दफ्तर (हाइकु)

दफ्तर का काम इतना बुरा नहीं, सही है

पर जिस दिन खिड़की के बाहर बारिश दिखती है

उस दिन ज्यादा ऊब पैदा होती है

Capitalism - बिजली तुम पर भी गिरेगी (A simplified and concise note)

जो आदमी produce करे, वो गरीब रहे या और गरीब होता जाए; कोई और आदमी सारा मुनाफा ले जाए और अमीर होता जाए?????? क्या economics में Ph.D. करनी होगी ये जानने के लिए कि ये system, जो common sense ,justice, ethics, logic हर हिसाब से गड़बड़ दिख रहा है, ये गलत है।

मेरे सभी दोस्त आज capitalism (पूंजीवाद) की जय-जयकार कर रहे हैं 'quality of products' का हवाला दे कर। क्या हम ज्यादा ही selfish नहीं हो गए हैं???

लेकिन क्यूँ फिर मेरे यही दोस्त अपनी नौकरी को गाली देते रहते हैं? क्या हम इस तरह खुश रहेंगे? अब भी अगर इनकी फैलाई हुई consumerism से हम अपने बुझे दिल को बहला रहे हैं, malls में खरीदार बनकर, शनिवार को शराब पीकर, पर जल्द ही कुछ सालों में situation और संगीन होगी........ आज नहीं तो कल, बिजली हम पर भी गिरेगी..... पहले africa से slaves import होते थे, अब हमारी बारी है.

अभी तो card punching, motion study, stayback after office, 26 Rs/hour पर इनके hi-fi restaurant में waiter, 6000 Rs/month के engineer इतना ही है। क्यूँकि लोग गरीब हैं तो वे इनका सामान नहीं खरीदते, local सामान अभी भी बिकता है, सरकार भी अपनी companies बेच देने के बाद, अपनी agencies को privatize करने के बाद भी कुछ रोज़गार तो निकालती ही है पर जल्द ही बाकी सब भी privatize हो जाएगा, इनकी 5 Rs की छोटू noodles, 1 Re का coffee पाउच, 10 Rs का छोटा recharge की तरह हरेक सामान अमीर-गरीब-सबके लिए यही लोग बनाएँगे, local entrepreneurs का (पूरी तरह से) खातमा हो चुका होगा, इनके लिए काम कैसे करना है, पढाई का मकसद केवल यही सीखना रह जाएगा।

उस समय जब सारी खेती की ज़मीन को ये सरकार के जरिये हथिया (acquire) चुके होंगे, जंगल काट चुके होंगे, हर तरफ इनके कारखाने, और उन में बनने वाले सामान को बेचने के लिए malls होंगे, जब सारा सामान, सारी नौकरियाँ केवल इनकी ही होंगी, सरकार का काम केवल administration का रह जाएगा, और वो समय दूर नहीं, तब हम पूरी तरह से इन कुछ लोगों के शिकंजे में होंगे, और वे हमारा गला घोंटने से कतराएंगे नहीं.... क्यूँकि ये अपना मकसद साफ़ साफ़ बताने में खुद भी नहीं झिझकते. Business का केवल एक ही मकसद है - Profit (कुछ भी कर के, किसी भी तरह)..........

Encounters with a dead man

Thank you ladies and gentlemen for coming! I really really wanted to talk to you. The matter is a serious matter, of grave concern. Grave! Huh! (smirks) Grave. Grave is serious. The man who coined this synonym, this allegorical synonym must have been a morbid man. Have you ever thought about it? Why would he choose, of all words, the word ‘grave’ to mean to be something very, very serious. Give it a thought. (Thinks)

Come to think of it, and you know, it makes sense. You can’t dismiss a grave. You can’t just laugh about death. Can you? And hence the word does make sense, after all. But I am getting increasingly curious about this origin, this man, and how it must have occurred to him. May be he was a child, and... well, not a child, a grown-up, a grown-up of say age around 25, or let’s just say my age, (grins) and he was talking to his parents. They were talking about something, well anything, and he happened to say kind of kidding, “Mom, blah blah blah blah blah blah, but what if I die before that? What if I go to the grave, and you are laying flowers on it..” “Oh stop!” The mom’s reaction-pretty easy to guess. “Oh come on, what are you saying?” She was totally disturbed, fretting more than ever, “Don’t say such a thing ever again, my boy. Why should you die? If anyone has to die, God take me, but you are talking in front of a mother about her son’s death. Why should you die?” And with this snubbing, he realized that man, never ever mention death, leave alone joking about it. Death is damn serious. Grave is damn serious. So whenever, he would have to say that this is a damn serious matter, he started to say, it’s a grave matter, requiring grave concern. What! Did this man have this inherent ability to be funny; to bring this morbid word into a common everyday usage and thus mock at the teaching of his mother. Or, was he trying to tell us something? May be he was trying to tell us that it’s..... no wait, let me not say it right now. I pretty well have digressed from what I was going to tell you about, happened to get into this word, but on a second thought, I’ve not really digressed that much as you would think. You would think much more, because this is not what you would have imagined. That when I said that please come, I got to tell you something important, it was death that I wanted to speak to you about. Did you? Is death important? Or money is important? Huh! Which one is more important? Or is there something more important than that? The Saturday night party, planning for the upcoming birthday celebration, office work, business, what? Whatever it be, now you’ll have to bear with me, because indeed it’s death that I want to shove into your ears; and (pause) your mind.

Many of you would be thinking that oh God! when we could have been enjoying an ice-cream among the (shouting this one word) over-bored, mundane (whispering) - pardon me! I’m not feeling well - enjoying ice-cream with the big happy crowd at India Gate this evening, we are listening to this morbid man. I treated that man with the same pathos. We made a point to stay away from him. We, I mean, my siblings, my friends, (quick recollection) even my family and I. When I met him for the first time, he was sitting in this park where I used to go for evening walks. He was sitting there on the bench. I was exercising. I had sweated a good deal. There were other benches in the park, but I don’t know why I chose to sit along with him. Actually this was queer of me taking into account my otherwise covert, I mean introvert, nature. I would rather avoid than talk to someone if it was optional. But (pause, thinking) I don’t know, I am not sure actually, May be that’s where I finished my sprinting shoot, and, and that was the nearest bench. (Irritated with the confusion) Well, whatever it be, I sat on that bench where he was sitting. I was resuming my breath. A few silent moments, before he asked me, “Who are you?”

“Huh?”

“I asked who are you?”

“Who am I?” Now, this question, “Who are you?” three words ‘who’ ‘are’ ‘you’ None of these words were foreign to me, or to any of you. These are elementary words. Yet the question formed out of these was in a way peculiar. No one had asked me that before. Generally people would ask, “What do you do?” or “What is your name?” But “Who I am?” But it wasn’t so peculiar after all, even though unheard to the ears. “Who I am?” that’s a relevant question. Well, well, I didn’t know then what to say. It was so ambiguous. I was a lot of things. I was a son to someone, someone’s brother, someone’s friend, student. I was a resident of so-and-so place, student of XYZ school. But was I really any of that? I mean, just that? Did the answer have to be an essay like that? Couldn’t it be something more definite? So, I wished not to go about elucidating my whole history, my stats, because I feared an awkward moment. I thought I would rather keep quiet. But the man pressed again.

“Who are you?”

“I don’t know.... I don’t know.”

I turned my face away. Then, suddenly, as if by instinct, I turned back towards him. “Who are you?”

“I am a dead man.”

“Fuck you!”

Was that a joke or something? What was that supposed to mean? (Caricaturing the imitation) “I - am - a - dead – man.”

“What are you talking about? You are some sleazy ghost or something? Damn you!” I got up instantly and walked briskly towards the exit of the park grumbling, blabbering. I could hear him rip-roaring with laughter. He shouted from behind,

“No, I am not a ghost. I am a dead man.”

“You know what? I don’t care. I don’t give a damn.”

I came home, had dinner, I didn’t talk much during dinner, then I changed into my overalls, and went to bed to retire for the night. As I closed my eyes, I had a sensation that he is sitting in a corner of the room, and he is looking at me. I knew this was idiotic, but still for some reason, no, not for any reason, just like that, I opened my eyes and looked into the corner. The study-table. It was all the more foolish, but I even bent low to have a peek below the table. The corner. Empty corner. I closed my eyes again. He had occupied my thoughts. I had to struggle really hard to catch on some sleep that night. The following morning my eyes were red because of lack of sleep. As I sat in the classroom with the teacher explaining some rocket science, I had a surreal moment. A sense of isolation. A sense of isolation. A sense of being removed from the surroundings. I could see the teacher scribbling something on the blackboard, I could see him speaking, but what I heard! “I I I I I I I ammmmmmm A (crisp) dead maaaaaaaan” I shook myself.

“So, to start any lucrative business, you have to look into certain things. Are you going to run it alone? Or do you need a partner? A trustworthy partner.”

“Dead maaaaaaan”

(Shaking)

“Then comes the analysis. A structured analysis is very important primarily because there are so many things to look into, any of which can’t be ignored. If you happen to overlook any of these important aspects, leave alone the business attaining those heights, even before it starts to bloom, it would be dead.”

Dead.

“So, we have here this 10-point analysis. The first part is the location analysis. Then comes the market. And so on. But before that, know your constraints. In order to survive, know well what can kill you.”

Was he saying all this or was I hearing things. Nonsense. Well, the class ended. I had some water. (Drinks water) Amar went about telling me his everyday bullshit. No, sorry, it was not bullshit. I used to enjoy it actually. I used to talk very much the same. About some or other girl having had responded to our distant gestures. Or so we imagined. Complaining of the idiotic syllabus. A complaint of all ages. Calling the teachers several names. Ha! Dreaming about the future. Talking of placements. Or sometimes, simply picking onto something trivial and going about it endlessly. But that day, my mind was occupied with something that had broken this routine. That was something out of the ordinary. A new man. A dead man. Why couldn’t I dismiss it as a joke? I don’t know. Somehow I knew that he was not joking. But if he was not joking, then what? I mean, Who talks in that manner? Let me admit that the man had become an enigma for me. Batman – the man who was afraid of bats since the time he was thrown into that well full of bats, and eventually he overcame it as a final fear, and donned that garb to become batman. Spiderman – the man stung by some rare species of spider, and getting the power to spread a web and go about jumping, crawling on walls like a spider. But this one was a big puzzle. What could it mean? It didn’t mean a ghost. Then what? Oh God! I wish I could stop thinking. But he had become kind of my unholy secret.    

The following evening, I went back to the park. I argued with myself that it was nonsensical of me to go there. But I counter-argued that why should an idiot matter to me enough to prevent me from going to the park for exercise in the usual manner. But all the time that I was exercising, my eyes were looking around. But he was not there. I slept rather peacefully that night. I smiled for no reason. I felt strangely....liberated. The morning after that, I shared this with my father. But my father didn’t take it as calmly or as enigmatically as I did. He was rather upset. He demanded in a way, as the king orders his servant to procure someone before him.

“Who is he?”

“He is the dead man.” I replied instinctively.

“What nonsense? I mean, who is he? Where does he live?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t seen him ever before. I don’t know who – “

“Well, I’ll walk with you to the park in the evening. You show him to me. Let me see who goes about raving in this manner.”

“Come on dad. Don’t be so upset. I didn’t mean it in the way of complaining about him. I was just sharing it with you.”

My mother, who’d already stopped her household chores to listen with careful attention, joined in at this moment.

“He must be all mad.”

“Come on mom, it’s fine.”

But dad just wasn’t in a mood to let it go. It was a Saturday. You know, what I did. I was checking my e-mail. (sudden hurry) No, nothing special about that. I checked the e-mail. Just the usual mails. After that, I searched for death on Google. It was in abundance. Articles, stories, images, everything. Bizzare. Spooky. In childhood, how talking about sex was such an adventure. The adventure with death reached far beyond childhood. I was enjoying it. Not exactly an adrenaline rush, but yeah, an excitement. Probably it was not about death. It was something out of my ordinary routine life. Something new to set my thoughts on. And probably that’s why it was enticing. Or... I am not sure though. Next, I thought to google ‘dead man’, but for some reason, I refrained. I knew the reason. I didn’t want any explanation from any such source. Anyways, it had to be a figurative one, because literally speaking, a dead man means someone who has died. I thought I would better leave it to myself. Or say, to myself and the man. I found some poems on death. But strangely, no! Not so strangely. I mean, it was strange to me that they were not in the least bit spooky. Because that’s what I associated death with. They were kind of philosophical. Death and philosophy! Oh yeah? Really? Well, here was Emily Dickinson. Frankly speaking, I couldn’t make much out of those poems, but I liked them. Ironical, isn’t it? (laughs) But.... How do I say it? Man, I was reading something, something different. It was not a Stephen King thing. The murder, mystery, blood, death, ghost. Nor it was a local Ved Prakash novel kind of stuff. Revenge, bloody knife, thirsty for blood. Or the laying life for country, parents, lover etc etc. with the white cloth for burial tied on one’s head, martyrdom, sacrifice.

No! This poem said a different thing altogether. Quite similar to listening to a middle-aged man in a park saying without the least bit of animated expression that he is a dead man. I could grasp the meaning of neither the statement nor any of these poems, but tell you what! Don’t mock at me, but I was almost feeling like an intellectual. You know, reading stuff. Different stuff. Forbidden stuff. Indecipherable, puzzling, philosophical.

Well, it came to an end. Or let’s say a new beginning. My father went with me to the park. And we did find the man. I wished to go to him by myself, sit with him, and ask him,

“Who are you?”

Upon his reply, I would ask him to elucidate, thus listening to something new. A break from the usual words and sentences of everyday life. I couldn’t say it to my father this way. A break? What break? Why break? Why think? And think death? Are you gone mad? (sighs) So, I put it across another way. 

“Dad, you wait here. Or you take a walk. Exercise. Relax and let me handle it by myself.”

But he wouldn’t let me.

“Why? Come. Come with me.” He said walking. “Or wait, you wait here. I’ll handle it.”

At this point, I realized something. It was not just about his son being infested with anything morbid or unholy; not about someone cracking a nonsense joke in front of his son. I felt that it was a mild shock for him too. Words different from his daily dose of words as well. But for him, it was not an enigma. For him, it was a disturbance, an anxiety. What kind of anxiety? Why? I don’t know.

“Excuse me.”

“Yes?” He looked towards us. He identified me.

“Hey, you!” He smiled at me. A friendly smile. A warm, reassuring smile. “Come on, sit,” he said, offering me the vacant space on the bench. And then, as if suddenly remembering that there was someone with me, and inferring that it meant something, yes, a propaganda, he again looked up at my dad and said nonchalantly, “Yes?”

“I am his father.” My father said in a tone of assertion.

“Ok, great.”

“Why would you speak any such nonsense to my boy?”

“Liberate him, will you?” He said fixedly with an intent gaze at dad.

“What? What are you talking? Speaking all kind of nonsense. What did you say – you are a dead man? What nonsense is it?”

He didn’t retort. He didn’t defend himself. He spoke matter-of-factly,

“You want to know what does it mean, or you want to tell me that it’s nonsense?”

His rational manner of talking caught my father unawares.

“I don’t want to know anything. I want you to know better than talking such foolish things in front of my son, or anyone for that matter.”

“Your son meets hundreds of people every day. They talk to him thousands of things. How can you screen everything he hears? Why not rather make him screen it himself by the simple process of thinking? Well anyways, I would take it no further. And - ,” He shifted his gaze at me, “If I upset you, I am really sorry boy, though I had not the slightest intention to do so. You see, I am a poet. That time I happened to harbour some thoughts on death. And that new identity was just a manifestation of those thoughts. Just then you came and sat near me, and it came out rather spontaneously. But I meant it to be a silent – “

Dad was too impatient to let him continue or to let me revert.

“Ok enough. Stop it.”

Dad was embarrassing me with being so rude when he was talking so gently. Making a mountain of a mole hill. I regretted having discussed it with him. As we walked away from him, I turned to look at him. He was looking in my direction smiling. Catching hold of my eye brought no change in his smile. I smiled back as if to say it was ok. And he winked in return.

All hell broke loose when my dad discovered the death poems on my desktop.

“It’s the effect of that old goon. What magic he has done over him!” He shouted at me in front of my mother.

My mother said to me calmly, “What all you are reading, my son! Concentrate on your studies.”

I said ok.

“No, it’s not ok. You won’t go to that park again.”

“Alright, calm down. I won’t.”

But he didn’t calm down. He told it to the neighbours. They took heed like responsible parents and instructed their children to play in the other park. God! Dad had made a big scandal out of it.

I discussed it with Amar as well the following Monday. The guy was excited as he used to be excited about almost each and everything. Then it waned when the man didn’t show up for many days. After around two weeks, I found him yet again walking to and fro.

“Hello dead man!”

He turned around to look at me.

“Ah! Hello! How are you doing?”

“I am doing good, dead man.” I spoke in a way a child does, with the resurgence of my lost interest in the topic. He laughed in a manner quite responsive to it.

“Well, well, well.... so?”

“So what?”

“Who are you?” He asked with the undertone being that you can’t evade the question any more. And I still didn’t have any answer good enough.

“I’m more interested in who you are, hoping that you still are what you were that day. A dead man.”

“All of us are lot of things. It’s the role that we reinforce ourselves into which creates the difference. You know, the priorities, the preoccupations. Now stop bothering yourself too much over all that. As I said, it was a spontaneous remark.”

“Whatever. Now don’t go about beating the bush.”

“Oh my! Alright boy, but I am afraid that it might disturb your dad all the more.”

“Come on now, I won’t tell him.”

The unholy secret was losing its covert nature. So I felt as I drew him into every other sentence of conversation. Spontaneous remark in a poetic mood. Well, some of it lingered though.

“Well, what do you want to know?”

“How are you a dead man? Were you into despair?”

“Oh no! Not that. Look, I am bound to death, and so are you. We can’t evade it. Whichever path we take, wherever we go, death is the ultimate destination. It’s certain. And it’s around the corner. It could come to us anytime. And it’s this fact of the imminence of death which, in a way, is the precursor of life. Hence, I am a dead man who is bound to die sooner or later. We were born from an absence and we’ll die into an absence. Before birth and after death is an absence. The same absence. It’s a round journey.”

He looked at me expecting me to say something in turn. But at this point, my eyes caught sight of a funeral procession through the bars of the gate. They carried the deceased on the arthi (a wooden bed made of bamboo spokes used to carry the dead to the cremation ground) which four men held onto their shoulders. Behind it a large procession of men mostly in white clothes followed. The young guys wore t-shirt and jeans though. I kept gazing. He had his back towards it. He traced my gaze and looked behind.

“See.” He said so nonchalantly as if he himself had done some magic to create that scene as a demonstration. A moment later, he was disturbed though, probably on seeing me disturbed.

“It’s a coincidence.” I said without looking at him, more to myself, with my intent gaze still in that direction.

“Yes dear, of course. Just a coincidence. Nothing more.”

I looked on until the last man had disappeared from my sight. Then I looked at him. I had lost onto the string of words. Even he said nothing more. He pressed my shoulder softly with a touch of reassurance. Yes, I knew for sure that it was nothing but a mere coincidence. This is how coincidences are.

“Are you okay?” He asked me with genuine concern.

“Yeah, I am cool.”

Actually, whenever I would happen to watch a funeral procession, I was never cool. I would feel that some morbidity hovered in the air, which I would first try to pacify by praying to God to bless the soul of the dead and rest it in peace. And then, I would try to dispel it by whistling a song. But here, I was caught in a different situation. My natural habitual discomfort might be misconstrued as one appearing from the current situation. I did not want to present a weak picture of myself. I am mature. I know what death is. Why should it affect me? I resumed my exercise, while he lay down on the grass and closed his eyes.

As I retired for the night, the words kept coming back to me. Bound to death. Death is the ultimate destination. Round the corner. I stuck earphones into my ears and played some music on my music player so as to rid myself of the thoughts and lull myself to sleep. Bound to death. So? What’s new about that? Even I knew that I am going to die. I never thought that I would live forever. Everyone knows that they are going to die. Who doesn’t? What’s the big deal? What’s so philosophical about it? What’s there to be talked about? I dismissed the whole affair. I shuffled the tracks on my player, and started listening to a new song.

The morning paper carried news of a road accident. A truck had smashed into a car, and all four members of a family had been killed. It was sad, but it was not uncommon. The papers carried such news almost every day. People murdered. Trains derailed. Buildings on fire. Road accidents. I would hardly ever read those news articles. What was there to read about? A stranger, who I didn’t know, who I didn’t have any connection with, died. How could it make me feel sad! The sound of it is rather blunt but I had nothing whatsoever to do with them. It didn’t affect me even remotely. Only at the end of the day, I would pray to God to bless peace to the souls of the people who died that day, and bless the new-borns with a good life ahead. That was it. That did it. There was nothing more to think about.

But now, I did think. I would suddenly find myself ruminating about death. Random thoughts. The enigma had disappeared. The puzzle had been solved. Only the unholiness of the secret still remained. No one is supposed to ponder over death. Least of all, a youngster like me. I was gripped by blues. Sometimes I would sit ruefully thinking of death in conscious thoughts. I would shake myself. I would call Amar. Sometimes, I would skip my exercise routine and roam around with him in the malls. I would hang out with my girlfriend on the weekend. I would try to immerse myself in the nuances of modern life. We would eat pizzas, and drink coke. We would watch films in theatre. I would try to keep my mind off the uprising topic which went on inside my head. I would talk non-stop with desperate urgency about several other things. But once, I happened to mention my death to her. No, actually I did it quite deliberately.

“What if I die, will you be able to live without me?”

She pressed her fingers to my lips. “Don’t ever say such a thing again. Promise me, you won’t say it again.”

“What? What have I said? I was merely – “

“I can’t ever bear to listen about your – “ She wouldn’t even say ‘your death’. She suggested that there was something wrong with me. Why was I talking in such a sadistic manner! But was something wrong with me? What about how hysterical all these people suddenly became! Did they not know what death is? Was there nothing wrong with them? After that, I never mentioned death in front of her.

When I would return home, I would start reading poems. I would think of reading poems in general, but eventually it came about to poems on death. I had started fancying it to be a meditation, or a path to self-development or to exaggerate it, enlightenment. I was getting closer to Emily Dickinson. And there were some other people who had joined in. Osho, the man who taught death. I loved the way he had phrased his sentences. His similes, his seeming comfort rather relishing while talking about it. And some, rather several others who spoke of it, death, as beautiful. Sometimes I experienced spurts of frustration. Why was I undergoing all this turmoil? May be I was advancing on the path of maturity. May be it was an important lesson that needed to be learnt. I wasn’t clear what lesson. But I had realized that there was more to what the dead man had said than what I had understood. It couldn’t be all dismissed just like that.

I had realized at least something. The understanding of inevitability of death, which although is a definite, unambiguous fact, has some levels to it. Knowing. Actually knowing. And may be something furthermore. Are you getting the point? Everyone knew it on an outer level, but they never really admitted it. They never discussed it. They went hysterical over it. They couldn’t imagine themselves dying. As having left forever. If at all, the topic came up, especially the question how would you like to die, they would say they would prefer to die sleeping. They attributed it to being a painless form of death, but I felt it was more because of the ignorance involved. That way they wouldn’t have to face it. But I had come to imagine my death. With comfort. Which cremation would be better? Or shall I make use of my dead body by having it thrown to the vultures, as in the Parsi culture. Or shall I donate it to a hospital so that students could experiment upon it and learn new things. Shall I donate my body parts? Also, I had thoughts about the mourning sessions. I wouldn’t like people to sit around my family members with their sombre pretentious faces and thus deject them all the more while also contrastingly not allowing them to express their grief openly. I liked what they showed in some western films. People drinking, talking about the dead person, sharing their moments with him, praying together, even singing songs for him. A celebration of death. How dreary and how romantic! Slowly, my discomfort was ebbing. I could think about death without fretting. It was no more an obnoxious morbid obsession. I was seeing death and hence life in a different vein.  

A month later, my teacher’s mother expired. When he was absent for the second day in a row, it was then that I discovered this from another teacher. They had gone to his place the previous day after school The whole staff. I liked that teacher. I wished he were fine. So, I wanted to see him. But what could I say to make him feel better? I didn’t know. Even after all that self-development, I felt nervous even at the thought of having to face him. So, I didn’t want to visit him. But I wanted to console him. I asked Amar if we should go to his place. He said that he would anyways be back to school in a few days.

“Of course, he would come, but that’s a different thing Amar. At this time, he must be sorrowful.”

“But what would we say to make him feel better? It’s rather awkward for me.”

Yeah! What would we say? How would we face him? The awkwardness related to death. But I really wanted to show him that we cared for him. At least, I did. No, in fact, Amar also liked that teacher. But he was unrelenting to go to his place, to the site of death. So, I thought to go to his place by myself.

Earlier as a child, I would never have to go to anyone. Children were spared this horror. Oh sorry, I mean.... Well actually, this is what I mean. My parents would go visiting friends mourning a near and dear one’s death. I would be at home. Then they would return, and initially I expected them to look sad and serious when they returned. But they would be so normal. Sometimes more normal, I mean cheerful, than otherwise. Oh God! so cruel of them. They used to be talking about the most mundane things.  No solemnity, nothing. I would fear myself becoming harder day by day. But then, I gradually got over it. Let’s say I matured. I sensed that they were internally sad about the friend’s loss, but the person who went away wasn’t connected to them. Hence, they didn’t really mourn that death but they were sad about the friend’s loss and consoled him or her by visiting and talking. So when they returned home, it was okay for them to be normal. Until this time, I never had to visit any mourners. In a way, my parents could take us with them just the way they took us to marriage functions but they would have us stay at home in such cases. They never discussed death in front of us. It was a conscious decision on their part. I know.

So, after all I went. I was nervous. I saw my teacher. There were many people sitting around him. Would I go to him, or would I settle here in a corner? Sooner or later, he would see me. What a selfish thought that was! But in a way, that selfishness carried a concern for him. I wanted myself to be seen by him so that he knew that I was there. That I am with him. I wondered how much support seeing me would provide him, but well, maybe it would. Why else would all these people be here? It was so as not to let him and his family feel lonely in such a difficult grievous phase. But then I reconsidered. Let me go to him, I thought. Every step that I took towards him felt so heavy. Finally when I was a few feet away, he looked up and saw me. I stopped there itself. I couldn’t move further. I looked down to avoid the discomfort, in the excuse that I was finding space among the people perched on the ground so as to move forward. Looking down, I moved forward and reached near him. I sat close to him. It was one of the most difficult moments of my life. I bent on my knee towards him.

“Sir, I came to know... But don’t be – “

God! What was I saying! Don’t feel sad? Come on, why won’t he feel sad. He had lost his mother.

“Don’t feel that you are alone.” A big pause. “I am here.”

His lips pressed together into a wry. “Yeah..” he murmured.

He looked so sad. I wished I could hug him tight. I felt that a hug is what he needed rather than so many words. But although I liked him, yet he was my teacher, not a friend. Yeah, it’s fine to hug a teacher, but you know, a kind of barrier... moreover, there were so many people around. I felt shy. I settled down on the ground. Just then, an elderly man called his name. He was inching his way towards us through the gathering. But sir stood up and went to him to avoid him the trouble. I retrenched towards the wall behind, and sat there without talking to anyone. After some time, they brought food for everyone. Sir was there. He put in my plate a roti and daal. Eating at the mourning of a dead man, I mean, dead woman? I felt morbid. Also I didn’t like him taking all this trouble when he was anyways so aggrieved.

“Please eat.” He said to me softly, almost in a whisper.

“Sir, you sit and eat. I’ll help with it.” I said half rising.

“Oh no! It’s ok. Sit. It’s all done. You eat.”

I had to eat. The associations with food and death had always been so contrasting. Holy food, unholy death. I was finding it difficult to chew. But I rebuked myself. Had death entered the food or what? What’s wrong with the food? I felt calmer. I ate. The food was tasty. Oh God! I felt so guilty at this thought of finding the food tasty. I also felt all the more morbid.

The teacher rejoined us at school 4-5 days later. Within a week, he was fine. You know, he was fine. I saw him talking and laughing with another teacher. But then, what did I expect of him? To wear mourning costumes, or to wear his grief over his face? To never get over his grief? Moreover, how did laughing on whatever they were laughing about, talking or seeming normal imply that he didn’t feel that sadness inside. He would have been still missing his mother now and then. Of course! Yes, one has to accept death. One has to move on. In fact, life moves on irrespective of anything. The memory fades but the loss remains. And you get to accept it more and more firmly.

That autumn, death showed itself to me at closer quarters. The roles were switched for me. My grandfather passed away one morning. Well, he was old and diseased. He was in the hospital for the past week. And although we hoped against hope, yet we foresaw it as a possibility. It wasn’t shocking for me. Nevertheless, I was aggrieved. It was the first death in my family that I had witnessed. I wouldn’t see my grandfather ever again. He was gone forever. I tried to accept it by thinking of it as the natural course of things, and that given his ill health condition, living longer would mean only suffering for him. Thinking on these lines helped but I couldn’t stop feeling heavy at heart. Amar came to me. As per his usual self, he seemed uncomfortable in saying anything. But he was there. And that was enough. He hugged me, and a tear dropped from my eye. Also I showed traces of guilt of an unknown nature. Someone, i.e. my grandfather had died but I was still alive. Well, I would die too. Some day. I had begun to accept death more closely.

But still, what I didn’t realize that this ‘some day’ could be any day. It needed not be at the age of 70 years, rather it could be any random day. I wish I could be kept away from this realization because it came at the expense of breaking my heart. Nothing has been able to hold my attention for this whole past week. Any moment I slip into a morose mood.

Amar is no more. He died. He met with an accident and died on the spot.

Not just this once, I have repeated these words to myself in my mind over and over again. But it’s too hard to digest. The boy who I met almost every day would meet me never again. The parties and the fun we used to have would occur no more. It’s strange but at times I totally forget this fact. I start to dial his number, and then the grim reality takes hold of me. I wait for him after college to go home with me on my bike, but after waiting for a minute, the reminder of his death suffocates me.

He was not meant to die. That guy who was uncomfortable thinking about death showed no possibility of dying. He was not old. He was not sick. He was humorous. He was filled with life. And yet he died. And so I realize, it could very well have been me.

This realization that death is around the corner has come to me shockingly. It has almost mentally crippled me. But you don’t have to go through it to learn it, because here I am baring my heart and all the pain within it. All of us know it, but we never actually realize it. If we did, then we won’t live our life so carelessly. There are friends whom we have not spoken to for years. We think that we shall meet them some day. There are several dreams inside of us dying a slow death, because we have compromised and put them on hold for a few years or even until the age of our retirement from the earning job. There are unsaid words which are waiting for that unknown day in future to be spoken. There are feelings that have been left unexpressed in the vague hope of being expressed some day.

But my dear people, please understand that that one day might never come. Death doesn’t discriminate. It waits for no one. Whatever you wish to say, do, feel for yourself or others, now is the time.

Don’t forget death, because only this continuous reminder of death could unleash a spurt of life inside you. Not by knowing but by realizing that you or anyone around you could die any fine day, you would be able to shake your inertia, your lethargy and go about doing what you want in this moment. Living in the moment has to be the way to live, because it’s uncertain whether we would see the light of the next day or even the next moment.

Antonyms are tied closely in a thread. If you detest and ignore death, you wouldn’t be able to live. It’s inevitable and imminent, and thus the most powerful stimulant to bring about a surge of life. We are here for a limited amount of time, which again is unknown to us. And it’s this limit posed by death that makes life valuable.

Even if in a figurative sense, that man was right. All of us are dead men. Well, if you don’t like his poetic expression, find out your other answer soon. Find out who you are and even what you are before you are actually reduced, or burnt or buried, to being nothing. So that when anyone asks you in the park who are you, you must be ready to answer it. You can’t lose any more time. Go on, discover your heart. Discover yourself. 

Discover yourself. With that, here I close. Please pray to God to bless peace to Amar’s soul. In a way, I speak through him, and I am feeling a little better now. Thank you for coming. I hope to see you again. Take care!

बुरी आदत (हाइकु)

हर रोज़ रूठना, मनाना, झगड़े, शिकायतें 

फिर भी दूर-दूर नहीं रह सकते 

एक-दूसरे की बुरी आदत हैं हम...

Leave and let live

Let me leave

Come on, please

Until when would I

Put up with you

Until when 

Shall we tolerate

Each other

And why?

For the sake of love?

And what is love for?

Go on

Talk about

That crumpled ideal 

Of selfless love  

Finding happiness 

In the happiness of lover

I would continue to agree 

Only if I were 

A crack-brained masochist

Accepting all that pain 

From my lover

As a pleasure

But hello! good morning!

I would rather

Seek happiness for me

Through a direct route

We fell in love

It was a beautiful feeling

Which made me happy 

It used to, 

Before it ebbed out

Now that 

It doesn't gladden

Rather saddens my heart

I would like to go away 

Let's not pick on 

The goodie me baddie you

The angelic one is who 

I give it to you

Had you not been happy

I don't say 

You won't have stayed

With me 

But I am not you 

What to do

So shallow a person

I am! 

Religious effeminism

The devotee wore white clothes with 'Hare Krishna Hare Rama' inscribed on them. A satchel made of cloth hung loosely on his shoulder. The beads of the rosary rotated through his delicate fingers, while his lips murmured softly the 'Hare Krishna' chant. The effeminate quality hovering around him was what caught my notice. And the seemingly sacrilegious thought occurred to me. 

Is this man married? If yes, is he able to sexually satisfy his wife? Religion must be infesting these people with a crisis about their sexual identity, which might extend to a crisis about their sexual orientation.  

I remembered the young priest whom I met on the Mathura bus stand. He was dressed in a semi-masculine floral gown which was, he explained in his ultra soft whisper, designed exclusively for the Krishna devotees.


The male God - a storehouse of sexual energy.

• Krishna. There wasn't much need to cut to inferences. He told me explicitly that there is only one male in Vrindavan, i.e. the Lord Krishna and the rest are all females, supposedly His gopis (Krishna's maidens). Even in the mythology, Krishna describes to his lady-love Radha that the gopis were male sages who wished a closeness with their lord, and hence were blessed by the gracious Sri Krishna to be his wanton strumpets in that incarnation. But they could have been close to him in the guise of his fellow gwalas, the male herdsmen. So probably, it was a sexual closeness with the lord that the celibate sages desired. The question that storms my imagination is that having had a knowledge of this fact, did Krishna not feel uncomfortable in conducting the maharaas, the great festival of lust, with these male, female or rather transsexual sages. I sighed with relief that I wasn't born in the holy land of Vrindavan, where, in addition to having to bathe in the gutter-like holy Yamuna, my sexual identity itself would be endangered by upholders of religion and tradition.   

• Shiva. The Bhagvata Purana tells us that after Mohini, the female form of Vishnu, had slayed the demon Bhasmasur, Shiva wished to see the bewildering Mohini again, while His abandoned wife Parvati (Uma) looked on with shame and envy. After repeated protests, Vishnu had to give in to Shiva's persistence, and took on the female form. Shiva was overcome by Kama (lust) and reached for her beautiful body. But he ejaculated before reaching into her vagina. The semen is poured into Anjani's ear and Hanuman is born. However, the transsexual Mohini and Shiva continue with their violent love-making. It is probably owing to such uninhibited nature of his sexual energy, that the God Shiva has His penis worshiped by the people. Wendy Doniger, an American scholar of the history of religion, states about Shiva lingam, "The lingam appeared, separate from the body of Siva, on several occasions... On each of these occasions, Siva's wrath was appeased when gods and humans promised to worship his lingam forever after, which, in India they still do." Why should a man with a straight sexual orientation touch, worship or pour milk over a penis, even if it were of a God? 

The slaves and devotees of God devoid of a healthy sexual life.

Isn't it ironical that while all the male Gods are married, some of them even polygamous or possibly bisexual, and replete with sexual energy, the slaves and devotees to the lord are expected to abandon their sex life?

• Hanuman. Hanuman is the human-monkey God whose sweat contained semen and thus a drop of it impregnated a fish swimming hundreds of feet below in the deep sea when he was flying from above. However, ironical as it is, this sexually charged-up and utterly masculine God with rock-solid muscles never had intercourse with any woman in his whole life, and is hence the deity of the celibates. Neither he drinks madira (liquor) or smokes, nor hang-out with apsaras, who are the concubines of the deities. What does he do? He is the daas (slave) of Lord Ram having decided to spend his entire life in His service. It's my inferential reckoning that his vow of celibacy is a consequence of his being preoccupied with Lord Ram's service. What's tragic is that despite this torturous vow, the poor slave Hanuman had to rip apart his chest and show inside a picture of 'Ram and His wife Sita together' to convince the suspicious Ram about his pure feelings towards Sita whom he addressed as Maiya (mother). 

• Laxman. The same holds true for Ram's younger brother Laxman, an incarnation of Shesha naag, who left behind his newly wed wife Urmila and proceeds to the forests with Ram and Sita into the 14-year exile. Urmila beseeches her husband to let her accompany them, but he replies that during these 14 years, he would be a sevak (servant) to his brother Ram and sister-in-law Sita in the forest, and that her presence would be a hindrance in his carrying out of his services. 

• Jogta and Jogtini. Talking of religious tradition brings to the fore one of the most peculiar ancient traditions of Jogta (male) and Jogtini (female), still prevalent in the south Indian state of Karnataka. The Jogta and Jogtini are devotees of Goddess Yellamma who are forced by the society to give up everything and serve God. They are treated as sex slaves. The women aren't allowed to marry or have children, whereas the men have to give up the very fact of being a man and suppress their desires, while satisfying the crude desires of the priests and the other men in the village. A recommendation of a worth-watch film in this context would be the poignant Marathi film 'Jogwa', which portrays one such Jogta's crisis over his sexual identity and his efforts to resolve it, while fighting against the shackles of discrimination and sexual oppression in the quest of uniting with the lover jogtini. 

• The ascetics and spiritual gurus. The anti-sex religious trend has percolated through several ages, as is seen from the sex-free lives of ancient saints, middle-ages Himalaya ascetics to modern spiritual gurus. Even for ordinary folks, the man and woman are supposed to sleep away from each other during some fasting periods. Christianity goes to the extent of condemning sex as an act of pleasure assigning to it a little sanctity only as a means of reproduction. Even the mother of Jesus Mother Mary is impregnated by the God Himself, and described as virgin and pure. Osho is an exception. He was normal in the sense that he didn't render himself effeminate before advancing onto the journey of enlightenment. But he became the one who was tainted by the puritanical masses. Even mentioning his name in some Indian households can create a scandal, and call for hushes and murmurs. 

Sex as a need and natural process.
Now it's an inessential but natural inquiry that does the vow of celibacy prevent the release of testosterone.  Surely it doesn't, as that's a natural process. So, do these devotees and slaves never feel attracted to any women? Do they never desire to have sex? If they control the desire, then how? Do they masturbate? A religious devotee and masturbation - how unholy! So, do they leave its secretion to a nightfall? But then, don't they touch that semen while washing their underwear and pants? Probably that's why, instead of the young people, it's mainly the old-aged people who are generally supposed all the more to devote their time to worship, when there is no slimy masculine extract to disturb their religious fervour. 

The sexist tendencies of the patriarchal society and religion is what seems to have brought in this religious effeminism, anti-sex religious trends and the myth of the female purity

• The weak female Goddesses for whom the husband God is Swami (master). Despite being goddesses of high repute, Lakshmi and Saraswati who are revered as the givers of wealth and knowledge also have to serve their husbands Vishnu and Brahma respectively. Lakshmi massages the feet of Vishnu. Parvati has to prepare Bhaang, an intoxicating bevarage made from the leaves of female Cannabis plant, for her husband Shiva whereas the most unfortunate, the embodiment of piousness, Sita had to go through agni-pariksha, which had her enter the fire to prove her loyalty to her husband, whereas he didn't have to prove his loyalty to her. Had she been disloyal, the fire would have burned her. But even after proving her innocence, she was ousted from the kingdom in a pregnant condition by Ram as a reaction to a casual doubting remark that he overheard between a washerman and his wife about His acceptance of Sita after a year of separation. 

• Polygamous Gods but Goddess tied to the husband for ever. There are several instances of polygamy, non-marital love relations and extra-marital affairs in case of the male Gods like Shiva and Krishna, but there are no instances of polyandry in the case of the Goddesses, who are either spinsters or utterly loyal and devoted to the service of their husband Gods. In contrast to the pure Goddesses, the Gods could also enjoy the company of the concubines, the apsaras, the dancing maidens in Indra's court.  

• The 'beloved' God and 'Mother' Goddess. Legends mention female devotees utterly devout to the worship of the God thinking of Him to be her lover or husband. The God is appeased and accepts her as his wife thus offering her sexual intimacy with Himself. The best examples are Rukmini and Parvati. Even when the God rescues a women as in the case of the 17000 women liberated by Krishna, He takes on the role of their benefactor. But nowhere the female Goddess marries a male devotee by being happy with his worship. The possibility is removed from the root itself as the male devotees are supposed to worship the Goddesses as mother - Durga Maa, Sitya Maiya, Sherawali Maa etc., whereas the male Gods are never worshiped in the form of father or brother, rather as a husband or lover. 

The effects of Sexual oppression. 

• Sexual dominance brings about ultimate dominance. This exertion of the God's sexual authority is one of the primary foundation stones of the establishment of his ultimate authority. You must have seen in old Bollywood films where the landlord or Seth (merchant) played by Amrish Puri or Prem Chopra ask their servant to send his wife to their cottage to spend a night. The Jogtini or the devadasi, whose work used to be to sing and dance in temple functions, is "married" to the temple deity and in a puberty ceremony, the devadasi-initiate consummates her marriage with an emblem of the God borrowed from the temple as a stand-in bridegroom. This sexual dominance of Gods over a female is further asserted by the fact that in the brahminical tradition, marriage is viewed as the only religious initiation (diksha) permissible to women. But the Jogta or any male ascetic has to give up the fact of being a man, because the man is already there - the all powerful male God. Be it the Hare Krishna or the Sufi tradition, he has to vouch only for the love of the (male by default) God, and hence ending or when unable to fully control, diminishing a sexual intimacy with his wife. 

• Curb the primitive instinct so as to tame them. Another big reason behind sexual oppression, which enabled its usage by kings, rulers, religious teachers and the state for their respective motives, is the primordial instincts, the intensity and the passion involved in the sexual act. And such a man is difficult to tame. 

• Hence, a conditioning is initiated right from the childhood in creating a taboo around it and guise it to appear to be something disgusting. 
• Religion condemns it as a an act of pleasure and suggests it to be seen only as a means of reproduction. Many mythological tales and texts talk of woman as one of the major impediments in a man's journey into heaven. 
• Also, the myth of female virginity seen as her purity, 
• And the ancient religious rules that a woman shouldn't engage into sex as an act of pleasure but rather as a duty to appease her pati parmeshvar (the husband God) are some tools to create a rift between the man and woman and thus alleviate the flames of liberating primordial passion. 
• Religion does away with it altogether by attaching it with guilt and making it a necessary renunciation for the attainment of God.    

And thus, in order to create an all fucking (literally, pun unintended), all powerful God, religion resorted to sexual oppression, infesting several male devotees with a crisis over their sexual identities and explaining to the females their virginity as a  symbol of purity or say a Godly virtue required in order to attain God.  

A suitable death

The glory had faded

His charm receded

He had outlived his life 

Weakened sensibilities

Left not much for him to do 

His weak frail body

Unable to move 

He was lost and forgotten 

 He could perform no more

Many referred to him by mistake

Literally as a figure of yore

The best that he was fit for 

Was a great obituary

But with all his being consumed 

Nothing left behind

Could he not exist in

A remote corner of his mind 

 Could he?

"It's better to burn out than to fade away" - Kurt Cobain

Reciprocatory love

Do you love me?

Yes? Then I love you too. 

What! You hate me?

Get away, Damn you!

 

You want break-up?

Who wants to live with you!

Dare you torture me! 

And I'll kill you.

Fair enough, isn't it?

Oh my love! 

The effortless geniuses

Today I downloaded Ray Charles' last recording - 'Sorry seems to be the hardest word' with Elton John, a song which was to form a part of the album 'Genius loves company'. Lying on a sofa in the dark room with my eyes closed, I listen to the reverberating voice of the legendary singer. I am not able to appreciate it. I am not able to say 'Oh wow! it's amazing', because I am taken in too much to analyse or comment. It fills my soul and goes deep down to touch me. This touch is so rare these days. Everything comes with layers of superfluousness. But here, I ain't talking about humans. I am talking only about arts - literature, music, acting etc.

There are some people who are crafty, who believe that there is a technique for everything. They try to impress you with hit tricks and formulas. There are film-makers who know just the right mix of item song, sex scenes, comic punches, action, romance, songs to make a blockbuster. There are poets who try really hard to make the audience laugh in a kavi sammelan even if it means reciting idiotic jokes as a prelude to the poems. Same goes for song-writers who are on the lookout for a catchy phrase which would get onto the tongues of masses. Or the cinematographers for the over-edited Tamil blockbusters who use those unusual camera angles, over-saturation, the flashy camera movement, dolly shot and other techniques each and everywhere. I loathe them and would extend my discussion here on to the kind of people who I admire. The people who are artists in every sense of the word. 

There are people who are geniuses - poets who wouldn't get any syllable in the meter of their poem wrong, writers who know just the right word for every expression, singers who wouldn't let any note go wrongly an iota up or down, film-makers who are so organic to make films with all the semblance to life - whose works are flawless. Be it Edgar Allan Poe or Ustad Mehdi Hassan, they have an extreme or, let me say, exhaustive knowledge of their craft. They are too careful to let one word or note seem even inappropriate, leave alone wrong. Surely I have a lot of respect for them. 

But there are some other people who are careless. They don't take pride in conforming to rules. No, these are not the people who take pride in breaking rules and strive to create experimental cinema or modern art. Rather, neither they conform to the rules nor they take pride in flouting them. They are the people whose art stems from deep inside. However romantic that might sound, but yes, I know it because I have felt it. And even without any trying, the final piece is of great quality. However, remarking on such pieces of art in terms of quality is itself a bit inconvenient. It's the rising of hair on my arms, the chills down my spine, the awe in my eyes, the grip on my mind and the hangover which remains for long after the experience.

Two days ago, I read Mohan Rakesh's novel 'Na aane wala kal' (the tomorrow which never comes), about the weariness of a school teacher disgusted with the mundane life at school with hypocrite colleagues and whose wife has abandoned him with whom he was anyways not happy. The novel questions the normalcy of the so-called normal life highlighting the burden of existence for those who wouldn't acknowledge it, and the resistance in form of survival issues and internal skepticism for those who realize the misery of this life and want to break from it. The novel has no show of elegance. Written in simple vocabulary and simplistic style without any metaphors, similes, symbolism or other elements, it seems like it was written in running hand. And I guess this is what makes it so poignant. It's just right in your face. Going to the extent of describing the minutest thoughts inside the head without the need for screening any of them, this honest diary entry automatically gets laced with imagery, where you see images of not just the prevalent scene and situation but also of whatever is going on inside the narrator's head. Readers of naturalist fiction like to read a story as if it were true, but in this case, no such effort is required. On the contrary, it's too difficult to discard it as a fictional tale. It's a natural piece written effortlessly. This is what I call authentic. This is what I feel has stemmed from the soul.

Similarly, there are actors like Heath Ledger in 'Dark Knight rises' and Daniel Day Lewis in 'My left foot' who went to extremes in impersonating their character and had their personal life disturbed months after the shoot of the film. The tendency to impress by doing one's best is an inherent tendency in actors, which sometimes becomes almost a desperation. But when someone lets go of all such worries, ambitions for applaud or awards, or the demand posed by the internal self to perform great, when someone doesn't use any method or technique and just performs from his soul, when the actor becomes the character, when the singer becomes the song, when the shayar's emotions at the time of writing the ghazal get personified in the singer, it is then that a true, authentic performance comes up, which thrills, moves, and as I said, touches somewhere deep down.

Doing this is not easy. To be so careless and to just write for what, in my view, is the first cause as well as effect of writing, acting or singing i.e. expression. It's all the more difficult in writing when there is no immediacy, take any amount of re-takes, and you've all the time to keep musing and analyzing your lines.  I haven't achieved that genius, where no one could pinpoint flaws in my writing. Leave alone others, I am myself hardly ever satisfied. So, even speaking from a practical perspective, there is a need for me to fit into the second model, that of the careless authentic poets. But even if there is a whole plot in my head, firstly I keep avoiding or procrastinating from putting it on paper. Then, after a long time, when I start, I scribble the first line. I keep gloating over it for some time. It doesn't sound good enough to be the starting line. So, I slash it, and start with a new line. Again, slashing it and rewriting keeps happening for some time. Finally, I get it and move on. But after writing a paragraph or two, I read it over and dismiss all of it as a futile attempt. It was much simpler in childhood. But now, it's quite difficult. It does happen in poetry that the whole poem comes to me right within five minutes from its origin in my mind from unknown source. But it's a rare phenomenon. And moreover, I disregard many of these poems. I wish I had more respect for them, but they just don't read so good to me. So I neither recite them, nor make a fair draft of the scribbles in running hand. While there are some other poems which keep on going unfinished for months or even years in the hope of finding the right word. Frankly, I don't even clearly know what does 'right' mean in poetry, especially when I am an upholder of free verse. But it just doesn't sound right. With prose which is longer, the problem is all the more bigger.

Well, today I have written this piece. And although I have half a mind to save it as a draft for ever like so many other drafts, yet I think I'll post it today.

Azaadi aur Yuva (Hindustan Dainik Report Page 9)

http://paper.hindustantimes.com/epaper/viewer.aspx

Vijay and I started a project with the name Takhti, under which we imparted free coaching to 80 girls from 14 villages to qualify CTET, the eligibility test for becoming a primary teacher. 15 girls cleared the exam. Also, we have been doing street plays in and around Delhi to spread awareness on various social issues mostly independently and sometimes in collaboration with Action Aid 'goonj project', HLFPPT and other NGOs. Hindi paper 'Hindustan' acknowledges our efforts in a special report on the occasion of Independence day. Follow the above link and check out page 9... 

Sweet Sin

Oh no, it’s not for nothing

That some shrewd sinewy sucker

Started the words sin and sweet,

No coincidence, with the same letter

Right from day one, they banished

The sweet was adjudged to be sinful

Adam got a lump in his throat

When he plucked and ate an apple

An autocrat invented discipline

That extra salt makes food inedible

Uniforms brought about conformity

Drills, parades robotized the rabble

Who need to merely follow orders

Applying no mind of their own

Masters don’t need discipline,

The slaves are the toiling pawns

And then the ridiculous reverend

Preached self-discipline and austerity

Infested the folks with a lot of guilt

Robbing them of all colour and gaiety

The penance, redemption, whip-lashing

Their heads bowed low in confession

For basic needs and innocent instincts

For natural behaviour like masturbation

A morose poet romanticised that

Struggle of life as the noble truth

Further deadened the sensibilities

He smudged the frolic of youth

If God has made this weird world

He must be a big-time masochist

The bitter gourd purifies the blood

Chocolate spoils the kid’s teeth

Sin is tempting, temptation is sin

God! He got everything wrong

Whatever he made delightful

To whom do those joys belong

Now the thought’s occurred

Exuberate in the time of reprise

Entropy will increase in waves

Go on, claim your own prize.

Pour me some ether

The green grass

The blue lamp casts

Flickering light

On my feet

Get me a whiff of ether

That flows in the stream

I am so hapless

Scoured is my dream

Don't pluck my eyelashes

Away from brashes

The low gas pressures 

Tug at my heart 

Let me evenly breathe 

No more needs 

Don't brag about bliss

When desire's dried out in me 

I'm tired of bargaining 

Just pour me some ether

From the stream

Darn the milkmaid!

Personal space

Girlfriend (GF) : जान, you know what I'm thinking...... हमें कुछ टाइम के लिए अलग हो जाना चाहिए 
Boyfriend (BF) (surprised) : मतलब... क्यूँ?
GF : I don’t know. I feel that I have become too dependent on you, you know. I just...I just want to feel free. I think that We are taking too much of each other’s personal space, you know?
BF (confounded) : No, I don't know. ये...क्या बकचोदी है 

GF (disgusted) : Oh this language! I am fucking sick of it.

BF : क्या sick? तुम 15 बार fuck fuck बोलो, वो कुछ नहीं. मैंने बकचोदी बोल दिया तो sick. 

GF – oh stop it. (shouting) Pleeeeeeease. You are impossible....... Well anyways, let’s not divert from what we were talking about. I think that we should separate for a year. No meeting, no phone calls, nothing.  

BF (matter-of-factly) :  क्या बात कर रही हो यार  ये!   अब तो  पूरे 1 हफ्ते से कितने अच्छा चल रहा है सब,  कोई लड़ाई नहीं, कुछ नहीं. और तुम suddenly - Become dependent, personal space? 't makes no sense to me. (pause) (his facial expression changes from tension to mischief) Oh! i get it,  तुम मजाक कर रही हो ना?..silly me!   

GF – नहीं, मजाक नहीं है. I am serious. Try to understand. This is for both of us.  

BF : ऐसे कैसे both of us, जबरदस्ती? I don't want it. I want to be with you. 

GF -  Don’t make it so hard for me. Trust me, we need this break. To..you know...live our lives, to reinforce our individuality. And when we’ll be back together, तुम देखना - we’ll love each other so much more. 

BF – Back together? अब...ये क्या है. इस एक साल में कोई और पसंद आ गया तो?

GF - मुझे तो नहीं आएगा, but तुम्हारा...मैं नहीं कह सकती.

BF - How can you be so sure? फिर क्यूँ चाहिए ब्रेक. इसीलिए ना कि इन कुछ दिनों में things not going that good between us, and I guess now you are not so sure if you want to....

GF - Wait. I am not sure? (flabbergasted with animated expression) Yea... See. I knew. I knew कि तुम कुछ ऐसा ही सोचोगे. क्यूँ, तुम्हें तो बस मौका चाहिए ना....for checking out other girls. 

BF : क्या बोल रही हो यार तुम? दिमाग तो ठीक है तुम्हारा? 

GF : हाँ, मेरा दिमाग बिलकुल ठीक है, लेकिन तुम्हारे दिल में जरुर कुछ गड़बड़ है. 

BF (mad with frustration) : मेरे दिल में गड़बड़ है? मुझे मौका चाहिए? It's you who wants us to separate for a year, और कह रही हो कि मुझे मौका चाहिए, I want to check out girls. और मौका क्या, जाना होगा तो मैं खुद से नहीं चला जाऊंगा? क्या बकवास है ये! 

(silence, tries to calm himself) 

(calmly) खैर anyways... हाँ तो, what are we supposed to do for this one year then?   

GF : मैंने बताया तो. तुम्हारी समझ में ना आए तो मैं क्या करूँ. 

BF : क्या बताया. मैंने तो सुना नहीं. please फिर बता दो. 

GF : I want to explore life, I want to explore myself, I want to build onto my individuality. 

BF : OK... and - I'm stopping you from doing that? 

GF : No, not that. But I need some space.... जैसे मेरे सभी decisions सभी plans सब कुछ तुम से ही... I'm becoming dependent on you. 

BF : I don't mind, I don't feel it. 

GF : But I do. For once, I want to do something alone.

BF : And that would be like?

GF : Well, मेरे दिमाग में तो करने के लिए काफी कुछ है. Things I have never done before. You know, I want to go river rafting, I want to learn pottery, I’ll learn Spanish, and may be playing guitar. And yes, I am planning to write something, and -.

BF : I still don't get it. ये सब exploration तो तुम मेरे साथ रह कर भी कर सकती हो ना. मैं रोक थोड़े ना रहा हूँ तुम्हें कुछ करने से.

GF : नहीं. मुझे ये सब करना है, और अकेले करना है. I don't want you to suggest or decide anything or arrange things for me... कहाँ से करना है, कैसे करना है....

BF : Ok, I won't decide or arrange. in fact, मेरे लिए तो अच्छा है, I'm spared the burden of it... 

GF : Burden? Burden? You mean to say that planning things for me is a burden on you? I am a burden on you? 

BF : No, not burden, I mean... I won't have to worry about.... you know...

GF : Yes, you don't have to worry now. I won't be a burden anymore. 

BF (helpless) : जान मैं थोड़े ना complain कर रहा हूँ. तुम्हें ही problem है. being dependent and all...      

GF : No, it's ok, no need to explain. So, I told you. this was fucking what I was supposed to, what I had in mind. पर तुम्हारे दिमाग में सीधा क्या आया.... कोई और पसंद आ गया तो... how desperate!

BF (shouting with anger) : Enough! (Pause) साथ रहना है तो तुम्हारी मर्ज़ी, अलग होना है तुम्हारी मर्ज़ी. अलग हो कर कब वापस साथ आना है, इस बीच क्या करना है, सब कुछ तुम decide करोगी क्या? मुझे तो नहीं सीखनी spanish, मुझे नहीं करनी pottery. आएगा मेरे दिमाग में जो आएगा....

GF : हाँ हाँ, I know कि तुम्हारे दिमाग में बस यही सब आएगा. (shouting) I am such a fool, I am such a fool. God! why am I even talking to you? 

BF : I don't know. Go. 

GF : Yes yes, I am going. I just wanted कि इस सब में तुम मेरा साथ देते, पर तुमसे कुछ expect करना ही गलती है. It's already so hard for me, and all you did is.... well, it's ok. bye.

(Starts going away.) 

BF (calling from behind) : अच्छा, सुनो तो... 

GF : कुछ नहीं सुनना मुझे. I don't want to see your face. 

(She goes away. He sits down dejected. A minute later, a friend comes to him.)

Friend : क्या हो गया. ऐसे कैसे बैठा है..

Boy : ऐसे ही यार.

Friend : कुछ तो. इतना सडा हुआ चेहरा क्यूँ बना रखा है............. और भाभी कहाँ गई.

Boy : भाभी? (grins with a wry) चली गई. 

Friend : चली गई? अजीब है.... (it occurs to him) ओहो, लड़ाई हो गई क्या तुम्हारी, किसी बात पर.

Boy : हाँ, ब्रेक-अप हो गया यार.

Friend : क्या, ब्रेक-अप? फिर से?

Boy : हाँ यार, पर इस बार final वाला हो गया है 

Friend : ऐसा है क्या?

Boy : हाँ.....I guess so. 

Friend : ऐसा क्या हो गया भाई?

Boy : ऐसे ही....पता नहीं क्या बकचोदी है. छोड़ ना, सिगरेट जला यार एक... 

(He lights a cigarette and passes it to him. Both of them smoke.)      

5 hours later.

(Both the friends are drinking. The boy is a little glum.) 

Friend : याद आ रही है क्या?

Boy : हाँ.....kind of. 

Friend : फ़ोन कर के देख ले

Boy : तेरे आने से पहले किया था 3-4 बार try, उठाया नहीं.  

Friend : हम्म....(pause) anything you want to share? जो भी...याद आ रहा हो.

Boy : क्या फायदा है भाई याद कर के... छोड़ ना. I don't want to remember anything.  

Friend : अबे मस्त है. seriously. मैं तो कहता ही हूँ - ज्यादा मत सोच. chill मार. 

Boy : अगला पैग बना यार.

(He pours next drink for both of them)

Friend : गाने चलाने है लैपटॉप पर? Low volume में?

Boy : हाँ, चला ले... 

(He plays song 'दिल दे दिया है, जान तुझे देंगे, दग़ा नहीं करेंगे सनम. रब्ब दी कसम यारा रब्ब दी कसम." 

Boy : साले, किसी पुरानी दुश्मनी का बदला ले रहा है क्या? 

Friend : क्या हो गया

Boy : यार पहले ही याद आ रही है, ऐसे गाने चला कर तू और मार ले मेरी. 

Friend : अच्छा ठीक है, senti ना हुआ कर    

(Stops the song.) 

ये ले, कर दिया बंद.

(Silence. Both of them sipping from their drink, eating peanuts.) 

कुछ भी बोल भाई, दारु में  BP best है                                                             

Boy : सही में....smooth जा रही है बिलकुल. नशे भी मस्ताने हो रहे हैं. (pause) चल, कोई मस्त सा गाना लगा, डांस करते हैं bhen****. 

Friend (happily, cautiously) : sure?

Boy : क्या.... अब इस में भी sure जैसा क्या है... 

Friend : अच्छा, लगा रहा हूँ.... (searching for song in laptop) अम्म्म..... 

(Just then, his phone kept on the table rings.)

Boy : अबे! 

(He rises to pick up phone.)

Friend : किसका है  

Boy : उसी का है... (Picks up) हल्लो हल्लो..... (pause) हल्लो....

(Friend asking in signs what's up. He signs back that there is no reply from other side.) 

हल्लो....जान.... हल्लो.... 

(Sound of sobbing heard.)

अरे, रो रहे हो तुम. जान... नहीं जान... ऐसे ना करो बेबी.  

GF (over phone) (sobbing) : मैं कहीं ना जा रही जान.

BF : हाँ तो, कौन कह रहा है तुम्हें जाने को.

GF (over phone) : मैं जा ही नहीं सकती जान. 5 घंटे दूर रहने में ही मेरी जान चली गई. मैं नहीं रह सकती जान तुमसे अलग.          

(He looks at friend. Signs that he's going to balcony, and will be back shortly.)

BF : yea baby, I know. 

(Signs to him to pass the drink. He passes him the drink. He goes out on the balcony. The friend plays the song 'Wake me up when september ends', and starts surfing facebook. Then sticks earphones in the audio jack, and starts listening through earphones.) 

(The boy returns. The friend sees him. Removes the earphones.) 

Friend : क्या हुआ? मामला ok है?

Boy : हाँ भाई, हो गया settle. 

Friend : यार, थोड़ा पहले कॉल कर लेती! बोतल तो ना खरीदनी पड़ती. (They grin.) वैसे अब क्या दिमाग में आ गई उसके, क्या कह रही थी.

Boy : पता नहीं, कभी कहती है space चाहिए, फिर उसे याद आ जाती है... पता नहीं क्या बकचोदी है..... पहले पैग बना यार एक.

(The friend pours another drink for both of them. They sit and drink.)