when you digress from the digression there's always an outside chance of coming back to where you veered off from in the first place

Towards the end of a long, far-ranging conversation I was having with Ant on Tuesday, I happened to utter the rather profound line- "Non-negotiables can wait". We were talking about how, as we grow older, we prefer to stay back home rather than go out to party and get wasted on weekends because you'd rather not play catchup during the week. A large chunk of growing up is learning to say no immediate gratifications. So far, so fair- but the flipside of that temperament is also the reduction of zones of serendipity and thus a foreclosure of transcendent possibilities. What that also does is elevate the tangible over the intangible, and it is no surprise that as we grow older we get more obsessed with money because it genuinely is a terrific tangible medium of exchange. I'd mentioned earlier in that conversation that I'd gone to watch a 35mm presentation of 2001: A Space Odyssey during Easter weekend and he said he loved that film. So at this point I posed him a thought experiment: "If you had to choose between getting to watch that film in the theatre now vs being paid $1000, what'd you choose?". He laughingly said, "Thousand obviously because I can buy a DVD and keep the rest" to which I responded, "See that's exactly the problem. The joy you will get out of watching the film is real, immediate and memorable and yet we rationally choose to take the money. Not because its somehow better but because we've gotten used to exalting the tangible over the ephemeral which nonetheless is real" [Or a version of those words]. We then riffed for a bit on chores and work deliverables and how that permeates a lot of what we choose to do even on holidays and it went on like that for a bit before I had to get off at Parra.

--

Back in the day when we were obsessed with Naipaul, Deekshith told me of an incident where during an interview, he [i.e., Naipaul] pointed to a stack of all his books and said, "Everything I am is in there" and I remember going Aww over it. While it is probably not true (Don't all of us like to believe there's something more to us than what's out there already) and an exercise in delusional arrogance to compare what I do here to Naipaul's work, I sometimes feel the same way about this blog. That all that there's to me is in (if not should be) in here. In his wonderful episode with Amit Varma, Chandrahas Chaudhury says that when he sits down to read a book he does so with a certain sense of respect and humility because when he is encountering the best, most thoughtful version of the writer, it is on him to offer his best version too. I think its a lovely, charming practice. And yet as a quasi-writer, I seem to be incapable of doing that. It seems to me that what I should put forth is not the best version but all of the bad, the ugly and whatever little of the good. While a large part of it comes from my lack of discipline, inability to revise, hubris and frivolousness, atleast a sliver of it is motivated by what Kaufman said in his BFI speech- "..if you’re honest about who you are, you’ll help that person be less lonely in their world because that person will recognise him or herself in you and that will give them hope." I know that that is not an excuse to present mediocre work or half-finished, unapproachable thoughts or a profound lack of craft, but that is probably why for all my failings, I haven't stopped blogging - It is a medium which allows for my short, somewhat self-contained bursts of thought which when seen together hopefully presents a more coherent evolution and worldview. Despite failing repeatedly, even last week I wrote a couple of pieces in a notebook to kick this habit, I'm doing this fairly frequently - comfortable in the knowledge that this the right thing to do. I really don't know if its genuinely my calling or intertia/ addiction but somewhere deep inside I know I'm my most natural self here. And natural is supposed to be good right? 

I have been working on a couple of minor projects since Jan and April respectively. They are non-serious, almost hobbyish and there's not much work involved; I spend like 2 minutes everyday on both of them combined but I've been doing it continuously for many weeks and I'm kinda surprised with my regularity. I must reiterate that quaility of each of those daily components is sub-par but the hope is that the overall mosaic will have enough to atleast protrude above the surface. The idea, again, is not to strive and find the best, and then polish it for presentation, but on the contrary to keep making them, without much thought of artistic intentions and motivations, to both capture the prosaic and cherish the making itself. If something larger/ grander/ deeper can be coaxed out of it, it is a (happy?) side effect. I'd like to feel there's something artisinal about it but even broaching those thoughts is to fall into the artist/ curator trap. It is what it is - a slice of my day that is true to itself with all its faults, follies, cracks, and intentions.

నాదీ భారతీయ సంస్కృతే

 My thoughts and counter-arguments to these set of Garikapati Narasimha Rao's video clips. For context, please watch the clips before reading.

 --

1. "..పంజాబీ వరకు పర్లేదండి.. అది భారతీయ సంస్కృతి.. పైగా నన్నడిగితే దాంట్లో కవరేజ్ ఎక్కువ.."
ఎవరు చెప్పేది భారతీయ సంస్కృతి? దేశంలో ఎన్నో కోట్లమంది ఆడవాళ్ళు చీర, పరికిణీ, పంజాబీ సూటు వేసుకోరు. వాళ్ళంతా భారతీయులు కానట్టా? ఒక ట్రెడిషన్ ఫాలో ఐతే భారతీయులౌతారా, లేక భారతీయులు చేసేది కొన్నాళ్ళకు ట్రెడిషన్ అవుతుందా? కట్టు, బొట్టు, ఆహార వ్యవహారాలు మొ|| సమాజంలో ఏర్పడటానికి, ఒక వ్యక్తి అలవర్చుకోటానికి ఎన్నో కారణాలుంటాయి. మరి అలాంటప్పుడు ఒక గిరిగీసి ఇది భారతీయత, ఇది కాదు అని చెప్పటం ఎలా సాధ్యమౌతుంది? మీరు చెప్పే పంజాబీ సూటు మరి ఇండియాలో పుట్టలేదే. అది మిడిల్-ఈస్ట్ నుండి వచ్చి ఇవాల్వ్ అయింది. అసలా మాటాకొస్తే 1940ల దాకా కేరళలో అప్పర్-కాస్ట్ ఆడవాళ్ళు బ్లౌజులు వేసుకోక పోయేవాళ్ళు. మరి వాళ్ళది కాదా భారతీయ సంస్కృతి? అయినా జీన్సు పాంట్లు వేసుకునే వాళ్ళకే/ వాళ్ళవల్లే రేపులు జరుగుతాయంటే, ప్రతి వెస్టర్న్ కంట్రీలో 24 గంటలు రేపులే జరగాలే? ఎందుకంటే అక్కడి ఆడవాళ్ళు అవే వేసుకుంటారు కనుక.

2. "..అమ్మాయిలకి చెబుతున్నా తండ్రి స్థానంలో చెప్పాలి కాబట్టి.."
వద్దు సార్, మీరు తండ్రి స్థానంలో కూర్చొని చెప్పకండి. మన గొడవంతా ఆడవాళ్ళని తల్లులుగానో, బిడ్డలగానో, చెల్లెళ్ళగానో ఒక straitjacketలో ఉంచటం. అప్పుడు వాళ్ళకి మనుషులుగా ఏజెన్సీ, లిబర్టీ ఇవ్వాల్సిన అవసరం లేకుండా. సాటి మనిషిగా గుర్తించి మంచి చెడు మాట్లాడండి, చర్చించండి, తెలుసుకోండి. లేదు మీకు చెప్పే స్థానంలో కూర్చోవటమే ఇష్టమంటే అబ్బాయిలకి చెప్పండి, "మీరు పద్ధతిగా ఉండండి, అమ్మాయిలని గౌరవించండి, అవతలి మనిషిని objectify చేయకండి", అని చెప్పండి.

3. "..అందమైన అవయవాలు పొందిగ్గా కనబడుతూంటే కుర్రాడెవడైనా ఊరుకోగలడా అండి"
మీరు ఆ స్థానం లో కూర్చొని ఇంత అసహ్యంగా మాట్లాడుతున్నారు కాబట్టి మీకు అర్థం అయ్యే పరిభాష వాడే ప్రయత్నం చేస్తాను: మీరు కొత్త కారు కొనుక్కొని ముందుగా పూజ చేయించటానికి గుడికెళ్ళారు. అక్కడ కారుని గుడి బైట పెట్టి అర్చన టికెట్టు కొనుక్కోటనికి లోపలికెళ్ళారు. అసలే చిన్న రోడ్డు, మీ పెద్ద కారు సందుని బ్లాక్ చేస్తోంది. ఆ రద్దీలో ఓ కుర్రాడు బైకు మీద అజాగ్రత్తగా వెళుతూ మీ కారుని వెనక నుండి గుద్దేసాడు. పరిగెత్తుకుంటూ బైటికిచ్చొన మీరు వాడిని పట్టుకొని వాయించేస్తారా లేక అయ్యో అసలు నేను కారు కొనటం వల్లనే కదా ఇంత ఉపద్రవం వచ్చింది, తప్పు నాదే అని సరిపెట్టుకుంటారా?

4. "..అది వాడి హక్కు.."
నాకు నచ్చినట్టు నేను ఉండటం నా హక్కు. వాడికి నచ్చినట్టు వాడు ఉండటం వాడి హక్కు. అంతే కాని నేను నా పాటికి రోడ్డుమీద వెళుతూ ఉంటే హరాస్ చేయటం, సెక్ష్వల్ అబ్యూస్ చేయటం వాడి హక్కు కాదు. నేను ఒకలా ఉంటే వాడు వాడి ఊహల్ని తీసుకెళ్ళి బాత్రూంలో ఏం చేసుకుంటాడు అనేది వాడి హక్కు. కానీ సమాజంలో నాతో అసభ్యంగా ప్రవర్తించే హక్కు వాడికి లేదు. కానీ వాడు హక్కులా ఎందుకు ఫీల్ అవుతాడు అంటే అది మీలాంటి వాళ్ళ వల్లే. అమ్మాయి ఒకలా ఉండాలి, అబ్బాయి ఎలా అయిన ఉండొచ్చు అని తీర్మానించి ఇలా టీ.వీల్లో చెప్పే మీలాంటి వాళ్ళవల్లే.

5. "..ఖాళీలు కనబడేలా.. ఇల్లాళ్ళండి వీళ్ళ దుంపతెగ.."
మరి అవే రూల్స్ మొగవాళ్ళకి అప్లై కావా? మీ ఏజ్ అంకుల్స్ అంతా రోడ్ల మీద మడిచిన లుంగీలు, కట్ బనీన్లతో తిరగరా? అయినా ఇల్లాళ్ళు సరిగ్గా లెరనే అనుకుందాం.. మీకూ పెళ్ళైంది కదా, మరి మీరెందుకు ఆ దృష్టి తో చూస్తున్నారు  వేరే ఆడవాళ్ళని?

6. "..ఎవరికీ ప్రదర్శనలు?"
నిజం ఒప్పుకోవాలంటే నేను ఇదే ఆలోచించే వాడిని, ఎందుకు చేయటం ఎక్స్పోసింగ్ అని. అయితే రెండు విషయాలు 1. ఎవడు నిర్దేశిస్తాడు ఏది ఎక్స్పోసింగ్ అని? తాలిబాన్ లకు బుర్కా కాకుండా ఇంకేదైనా ఎక్స్పోసింగే? రాజస్థాన్ లో పైకొంగు లేకపోతే అది ఎక్స్పోసింగ్. ఎవరు నిర్దేశించాలి? అదలా ఉంచితే మొగవాళ్ళ ఎక్స్పోసింగ్ కూడా ఆపమని మీరు చెప్తారా? 2. పోనీ ఒక అమ్మాయికి ఎక్స్పోసింగ్ చేయలనే కోరికే ఉందనుకో. అయితే ఏమైన చేయొచ్చా? ఇంకో ఉపమానం: మీరు రేపు రోడ్డు మీద పోతున్నారు, ఎవరో వెనక నుండి వచ్చి నెత్తి మీద ఠపీమని కొట్టాడు. ఎందుకురా కొట్టావ్ అని ఆడిగితే నువ్వు హెల్మెట్ పెట్టుకోని తిరగవోయ్ అని సమాధానమిస్తే ఊరుకుంటారా?

7. "..వాడు కుర్రాడు.. శ్రీరామ చంద్రుడిలా ఆలోచించాలంటే వాడి వల్ల అవుతుందా?"
ఓ, మరి ఆడపిల్లకెందుకు చెబుతున్నారు సీతమ్మలా ఉండాలని, అనసూయలా ఉండాలని? ఎందుకు సంస్కృతి, కుటుంబ కుల గౌరవాలు, ఆఖరికి తన ఫిసికల్ సేఫ్టీ బరువు బాధ్యతలు పూర్తిగా ఆడవాళ్ళ మీద వేస్తారు? మొగవాళ్ళకేమో కాస్త మనిషిలా ప్రవర్తించండిరా అని కూడా చెప్పలేనప్పుడు?

8. "..సమాజాన్ని దృష్టిలో పెట్టుకొని మన పద్ధతి మనము మార్చుకోవద్దా.."
మీకు మీరు అన్వయించుకోలేరా ఈ స్టేట్మెంట్ ని? మీరు మారండి బయట సమాజం ఇలానే ఉందని. ఎందుకంత తాపత్రయం మరి "భారతీయ సంస్కృతిని" కాపాడేయాలని? అయినా సమాజం మారాలని పోరాడకుంటే దేశానికి స్వాతంత్రం వచ్చేదా, ఈ మాత్రం అన్నా power imbalance తగ్గేదా?

9. "..మన భారతీయ సంస్కృతి సమన్వయ సంస్కృతి.."
An insiduous capture of important terms. కొన్నేళ్ళ కింద ప్రభుత్వం ఎవడు national/anti-national అని తీర్మానించినట్టు, మీరెవరు సార్ "భారతీయ సంస్కృతి" మీద copyright పుచ్చుకోటానికి? అంటే మీ guidelines follow కాని ప్రతి అమ్మాయి భారతీయురాలు అని చెప్పుకోడానికి అర్హురాలు కాదా? నేను మీ భగవద్గీతలు, పురాణాలు ఏవీ చదవలేదు. మన రాజ్యాంగం కొంత వరకు చదివాను. కాని నన్ను నేను భారతీయుడిగానే పరిగణించుకుంటాను, బయట పరిచయం చేసుకుంటాను. నేను ఈ పోస్ట్ రాయటంలో భారతీయ సంస్కృతి తోనే సంభాషిస్తున్నాను. మంచి అనిపించేది నలుగురితో పంచుకొని సెలబ్రేట్ చేస్తున్నాను, చెడు అనిపించింది అర్థం చేసుకొని మార్చే ప్రయత్నం చేస్తున్నాను. సంస్కృతి అంటే ఎప్పుడో ఎవరో చెప్పిందే కాదు కదా? దానిని మన బుద్ధితో, సమాజ అవసరాల మేరకు అన్వయించుకోగలిగినప్పుడే కదా సంస్కృతి regenerate అవుతూ evergreen గా ఉంటుంది. దేశభక్తి, సంస్కృతి పై ఇష్టం, గౌరవం మీకే కాదు మాకూ ఉన్నాయి.

10. "..శృంగారానికి అశ్లీలానికి మధ్య గీతుండాలి.."
మంచికి చెడుకి మధ్య గీత మీరన్నంత క్లియర్ గా ఉంటే ఇంక ఇంత ఆరాటం ఎందుకు. ప్రొఫ్ ప్రతాప్ మెహ్తా ఒక భలే మాట చెప్పారు- "మంచికి చెడుకి తేడా అంత ఈజీ అయితే ఒక రూల్ బుక్ ఉంటే సరిపోతుంది. కోర్ట్లెందుకు, ఆలొచించి తీర్మానించే జడ్జులెందుకు? Principles మనకి ఎంత వరకు పనికొస్తాయంటే అవి మనల్ని వివిధ కోణాల నుండి ఆలోచింప చేస్తాయి. ఆ పైన అన్నింటి కన్నా ముఖ్యమైంది మన జడ్జ్మెంట్". దానికి కావాల్సినది మీరెక్కడో కూర్చోని మంచి/చెడు మధ్య ఒక absolute గీత గీయటం కాదు. ఆ గీతని సమయానుసారంగా గీయగలిగే విచక్షణ ఎలా అలవర్చుకోవాలో ఆ thinking tools ఇచ్చే ప్రయత్నం చేయటం.

11. "..శెనగల్లా వధూమని తన కోరికలని దాచుకోవాలి.."
జీవితమంతా ఆడవాళ్ళ desiresని, agencyని police చేయటమేనా పని? మొగవాడే వాడి కామాన్ని, ఉద్రేకాన్ని జాగ్రత్తగా పొందు పరుచుకోవచ్చు కదా? ఒకసారి ఆలోచించండి.

12. "..చీర కట్టుకొని పద్ధతిగా ఉన్న అమ్మాయిలని వాళ్ళేం అనరు.."
ఆరేళ్ళ పిల్లలు, అరవైయ్యేళ్ళ పెద్దలు ఏం చేసారు మరి అని అడగాల్సి రావటమే ఎంతో బాధాకరంగా ఉంది.

13. "..టీ-షర్ట్ల మీద నినాదాలు చూసి.."
పాపం instructions follow అవుతున్నారా? 'ఆడవాళ్ళకు మాత్రమే' అని సీట్ల మీద రైల్ కంపార్ట్లమెంట్ల మీద ఉంటే మాత్రం అవెందుకు అనుసరించట్లేదో? ఏం సార్ ముందో కెమెరా, మైకుందని ఏది పడితే అది మాట్లాడితే ఎలా?

14. "..వేషాలు మారితే తప్ప అత్యాచారాలు మానవు.."
మరి మీరు చెప్పేదే నిజమైతే, 60-70% రేపులు ఇంట్లోవాడో తెలిసిన వాడో చేస్తాడట. దానికేంటి సమాధానం? స్త్రీవాదుల మీద విరుచుకుపడ్డారే, ఒక్క స్త్రీవాద పుస్తకమైనా చదివారా? వాళ్ళ కథలు విన్నారా? రేప్ కల్చర్ మీద, వుమెన్ హెరస్మెంట్ మీద ఎంతో మంది చేసిన రీసర్చులు చదివారా అసలు sexual harassment మీద మాట్లాడటానికి?

15. "..అత్తగారి వల్ల..డబ్బున్న కుర్రాళ్ళు.."
Random. ఏదన్నా statistical backing ఉందా ఈ claimsకి?

16. "..ధర్మం కోసం సంఘమేది?..ఏది ధర్మమో దాని కోసం పోరాడతాం.."
అదే కదండీ గొడవంతా. మీరు ఇది ధర్మం అంటారు, ఇంకో మతపోడో కులపోడో వచ్చి ఇంకేదో ధర్మం అంటాడు. అందుకే కదా liberal democracyలో individual rightsకి పెద్దపీట వేస్తూ రాజ్యాంగం రాసుకున్నది. నీకు నచ్చినట్టు నువ్వుండు ఆ హక్కు నీకుంది. కానీ ఇంకో మనిషికీ అదే హక్కుంది. అవును సొసైటీలో అంత తేలిక కాదు అంత individually delineatedగా బ్రతకటం. అందుకే కల్చర్, ఎడ్యుకేషన్ వగైరాలు. దానిలో భాగంగానే ఏదో మంచి విషయం తెలుసుకోవాలని ప్రజలు మీలాంటి వాళ్ళ ప్రోగ్రాములు చూసేది. మరి దానికి తగ్గ మాటలే మీరు మాట్లాడుతున్నారా?

ప్రజల మీదా బాధ్యతుంది ఎవరో పండితుడట చెప్పాడు కదాని ఊరేగటం కాకుండా, మన ఆలోచనల్ని, అనుభవాల్ని, విచక్షణని, వివేకాన్ని ఉపయోగించి మంచి చెడు నలుగురితో చర్చించటం. ఆ చర్చలో పాల్గొనాలనే కోరికే ఈ పోస్ట్ కి ప్రేరణ. ఎవరికీ monopoly లేదు సంస్కృతి మీద. మనమంతా ఎలా బ్రతికితే మంచిగా కలిసి బ్రతుకుతాము అనేదే గా మంచి సంస్కృతి. మరి మనుషులు మారుతున్నప్పుడు, ప్రపంచపు స్థితిగతులు మారుతున్నప్పుడు, ఎలా బ్రతకాలి ఎలా మారాలి అనే విషయాలు ever-evolving. అది నిత్య చర్చలో భాగం, నిత్య చర్యలో భాగం. It is the human project. It is on us to remember that we cannot outsource it to anyone- అది PM అయినా సరే, ధార్మిక గురువైనా సరే, కుల పెద్ద అయినా సరే.. ఇంకెవరైనా సరే.

1001 ways to be civilized

The first time I saw Siva, a few years ago, I remarked that it was a neo-western. I hadn't, still haven't, seen any of the original Westerns but the following is what I learnt by cultural osmosis of what the genre signified:

• There is a lawless land.
• An outsider representing law and order, usually a sheriff or a morally upright outlaw, arrives.
• He tries to stay away from the gangs but is reluctantly drawn into a confrontation when he saves an innocent man.
• He then tries to leave the town but by then the citizens see in him a saviour and plead him to stay.
• While he takes on the burden and starts to transform the town, the main villain refuses to change and builds a personal hatred towards the hero.
• The villain then destroys something the hero holds as sacred/ innocent.
• Eventually, the hero is forced to 'act' like the villain and kill him.

Siva follows the template almost to the T. It is an extraordinary film, not just for it's technical excellence and narrative design, but also for the themes and topics it tackles. While rewatching the film today, after listening to the brilliant episode on The Other Banana podcast, I realised that it also does a brilliant job of portraying what I think is one of the foundational problems of a modern, liberal society. 

Namely, how do you deal with the illiberal minority in society that lays claim to power¹? 

Especially, when that minority manages to form a nexus with certain arms of the state. To be fair this is not a problem just with liberal societies. Primitive societies are infact exactly this where a king or a lord or a priest or the head of the family etc. is the illiberal dominant force acting upon the individual. So infact a modern society evolved as a reaction to this. So the problem with a liberal society is not that it desires this sort of an arrangement but while seeking specifically to avoid this, almost always ends up in this state.

This is a truth for most of us experientially. We have seen  the local rowdy who demands Ganesh chanda; The corporator who draws borewell water from the locality and sells it; The Hindutva goon who roams around with rakhis on Valentine's Day; The policeman who gets together with the builder/MLA and causes problems to the landowners. Basically anybody with power who wants something that isn't lawfully theirs. I won't go deeper into this here because I think it's clear to the reader what I'm talking about but I highly recommend Amit Varma's episode with Milan Vaishnav to get an excellent high-level understanding of why there's such a deep relationship between politicians and goons in India.

It is inevitable in any society that there be illiberal folks. Sometimes their fight maybe valid but as someone who celebrates and wants to live in a liberal society, I'd rather they not take over the parliament. Ofcourse it is hard, if not ever entirely right, to divide people into liberal and illiberal types (funnily, group identity is one of the things the liberal in me desists), for the sake of explaining I will use Atishi Marlena's Bell Curve Model:

20% of people in society are fierce liberals and will do everything in their power to fight illiberal forces.

20% of people are illiberals and will try to capture power and oppress others.

60% don't care too much either way but are still individually rational. So they'll try to game the system, but not too much, no matter what its nature. 

The fight then is between rule of law and autocracy. Between civility (all people are equal) and barbarity (power is right). The assumption being that a society is more humane when it veers more towards the former than the latter. 

Stating the terms of discussion as I have creates a picture of a noble army standing at the gates against the hordes of barbarians. That description is not very accurate. The critical difference being that the enemy is within the gates and is looking to take over the citadel. One of the critical safeguards the constitutional founders had for this problem was separation of powers. Ensure that an individual or a small group can never get enough power to become authoritative. Yet the more distributed the power, the harder it is to create consensus and take definitive action. So as some aspects start moving too slowly or seem less accountable or cause resenment in particular sections, it is natural for people to look for definitive, fast-moving reforms especially when that resentment reaches a critical mass. And that in turn makes the figure of the strong-willed king more alluring². But isn't that exactly the kind of autocracy we wanted to get away from in the first place. So what do we do³?

That brings us to the alternative the film, and Plato, offers. The concept of a philosopher-king. Give us somebody with power and strength who can fight for us, while also ensuring that he isn't weak or malicious enough to be corrupted by power.

Ofcourse the law of entropy states that no matter who is in power, eventually corruption will become so deep-rooted that the entire system will collapse⁴. No wonder stories of all great society are called 'The Rise and Fall of'. The question is, What you as a liberal would rather fight - Incoherence or Domination?

¹ It goes without saying that power can be of any nature. It could be about being physically violent, about being majoritarian, group over individual and even claiming an autonomy over religious interpretation and punishing those who don't toe the line.

² I think it is clear at this point that I'm using UPA IIs messy coalition politics, with a weak centre, as one of the primary reasons Modi's 'decisive', autocratic persona seemed attractive in 2014.

³ Amit Varma asks his guests if they believe in The Great Man Theory of history. Dr JP says that history is created both by large, extrahuman factors but also shaped by human actors. I think I agree with him.

⁴ I don't want to sound fatalistic here and say, "Oh in the end all of us are going to die anyway. So what's the point of all this?". To build a good human society is to stave off suffering to as many beings as possible for as long as possible and that is the assumption on which this discussion takes place.

P.S- As is often the case, this piece too started off as a hypothesis before veering off into unexpected directions and ending in a cul-de-sac. Sravani says, and I think she's right, that I have this problem where one attempt at an answer to a question leads to more questions. So in the end I'm left with a bunch of nested open brackets with very few closed brackets. 

I have tried staving this off by sitting on posts in the hope that I will work on them and build something more coherent and finished. More often than not I get bored and it just sits there. So I'd rather post this stuff here not at all as authoritative pieces but simply as acts of thinking in public in the hope they add some value to the world.

religion by other names

Sravani and I went to see professional sport, A-league football and ATP Cup tennis, in the last few days and I've been thinking about a few things. Broadly:

1. How have we let corporations take over communities? In one of the essays in The Blizzard, I read about how in it's initial days Bundesliga brought people together. Players and supporters belonged, generally, to the same villages/ towns and often knew each other. What motivated the players to give their best was not money, because they hardly made any and were happy with free beer, but pride in representing their people. Fans literally built the stadiums, by providing both money and voluntary work, and treated the players as their own. Yes, it sounds too Utopian now, as if they were waiting for money to come in and pollute everything, but that idealism seems like a natural part of every human being as much as I guess the temptation of power that makes them give up on their ideals is. A lot of teenagers are idealistic until they're told repeatedly by the grownups that that won't work because the world is a harsh, cruel place. And I guess the human tragedy is that it is true but to give up on even trying to imagine a better alternative is accepting easy defeat.

These days, the stadiums are named after corporations, the jerseys are filled with logos of sponsors, players are bought and sold in a marketplace to the highest bidder as if the only parameter is money. Despite that, people go to stadiums to support their teams and I find it embarrassingly funny. Your only participation with the team is as a consumer and their only allegiance to you is to justify the money you've paid for them. And what's worse is that even this relationship is not direct, it is mediated by corporations- A group of people who's only motivation to come together and build things is money. How did we let this happen? How did we let money become the blood of the social organism? It is not sufficient to detest it and wish for an alternative. It is important to learn how we came to live in this world, why we wish we lived in a different world and how we can start walking towards that.

Also we have created players into these hyper specialised beings, which I think is as true for all the workers in this society, that they seem to have lost other essential aspects of their personality and have turned into automatons. Which is why we find it so refreshing to find celebrities who are vocally political because so many of them are uninterested or scared for the impact opinions might have on their primary identity.

2.  This is a banal observation, voiced since the era of McLuhan and Postman, but TV indeed does turn everything into a decontextualised spectacle of sights and sounds. In the stadium, its just a bunch of guys playing a game. Yes, their athleticism is rare and beautiful, but it still stays in its human context. In TV, it turns into a hyperdramatic event, egged on by the commentators with their hyperbolic language trying to make the audience feel that what they're watching is a life-changing event, the slow motion replays giving every move unnecessary importance, the flipping of channels from sitcoms and music videos raising sport, or even news, to a realm of artificial emotionality.

3. It is so hard to watch sport without picking a side. I've always claimed that I watch it for the beauty, as if I'm placing myself above the hoards of people with their more baser instincts of the modern practice of transplanting deities with their favourite players, but jaw-dropping beauty is as rare in sport as it is in life, which is probably why we turn to art, and it becomes imperative to support one side to participate in the game.

The fervour involved in supporting a team got me thinking if its possible to function in a world devoid of religion. It doesn't have to deal specifically with gods; atheism, agnostism, capitalism, communism, nationalism,for that matter, Pawanism, are also religions. By religion I mean the basic set of assumptions we have about the world on top of which we can stack everything. I would call myself a Western style liberal which basically means I believe in the religion of individual rights and pray at the altar of the human mind. I don't claim it has the capacity to be any less evil that what other religions have done, and it might not solve all the problems of the world, but in my experience it is better for me to hold an individual responsible for his or her actions than transfer that burden to a god, a book or an ideology. Tomorrow, something could come up which would be more evolved than this and I might embrace that.

But the more interesting question is, what are these axioms standing on? How is my belief in this nouveau religion any different from that of an Islamic or Hindu Fundamentalist, or a proud Capitalist, who is so convinced by the Truth in his ideology that he wants to impose that on the world? Postmodernism taught me this. If modernism said yours is a stupid belief system and mine is thought through rationality, postmodernism said what if your rationality is also just a religion. Then instead of having to carry the white man's burden, you are paralysed by self-doubt in the quagmire of trying to understand your motivation. Is that also one of the reasons religion has made an unexpected comeback in public life in the last few years because constantly having to reassess our basic assumptions can be so exhausting. Better to use the one tool you hold and use it for everything from trying to understand why you didn't get the promotion you so deserve to who's to be held responsible for deaths of people.

At this point I'm not concerned with spirituality as much as religion as a way of organising society. And that's the topic these questions are trying to explore.

of morality and mortality

Some people advice me to have kids. Here I am, confused about purpose, worried about climate change, unable to make up my mind if Hobbes or Monboit is right, flitting regularly between self-love and self-loathing, angry, weak, bitter, absent-minded, easily susceptible to vices, appalled at my easy susceptibility to vices, jotting beautiful sentences in the hope that they'd salvage me some day, preaching a high moral standard and personally failing to uphold it every single time, googling synonyms for unable, having a hard time socializing, waking up into the voracious maw of  inconsequentiality, using all the little knowledge I have to negate action¹, judging people, judging myself for judging people, with no inclination to find a job, fantasizing about making a film like Apocalypse Now set in the Naxalite zones to share my notions of morality, justice, development, motivation and greed, ecology, and that wet question of film festival favourites, "What does it mean to be human?", and people, following, I believe, their own misunderstood convictions, want me, someone who can't even recite one Urdu couplet, to bring about a being, that I'm going to be responsible for, into this bizarre, beautiful, cruel, indifferent world that seems to be racing towards annihilation.

The higher I tilt my head to catch a glimpse of the summit of knowledge, the bright sunlight reflecting off its magnificent surface forcing me to squint and making it impossible to see the actual surface, the higher the cliff seems to get, disappearing into the clouds, inducing a strange combination of reverence and sadness, leading to vertigo and disillusionment. Are the cliff, the sunlight, me, the seer, all maya, all illusions created by my (illusory?) mind?²

One part of me seems to strive for greatness, create art that is honest and beautiful, another questions the point of the craving, stopping me from putting in the effort, because really how does it matter?, while another, and I'm guessing this is the part that's half-digested midway-abandoned magazine articles on Vedanta and Zen, says that the effort is the reward. It is so hard to write, incredibly harder to well. To regurgitate demands focus, discipline and a willingness to defend positions. To write well is to brush aside the frivolous, temporary facts and feelings, to refuse to be lulled by their woolly warmth, to walk past the shallow certainties of the mob and be prepared to wade into deep waters, and try to find solid ground on which you can slowly start building the delicate house of your morality instead of meandering through, as per convenience, the dilapidated, Kafkaesque edifice of  'popular morality'.

I really want to make the Apocalypse like film I mentioned earlier. I think our popular culture is too shy to talk about important things. For that, I must read, travel, listen and watch a lot of art and real life. But it is something I'm serious about. Our popular culture seems to think that talking about mob lynchings, rural population's sufferings, the scary news about climate change and it's predicted effects etc. would take it away from the realm of pop as well, since anyhow the idea of culture has already been ravaged. Telugu movies exist in a strange spacetime, and I'm sure some enterprising kid is going to grow up and write a thesis on the sociological reasons for its gaping distance from normal life, that any self-respecting, serious thinker is going to be appalled and, diving into the muck, be repulsed by³.

Maybe, like Bujjimama says, I shouldn't think about this too much, especially when I can't seem to help it by brooding about it⁴. You just do your own exploring, read poetry that captivates you, observe people whose way you appreciate and make the film you want to/ can make.

Self-help gurus exclaim that it's the struggle that turns the prickly caterpillar into beautiful butterfly, that the struggle is necessary, desirable even. I don't know the biological desires behind the transformation. But if I was a caterpillar, I wouldn't find myself prickly and I might want to take the option of staying safe and warm in the cocoon than develop delicate, attention-grabbing wings that would attract young boys into catching and hurting me. How does the self-identity of a caterpillar change after it transforms? Would it keep struggling for the rest of it's life, convinced that the struggle is good and if it struggles, it could become something more beautiful than a butterfly?

¹ I'm done with thinking questions like, "Is inaction an action too?"
² No wonder sadhus seem to want to get high; this is all so gorgeously trippy
³ Ofcourse, my brain being my brain is already questioning on the cyclical relationship between cause and effect, and if the public, whoever that is, deserves anything better (has someone defined a Maslow like hierarchy for ranking cultural produce) because they seem to have made peace with this atrocious junk
⁴ But how to we decide how much is too much. How do you know while living it, if the break you are taking is going to fire you up and the empty meandering is going to light your imagination, and that's going to be a good thing, or if it's going to turn you into a lazy, complaining, 'raped by psychic Bedouins' self-conscious person who can never integrate with society again

On picking a side and getting into the fight

Will Durant, in his The Case for India, writes that we must all choose a side, and get into the fight, because life cannot wait till the knowledge is complete. It is so much easier to say, "that's his opinion; he must have his reasons and what right have I to dissuade him"; or "his actions, however cruel, must be motivated because of events that must've made him what he is.  I don't have the authority to judge him because if I'd walked his path, I might've done the same"; or "there is no bad art. Different people have different tastes". All these statements arrive at the same conclusion. In a world which we're increasingly led to believe is subjective, it is almost impossible to measure and decide objectively what is good and what is bad. As much as one must make concessions for subjectivity and inherent biases, this seems like a cop out to me. Ofcourse, a cruel man must've become like that because of childhood traumas ( popular culture generates surface level sympathy in all of us and has turned us into a society of Stockholm Syndrome afflicted patients ) but that doesn't mean there's no threshold a society can create to ensure others don't have to suffer because of one man's maladies. And yes, there is bad art. No, Marcel Duchamp's Fountain is not art. It is a political statement. As are 'Atharintiki Daaredi is a shit film' and 'Yakub Memon shouldn't have been hanged' ( No, by no means am I placing those statements on the same status but just making a case in point for everything being equally political ). Politics, and particularly Political Philosophy, is a Social Science where newer principles and ideologies go mainstream way more frequently than other fields of thought. Everything ought to be respected, but nothing is sacred. Religion is political, Art is political. All of us must pick our allegiances, fight for our beliefs. About things as trivial (?) as Federer vs Nadal, or if sharing TV Series spoilers on Social media is ethical, to if anachronistic Government Censoring bodies should be allowed to exist in a world that's becoming more and more complex and fragmented, or if it was all Lalit Modi/ N Srinivasan's fault or we're equally responsible as passive consumerist bystanders? These are important questions and I'm sure they will lead to fantastic, mind expanding discussions but we don't have them, atleast not in public consciousness, because we're either intimidated by the mobs or we're too soft on each others opinions.

We are defined more by what we choose to oppose than what we accept. All our friends fall somewhere within the acceptance spheres of our likes and principles but it is our who enemies give us personalities, make us draw territories and stand guard on what we believe is right. All the Hippie World Peace- No Borders shit is fine but real life is about opinions and allegiances, acceptance thresholds and intense beliefs, objective principles and conscious drawing of lines. I respect your opinion that you like Tendulkar but I can argue hard to convince you that Dravid was better. We might not be able to budge each other off our pedestals but I hope we can make the other person see from a different point of view and empathise. Cultured debate is the cornerstone of any progressive, liberal society ( After the Charlie Hebdo killings, Devdutt Pattanaik made a fantastic case for violence as a form of counter-argument against intellectual imperialism. I highly recommend it ). Harthals and mob actions are, very validly, forms of dissent and disapproval, and there is no need to look down upon them, but the consequences of their actions are final ( killings and physical mutilations ). So though sometimes justifiable, they are also barbaric and ill-tempered. ( Now, actually, that's a topic for a fantastic discussion )

I have been watching quite some standup comedy of late, and I love what these guys are doing. Consciously, or otherwise, they are raising questions that we, as a society, ought to answer. Questions about Freedom of Speech, role and responsibility of Public Figures, about habits and practices that are so deeply imbibed that we don't questions their fidelity anymore. True, they stereotype, and not all of them are political in the strictest sense, but they pick our most commonplace opinions and actions, and question them. They are, the very good ones, public intellectuals. George Carlin questions censorship and war, Bill Hicks questions authority of state, Nitin Gupta talks about such political things that no one in India wants to talk about ( except ofcourse Anurag Kashyap ), Danny Fernandes uses powerful irony to make us feel ashamed of so many of our head turns and blind spots. The others ( EIC, AIB, TVF ) stick mostly to films but they're acting as our questioning consciouses ( They ask the questions that we have deep inside us like "Why are we taking these shit films?", "Is this even art?", "Is the average Indian filmgoer so crass and unsophisticated and unlearned?" ) and they're doing a brilliant job of articulating. They might not be always right, like they ought not to be, but it is important to keep asking questions to move forward as a society. I believe the primary responsibility of an artist is to deal with his inner demons but by creating the art they do, they question the audience and the society they're talking to- Is this acceptable in a society you want to live in ( eg: Female Objectification, Simple Moralizing ), Does art have to be so uninvigorating to be popular, Do you want to be passive consumers or active participants, Should news channels with foulmouthed idiotic anchors be patronized or not ( I try and avoid watching an Arnab Goswami or a Sampoornesh Babu clip, even to laugh, because that too is one form of engagement and encouragement. I don't want the scourge to know it is capable of grabbing my attention ). And I think we should respond to those questions, get into those arguments, complete those discussions, talk and write about it in all forums, big or small. What, and how, we choose to answer will either make our world a little better or not.


"Time and again, I’ve said this. I can’t change the world. And a book can’t change the world. But you bet I can try. I have no business to be around if I don’t try." -Kiran Nagarkar

Love in the Time of Everything

When, once, asked about his legendary concentration, Rahul Dravid said, "It’s not easy to concentrate for 10 hours. You switch on and off. You push yourself. Your mind wanders, but you bring it back. You steel yourself. That’s the real beauty, when you win the battle against yourself." Increasingly, this seems to be the way I'm beginning to see relationships. Love is in the air. It's probably the age but for almost everyone I know, Love has become the fixation. People are either overwhelmed, confused, angry, resentful, depressed, optimistic or desperate and all for that one word. I've always maintained that life is like a Sine Wave. All your moods, choices, ideas, philosophies are dependent upon whether you're riding the crest or the trough. When you're riding the crest, the world can't be a better place. You love yourself, forgive people, dream big, charm the hell out of others and in moments of solitude, thank God and hope that when you fall, you don't fall too bad. On the other hand, while riding the trough, you hate yourself, are too hard at yourself and others, are too scared to dream, claim that all people are hypocrites and in moments of unnerving loneliness, pray that you get out this as soon as possible. That's life.

Now, when two people commit themselves to be together, while both of them are riding the crest, there's nothing like it. It's blissful. Squabbles? Whatever the fuck they mean. Ever heard soulmates, brother? That's right, that's us. When one of the two is hitting it pretty rough but the other one's still on a high, it'll still work out because one will pull the other up. She/ He used to love me once. She's going through a bad phase. This is going to make our bond only stronger. But there are times when both are at rock bottom. Life becomes unbearable, unworthy, too much of a pain. You start dreading the other person's company, you find faults where there are none, the fissures become almost big enough to swallow you up, you feel so much hatred that you're surprised you're capable of it; You want to breakup, to move on. You convince yourself the relationship's dead, that some things are never meant to be forever. If this goes for too long, more often than not, people breakup. But sometimes, some people get lucky. They get a second wind. They have that moment of inspiration, divine intervention, crystal clear clarity, a piece of timely advice- whatever you want to call it. And in that moment, of the tinkling laughter, or of the passionate hug, or of the expression that takes you back to those beautiful times all those years ago, you decide you're not going to let go, you're not going to let the embers fade away into darkness, you're not going to let the world teach you practicality. You remind yourself of every beautiful moment that you've spent together, you tell yourself these are tests you will pass, you summon all your energies and you decide that you will give one last shot- the last, desperate punch of a boxer who gives it his all just before he falls. 

This is where the movies end. But life doesn't. You will keep getting these moments, you will have to keep fighting them. It is impossible to maintain a relationship, either with your love, work or art, with pure passion and focused intensity. You can probably do that in slam bang T20, which is all sound and no substance, but to build a meaningful, complete Test innings, you need more than that. You need discipline, you need perseverance, you need what Cricket writers call Temperament, you need commitment, you need dedication, you need to keep reminding yourself the bigger picture, the great moments you've had before, the wonderful moments you will have in the future if only you will focus now and keep your wicket.  Like Dravid so succinctly put, the idea is not to overcome the opposition but to overcome your need to oppose. In moments of pure love, ego dissipates. You become one with the object of your desire. Like playing in the Zone. It is in search of that wonderful, elusive period that we keep playing. It is what gives the entire enterprise its meaning, and purpose. But we keep forgetting that it is so captivating precisely because it's so elusive. You have to earn the zone to experience it. You have stick together in these troubled times to reclaim the high of well-deserved happiness. Effort, for the lack of a better word, is the cornerstone of all contentment. My earlier self would have scoffed at this statement but what is life if not change; if you don't constantly realign yourself with your true feelings, doesn't it mean you have stagnated? Again, I don't mean change as in replacing all things you dislike now. No matter how much you change on the surface, the core of your being more or less remains the same. Like the monsoons only bringing new waters into the river. The river's still the same.

I have digressed much from where I started. And though I'm not sure if I've made myself clear to you, for the first time in ages, I'm clear as of what I want and where I'm heading. It's not a bad life neither is it very catchy. It's eventful if you know where to look. Sometimes, it doesn't give you too many options and at other times you're so sure of what you want, you don't want any options. It's alternatively fun, irritating, poignant, free-flowing and purposeful. And in those rare moments, extraordinarily beautiful which makes everything else worthwhile. I might as well have been talking about a test innings here.

Churning the mind

It is one thing to sit home and watch Ted-like talks. A totally different experience sitting in the crowd and see such luminaries talk on the stage a few feet from you. First of all, the fact that you have made an effort to move out of the comfort of your zone and travel to the venue brings a certain importance to the proceedings. Then the fact that you are sitting among all those interested participants who listen with rapt attention and ask incisive questions excites and humbles you which the self-centric world of the internet in the isolation of your house cannot. Most importantly, seeing the speakers so close to you, eating or conversing, doing things that they do beyond the stage, breaks a huge barrier of disconnect between your world and theirs which any video medium creates. Yogendra Yadav is not some figure of mythic proportions who argues on TV but a very amiable, gentle man who smiles at strangers who stare at him and answers questions with dignity. Vandana Shiva is not the woman you've read about in The NewYorker and who fights with the likes of Monsanto but a graceful lady who tirelessly tries to educate people in what she believes in. Also, being in the physical presence of such people brings a sense of authenticity and immediacy to the content of their talks and affects you deeply.

Yesterday, I had a great time in Manthan Samvaad. Vikranth Ananthula casually mentioned it sometime last week, I looked it up and since it seemed interesting, I signed up. I had a vague idea of what the talks were going to be like and I wasn't proved wrong but I had underestimated the magnitude of the impact. Without an exception, each of the six talks basically dealt with the need for civilized debate and the need to question the mainstream.

It was a slow start. After Jaywant Naidu's rendition on the Hawaiin Guitar, and the organiser's talks, Kalpana Kannabiram spoke about the need to protect women's rights and how we as a society were faring worse at making our women feel secure. She spoke with feeling and conviction but somehow I didn't find anything new that wasn't already a part of general public discourse. One stat that stood out of all the ones she was giving was that the average age of women at marriage, which kept rising after the child marriages of the early 20th century, have been getting lower in the last couple of decades. And she said that is because of the "re-enslavement of women in the guise of Tradition, Culture and Honour". I was surprised with myself for never having realised that most social atrocities take place under the masks of upholding culture and tradition. Once she said it, it seemed obvious but when she did, it came as quite a revelation. Of the other things that I scribbled down during her talk was BR Ambedkar's Constitutional Morality and Public Morality which was prescient because similar concerns were aired during other talks.

Arun Maira started off with the dryness of a bureaucrat, out of habit I guess since he's on the Planning Commission, but he spoke with clarity and insight about the need to redesign our institutions. The basis for his argument was what's already known, that India's economic growth is neither fair nor sustainable, but his linking of the discrepancy between the rich and the poor and its relation to the government institutions was informing and his ready acceptance that he didn't really know how to fix it but that he would like to present a few 'humble' suggestions was a great gesture of a man in such a position. He spoke about the tug-of-war between the Capitalistic need of the country to increase GDP and the Socialist need to subsidize and elevate the poor to better their lives. It was an interesting talk, sprinkled with the list of books he kept referring to, and so was his analogy of repairing the aeroplane while flying it. At the end, I felt a deep respect for him.

Then came on Yogendra Yadav who spoke about Alternative Politics and his ideas for deepening the democracy of the country by getting every citizen to actively participate in Politics. He spoke with the solemnity of a Political Science professor, with his Presentation Slides which I found distracting, but he spoke with candidness about the Aam Aadmi Party's stint and instead of defending himself from its detractors, he faced them, accepted their mistakes but also made a point to tell the crowd that they were trying hard to improve but at most the Aam Aadmi party was an imperfect vehicle to carry forward the ideals of a new, thriving, alternative political movement. The Q&A session was inevitably filled with questions on the AAP's future and I marveled at his calm demeanor even when taking the flak. Here was a man who acted on his beliefs and seemed to be having a great time doing what he was doing.

I've always loved listening to Shekhar Gupta talk, mostly from his Walk the Talk interviews where he came across a man who was knowledgeable, respected and articulate, but to see him yesterday talk like that was a fantastic experience. He seemed the least prepared of all the speakers, stringing his talk with a series of anecdotes but for me it was the most eye-opening talk of the day probably because it was a topic I deeply identified with. He spoke casually, with irreverence, with honesty and feeling, with good humour and unmasked criticism. He spoke not with an agenda but with a purpose, with immense erudition that always only served the point at hand and he spoke with the frankness of a man we're not used to in public discourses. I recommend you to watch his talk because the points he brings up are very relevant- "Never switch off the Bullshit Meter"

KT Ravindran's talk was the most underwhelming because there was an overdose of information and though all that was probably important, he did not manage to bring up the levels of enthusiasm of the crowd as the other speakers had. On the other hand, Vandana Shiva can never be accused of being a dull speaker. Having probably given thousands of talks across the world all her life, she speaks with the confidence of a veteran, with the practiced dramatic pauses of a thespian and with raw emotion of anger and pity flowing alternatively through such a booming voice. It's a great experience seeing her talk and though the talk dealt with elements that I've read her talk about, I couldn't help but feel sympathy for the Indian farmer, shame at myself for letting those atrocities happen and a deep contempt for Monsanto. She does that to you. When Vandana Shiva wants you to feel something, wants you to think about something in a certain way, you damned well can think about it only that way. She's a fervent woman and spirited. It was some experience.

Having attended a few other similar events, I understand that these talks are targeted at a general audience who don't necessarily have an interest in any particular subject, are motivated by the eclecticism, but those who come with a readiness to listen and think. Which is why if you happen to know the work of the speaker beforehand, the talk can seem redundant but I suppose that's the only way they can capture the interest of the uninitiated person who when inspired by the talk will go home and delve deep into the subject. Like those audit classes in American universities I guess. I had a great time, with the delicious Biryani and all that, but more with the talks, Shekhar Gupta's especially, that reminded me to think, question and participate actively in public life. What a lot of us have been doing is consuming whatever the mainstream is feeding us. Just because something is accepted by many, doesn't make it right and you don't have to conform to it. I can air my opinions, skepticism and beliefs- I, after all, like Arun Maira succinctly pointed, am not a consumer but a citizen.

The complete talks can be viewed from this link.

हाँ , मगर मक्सत है क्या?

What is the point? Of life, I mean.We read books, build houses, throw parties, cry at funerals, create art, leave a legacy behind. But why? I'm pretty sure we weren't created to do all those things. Or atleast just do all those things. There must be a reason for our existence, God or no God. I still haven't seen Ankhon Dekhi but I like the premise. The story of a man who refuses to believe in anything he hasn't seen with his own eyes. I am surrounded with all the beauty, grandeur and wisdom in all directions. We live in a world where we are surrounded by things real, artificial, stuff we dream on and stuff we consciously imagine. Which is probably why on a few morning, as soon as I wake up, I have a tough time making out if it's a dream or for real. Sometimes, when I'm alone somewhere, late in the evening in Golden Light, or on an empty street in the blazing afternoon sun, or late in the night when I'm stargazing, the experience seems surreal. Like I'm the only person that exists in the entire world. I dabbled with Solipsism for a bit but it never gave me the answers I was searching for.

Okay, let me rephrase the issue at hand. Why do we go on living despite knowing that we are going to die one day and end all this? Like someone once said, "The only thing we can really be sure of is that we are all going to die one day. We are, in a way, walking-talking time-bombs". So then why do we do all that we do? If I told you you were going to die tomorrow morning, would you take your life as seriously? I don't intend to say this in the way mainstream cinema gives it's protagonist a deadline ( Anand, 50-50, Chakram, Ikiru spring to mind ) and then have him realise he wants to leave a proof of his existence behind when he leaves. It seems paradoxical to me that we embrace life more fully when the threat of death is more immediate but I suppose that's how it is. I don't even have a problem with death. I think it gives the required context to life, without which we'd be all the more clueless. My question is, despite knowing the artificiality of it all, the castle-made-of-cards fragility of our constructions, why we take it all way too seriously? We fall in love with all our heart, we pursue dreams obsessively, we make resolutions to grab life by its throat and experience life to its limits. Why even care? I think we do all that to be entertained. Let me rephrase, to be engaged.

A small detour here: The most exasperating thing about life is that we never enjoy the present moment. When we're doing something we love, we are so involved in it that our ego vanishes and we fuse into our action. There then lost is the chance to look at the moment in a bigger perspective. And at other moments, when we are contemplating or reminiscing, we look back at past with nostalgia and the future with hope or despair. So, there is really no point in life when you know what exactly you are doing and why you are doing it.

Back on track. I like living. Even in moments when things are as bleak as they can get, there's a part of me that tells me that I should be glad for feeling something. Anything. I would like to live. ( I love Tyrion Lannister's quote, " Death is permanent. Life on the other hand offers infinite possibilities." ) But I'm just curious as to why I'm here in the first place. This train of thought is more of intellectual curiosity than any pursuit of a philosophy. Probably, right now, even I'm trying to engage my mind than unearth the truth. Like evolutionary biologists suggest, a man's brain started growing when his most immediate needs of hunger, sleep and sexual pleasure were met and he had time to sit calmly for a while and let these thoughts take shape. I neither place entire belief in Scientific Atheists ( The Four Horsemen ) nor has my limited knowledge in traditional religion been able to give reasons for these questions. Right now, when it comes to God atleast, I'm stuck somewhere in-between being an agnostic and a possibilian ( Quick tip- Read David Eagleman's Sum. It's astoundingly original and mind-numbingly trippy ). Both religion and science, atleast parts of them I've been exposed to tried teaching me the best and the most fulfilling way to live, but haven't really been able to convince me simply because neither could explain the reason for my existence. I've apparently been living for '24 years' ( I still have not been able to figure out the alluring nature of time. Alan Lightman's Einstein's Dreams is another recommendation ) and I hardly know anything about myself or my surroundings. I don't understand consciousness, or who really 'Aditya' is, or why I do what I do. ( Heck, we can't even figure out what our next thought is until it arrives to surprise us and we talk about understanding the cosmos ).

Indian Yogis and Zen Master's talk about distancing ourselves from life and looking at it to understand the true nature of reality. Some people I know talk about life like it's a problem that is to be solved. If God really exists, why would he bother to create us, have us crack the puzzle and then liberate us by granting Moksha. What is the point? Buddha attained Moksha and told his fellow beings on how to go about it. And they believed in him because he was talking about an experience they never had, they followed the path he gave because for them he seemed to have cracked the puzzle of Samsara and was offering them a way. We have so many new-age babas cropping up, claiming to be enlightened and promising answers if one followed them. ( What are we in search of: Truth or Bliss? ) People trust them because having followed them to a certain distance, they've reaped rewards. But what if even the honest, well-meaning baba is only imagining that he's gotten the answers? What if even enlightenment is only halfway up the ladder? What it takes to be a baba, more than anything else, are self-belief and excellent oratory skills ( like Kumare so beautifully points out ). Then, in that case, how do you differentiate between an enlightened soul and a lunatic?

Despite all this, my question is not what happens afterwards but why we live the way we live. Like I already asked earlier, why do we go on living  with all this seriousness in this not-so-permanent world when for all we know, this might just be an intermediate world and we'd be really born in it only after we die here? Why all the intense emotions? The answer, I think, can be found in a film theatre after the lights have been dimmed and the titles come up. We know it's an artificial world, we know it's make-believe, we know the filmmaker is manipulating us by using all the props he can to bring out the emotion he wants us to feel. The best part, we fall for it. There is a part of us somewhere deep within that falls for the trap and it comes very naturally. We willingly enter the matrix, we choose not to take the red pill, we are tempted by the beauty of maya.

I don't have answers to most of these questions. Yet the possibilities life offers are very interesting. I can listen to Rahman, watch Wes Anderson, marvel over Godel's Incompleteness Theorems, be captivated by a Jackson Pollock, be lost in the richness of Mahabharata and its intricacies and still be able to marvel at my existence. These are beautiful times to live in. And I'll not trade this life for anything else. Even if I'm unsure of its मक्सत.

On Arranged Marriages

Marriage is a just legal way of having sex and all those who're not capable of impressing a woman on their own, turn towards their parents who pick them up under the pretext of 'Arranged Marriage'. Harsh, prejudiced words, but how else do you start a debate unless you are an extremist yourself. To wake people out of their slumber and have them thinking, to either approve of a claim or retaliate, I need to make a statement. And that is what I want this piece to be- a catalyst to a much needed debate. I want people, some of them I know well, to think about the choices they are making. Why do I give a shit what someone's outlook towards arranged marriage is? Fair enough, but I'm on the verge of becoming a victim of the existing system and I want to fight it.

Why do people marry? The answers I often hear are:

1. Because my parents want me to ( this might actually seem funny but a majority of 23-25 year old heavily educated software employees who do almost everything which their parents disapprove of give me this )

2. Because everyone else is getting married ( this is more of a parental good cop-bad cop routine; one of the parents explains the virtues of marriage and the other pushes and prods by involving peer pressure )

3. Because it is the right thing and we would need someone's company in our old age ( my personal favourite: reminds me of those shitty pension plans which promise you a safe, happy retirement because you're busting your ass now to pay them )

4. Reproduction ( Kishore's the only guy I know blatant enough to say something like this; you want sex and your parents want a cute-grandson-toy to play with and show around )

Almost all the replies I have heard are variation of these four statements. Or, a personal affront: "You are too arrogant to understand this. You will know the day you grow old." What is that even supposed to mean? Why are you converting your shortcomings into a convenient escapist theory? How is it different from saying you do not believe in God because he has not yet bestowed your grace upon you?

"If you can't explain it to a six-year old, then you don't understand it yourself."
            -  Albert Einstein

Ok, since marriage as an institution is another debatable topic and not in the scope of this argument, we'll leave it for some other day. Lets just assume that you have had a happy marriage, your son/daughter wants to get married too because that for him/her is an ideal way to live a life. A personal choice and thus, indisputable.

Imagine you are parent of a 23 year old woman. She's educated, sophisticated, refined, good-looking, well-paid. You want to get her married- that is an action, a symptom. Lets look at the cause behind that action, the thought behind that manifestation. Usually, it is simply because you've grown up in an environment where a 23-year old unmarried woman is a burden and so, almost reflexively, you want to get her off your chest. Either because you think that is ideal, or because of your friends and colleagues and relatives who're getting their daughters married off or, rarely, because your daughter wants to get married herself. So, straight away we can draw a conclusion. That 23 being the ideal age is not God's will. It's a practise we've been following as a society because of reasons physiological, cultural, societal etc. 80-100 years ago, in the same province that we live in now, girls got married as young as 8-year olds. Apparently, the Nizam took any women he wished but with a single clause: he never touched married women. So, simply the need of the hour said that you want your daughter to escape the clutches of a womaniser, you got her married off young. We now look at Balika Vadhu and tut-tut simply because a 10-year old girl is getting married. How is that different from getting a 23-year old married off?

Both of them are arranged marriages, both of them have the support of Grahas and Stars ( I do not want to talk about the validity of Jyothishyam because I have no knowledge of it whatsoever but I personally know marriages that have failed despite the stars aligning perfectly ), in both cases parents think what they're doing is in the best interest of their daughter, in both cases so-called relatives and well-wishers play a huge part ( which is kind of funny because they're the ones who have the least to lose if it goes wrong ) and almost always, the daughter doesn't have much of a say.

Does overwhelming public acceptance make a thing right? Because if it doesn't, I cannot comprehend the immense stupidity of all these people who're walking into an arranged marriage or are prodding others to do the same. I'm digressing. So, yeah, the daughter is shown a photograph. The guy comes home. They talk in the presence of Elders. They're allowed to chat on Facebook and are asked for their responses in a week. Though recently I have heard of a marriage settled two days after they met each other for the first time. I have been a relationship more-or-less for six years and I still find my girl mysterious. Two fuckin' days. What the fuck are you supposed to feel? Vibes, divine voice, soul chemistry. How often is it that we haven't liked someone instantly but soon have realised how simply awesome they are. Or even the other way round. Extremely charming guys turn out to be backstabbing assholes as time passes. What is she supposed to know in 2 days? His likes, his interests, his ambitions. How does that tell me anything about the guy? And isn't it really similar to a job interview process which is so flawed. If you don't trust me, go around and look in Hitec city. Look at the unhappy, depressed Monday morning faces and ask them why they're working for a particular company. A huge majority will jump ship if someone else is paying them higher. Isn't a job supposed to be more about the process than the returns? When the work we do defines who we are and that is probably the one thing most people will know us as, shouldn't we be better equipped than to work for someone just because he bid me for higher than anyone else?

I'm digressing again. Ok, agreed, we can't know a person in 2 days. So, we look at his financial status, his job, where his father works and find more about the family from mutual friends. What does this tell me about the prospective groom? It helps me speculate of what he might be based on this angle. But any man is shaped by a million things and just because he is not really rich, doesn't work either in the Govt. or the Software industry, or his father's not-so-socially known, does all that translate into a bad guy? Which again brings me to the point of good guy vs bad guy. Everyone wants a good guy when what we should ideally be looking for is compatibility. You think your daughter's the sweetest, nicest, cutest woman in the world, like you have a right to, but you don't know her half as much her friends do and 90% as her boyfriend does. And it is not your fault most of the time. It is simply because friends are the only people in the world who identify a person what they exactly are. They are not forced to bear with someone because of a relation of blood or need or social structure. I know my friends most intimately because I walked into them without the burden of expectation. So, yes, maybe if friends picked up grooms rather than parents, we'd probably have more successful marriages. More so because a girl can look at her friends and ask why they're choosing a particular guy. And they're obliged to answer.

Which brings me to another idea of a successful, happy marriage. Isn't it close to defining a happy, successful life? Happy, according to who. Successful, by whose standards. What are the parents looking for in a groom so that their daughter might have a happy marriage? Are they themselves happy about their marriage for them to take up a responsibility to make someone else happy through marriage? What sort of a parent are you when your daughter trembles with fear just to come up to you and talk about a guy she likes? If you cannot have a sensible dialogue with your grown up daughter, who you think is too immature or too stupid to discuss such a serious topic, how the fuck can she be ready for marriage?

Does all this make love marriages better? See, again, we are looking for a single answer to all those complicated questions. A few years ago, tv9 went apeshit covering all love marriages on live television and standing by the decision of eloped youngsters. I'm pretty sure a lot of those marriages are not working too. It is not a question of doing the right thing. For almost everything in life, we act in a certain way with best intentions for our loved ones but end up making such a mess of it. I think it is because we don't communicate. We don't talk. We don't discuss. We don't question. We don't take up responsibility for our lives. I know this girl who is so scared to take up responsibility of her own life for the fear that she might ruin it, that she's simply nodding her head to whatever her parents have to say. If there is one person who knows best in the world, it is herself and if she can't back herself up to stand by her actions, isn't she letting life go without living it? She won't end up with a guy who loves her because it might fail and her parents might hate it but she's ready to walk into a lifeless marriage because when it fails, she can still guilt trip her parents and she won't have to take up any blame.

What exactly is a parent's love? Is it letting your son/ daughter live a life of his/ her own choices and you are there to guide them? Or does it mean you decide for them everything that they have to do because you are standing on the higher pedestal of experience and that you tell them you want only the best for them? Do we, as a society, have a right attributing children's successes or failures to their parents?

I'll finish off now but I want to talk about this. Please leave your views as comments because I know what I'm saying is not 100% right but we'll end up being better people by discussing and looking at things from different perspectives. But before I leave, I'll tell you a true story. I know this man who's daughter eloped four years ago. She married someone in the US and he hasn't spoken to her since that day. Not even when his grandson was born. He has a right to be deeply hurt. But what surprises me is that despite knowing how happy she's with the man of her choice, he still doesn't talk to her. And I realised it one day, when in the middle of another topic, he spoke about how he always wanted get her married so grandly, how he wanted to invite all this friends and colleagues and show them what a mighty son-in-law he managed to rope in etc. that it was never about the woman. Don't get me wrong. It was about his daughter and himself. He wanted the best for his daughter and he wanted to give the best himself but he never really knew the woman. His choice of a groom would have been based on giving the best to his daughter, but not how that man was going to be with this woman. It wasn't his fault. He didn't know any better. Just like my idea of my mother as a mother overshadows almost my idea of the woman she is. But luckily, I don't pretend that I know her best and don't take decisions on her behalf.

If only we'd talk, wouldn't the world be so much of a better place.

the anand gandhi effect

Memories are phenomenal things aren't they. Lucid, slippery, indefinite. We fill them with stuff we want to, we remember only the ones we wish to look back to and I'm pretty sure we fabricate a few ones. Maybe we can't create new ones out of thin air but depending on our mood at a certain point of time, I'm sure we juxtapose a few unrelated events to create the events we wish had happened. Anyway, honestly, I don't even believe in the linearity of time anymore. Not because of philosophical underpinnings but simply because Deja Vu's happened to me a lot of times. It has to happen. Because your mind's dealing with so much all the time, maybe it hangs up a few times, and unintentionally, it points to the current location and time as something that happened a few lifetimes ago, or recently in a parallel universe, or maybe its you realizing that life's like Groundhog Day.

So, anyway, we've been hearing this shit since we were like kids- Do not do anything to impress anybody or do not live somebody else's life. Well, we can't live somebody else's life and despite knowing that there is a tough story behind the adulation that someone popular receives, don't we, atleast for moments wish to emulate them, hoping that it would lead us to our salvation. Despite repeatedly refuting the notion that external acceptance is important to us, don't all of us crave for widespread adulation and respect. And it is this part of us, I believe, messes up the most with us. Without understanding what is deeply personal to us, what is closest to our hearts, we tend to do things that are triggered by the environment we live in, the world we wish to be a part of. This is probably the reason why so many of our countrymen aspire to be cricketers or film stars. Admitted, they start off with a love for the craft but I'm pretty sure that if established cricketers or movie stars aren't treated like demigods, a lot of the aspiring ones wouldn't be trying so hard.

We want the world to look upto us, to love us, to remember us. But all of us know everybody is busy living their lives. Maybe Tendulkar brightens us up when he takes on Shoaib Akhtar or Shah Rukh Khan temporarily erases our dread when he makes us laugh but after walking out of the theatre or the stadium, we are back to being the protagonist in our lives. Our lives are our movies, and though we have a few important people in our lives, we are more important to ourselves than to anyone else.

Sab ke dimaakh mein picture chal rahi hain. Sab saale hero ban na chah rahe hain apni-apni picture mein. E saala, Hindustan mein jab tak saneema hoga, log chutiye ban tey rahenge 
                                                                                    - Ramadhir Singh in Gangs of Wasseypur II

Like Bob Dylan once said, "I can only be me, whoever that is", is it really possible for us to carve an identity for ourselves without the influence of society, our environment? What are the factors that truly leverage our decisions, our ways of living, our dreams and passions? How much of our identity is hardcoded into us at the time of our birth? Can a child who is a gifted painter turn into an astounding musician when trained and nurtured the right way? Is there anything such as natural talent or is it just the confluence of one man's inherent taste in craft with the mindset and social behaviour of an audience? Is that why genius is often misunderstood at its time and lauded later? Is it why a few people are called "ahead of their times"? Is there anything such as genius or is it just one man's mindset mildly different from a socially accepted norm? If very high IQ is out of ordinary and is considered brilliant, why isn't very low IQ, also out of the ordinary, considered brilliant? Can we even measure beauty, intelligence and righteousness? Why is someone called beautiful and someone else called ugly? Are we born with a sense of what is right and what is wrong? When we fall in love with that person, do we fall in love with that man at that point of time for what he is? If not, then why didn't we love him earlier, or if yes, since he will not be the same person the next moment, will we not love him? If a child is swapped at birth, will an unknowing mother love her foster son like her own one? Is the love between a mother and child because she carried him for nine months, or because the child is a representation of her womanliness, or simply because like somebody once said, "The only reason a mother loves her child so much is because of the friendship they share.From the time of the child's conception to atleast the age of six, the child is perpetually around her. And so she gets so used to the child's presence. Also, because the child is the weakest and loneliest then, the fact that the mother takes care of him builds a sense of gratefulness."? I don't know.

All this is the Anand Gandhi effect. Ever since I saw his interview at TIFF and his TedX talk, I have been mesmerised by that he has to say. So all these questions have been popping into my head. There is so much to know, to understand, to appreciate and yet we live our lives like trained elephants that don't break free of their shackles because they believe they can't. We have been taught to fear the future, fear the world outside, fear the unknown. Maybe that makes sense when we are kids. But we don't walk out of the beaten path even when we're grown up because we've been conditioned to live within boundaries. But boundaries change every generation. Someone has to push them, not for the sake of humanity, but just to satiate curiosity.

the world out there

This is what an overdose of P.Sainath can do to you; it can have you questioning your right to everything you eat, wear and drive around in. Two days, Noam Chomsky and P.Sainath, I wouldn't say I'm completely transformed, I've been hearing this all the time, but if I don't acknowledge them even now, when will I. And my acknowledging this will not change anything. The more important part is to act in anyway I can. 80% of the population of this country goes to bed every night hungry. I don't give a shit about it. I'm far too busy watching the Indian Cricket Team, the Tamasha on 24x7 news channels or counting the number of lip locks in Emraan Hashmi's new film. I'm not angry, I'm just supremely disgusted with myself that despite knowing all that I know, even now, I don't really seem to care. Being not able to do anything about farmer suicides or hungry children or sexual abuse or anything of that sort is hurting me; Paradoxically it is my callousness, my ignorance, my inability to feel offended by all this is what is hurting me. Not just me, a lot of people like me do not understand hunger, or poverty, or injustice, or marginalization, or illiteracy, or the hardship of living because We've never been in those places, ever. It's not that we're not in contact with that. We are. Every morning I walk out of my house, I see a street kid not going to school, I see a poor Brahmin begging for money, I see women carrying children begging at traffic signals, and occasionally, when I don't change channels at the sight of them, I see reports of farmer suicides or rape victims. But it's just that that cannot afford space in my mind. I'm far too busy planning the next party, or bribing the Police constable, or buying a shampoo or ptch-ing at the state of this country.

I was once somebody who thought I didn't have to do anything to anybody because I wasn't doing them any harm and sad that they were unlucky but they had to get on with it. But since, I've realised something very important, very fundamental to the structure of human existence, human civilization. That like any other society of animals, we can survive only when we acknowledge our mutual interests and work towards them. But the problem with our World getting smaller and closer is that we are creating a bubble where entry is restricted and all of you who cannot scramble into that bubble, sorry guys, it's just for us elite. Nobody gives a fuck about how many people die everyday or the kind of lives they live. Everybody is busy being happy, turning our heads away from the filthy sight that presents at us at every juncture. The media's done it's job, its told us people are dying, its given us the reason, its blamed the FAO, the ITO and other big players who sit in Geneva or Paris and decide what farmers should do; all that is correct, Well done. Now what? The policies are realigned in accordance with the interests of the poor, that's been done too. Brilliant. The ideas, the policies, the solutions, the intellectual brainstorming, good. But the biggest question is, will it be applied, and how long will it take for all those policies to come into action with the kind of bureaucracy we have and by the time we get that done, there's going to be a new government, a new set of policies because inevitably a government which has given the foremost importance to the ideas of equality and basic amenities is not going to last long enough.

The problem as I see it is that the middle class doesn't care because they are too busy paying taxes and fees, buying groceries and sweating out every month to pay the loans. The poor are uninformed and have no idea as to what they should be doing because they are illiterate and listen to their local heads. Now, it is upto the rich to do as to their liking. Now that word, Rich, is a very relative one. When you start at the bottom of the rung, the richest man in the village wants what best suits his business needs, so he has somebody elected as a Sarpanch who would do things for him. At the next level, a few businessmen in a district want to fare well over others, so they elect an MLA who is their man. And so on and so forth until the whole Government is elected that way. Capitalism feeds capitalism. We all know this but we don't care. Because let the Big people be the Big people, not interfere with their decisions and policies and hope they wouldn't snatch away your car and your house. Or like Noam Chomsky put in, we are busy being consumers where our whole idea of existence revolves around the superficial ideas of commodities, trading them, watching their advertisements, stacking them up and showing them off. I'm not saying we are bad people, we acknowledge those who fight for the downtrodden, Binayak Sen, Satinath Sarangi, Arundhati Roy, Medha Patkar, P.Sainath etc. We honour them with awards and convocation speeches. But we don't want to be them. We're happy being the anonymous supporters, we don't want to be dragged into the fight. And this is what the majority is like. Almost all of us. This is the pathetic kind of a world we live in; where we don't have the balls to do what is right and tell people to do what is. You don't carry your driving license with you because you can buy the Police with a hundred bucks. You buy tickets in the black because you are far too busy to be waiting in lines. You drive away little beggars from your car windows because you don't want to give them money and have them live beggars forever but have you ever spared a moment and asked why is this kid begging.

It is impossible to live in this world and stay atomic. And we can see the consequences now. Every morning you wake up, the milk for your coffee travels half the country before it reaches you, employing thousands of people. The newspaper you read brings with it articles and advertisements, giving food to millions of them who spend half their lives trying for the best way to sell goods people don't want. Capitalism is not a bad thing, its given millions of people jobs, food and a better lifestyle. But at what cost. What does it feel like when you're driving your brand new McLaren next to a slum or when you don't want a power cut in your city because you can't be deprived of your facebook hours, but don't care even if villages are consumed in darkness. Now, Capitalism is a tricky thing. I once read that Capitalism makes people unequally rich but Socialism makes everybody equally poor. But in this country, the chasm between Rich and Poor is so huge that 2% of the country's richest pay more taxes than the rest 98%. What happened to the 3% Hindu growth rate that Manmohan Singh so wanted to change it all on one March 31? And why is it that despite knowing all the stats, despite all these NGOs working towards the cause, despite the relentless working hours of Journalists and Social Activists, don't we do something about it?

I had abandoned this piece earlier in the afternoon here and here I'm back but the rhythm's gone. I'll get straight down to the point here. The changes, that all of us want to see will happen only when there's an inherent change in the way people see this world. This is not the work of policies or rules but of ethics, morals and a clean conscience. It is about understanding, of staying open to people, and if all of us someday realise how important it is for us to live together beyond all differences, we might someday be eligible to be called humanity.

Nero's Guests, which inspired me into this frenzy.

ఎవడి పాపాన వాడే పోతాడు

This piece has been in my head for a long time. I cannot pinpoint the right time but I've been thinking about it for a long time. This is about India and the society we live in. About 1/5th of all people in the world are Indians and we never had a choice. That's a lot of people crammed into the place. You'll know what exactly I'm talking about if you've ever traveled a lot of India in trains, more so if by second class. There are far too many people in here. And if this wasn't enough, we have the greatest diversity among people on the planet. Nowhere else in the world is society divided into these many classes and sub-classes based on religion and wealth. Infact, I sometimes wonder if we have more number of deities than all their devotees put together. Anybody can be a God and be worshiped. Also, India is a land of instantaneous friendships. You barely have to know anybody before you tell him everything about your family, crib about your work and talk Cricket. It wouldn't be too far-fetched to say that in no other country do we have a more trafficked many-many relationship.

But how do we sustain this? We live in a world where Nature has taught us that one life is just a minute entity in a web of lot of lives and everybody is interdependent on everybody else, directly or indirectly. Nobody has understood this more than our ancestors. I am no educated anthropologist but from what I've seen, if I had to deduce a theory of how all of us still manage to live together despite the millions of differences, it's because of the so very complex structure of society that has been handed over generation to generation. Everybody wants to be at the centre of the universe. At some point or the other, people would like to believe that they can survive alone. And anything said on the contrary would hurt their ego. It is for this simple reason that the whole structure of religion and God have been added into everyday life. I respect Indian tradition, atleast the little I know. And somewhere deep inside, I realise that Randian philosophy of every man for himself does not survive unless in a totally Utopian society. So, to prevent a man from crossing the threshold of selfishness and also think about the after affects of his actions, somebody had to create the notion of Bad Karma. One of my favourite lines I read recently in Mystic River is that, "There is no Guilt. There is only a fear of Bad Karma." I am yet to read a more honest line.

Unless in the most extraordinary of cases, for all us everyday people, what prevents us from vengeance or greed or lust is the fear of Karma. Guilt, might come, but only after the act. All of us believe, and Indians more so, that the Good Lord we worship has a table of all things good and bad we have done. That is why we try to please him, to coax him to get things done in our favour. And it is also the same thing which stops us form sinning more often because we are scared that someday, we will have to payback for all we have done. Honestly, how many of us wouldn't do all that we liked to if only we could get away without paying for it. I will give you a prime example, just think about it. Why do we have more number of voyeurs than rapists? Infact, that notion of Good deeds vs Bad comes into play in more ways than we can imagine. At the beginning of this post, I asked How all of us Indians manage to survive together. The answer is simple, We are the most accommodating society in the world. I have not been in any other place in the world than India but from all that I've heard, seen or read, I don't think that anywhere else do 500 people travel amicably in a compartment which is supposed to fit in only 100 people.

We are okay with sharing, with forgiving, with looking away because we know that one, if I help somebody someday, that would return to me somehow and two, we believe that the उपरवाला is a fair judge of all deeds performed by everybody. All this has been imbibed into us. I am not saying there aren't people who would be good just for the heck of it but I'll discuss that in my next post, which has been brooding inside for a long time. Anyway, that accommodating nature of ours is our biggest boon and the biggest curse. I don't have to specify the reasons why. It helps us, like I already mentioned above, into sharing and forgiving, giving people a second chance which more often than not, they deserve. But that also happens to be our biggest curse because we are far too outer-worldly to change things in this world. We don't really give a shit about anything because we believe in the great providence and his just trial system.

And that is why India is the land of contradictions. Good or bad, that is the way we live. And have been for the past 5000 or so years. We have our Mahatmas and Mother Teresas as well as the world famous 'politicians' and corrupted government officials. And it is only here, at the end of the day, an honest man, albeit a poor one, is so proud of himself.