Independence Day, the Government of India has deigned to detain Anna Hazare, Kiran Bedi and other noted social activists. What may their crime be? That they demand the inclusion of the highest offices of power and authority in this nation under the aegis of the Ombudsman Act? Surely if the Government is truly serious about addressing the malaise of corruption, it ought to embrace the idea.

The Government retorts that the Ombudsman is an unelected individual and to repose such a collossal level of authority in an unelected position is an affront to Parliament and the sovereignty of the people. Does it serve the sovereignty of the people that certain positions should be exempt from any questioning, from any supervision whatsoever? The Election Commission is a body of unelected individuals, and they, for the period of elections, decide the fates of elected legislatures and governments. No one seems to be complaining about their functioning. The Judiciary is comprised of solely unelected and nonpartisan members; no one minds being brought before them for judgement. You may retort that there is a constitutional basis for their authority and for our subservience to the same. The point is why cannot the Government find a constitutional solution to this problem? The unelected individual argument is baseless and stupid, and demeans the intellect of the people.

Senior members of the Government have emerged and have stated that to protest against a piece of legislation while it is being discussed in Parliament is unconstitutional. Where does it say so? Is Parliament infallible? Are its members incorruptible and divinely ordained? Is Parliament separate from the people or does it represent or purport to represent the people? If protesting against a piece of legislation is a crime, then the Father of the Nation was a criminal, for he protested against the Rowlatt Act of 1919, and many more legislations of the British Indian Government prior to 1947. But surely one can expect one's own government to be more understanding?

It is a shameful day in our history, and no matter how much our economy grows, we can never wipe this blemish off our foreheads.

Happy Independence Day, USA!

2011-07-04T09:48:00.006+05:30

So you are 236 years old today. A hoary age for any nation; eventful - and you have had your share of events.

Barely a century into your existence and your denizens fought to define the nature and structure of your government, to decide whether the principles espoused by your founding fathers "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" was merely scrawling on a piece of parchment or was it something that was imbued into your very soul, your DNA. You emerged scarred but victorious from that struggle, morally and spiritually rejuvenated. The blemish of slavery was wiped from your forehead and you were pure once again.

But the scar was a wound and it festered, for the differences that exist in the hearts of men can scarcely be obviated by the smoke and the blood of war and destruction. So your promise, your oath to humanity, that all men are created equal, was mortgaged for political gain, to be reclaimed only a century later at great cost and at great human suffering in the meantime. You destroyed and made homeless millions of native Americans, the true sons of the soil, because it was your 'Manifest Destiny' to expand from coast to coast, to claim the land, the rivers, the forests for your own sake, and for none other. You claimed to be a Christian nation, driven by Christian morals, beliefs and principles, and yet it was the meek that you reveled in suppressing and crushing beneath the wheels of your 'progress'.

But you aren't alone in these sins and so you cannot be alone in your penitence. For at least you acknowledged your errors and made amends for it, and for that you are a superior nation. You fought two great wars in the defense of freedom and liberty, albeit entering conflict only when your own people were threatened or harmed, but if selfishness should be a crime, then humanity is guilty of it as a whole. If you were guarded against entering a conflict you didn't see as your own, once you made a cause your own, you embraced every tenet, every facet of it to its entirety and were its greatest champion in the face of all odds.

You were among the pioneers in the race to reach for the stars, and in that goal, we saw ourselves as one people on one earth. This little blue sphere was wracked by your struggle with your foes to protect what you saw as the ideal of freedom and we often stood on the brink of destruction, wondering whether the freedom you were fighting for was worth the effort. It was, and we thank you for your perseverance.

You have lived the words of James Russell Lowell in his Stanzas on Freedom

"Is true Freedom but to break

Fetters for our own dear sake,

And, with leathern hearts, forget

That we owe mankind a debt?

No! true freedom is to share

All the chains our brothers wear,

And, with heart and hand, to be

Earnest to make others free!"

You are a nation of contradictions - a nation founded on the idea of liberty and freedom, and yet one that distrusted its own citizens based on what was the color of their skin or the accent of their tongue or their origins or their beliefs. In that you show your humanity, that while you were created to be a perfect State, you evolve and improve on your faults, just as humanity does in its constant struggles.

You face a greater challenge now. Your foes in earlier days were visible, ones who could be destroyed by sheer force, but your most difficult struggles have been against those demons who infest the minds and souls of men, for there force is ineffective. Like slavery, segregation, fascism, and absolutism, ideas and beliefs cannot be uprooted by drones or guns. It is the hearts and minds of men that you must win if you must emerge victorious in this struggle against terror, anarchy, and the enemies of humanity. There only the brilliance of your ideals and the dint of your will can cause a lasting impact.

As Lady Liberty stands proud on Ellis Island, her torch a beacon promising the warmth of freedom to all those who struggle under oppression, as your star-spangled banner reminds the world of the permanence of the star-filled heavens, so do you, by your actions and your ideals, remind the world of Einstein's words, "Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual that can labor in freedom." Stay true and firm on this path.

Happy Independence Day, America!

An Ode to Friendship - II

2010-07-20T01:30:00.007+05:30

Aristotle says that friendship is one soul dwelling in two bodies. One wonders then if one has more than one friend, does it mean one is constantly inhabited by a number of discrete and different souls, each dear to us? It is an endearing thought that one is bound to one’s friend(s) by a bond far greater than that of time, for whilst time moves on, the soul is immortal (and my apologies to any skeptics out there).

To my mind, when one befriends someone, one unconsciously gives that person a piece of oneself, a small token of one’s being, a part of one’s soul, and in turn receives, equally unconsciously, a similar token of love and amity. One doesn’t keep such tokens locked away in some armoire in one’s room, or in some bank locker; these tokens simply melt away into our being, becoming one with our soul. When we give away a part of ourselves, our soul experiences a momentary fracture, but on receiving someone’s love, the void is made complete, as if it never existed in the first place. Each soul, each heart is so made up of not just one soul, or of different souls, but of a love shared between multiple souls.

You may opine then how does one differentiate between a mere friend and a lover? To that, I respond, can one really love someone without befriending him/her before? You retort, what about love at first sight? Coming from a culture of multiple rebirths, I imagine souls remember a kindred soul across the ages, and once you befriend a soul, you befriend it for eternity. Coming back to how one differentiates between someone who is merely a friend among other friends, and someone who is primus inter pares, it would seem your heart seeks out this soul more fervently than it seeks the others, drawing closer and closer to its presence however and whenever it can. After all, not all friends are created equal, are they?

Have you ever experienced a gut-wrenching anxiety, a pain in your chest, uneasiness, when you quarrel with a friend? It is little to wonder that one feels such torment; after all, aren’t parts of your soul quarrelling with each other, a sort of civil war, and who would deny that a civil war is anything but painful? When you separate and try to move on, you wrench your soul and cause it to fissure, taking apart that which you no longer hold dear, and receiving in turn that of yours which is no longer held dear. Unlike when you create a friendship, when you give a part of yourself voluntarily, detaching a part of yourself in rage is an act of destruction, a moment that grievously wounds your heart and soul. Such wounds take time and patience to heal, and the healing is rarely if ever painless.

Friends are those who care for us, and who we care for, unbidden and even when we and they would rather no one cared for us. And considering we are one soul, do we wonder why?

An Ode to Friendship

2010-07-04T09:26:00.002+05:30

What is friendship? Is it a binding obligation that prolonged companionship confers on one, an obligation to care for, to look out for each other, or is it something that you feel within your heart every waking moment? Does one have to feel duty-bound to respond to the call of a 'friend', or do we leave that to the vagaries of emotion and feelings? Does the string by which friends become one soul inhabiting two bodies, to quote Aristotle, come about by design, by desire, or by the sheer will of the Fates? And if the sundering of the soul from the body after death is described as a torment, then if friends should quarrel, does that sundering, albeit temporary, also cause for similar terror and anguish?

We are told that people everywhere ought to be the same, or that they ought to think alike, and have similar frailties, weaknesses, biases, prejudices, beliefs, desires and aspirations? While a voracious appetite for books may compensate for a life spent in a single country and surroundings, it cannot compensate for the reality that you cannot hope to understand a people merely by the descriptions in tomes. While it is equally true that you could live your entire life with your own people, and yet not hope to grasp everything and every facet of who they really are, it is perhaps a hundredfold, maybe a thousand-fold, more difficult to understand a people different from your own. For it is difficult to understand what offends, what pleases, what amazes, what is held dear and cherished, until you can understand how their heart beats.

And yet when one comes to a foreign land, it is not unheard of for one to find friends who seem like they have always been by one's side, though happiness and grief. There is no hesitation, no derision, no jaundiced vision; just a simple connection between the heart. What drives or inspires such a connection? How can someone who barely knows you, and who you barely know, become so indispensable to your daily routine, without talking to whom a day seems incomplete and bare? Truly, what Pascal says of love is equally true, perhaps many times over, of friendship, that the heart has its reasons that reason knows nothing of.

It is so easy to say that friendship is a social compact, a convenience; one hears of concepts such as 'friends with benefits', and it bewilders me. To suggest that friendship in itself does not benefit the soul, that it, by itself, does not enrich one's existence, that there have been 'benefits' that hitherto have been absent in friendships, is to cheapen what has been held so dear and true of the relationship for ages. And yet maybe it is convenient for me, in my ivory tower, to look down upon this change, this 'progress' in what can be encompassed in the word 'friendship'. It is a confusing change, but one thing I hold true; friendship will endure as the sole relationship whose value in our lives will never diminish, for without a friend, are we not incomplete, a body without a soul, like a lonely leaf on the bough waiting for the winter to come and free it from its torment?

Musings

2010-06-26T07:42:00.001+05:30

Why does one fall in love? A stupid question, you say? Do you quote Pascal and tell me that the heart has its reasons that reason knows nothing of? Maybe it is so. But that is why it is so vexing. To one's mind, the very fact that love and its cause is so inexplicable makes it ever more so desirable and yet so terrifying. Its touch exhilarates the soul, filling the body with sensations that cannot be described adequately in all the words in the world, and yet in that brief moment, the heart experiences fear, a terror of loss, of deprivation, of denial. François, duc de La Rochefoucauld says of true love that it is like ghosts; everyone talks about it, but few have ever seen it. The ivy of suspicion oft creeps onto the edifice of one's affections, and one sees shadows when only light previously appeared. Like Othello to Desdemona, what was once precious as the sun and the moon, as pure as the waters of a bubbling mountain spring, starts to bear semblances of foulness.

And yet I do injustice to love and lovers when I make it seem so simple to describe love, because love in its essence is indescribable. Could the good Duke not have known that just as there are many colors in the palette of nature, there are many kinds of love, true and pure, where distrust, trepidation, or rejection are but pale phantoms in the distance, and where in the moment and for eternity there is only joy and happiness? Where the smallest distance is too great, and yet the greatest distance is not big enough to keep two souls apart? Where being in each other's arms is just as comforting and romantic as a cruise along the Seine? Yes, there are dark moments in each relationship, and love and lovers are no exception to it. But where there is rain, there is also sunshine, and the purity of a relationship, of the intensity of the feelings encompassed within, is tested most sorely by such squabbles. It is better to quarrel and get all the anger out, and then becalmed by love, than to let it fester, like a monster beneath still waters.

So, why does one fall in love? Who knows, and yet I think the thrill of the whole experience, of it being so unknown, makes it even more exciting, no?

The Specter

2009-11-13T22:50:00.003+05:30

The darkness fell over him

Like a shroud over a cadaver

His unseeing eyes seeing all

And his silent lips telling countless tales

As he sat there quiet and forlorn

Lost and feeble

His arms trembling on his walking stick

As the cold chilled his arthritic bones

She lay there

Just beyond the great sycamore

Separated from him by death

When nothing could in life

He cursed the tears in his eyes

Those cold pearls of sleet

He cursed the snow that covered her now

For he knew she would hate it so

As the darkness grew

He knew it was time

Time to go, time to depart

He placed the lilies on her headstone again

And slipped into his coffin a few feet away… …

The Autumn Leaves…

2009-11-13T03:38:00.007+05:30

I walk along the path

Amidst the red and yellow autumn leaves

Through the mass of gingko and oak

The colors delight my soul

And I remember you…

Some find autumn to be sad

To be reminiscent

Of a decaying before the end

But to my heart they bring hope

Hope that we shall meet again in the spring…

It is raining outside

And everything's so cold and weary

The wind pierces through to the very core

But my heart is warm and content

Because your memories live within…

Can love die or fade away?

Can what lies in my heart diminish

Because you are so far away?

Just as the spring will bring fresh shoots and the sun

So also someday we shall love again…

Back to school....

2009-08-24T10:01:00.005+05:30

Come tomorrow and what will be the toughest two years of my life start off. Tough not insomuch that the stress and the pressure is something I am not used to, but because how I perform in these two years might very well determine the course of my entire life. But that’s for tomorrow.

The Ropes course was AWESOME!!!!! For someone who’s never done anything remotely adventurous so far, I found it to be absolutely enjoyable and a greatly intoxicating experience. Zipping across Lake Matoaka suspended from a harness and trusting a steel wire to bear one’s weight as the waters came closer to one’s derriere and then being jerked upwards towards the shore was perhaps the most exhilarating and invigorating thing I have ever done so far. And then there were the High and Low elements in the Course; the Low ones were informative vis-à-vis how we work in teams. But the High elements, especially the swing over the pits, the bell-ringer jump, and the two-wire walkway were simply mind-blowing (although I did not do the bell-ringer myself, but it seemed so damn fine).

If there was one thing that made the experience even more enjoyable, it has been the presence of a stellar team. Isaiah, Katie and Snowy have been the most supportive and encouraging lot I have had the pleasure of working with so far and I have been fortunate to have worked with generally supportive people so far, so this is a big thing. At every element, I was eager to go ahead, but my inbuilt reticence held me back, but their prodding and motivation ensured I had a wonderful time.

The debriefing after the Course was equally informative; we were asked when we felt particularly effective and ineffective in a personal and team capacity during the duration of the Course, as also what we noticed about each other’s capabilities and qualities. What came out of the discussion was a frank understanding of each other, of strengths and weaknesses, of places where we need to improve and places where we need to build on our laurels. But essentially so far, and I hope this luck lasts for the entire 2 years and even beyond, the team seems to have gelled well together.

Thereafter at the Logos design for the individual teams at the Amphitheatre it was enjoyable to see individual teams come up with interesting and somewhat meaningful logos and connotations for the same, and trying to explain the connection with the team. Somehow we, as a team, decided we wanted something that represented unity and strength in numbers, and after much deliberation, struck on five joined links; individually we may have some weaknesses, but together we build on each other’s strengths. To my mind, this is a good omen, that such a thought is so prominent in our team’s ethos, and augurs a very pleasant working environment.

The end-of-orientation party on Saturday would have ended up as another quiet and ‘well-mannered’ affair, had it not been for the ‘raucous’ Indians and our tendency to just let ourselves go loose when it comes to dance and ‘bhangra’. And considering we have 34 Indians in this year’s batch, and had 20 in last year’s, that’s a huge number on the floor, and that’s not even counting the locals and other International students who just couldn’t resist joining in. That really shows how rhythm and enjoyment has nothing to do with cultural boundaries; if you can dance, you can dance on any music.

The orientation is now over, the preliminaries complete and now it's time to go in for the final kill. It will be a long, arduous and stressful affair; there will be moments of happiness, success, and sometimes grief, despair and disappointment. But then the pleasure of the journey lies not in the destination but in the journey itself. So here's to books, studies, case studies, lectures, presentations, team meetings and discussions, internships, projects and other activities (time, energy and life permitting)!

MBA musings

2009-08-20T03:56:00.004+05:30

The last one week has been a most fruitful and engrossing one, despite it being so hectic and fast-paced. Finally I get to sit in class or at least in ‘my’ college; it feels so lovely to be able to say that after three years of work.

We have been having orientation sessions from the Center for International Students here at the College of William & Mary, and it was outstanding to meet and interact with people from so many different nationalities and cultures, and, to my great embarrassment, to understand how limited my outlook towards life has been so far. I guess how and what one thinks about a career is all dependent on many factors: one’s upbringing, one’s family background, the careers being pursued in the near and distant family, and in general the basic temperament and awareness level of the individual concerned.

Meeting the faculty and my coach has been a wonderful experience; I don’t believe they will always be so nice and laughing, but the overall atmosphere is of a subdued informality infused with a sense of friendliness and reassurance that people understand what you are going through and are here to help you out, provided you are ready to help yourself first.

Meeting my classmates in the MBA program has again been a huge eye-opener, perhaps more than the eye-opener at the International Student orientation, because there are some people here, of the few who I have managed to meet in this time and I really need to pick up my pace in that matter, who are really outstanding; I mean, their profiles are absolutely mind-boggling and superb. It makes me feel so very sheepish with my basic Computer Engineering degree and a 3 year stint in an Indian IT company (sure Capgemini is a French concern, but frankly let’s stick to the facts here). It is going to be a challenge working with them, competing with them, and if luck favors the brave, to even better them; but perhaps more than the challenge, it’s going to be a hugely pleasurable exercise just getting to know them and to maybe rub off some of their skills and hopefully pass on some of one’s ‘own’, howsoever small they may be. The statistics are also pretty impressive; we have total class strength of 121, of which 40% are international students from 12 different countries and 40% are female students. That’s a pretty high number, but it would make life much more interesting, don’t you think?

As part of the Business School orientation, we had a session today wherein they took us down to the York River State Park to do some Community Service Activity. The Park is a beautiful site spread over nearly 2500 acres of forest, marshland and river acreage. What we were expected to do was help the Park authorities with certain tasks like cutting down wild vegetation in the riverside areas, cutting down some trees that have overgrown or are a hazard to general safety, clearing the biking trails of huge stones and large pieces of gravel, cleaning the kayaks and canoes that the Park rents out, and just keeping the Park furniture in the right places. It may not seem like much, but in the hot Virginia summer when temperatures are ranging around 32-33 C, nothing can be more tortuous, and especially more so if one has to trudge through bristles, thorny bushes, shrubs filled with bugs that bite and scratch, and maybe even slush and muck. But it was a fun affair irrespective of all that, because we did it all as a team, and I guess that was what was the intention, because eventually we are all going to engrossed in our programs, but if we can gel together as a group now, it would help us do a lot better job at coping with the stress and tension.
Typically for me, I got the somewhat easier job of helping to return the Park furniture to the original positions, a job that required a group of 4 to pick up picnic benches, put it into a I-don’t-know-what’s-it-called vehicle, sit in the vehicle and ride for say 2-3 minutes and then lift it back from the aforementioned vehicle and just place it in the designated place. So I got lucky, I guess :) .
All in all, it’s been a whole lot of fun this whole week; I don’t think it will always be like this, but it’s nice while it lasts. I am really looking forward to the Ropes course on Friday, which is supposed to be something like an Athletic Adventure Course, and everyone who knows me on an intimate level can attest to the fact that if there was an chap not attuned to athletics or sports of any kind, it is me.
Will post on Friday after the Ropes to let you know how it was.

Here I am

2009-08-09T08:52:00.001+05:30

Come tomorrow, and I will have completed one week here at Williamsburg. It seems so surreal, to have finally embarked on a journey one was awaiting for so long, and to find that while the journey, in a travel sense, ended with one landing on the shores of one’s destination, it has but begin in the real sense. Each day brings forth new surprises, new challenges and new realizations such as we aren’t as incompetent (or competent) as we once believed ourselves to be, or that while we may have prided ourselves on our ‘terrific’ sense of humor, in truth it really stinks, not quite the “l’air de l’humour” as much as “l’air de folie”.

Williamsburg is the most beautiful little city I have ever been to. Cities like London, Paris or Berlin exhibit their magnificence through their sheer sizes and the weight of history, but Williamsburg has history and yet a most comforting warmth. Life here isn’t quite as hurried or tense as in the big cities, maybe because it’s essentially supposed to be a relic of an age when relaxation wasn’t something people did away from home. The word ‘relic’ is most misleading, because it isn’t as if Williamsburg isn’t endowed with present-day comforts; it’s just that it prides itself on the relaxed and calm life that it offers its denizens. I don’t know whether this is the norm everywhere, but the people here seem very kind and generous insomuch that despite there not being a stop sign, they will stop their vehicles to allow pedestrians to cross the roads, or in that once in a while they will just give you a nice smile when seated opposite you in the bus.

The College of William & Mary, my home for the next two years, pervades in everything at Williamsburg. No matter where you go in Williamsburg, your status as a student just won’t leave you and that’s very much to your benefit. Just roaming around the campus would take you a good two-three hours, and that would be time well-spent, because I don’t reckon I have seen a greener campus, with the possible exception of the IIT-Mumbai campus, or a more architecturally pleasing one, again with the exception of Oxford and Cambridge. While Oxford and Cambridge have an aura, a magnificence that comes from being hoary half-millennial giants, Williamsburg’s relative ‘youth’ (the college is currently in its 316^th year since incorporation) means that its structures aren’t quite as forbidding and yet have a solidity of age and time.

The new Miller Hall, where my MBA program is now housed, is simply breath-taking. Standing in the Courtyard and looking around at the structure, one feels a strange thrill rush through one’s body. The building isn’t just pleasing to the eye; it’s sophisticated within. As the Dean would say, it’s a building built to match William & Mary’s age and style but with an eye on the needs of the future. I, for one, was really impressed with the level of detail and care that has been taken to ensure that the building is geared to meet every conceivable requirement of the students and the faculty that it will house. It will be great fun to work there; 2 years may just fly past, but memories such as these would always last a lifetime.

I started out this journey with a question “Quo vadis?”, or “Where are you going?”; now I can say “I am here”.

Williamsburg

Tick tock, goes the clock....

2009-07-24T13:47:00.008+05:30

Just 10 days to go before I leave and the finality of my departure is finally beginning to dawn on me. There was a sense of excitement and eagerness that accompanied the shopping; an anxiety that one should be adequately prepared and should have everything that could conceivably be needed when one reaches one’s destination.

But now that the shopping’s over and it’s time to start filling in the bags, a strange sense of despondency is setting in. It isn’t as if this is the first time I am going away from the family, although the last time that I did, it was just for a fortnight, and with a certain date of return in mind. Maybe the uncertainty of when I would get to return (surely after the two years of the program, or maximum after three years) is getting to me; maybe it’s me doubting my ability to stay alone for two years, having never done anything of this magnitude before in all my 24 years.

Somehow looking at the shopping and thinking that, excluding a few minor additions here and there, this are going to be all my worldly possessions for the next two years is slightly unnerving. That I won't be able to argue or fight with my brother the way I do now would be comforting for my parents, but somewhere deep down all that squabbling was part of our affection for each other, and I am surely going to miss that. I will miss my breakfast time chats with my parents over myriad topics while we would read the newspapers, my tea getting cold and their scolding me for never drinking tea as it should be drunk, hot. Whatever it is, it’s weighing me down.

Somehow it feels so unreal that after 10 days, I will have to do everything on my own; perhaps more than anything, it’s the cooking which is terrifying me, considering I have NEVER cooked a decent meal in my life, save maybe omelets, scrambled eggs, and the occasional half-fry. Maggi doesn’t count as cooking, and well, tea and coffee is something you just know, so it also doesn’t count. But mother’s tips and recipes and the good old Internet should hopefully see me through. La mamma is packing in so many condiments, prepared masalas, ready to cook dishes and utensils that someone might think I am going to cook for an entire regiment at Williamsburg; but in frankness, it would be nice to once in a while cook a nice Indian meal to remember the pleasures of home and the taste of mummy’s cooking. You can't get it all, but a simulacrum is better than nothing at all.

In all this, let it not be said that I am not looking forward to going; au contraire, I am most eager for the opportunity; to quote the parents, this should teach me responsibility. There will be many who are in the same condition as me; we will all stumble a little, but we will all be there to help each other overcome the teething troubles smoothly. So here’s to life at Williamsburg and to the next two years at the College of William & Mary.

You're nothing but a pack of cards....

2009-07-03T11:56:00.003+05:30

Iran's attempt at change may have fizzled out, or at least it may seem like it has. But I, for one, am hopeful and somehow feel certain that we haven't seen the end of this just yet. Call it a retreat if you may, but even the greatest military strategists will confirm that sometimes it is better to tone down one's assaults and to recoup for a day when the enemy will be least prepared than to continue to barge into the bayonets.

Somewhere this entire episode has revealed to the Iranian people that the system, the establishment which was set up to rule in their name has subverted its purpose to rule, over them and to dictate how they, the people, may lead their lives. The Ayatollah may have thought the clergy a better bet than the nomenklatura of the Pahlavis to run the nascent Republic; the chances of ideological differences and strife breaking apart the Republic would have been remote. But even he would not have foreseen these troubled times when even the clergy is divided on whether or not to support the Establishment.

The incumbent Supreme Leader, a man foisted on the Iranians not by the dint of his own eligibility but by back-door politics, quite like a Pope in medieval or even recent history, seems a kindhearted and noble soul, but his pronouncements on the protests have shown him to be delusional and perhaps distant from those whom he is ordained to lead. He and his acolytes have turned Iranian against Iranian and for one brief moment raised the specter of the Iranian Revolution; just this time, the enemy isn't the Shah, it's the clergy and their baseej.

Lewis Carroll may not have been a prophet but his Alice in Wonderland somehow finds resonance in this sad and unpleasant episode in Iran's history. The cavalier attitude of the entrenched establishment towards the protests of their own people, their blatant and unapologetic attempt at denying the people their right to choose who should rule them, and their repudiation of all and any tenets of basic human courtesies makes this a very difficult game indeed.

Alice said of the Queen, “They're dreadfully fond of beheading people here; the great wonder is that there's anyone left alive.” To every call suggesting that the people have the right to think, the clergy retorts that the right is just as much right as pigs have to fly, to quote the Duchess. But in the end, the Iranian people, like Alice, though small and subdued now, will grow to her true size and will triumph over those who deny them their rights and privileges just as Alice triumphed over the Queen's and the Duchess' armies, and then will retort in their baritone voice, like she did, “Who cares for you? You're nothing but a pack of cards.”

Till the sun rises

2009-07-02T15:35:00.003+05:30

What is it about love that drives us to it like moths to the lamp? Perhaps the metaphor is a bit too negative, too harsh on the beauty that is love, but apt nonetheless for there are always two sides to every coin. Why is it that we can't just be friends, not be bound by crazy emotions and sentiments, or by expectations and assumptions? Why must we insist that there be something more than a deep and resounding sense of friendship, of a sense of lifelong companionship, for arelationship to truly mean something to us?

Love isn't all it's made out to be; it's so much more. Love is a strange emotion. When one thinks of it, a conflicting multitude of thoughts arise. Love is pitiful and marvelous, empowering and parasitic. It is hideous; it is beautiful. It is weak and strong at the same time. Love has started wars, ended wars, caused the depression and death of millions, as well as caused uncountable others to be thrown to the heights of ecstasy. So is love truly such a pure, lovely thing? I think it is a mixture of both. Just as nothing is purely good or evil, so is love. When you are in love, it's like every morning is the sunniest and the brightest in the history of mankind. The flowers never smelt so sweet, the birds never sang so beautifully, and the breeze never blew so pleasantly on your cheeks. The rains never came down in such melodious drizzles and the heat, well it never really mattered, did it?

But when you find the doors of love closed onto your face, even Hades would be a more pleasant place than life. Persephone has to spend just six months with Hades in his dominion and yet when she meets Demeter in the spring, her soul has paled and diminished; imagine then living such a life day in and day out, not knowing when deliverance would come from this pain. You want to yell out, to scream, to cry, but the tears will not flow, the sounds will not burst forth. It is the punishment the Fates entailed for your heart, a punishment for its impudence in presuming that it may seek love where it had no right to do so, for its audacity to dream of a life of its own creation free from the dictates of the Fates. Your heart may burst with the deluge of emotions that it contains, but it must not ever let loose the flood waters.

In such turbulent times, the memories of the past prick and pain, and yet they soothe and calm. They mock the Fates and their punishments, the pain and the suffering, and serve to remind us of our courage and our belief in our self, that we too are worthy of some one's love and affection, that friendship need not always be the final frontier, that someday someone will feel the same love that we feel for them. They implore us to stay true to our heart, to not fail it when it needs us the most, to caress each memory of a love bygone like it were another life within us. They foretell that one day this night will get over, and the sun will rise again. Till such day, they offer us only their comforting support as lights in the darkness.

A new revolution?

2009-06-21T08:21:00.004+05:30

Iran stands on the cusp of a revolution. It may seem presumptuous to state so; after all, can a few thousands or millions on the street really shake a 30 year old regime? I say 'shake' because the stated aims of the protesters is not to uproot the 'Islamic' part of the Islamic Republic of Iran; it is to emphasize the 'Republic' part. And that would be an important step forward.

Ever since the Revolution of 1979, the conservative factions of the Iranian people have systematically silenced the more reformist and liberal voices in their society. A nation that was once at the vanguard of globalization (the Persian Empire, the Safavids) now turned its back on the world and chose to stay secluded within the walls. They have denied their people the right to choose their leaders, those who will rule the nation in their name; true, they have elections, but the candidates aren't always those who want to serve; they are those who want to serve and are 'permitted' to serve. Permitted by whom, pray? For in a democracy, in a Republic, that was founded on the rage of the people against a tyrannical king, who save the people can permit someone to serve them? To presume otherwise is to subvert the will of the people.

True, Iran isn't just another Republic; it is a theocratic republic, guided by its clergy, the 'incorruptibles'. Whether they truly aren't susceptible to human emotions and prejudices is a matter of debate, but even they cannot be entirely trusted not to take care of their own power source at the expense of those whom they are to 'serve'. It's a classic case of a conflict of interest: to loosen up would endear them to the masses, but may mean a reduction in their authority; to tighten down may earn them the undying hatred of the people, but will ensure that they enjoy absolute power for their lifetimes (or till they can muster the brute-force to silence their critics).

Critics of Mousavi's protests state that he, being just as much a creature of the Revolution as Ahmadinejad, cannot be trusted with genuine reform. Mousavi's intentions are best known to him, but the courage and the determination that he has shown to challenge the establishment, to suggest that there's something rotting in the system, is admirable and worthy of being emulated. Gorbachev too was a dyed-in-the-wool Communist, but his perestroika and glasnost were genuine attempts to reform the Soviet state before it imploded on its own people; that they failed were both his and his people's misfortune. Mousavi promises more, because the people back him, and yet the perils of failure are even more.

What is more important is that for the first time the reformists have gained a slightly upper hand over the conservatives. Khatami received a mandate but couldn't get past the clergy's machinations; his failures meant that Ahmadinejad seemed a better bet the last time around. This time, it's time for change, and the Iranian people must raise their voices, for their lives, for Iran.

P.S. I find this song to be particularly poignant and pertinent to the situation. Especially the lives "We're not going to live in silence; we're not going to live in fear. This time we know we all can stand together. We have the power to be powerful, believing we can make it better."

Talking about the news

2009-06-18T09:26:00.007+05:30

I haven't written much in fifteen days and there have been so many things to write and talk about, so here's my take on a few of them.

Iran:

Where do we go from here, is a question most Iranians and their neighbours and perhaps everyone else in the world is asking themselves now.

Just 30 years ago, similarly furious denunciations of the system that is, a desire to change the course of government caused a Revolution, a revolution that changed the very manner in which people would now view the Middle East and Iran. Relations between Iran and the world haven't quite been as normal as before.

Ahmadinejad is widely seen as a rabble rouser and a hard line leader, a hawk when it comes to Israel and the US, and somehow in the changed geopolitics with Obama's ascent and the coalition pulls and pushes in Israel, Ahmadinejad's stubbornness and belligerent tone does more harm than good to both Iran and the world. His confidence perhaps arises from the abundant resources of oil and natural gas at the disposal of the Iranian state and the currently high prices of these resources, but sadly he has failed to use satisfactorily the previous windfall, giving no reason to believe that he will do a better job now.

What will Mousavi's followers unleash on Iran and the world this time around is anyone's guess, but if Iran is showing any signs of moving away from an autocratic clergy-controlled 'democracy' to a truly representative one, those changes would be a welcome one.

Why Obama isn't showing more outrage about the Iranian elections

India:

The 'racial' attacks issue pertaining to Indian students in Australia and Canada seems to have lost its lustre, at least in the eyes of the media. I guess we all suffer from a very short attention span, needing very fast changes of topics to keep ourselves interested in life, a sort of short-term memory loss à la Ghajini. That these attacks themselves have not ceased is a given, because these attacks are not the first on international students and frankly they will not be the last, no matter how hard we may wish to believe to the contrary. In a comment to my last blog on this issue, a reader said that sometimes simple vandalism and hooliganism hides beneath the cloak of racism; it's diversionary tactics at its best.

What we need to do is to protect ourselves, within the ambit of the law of the land. To be truthful, most people find it easy to single out international students because such students are literally neon-lit signboards saying 'I am different', an open invitation to be harassed. While retaining one's cultural and ethnic idiosyncrasies is one's personal choice and right, when in Rome, at least try to do as the Romans do; don't be like the barbarian at the gates, or at least don't give that impression. In the end, God helps those who help themselves, but an eye for an eye will make the whole world go blind.

The United Kingdom:

Gordon Brown must love roller coaster rides. From the dizzying height of being acclaimed the saviour of the free world economy to being denounced as a useless, good-for-nothing, self-centered, obnoxious and uninspiring git must have been quite a journey, and that too when it happens within just six months. But then in politics, a week's a long time. Mr. Brown's colleagues are either being implicated in the expenses scandal and are being forced to resign (a bloody good thing too, and something I want to see replicated in India; 90% of our fat cats would be out on the street then) or are leaving the sinking ship themselves, with no implied allusions to the rodent class.

In the end, Mr. Brown's woes are emanating from the fact that he is an unelected leader, thrust upon the people. So far, our Manmohanji was also sharing the ignominy, but with the recent election results, he's our leader, by our choice, not Madam's alone. Somehow the people of the UK haven't quite gotten over the magic of Blair and the fact that Brown is to some extent responsible for not having done enough to control the wildly spiralling economy when Chancellor of the Exchequer makes him no one's Darling (poor Alistair, being forced to clean up Gordie's mess).

Well that's all for now.

Going down under....

2009-06-02T12:18:00.006+05:30

The crisis in Australia with regards to racist attacks on Indian students has now blown over into a full-scale evaluation of whether Australia as a nation is racist. While it is unfair to judge an entire country for the misdeeds of a few demented individuals, one must bear in mind that a country is made up of its people, no matter what be their ideology, and the country must in effect take some of the brickbats for their views and opinions.

Australia is not new to accusations that it is racist, perhaps more because of the White Australia policy followed till the mid-1970's. While Australia wasn't alone at that time in trying to limit the numbers of non-Caucasian and non-European immigrants,

it certainly was the most determined of the lot, perhaps following South Africa in its zeal. While the architects of the policy stated that it had been justified by fears of a potential deterioration of living standards with the influx of such immigrants, their own views at other fora spelt things otherwise. The chief architect, Alfred Deakin, stated then, and I quote, "It is not the bad qualities, but the good qualities of these alien races that make them so dangerous to us. It is their inexhaustible energy, their power of applying themselves to new tasks, their endurance and low standard of living that make them such competitors." A fine reason to exclude people from your land...

The current financial crisis and the fact that India and China remain amongst the few economies that were relatively unscathed and are finding it comparitively easier to tide over the storm means that an already uneasy local populace has even more to fear from Indians and Chinese. Racism, to my mind, is a manifestation of the innermost fears and anxieties of the locals about the security of their livelihood, about their ability to compete with the immigrant population and their belief that even if they are unsuited for the job in question, they ought to receive the job, merely because they are the locals. This policy is akin to the sons-of-the-soil policy in India, and is no less deplorable.

In a globalised world, no nation can maintain its exclusivity. Australian mines served during the good times the industries of India and China, illustrating the link between the nations. But if, when the going gets tough, people wish to look inwards and cut off their links to the world, there is no greater tragedy in progress. If there is one nation that akin to the United States has welcomed those whom their homelands forsook or threw out, it is Australia.

Just as the US has benefited from the toils of its immigrants, so also has Australia. And they continue to do so. That in these times one's race makes one susceptible to hate crimes is not only tragic; it's fundamentally stupid and reprehensible.

The financial crisis has served to underline that the veins of the global economy run deep in every nation and every part of the globe. Tremors felt in one part are equally felt somewhere right across the planet, underlining the fact that there is no such thing as a localised issue anymore, at least not one that concerns trade, commerce and the exchange of ideas and opinions. We must be prepared to welcome people of all colours and hues, of all backgrounds, so long as they consent and submit themselves to the rule of law and do nothing to subvert the safety of our nations. Their ideas combined with ours could yield better results; that they are darker in skin tone doesn't lessen in any manner the value of their opinion nor does our being fair-skinned increase our ideas' worth.

One could look sympathetically at the concerns of common Australians and perhaps explain away these acts of madness, but somewhere one knows that this approach is not enough. That these concerns exist is true, but then they exist everywhere. Such acts haven't taken place there with such ferocity, have they? Though this is madness, there is a certain method to it, and failure to recognize the patterns could prove very dangerous for everyone concerned. The callousness and reluctance on the part of the local authorities to accept that there is something wrong makes matters worse. One wishes that those perpetrating these crimes remember that hate injures the hater more than the hated. The authorities would also do well to remember Mary Shelley's words where she says that it isn't charity but justice that is wanting in the world. If there are noxious weeds that are poisoning the crop of Australians, the authorities must be swift in uprooting them. Till such time, as Marcellus said, something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

A new beginning

2009-05-19T23:15:00.006+05:30

The Congress' win, and in such an emphatic manner, is perhaps the best news that could have emerged from what was otherwise a most

disturbing and uninspiring election in my memory (which isn't much, but it's a damn figure of speech, so get on with it!). I will not credit the electorate with much; after all, if they were so keen on the Congress, why not a repeat performance of the 1984 elections? Then the Congress possessed around half the vote share and nearly three quarters of the seats in the Lok Sabha; that they failed to do much with such a huge mandate is a different thing. But I think the real reason the Congress managed to do so well now is that the Congress has no real alternatives, for once.

It is baffling to see how a potential alternative, the BJP, succumbed to hubri

s and has now reached a point wherein its future seems bleak. I was and remain a supporter of some of the BJP's stands, such as the introduction of a Uniform Civil Code, the abrogation of Article 370, and perhaps even the introduction of a directly elected president into our polity. While the last may not be entirely practical, given India's fractured and divided political sphere, the remaining made sense to me. But of late, the BJP and its chief allies were behaving as if they were the sole guardians of the Indian nation and that their opponents were out to sell

the nation.

Patriotism is the last resort of the scoundrel and especially more so of a politician. The issue of Afzal Guru's execution, the retri

eval of illegally siphoned off monies from international tax havens, and the supposed lack of strength in our Executive are issues that somewhere hurt the BJP more than they could ever have hurt the Congress. You were in office; why didn't you do something about these issues then? (To be fair to the BJP, Afzal Guru's death sentence was confirmed by the Supreme Court only in 2005, a year after they had handed over office to the Congress.) On the other issues, you are just as guilty of omission of duty as could be the Congress.

The best thing that has come about as a result of this election has been the decimation or at least near-decimation of the most divisive and retrograde regional forces in this country. Laloo, Paswan, Mulayam, and to some extent Mayawati are the scourge of this political class, the worst of the worst and what has come to be their fate is immensely enjoyable and pleasurable. The Left too has received their comeuppance for behaving in so high-handed a manner

regarding the nuclear deal and for having endangered the political stability of the country over what many would term childish tantrums.

The Congress' re-emergence in Uttar Pradesh also heralds a new beginning for the party, and perhaps for India's political system. Rahul Gandhi's role in this miracle of sorts cannot be overstated even if that is one's intention; it simply wasn't an idea whose time had come, it was an idea who was made to come now, nevermind when it was supposed to come.

If this pattern continues, we could look forward to a time when national parties would truly matter more than regional outfits, and where a more cohesive national policy on many important issues can be thrashed out for the betterment of every Indian. Stability is desired by everyone and this election's result reflects this desire. The BSE Sensex couldn't have been more vocal in its approval when it breached the upper circuit limits twice in a single day and registered a rise of 2100 points. A sign of good times to come? I sure hope so.

The Circus is in town!

2009-05-16T09:52:00.008+05:30

So ends our five-yearly circus of democracy. Today, we will get to see which bunch of clowns will wear the high hat and which bunch gets to sit moaning about how it would have fit them better. To be frank, there's no sense blaming the clowns for their antics; we, the supposed ringmasters of this circus, have abdicated our posts, so who's to stop the jesters from running amock?

Initiatives like Jaago Re seem to have been like the proverbial hot air balloon, running of steam at the very moment it's needed the most. People registered themselves, got all furious and excited about exercising their franchise, but when it mattered, very few bothered to turn up. In a city that was afflicted by a terrible terrorist attack, whose sole surviving culprit is now facing justice, that the turnout was below 45% is not just shameful; it's downright hypocritical. These very same people came out in hordes after 26/11 and said that enough was enough; they cursed and berated the political class for 'their' apathy towards Mumbai. I wonder who will remind them that those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones at others' dwellings. Celebrities who exhorted people to go out and vote simply didn't bother to turn up; serious credibility check required, if you ask me!

Disilllusionment is something we would rather live with than do something about it. People who didn't go out to vote in Mumbai attribute their lethargy to the fact that the Election Commission very unwisely kept the voting date in Mumbai on the eve of a long weekend. SO WHAT? You could have spent 5-10 minutes standing in a queue, exercised your franchise, and then gone to whichever hill-station or holiday spot you went!

In recent times, the ideological differences between almost every party in the fray have diminished to nothing, except for maybe a few so-called purists like the Communists. Basically, where Mammon directs, there shall his slaves proceed. It's rather uncomplimentary, but what the heck, I am not standing for the post of Prime Minister; not that I would do any worse than any of the cuckoos who are offering themselves for the opportunity! Is anyone listening?

P.S. at last view, the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance seems to be leading by quite a good number and could be headed for a simple majority on their own. So, Doctorsaab will get one more chance to make a difference.

Quo vadis - To Williamsburg!

2009-04-07T22:35:00.006+05:30

So finally ends the MBA campaign at the gates of The College of William & Mary's Mason School of Business. The day has been absolute poetry so far; when I opened my mail today morning, I was pleasantly surprised to find the Admissions Coordinator's mail (ok, that was an exaggeration; I was waiting for it for the last one week with the eagerness of a father-to-be outside the OT waiting for his child to come forth).

The Mason School of Business and for that matter the College of William & Mary has a most splendid website, which really gave me all the info I needed to prepare my application as also to fill me with the conviction to want to be there. Maybe all B-schools are equally good, but then that's my personal opinion that a good B-School website should have all the info right there and easily accessible; it makes the student's life easier and lessens the correspondence to answer simple FAQs.

The College also has been really nice to keep on contacting me once in a while, just to give me a heads-up on where my application lay. It even appointed a senior student to guide me through understanding what life at William & Mary is all about, which goes to say volumes about how much they valued my decision to apply to them, and how they wanted me to have the most accurate picture of things.

On informing the Home Office of the good news, well the riverine tales began. Never get it why moms must cry, but heck, maybe moms feel that mera beta bada ho gaya, notwithstanding the fact that the 'beta' is a 24 year old bloke.

On telling everyone in the Foreign Office (the Home Office is les parents et le frère), the usual demands for treats and celebrations were raised and deftly deflected, but of course, merely pushed forward to a more opportune time (may that day never dawn :P). I should be scheduled to put in the papers once the Visa's stamped and delivered (fingers crossed about that); a lot's still to happen - must send check to college, get I20 from them, submit visa application....damn, learn cooking, get new clothes (:P)...so much to do, and so damn little time.

The happiness was a bit tempered by the fact that one's best friend was still without an admit, and was in the dumps, feeling all low and negative. It's so damn hard to console someone when you are seen to have what they want; it almost seems as if you are teasing them. Thankfully as the day ended, matters were more cheerful as the friend also received an interview call, making things look more positive and possible.

I have been browsing through countless sites trying to find out more about Williamsburg; the weather, the possibilities in terms of accomodation, financial aid, etc. I even started walking the streets, courtesy Google Maps :P. All in all, a great day!

Quo vadis.....?

2009-03-25T23:15:00.002+05:30

Last year, around this time, with my GMAT score in, an MBA didn't seem that difficult a goal to achieve. But then a week is a long time, and a year even more so, and what a year it has been! Of the 11 colleges I have applied to, all save 3 have sent in their polite regrets. Each passing day fills one with despondency; the realization that it's now or never doesn't make things any easier to bear.

So time for a post-mortem; actually it's premature since I still have two more colleges whose replies are yet to come in, one which has invited me for an interview, and I have still one more application to submit. But I still feel it would be worthwhile to do a PM while one is at it.

The PM would start and end with just one sentence: One did not prepare as well as one should have

A favourite grouse of the parents, and quite justified in my case. Frankly I must admit that my whole approach to the affair was a tad frivolous. Deadlines are meant to be respected, but surely one could have written one's essays earlier than the day before the deadline. One's research about the college one was applying to was zilch in most cases, and by the time one realized that over three quarters of one's applications had been rejected.

Essays could have been submitted for more detailed scrutiny by experts and peers; one always feels one writes well, but then one wasn't writing about the Napoleonic Wars or the Tokugawa Shogunate or the effect of Radium on a photographic plate; one was writing about oneself, perhaps the most difficult of tasks ever devised.

I could always hide behind the excuse that the recession and the resultant upheavals in the professional world are resulting in a steep hike in the applications being received by MBA schools this year. Sure, that may be true and my applications' being rejected may have some connection with that fact, but does that mean I am completely exonerated? Perhaps not; what my competitors may have brought to the table was work experience, a uniqueness of exposure, but surely there must have been something even more unique I could have stated, had I chosen to look within?

So the point is, the entire campaign has been a disaster, with a few triumphs thrown in between, so far; whether it eventually achieves the status of a fiasco is for time to tell.

Tribute to 'Ordinary' Miracles....

2009-03-08T10:13:00.007+05:30

On International Women's Day, I could think of nothing better and no words more true than the words of this song. Here's a toast to the miraculous, to the charming, to the ever understanding and ever loving 'ordinary' miracles in our lives - women! Happy WOMEN'S DAY!

It's not that usual when everything is beautiful

It's just another ordinary miracle today

The sky knows when its time to snow

You don't need to teach a seed to grow

It's just another ordinary miracle today

Life is like a gift they say

Wrapped up for you everyday

Open up and find a way

To give some of your own

Isn't it remarkable?

Like every time a raindrop falls

It's just another ordinary miracle today

Birds in winter have their fling

And always make it home by spring

It's just another ordinary miracle today

When you wake up everyday

Please don't throw your dreams away

Hold them close to your heart

Cause we are all a part

Of the ordinary miracle

Ordinary miracle

Do you want to see a miracle?

It seems so exceptional

That things just work out after all

It's just another ordinary miracle today

The sun comes up and shines so bright

It disappears again at night

It's just another ordinary miracle today

- Ordinary Day, Sarah McLachlan, Charlotte's Web OST.

P.S. Somu, this one's dedicated to Angel's memory....to the miracle of love that she brought into your life.

My best friends' engagement....

2009-02-08T22:18:00.005+05:30

Today two of my dearest friends got engaged, and that to each other :) , making the occasion even more special. Those who had seen them first bump into each other 6 years ago knew that something special was going to happen, something lovely was going to come from this meeting, and it feels so great to be vindicated all these years later.

I guess that love is like a fine vintage; the sweetness of the grape, when slowly aged and matured, gives off the beautiful taste of the wine, just as the stroke of lightning one experiences at first sight, with the passage of time, becomes the deep and everlasting affections that one feels for that special someone. Some vintages take a long time to reach their finest point, some mature very quickly, and some never come to fruition at all; but the name of the game is to keep on trying to make that perfect brew, for one's own sake and for the sake of living life as it should be lived.

Seeing two dear friends come together in a bond of hearts, not out of compulsion, but out of a simple desire to love and cherish, fills one with emotions that cannot be described in all the words in the English or any language for that matter. To see the joy on their faces leaves one simply overjoyed for having had the opportunity to bask in the sunshine of their happiness.

Love coming to fruition gives a special glow to the faces of both partners; it's as if the sun shines through their eyes, through their very person. For one moment, you forget your problems, and just lie silently in their warmth, in the cheer that their smiles spread, and somehow everything seems all right, like the Biblical Garden of Eden. One could go on rambling, but such occasions are best understood when personally experienced.

Here's wishing them both a very happy life together! May it be filled with bliss, contentment, and felicity in every walk of life! May all the blessings that the world may have to offer be theirs by right and as is owed to them!

Raju and Nami, this one's for you!

Morality and us.....

2009-02-03T23:06:00.004+05:30

The Delhi High Court's judgement on the case of the 'obscene' kiss (makes it sound like a Hercule Poirot or Sherlock Holmes novel....) is a bold way of taking the mickey of all these xenophobic and patently narrow-minded monkeys living in God knows which century and which country.

That a married couple should be arrested and subjected to such mental trauma over a period of nearly six months for a simple kiss or even for overtly displaying their mutual affections puzzles me. Don't the police have better things to do than watch out for couples kissing or holding each others' hands in parks and public places? Whatever happened to the good old days when the police had actual criminals to apprehend and punish? Surely not everyone of the delinquents is in jail? Or have all of them reformed, trembling in their pants at the 'machismo' of the Indian police who will arrest a couple over a mere kiss? I can't even think what they will do to someone who perpetrates a murder!

Morality is a highly subjective and personal issue, especially more so in a country like India where cultural influences and beliefs differ in every locality. What may seem unacceptable to one section of the populace may be perfectly normal to another; so how do our lawmakers decide what is best for the entire society? A good option would be to leave the morals to the people themselves; if they are mature enough to decide who's good enough to represent them in legislative bodies, surely they ought to have the sense to decide what is moral and what is immoral in their lives.

But no, we have these self-appointed guardians of morality, of a Indian culture that frowns upon kissing, holding hands and drinking in pubs. Bravo! So may we presume that the titans of Bollywood would now be expected to scale down on all the modernism that they are wont to show, because even if it's the reality in our society, it simply isn't 'right'? No more singing and dancing, eh? What next, the purdah? Dressing and grooming regulations for males? Shouldn't the pant be deplored as a foreign garment, meant to enslave poor Indian males into a sense of bondage, as opposed to the grand dhoti which is the very essence of liberty and freedom?

In conclusion, I am reminded of George Bernard Shaw, who very succintly put it, "When you prevent me from doing anything I want to do, that is persecution; but when I prevent you from doing anything you want to do, that law, order and morals." The Sri Ram Sena and all their brethren should bear this in mind.

Our Moment in the Dark.....

2009-01-09T22:49:00.004+05:30

The Satyam affair is perhaps not so much surprising with regards to scale as with regards to where it has occurred. The IT industry was so far held as the brightest symbol of a new India, an India that had given up on wheeling and dealing and on corrupt business practices, an India which was prepared to match the world when it came to the best practices in managing companies and delivering value to one's stakeholders. Names like Infosys, TCS and Wipro would always seem to be synonymous with integrity, honesty, and success achieved by sheer talent. In many parts of India, a bridegroom with a job in the IT industry would be valued (cheap process, but fact of life) almost as much as a regnant king.

But now, the mirror is showing cracks. Even before, Indian IT companies like Pentafour and DSQ revealed that all was not all that shiny in the new industry and that behind the glamour of the biggies, small timers were indulging in the same notorious practices that give businessmen a bad name everywhere. But it was always imagined that the big giants like Satyam were impervious to such allures. After all, after having achieved so much in such little time, surely they did not need to stoop to such depths for mere profits. Perhaps it was wishful thinking, perhaps we were trying to deify a specific breed of people, despite being fully aware that they were, in the end, humans and prone to human errors.

Satyam's treachery with its stakeholders, be they its shareholders or its employees or its clients, will undoubtedly raise questions about how changed is Indian industry from the days of the license raj. Our regulatory authorities will be challenged to meet this fiasco head-on and learn valuable lessons, and not just learn but also ensure that such learning is applied to make sure that such incidents do not recur. Most of all, Indian companies across the length and breadth of the country will be hard-pressed to demonstrate to a greater extent their commitment to ethical corporate governance. The fourth estate can be trusted to be vigilant about any impropriety being committed by companies on a similar scale and of a similar nature.

However what about the present? The fate of Satyam's employees and its shareholders needs to be top priority now. As it were, class actions by ADR shareholders in the US seem to imperil the already tottering edifice even further. Legal liabilities, both domestic and international are expected to be huge. The sacking of the board and the Union Government's resolve to appoint a new board would mean some uncertainty about who's in charge for some time. Mergers and acquisitions are a risky business anyways, and with such baggage in stow, Satyam will find suitors hard to find. There is need for some quick action; only the coming days will tell what it portends for India's image in the world.

Review - Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi

2008-12-15T23:17:00.003+05:30

Just back from a screening of Yash-Raj's newest opus 'Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi'. The movie's a good one, something that you can go and see with your family, without feeling awkward or sheepish at any time. But then, I have always been a sucker for love stories with happy endings, so really not the best person to ask.

I have never been a die-hard fan of SRK; Swades was, to my mind, his best performance so far. His roles, I felt, were too escapist, and at the same time, were catered to the tastes of the NRI populace, to help them associate with a fictional India.
But in RNBDJ, he's done himself justice. His rendition of the simple, sweet and devoted Surinder, madly in love with a woman who says to his face that she could possibly never return that love, is touching and most endearing. He emotes so brilliantly that he brings alive the character. His willingness to do just about anything, just to see her smile and laugh, perhaps appeals to my idea of a romantic person, to a love that transcends all reason and thought. And even when he realizes that she is ready to leave him than to stay all her life with him, his stoicism and willingness to let her go, just so that she may be happy wherever she goes, speaks loudly of a true love, if there is any such thing in the film industry. Perhaps the story was written keeping the adage "if you love someone, let her go; if she comes back, you always had her, if not, you never had her in the first place" in mind.

Anushka Sharma is charming in her debut, so everyone says. Heck, to hell with all this decorum! She's BRILLIANT! Of course, she's a pretty sight to behold, but the hold of her character comes from the innocence and guile that only a debutante could have brought, and perhaps no one could have brought it as effortlessly as her. At times, she manages to steal SRK's thunder with such ease and finesse that one is left in awe.
Many have found fault with the fact that her character doesn't recognize her own husband in the debonair dancing partner; after all, she sees her husband everyday, doesn't she? That's the beauty of it. Taani (her character) has accepted Surinder as her husband, but doesn't find it possible to love him. It's one thing to look at someone, and quite another to see that person; you can look at a person for ages, but you only deign it fit to see into the eyes of the person whom you love. So it was with Taani. When you have never looked into a person's eyes, no matter how many times that person parades himself in front of you, you will never recognize him.

Newspapers may have panned RNBDJ, but if you happen to visit any theatre playing it, it's running to full houses; audiences laugh at the jokes, clap when Surinder wins his little victories, and whistle when Taani makes her delicate and graceful overtures. That, to me, is the mark of a film that has struck a chord. Not every film need strike a high note with everyone; it just needs to set off a rhythm. The symphony will definitely follow.

RNBDJ tells a seemingly fairy story: that you don't need to be a dashing person to win someone's heart. Sometimes, the sincerity of your emotions will pull you through. And this, though a over-romanticised idea, always rings true. Love dwells in the heart, and if the heart rings true, then how can love not come forth? People would call it long-drawn and farcical at points, especially during the sumo-wrestling sequence, but if anything, it just demonstrates the intensity of love a person can feel for another. And when you are in love, when you truly feel for that special someone, nothing is too much. Isn't that how all great love stories go?