Saket Suryesh's Blog, page 15

Where is the Hindu Intellectual?

My idea of religion is borderline-atheism. In today’s India, it is very down-market to be talking about religion. Customs and traditions unnerve me. There seems to be no logic in continuing to do things the way they have been done for centuries, simply because that is how we have been doing them, for centuries. Still, there are places I would not want to go and touch. Modernism today has two problems, one, it tries to change benign symbols which identify a people merely for the sake of change. Just as “This is how we have been always doing it” is not an argument to continue with a thing. On the flip side, that can also not be an argument to oppose it. Secondly, there is such a surge of fake righteousness that the real meat of any movement is lost in the noise.
Those who control the narrative, claim to be the weakest and are the first to cry victim-hood. It is a common trend. So you pelt stone, hold the state to ransom, out of your free-will (you can very well chose not to), on cops and soldiers, who do not have a choice, but to be where they are, and when retaliated, cry victim. You are a journalist, you control the media. When you decide to write non-sense, out of stupidity or some evil design (your desperation and stubbornness to stay stupid would point to latter) the media offers space with wide circulation to you. When holes are plucked into your manufactured narrative by a common citizen, who also reads your paper/watches your show, and thereby is a customer of yours, you attack with vengeance. It is now getting so common that I felt I should write. There is an angry, almost violent reporting of slapping and thrashing of people under the fancy term of Cow-vigilantism. Just imagine, in a nation of 125 Crore people, where murders and rapes do happen routinely, we are outraged, angry and revolted by some people getting thrashed. Even the politician whose party members and supporters have been charged by worse physical abuse by their own better half, pretend to be shocked as if they have not scene worse violence in all their life. A rape right in the heart of Delhi is under-reported or unreported, while a man, claiming to be “hounded” by autorikshaw-driver becomes a prime-time debate. If you have read some book on how to write non-fiction, and if you believe the capabilities of our journalists, you will know how the same rules which can be used to make the same story have impact, and when not used, deliberately, can make the story tame and meaningless. I will cover that game in another post. Right now, this is about the Right to pray and Sabrimala debate.
There is some kind of concerted effort to equate small portions of Hindu faith with violent fanaticism of other religions. Christianity went through dark ages, but Renaissance rescued it to a great extent. Words of Christ was no longer absolute and could be evaluated, analyzed and judged. A religion to evolve, need so escape spiritual dictatorship. Hinduism has always been a fluid religion. People who have tried to hold the flowing brook of Hindu faith to ransom, thereby muddying the waters, were either ridiculed or defeated by Hindus themselves. The key reason, in my view, was that Hinduism has always been a very private, very personal religion. It has never been a political religion. So, if you are a good Hindu, faith promised you a good, happy and contented life. It never proposed you a Hindu kingdom, even in the days of rule of Hindu kings. It never wanted you to fight for a Hindu kingdom, which superseded your regional loyalties. Even the stories from ancient times will not speak positive about fanatics (rare if any) in Hinduism- you have a greedy Pandit, the arrogant Brahmin. Eventually, the stories will have them humbled. God will be on the side of truth and reason. Hinduism has not been driven by the desire to establish the kingdom and therefore never was a political tool. It was always spiritual and has always been evolving. It was always a search for the truth, no word was perfect, nothing was unchallenged. For Dvait (Duality), there was advait (Universality), for Dasya Bhakti (worship as a servant), there was Sakhya Bhakti (worship as a friend). Hinduism floated from one extreme to other and you test it with your logic and follow. There was never a messenger who brought in a revelation, which you either follow, or bend, transform to fit in to. There were no scripture demanding surrender of reason, else your well-being would be doubtful. You can simply forego a principle and pick another. Nothing impacted your Hinduism, made you a lesser Hindu, or an unbeliever.
A religion, as supple, as flexible as Hinduism, doesn’t need its followers to protect and defend it. But that has also been undoing of Hinduism. As the battle of supremacy unfolds, among Abrahaminic religions, Hindus watch awestruck what is unfolding about them. They saw it similarly when Hinduism shrunk across the South East Asia and eventually contracted primarily to only one nation. And we are only talking of nations with Hindu population, not even Hindu nation. If we talk about the former, there is none. There is much about political, expansionist religions, which Hindus do not understand. We try to find a balance, a foolish balance. The arguments of absurdity goes like-  so what ISIS wants to establish a monotheist empire across the world, the taxi driver harassed the guy (supposedly) in Mumbai, because he carried a bag made of Cow leather. "Harassed", and on the other hand, we have missiles, stoning, killing of hundreds every other day, and an attempt to establish a foolish equivalence is undertaken. Some Hindus who try to imitate the orthodox religion- no one can question my Guru, These Muslims, and this and that, are trying to imitate those they are trying to fight, and that is even more pathetic. We need to identify clearly the defining features of being a Hindu and not be apologetic about it. Debate, spiritualism, philosophic honesty are the hallmark of Hinduism, not militancy and orthodoxy. We need to inculcate these and not back out. Unfortunately, by default or by design, very few Right Wing debaters called in for debate on TV channels inspire any confidence to me. Very few are well-read in Hindu philosophy, let alone the thoughts of any other religion. To me it seems, it is by design. On twitter, one would find many handles which are extremely well-educated, exceptionally erudite, they never find space in main stream media.
 This Right-to-Pray is one such attempt of making so much noise about a non-issue. The opponents of Right to Pray say the women are not allowed because the presiding deity is celibate man. A celibate, a brahmachari, is supposed to stay away from women of certain age. Similar was the case of Shani. These stories may or may not be true. But the people who are shouting at the top of their lungs that these beliefs are untrue, would happily go around wishing Merry Christmas, come December and be considerate to those who go fasting on Ramadan, for what they believed happened centuries back during some battle. It is a faulty argument on either side for those fighting for right-to-pray and wanting to force their way into the temple, trampling over the faith of the believers. If you believe in God, why would you want to go in when you know He doesn't want you; If you do not believe in the God, why go at all? I personally have no reason to believe (borderline atheist, remember) but then I have no reason to sit in the judgment of those who believe. Till the date, they walk to my place, my home, my work place and tell me, that Lord Ayappan has descended here and I need to live in a certain way to accommodate him, I would rather let them be. The world has lost the most out of this tendency to control, to create uniformity out of diversity. 

The courts which object to multiple Hindu festivals, feigns ignorance when Beef festivals are organized in full media glare in states where Beef sale is banned. The logic given is that Cow slaughter is banned but beef eating is not. I wonder if the lordships in our exalted courts believe that the beef distributed in these freedom-to-eat festivals was prepared out of cattle which voluntarily sacrificed their lives by means of euthanasia or penance or some other acceptable means to strengthen the secular fabric of the nation. Hinduism across ages had attracted best of the intellectual minds. While today, the intellectual mind is considered a synonym to leftist-atheist-communist, which derives its legitimacy by opposing anything which it fails to argue or explain against as Brahminical; in history we have had brilliant minds getting attracted to Hinduism. Instead of putting our mind to reach the sublime truth, we have left it to the half-educated to defend Hinduism. It is the sad plight. Those who mind, do not matter, and those who matter, do not mind. When have we seen in our time, someone of caliber of, say, a Thoreau(who considered Christianity as radical due to pure morality in contrast to Hinduism which he said, was pure intellectuality), coming out to argue the attempt of the half-baked intellectual to malign Hinduism and insult its symbols without even comprehending their true meanings. Most debates are with Right-wingers is like- I oppose you because I am hurt, while it should be – I oppose you because you are a moron. That is my argument on Sabrimala debate. I oppose you not because I am hurt, but because of the absurdity of your argument. I would support your entry into Sabrimala, if it were a school and you want to go there for education, or for an employment, for the sake of argument, and are prevented. But no, why would you want to go into a temple to pray to a God you don’t believe in, trampling over faith of those who do believe in Him?  The middle-aged Marxists of leftist colleges mock Vedas in TV studios, while Schopenhauer wrote, of Upnishads, “f rom every sentence deep, original and sublime thoughts arise, and the whole is pervaded by a high and holy and earnest spirit..In the whole world, there is no study so beneficial and so elevating as that of Upnishads .” Voltaire even went to the extent of saying that “Our holy Christian religion is solely based upon the ancient religion of Brahma” . However, there is this another quote of Voltaire that worries me much- Hindus are peaceful and innocent people, equally incapable of hurting others or defending themselves. I so wish his last statement was not true. I never thought I would write anything formal tangential on religion, but here it is. Do read and think about it. Biggest strength of Hinduism is intellectualism, and we must not surrender it. 

My Bright Saturday- The Magical part of the Mundane

There were many things of immense import which begged to be written. Religion in politics, the art of creating a narrative- how slyly media creates a narrative. I was reading Sol Stein on Writing on the way to office on Friday, and it occurred to me, the total apathy with which a student, a leftist leader from JNU charged with rape is being treated by mainstream media. A regular in TV debates, a known figure from a University much in news for all wrong reasons of late, and media acts as if nothing has happened. The silence is to kill the story, so perfectly dead truth being presented. Nothing beyond facts, no flesh, not blood, not personality caricatures. It is discomforting. But then I will write about it next week. This week, I write about simple pleasures of life. My monthly visits to children library with my eight year old. Here it is, I share my Saturday with you.
While on my way from the Car workshop where I had dropped the car for repair, I get a call from Nonu (my eight year old), reconfirming the sojourn and reiterating that lunch will be at the Udipi next door to the BC Roy Children Library, in ITO. I pick her from home, just picking the four books to be exchanged, the magical part of my mundane existence begins. We take the auto from home, her friend, landlord’s grand-daughter, two years older than Nonu, accompanies us. We mostly take public conveyance on this day. She mustn't think Public conveyance an impossible inconvenience when she grows up. Furthermore, it is a great equalizer. Her hairs lose, her face iridescent in the afternoon Monsoon Sun, her demeanor buoyant, more than usual with her friend for company. We get on the metro, I park myself resting my back on the glass partition at the door, and they get the seat. They are talking at the moment like two grown-ups, on their way to do attend to things of business, work- things grown-ups do. I look at her with the fond affection of a father. She is playing with her locks and the bright yellow hair-band stands out, splendidly as if a sunbeam has stuck in her hairs. I try to figure out what is painted on her Tee. It occurs to me, how much we see, how little we observe. I thought it to be a Donald duck, only today I realize it was Dory and Nemo. It brings smile to me. I wonder, how quickly time passes, and for how long she will be wearing such dresses. A tinge of sadness, and an urge to hold the clock back. My thoughts float to the Nursery in Max hospital, where I had met her first, and her palms had first curled around my finger. The first night I slept, almost sitting, holding her on my shoulder. Life was never to be same again. We get down at Central Secretariat for the change of train. Trains towards ITO seem to be running late. She is unperturbed. Delays do not worry kids. More time to play. She plays, as I watch her. A deep blue canopy of night sky stretches itself under the hot, Monsoon Sun, with her sudden laughter shining like stars spread over the deep blue sky of my imagination which covers us. She breaks into a dance. Yes, at the platform. She isn’t perturbed about who might be looking. She is happy. She is always, I silently pray, she always be as happy, as unrestrained. She takes off her Disney slippers and jumps. Her friend also jumps. They hold hands and jump. At the platform. People watch. Whenever you feel like flying, my child, you jump. Never look around who is watching. Just jump. Always believe your father is watching over you. Even when you are seventy and I am long gone. Stay aloft, levitate- I remember the dialogue from the Movie, Meet Joe Black, where Businessman, William Parrish (played by ever elegant, Anthony Hopkins) tells her daughter- “I want you to get swept away out there. I want you to levitate. I want you to sing with rapture and dance like a dervish. I mutter something similar. 
The train to Mandi House comes first. The crowd thins at the platform. She sings, loudly, in her yet untrained voice of unadulterated innocence. Her friend is couple of years older. She looks little embarrassed, a little held back. She is also happy, but she thinks. Her thoughts seem to hold her back. Nonu’s exuberance is not yet adulterated with thoughts, thoughts of who might be watching. Her friend tells her that people around might think them mad. She doesn’t care. She sings. Some rhyming sounds, not even words. Happiness doesn’t need words, it needs soul. We get on the train. She keeps repeating the announcements- “Please stand clear of the door. Please mind the gap.”  We reach ITO. We have lunch first. Then we reach the library. And the magic is now augmented with fantasies and fairies. She runs among the books, she touches the books. She and her friend find a book of schoolkid’s jokes. They read them and giggle. She looks for Roald Dahl. She loves Roald Dahl, his life. She almost wants to become a writer like him. Him and Ruskin Bond. She is an only child, but with this friendship, she will have company which will never abandon her, which will never judge her. These books, they will carry her through to the day when she’ll be swept off her feet; the day when she will sing with rapture and dance like a dervish. And even beyond. These moments are the brightest part of my weekends, they will take me through the worst days of my life. This ability to sing, dance and whistle while walking through the loneliest and darkest patches of her life, is the biggest inheritance I leave her. I wrote once- When kids grow up, they judge their parents. Sometimes, they forgive them. I hope she will judge me kindly, when her time comes. This is from this Saturday, this is my one Saturday of each month. This lights up my days, hope it does light up yours as well.

Book Review- The Waves- By Virginia Woolf

Book: The Waves Author: Virginia Woolf (1882-1941)Genre: Fiction (Spiritual/ Philosophical)Style: ExperimentalPublished: 1931Publisher: Hogarth PressRating: Must Read, Classic
“The Author would be glad if the following pages were not read as a Novel.” – Wrote Virginia Woolf(1882-1941) on the manuscript of The Waves (Initially called The Moths). It was first published in 1931.  We are close to a century since this book was published, still this book is unparalleled and unequaled. The Independent called this Book of a Lifetime.
This is not an easy book to read. Beauty is never too easy to create, or is it ever too easy to savor to the fullest. Both production as well as the consumption of true work of art needs to be earned. This is a difficult book to read yet immensely elegant and infinitely exquisite. The story, unlike most fictional novels, does not unfold through dramatic events. It doesn’t depend on drama, it deftly steers clear of the mundane. It is sensually sublime and magnificently mystical. It breathes softly in the cusp of prose and poetry. Riding on fascinatingly gorgeous prose, it rises to glory from the space where literature melts into philosophy and the exact intermingles into the abstract. The words written here have a soft tone, almost like a whisper as if they were giving away some magical secret to the reader.
The Wave tells the story of six individuals who are the key (and only) characters in a beautiful story. Well, there is a seventh one, who is there only as reference for the six characters. The story is told through the monologues of the six characters- Bernard, Susan, Rhoda, Neville, Jinny and Louis. They meet, as kids at the beginning of the story on the sea-shore against the backdrop of waves, hitting on the shore- incessant, unrelenting, representing the continuum and passage of time. It is this rhythmic sound of life which Virginia Woolf refers to when she wrote- I am writing to a rhythm, and not to a plot. And one really feels a soft beat of drums coming from a distance as the words unwrap themselves, unhurriedly.  The novel traces their lives through school, college and work. The story moves in monologues, as Mrs. Woolf wrore- The Wave resolves itself into a series of dramatic soliloquies.
Through monologues we understand the characters and how they look at each other and at life as it unfolds for them. Susan accidentally finds Jinny kissing Louis and is very unhappy. Their individual characters unfold in the first part of the story itself. Jinny is a happy kid. She says, “I dance. I ripple. I am thrown over you like a net of light. I lie quivering flung over you.  She is sure of herself, and looks for happiness. Susan is earthy and sad. Bernard wants to comfort her. Bernard is the writer in search of right phrase. He writes letter like Byron to his friends. He explains Susan’s anguish, “Susan has spread her anguish out. Her pocket-handkerchief is laid on the roots of the beech trees and she sobs, sitting crumpled where she has fallen.” She is not anguished because she loves Louis. We find the sorrow is within her, on account of her own image about herself, incapable of love and happiness. She has already concluded, and resigned to a life of the usual, the unremarkable, when she says about herself, “And I am squat, Bernard, I am short. I have eyes that look close to the ground and see insects in the ground. The yellow warmth in my side turned to stone when I saw Jinny kiss Louis. I shall eat grass and die in a ditch in the brown water where dead leaves have rotted.” Susan has already given up on life. She trades passion for propriety and in the end, laments, "I am sick of the body. I am sick of my own craft, industry and cunning, of the unscrupulous ways of the mother who protects, who collects under her jealous eyes at one long table her own children, always her own." 
 Bernard continues his journey into the search of a voice of his own, as he keeps looking for the best of the phrases. Neville advises him that you are not Byron. You are Bernard, in the college, Cambridge. It is only towards the end Bernard agrees. There they meet Percival, who is only external character in the story. Percival is quintessential representation of orthodoxy, a conventional hero. He is an old-fashioned hero of myths, to who all are attracted – like Moths. 
Rhoda feels inadequate thought spiritual. She misses earthiness. She says, “I have no face. I am whirled down caverns, and flap like paper against endless corridors, and must press my hand against the wall to draw myself. She is in dilemma. She wants to become like Susan or Jinny. She never is able to come into her own. Her own self is lost. She says- “I am cast up and down among these men and women, with their twitching faces, with their lying tongues, like a cork on a rough sea. Like a ribbon of weed I am flung far every time a door opens..I am also a girl, here in this room.” She has lost herself in her menial, an inconsequential identity, a broken self and she is twenty-one. She will jump off the cliff eventually and kill herself, hounded by her own sense of inadequacy.   
Louis is the ambitious one. He is articulate, thinks of himself as an unhappy poet. He is a realist. He says, “The bird flies; the flower dances; but I hear always the sullen thud of the waves; and the chained beast stamps on the beach. It stamps and stamps.” The chained beast is the sea, the stamping- the sound of the waves. Louis is artistic but notes the time which is passing by. He goes to London, who spoke of “My father, a banker in Brisbane” with embarrassment, is laboring in office. Maybe his picture will not be on the wall as an unhappy poet. He has given up on being a poet. He says, “I repeat- I am an average Englishman; I am an average clerk.” He is tortured by the sense that he has compromised his potential, his ability. He says, “I smoothed my hair when I came in, hoping to look like the rest of you. But I cannot, for I am not single and entire as you are. ..I am the caged tiger, and you are the keepers with red-hot bars.” His sensitive soul, we find later, is tamed when he says, “There is no respite here, no shadow made of quivering leaves, or alcove to which one can retreat from the Sun, to sit, with a lover, in the cool of the evening.
Neville is pursuing a dream, following a chase. He too is hounded by a certain emptiness, a certain sense of loss. He says, “ I am like a hound on the scent. ..I shall never have what I want, for I lack bodily grace and the courage that comes with it.  ..I excite pity in the crisis of life and not love. Therefore I suffer horribly.”  
Percival dies. The hero dies the most ordinary death. He falls from his horse in India and dies. The six lives, who would be attracted to Percival like moths will suddenly come home to the ephemeral nature of life. Bernard says- “This then, is the world that Percival sees no longer.”  From ashes to ashes.
What we have to the end? What memories hold to their own in the end, when we look back? Are there these six distinct people whose life we watch with some sort of vicarious attachment, or are they one? Neville says in the last chapter, “The old corrosion has lost its bite- envy, intrigue and bitterness have been washed out. We have lost our glory too.”  Bernard says- “ Percival is dead and Rhoda is dead. ..As I talked I felt, I am you! This difference we make so much of, this individuality we so feverishly cherish, was overcome. Here on the nape of my neck is the kiss Jinny gave Louis. My eyes fill with Susan’s tears.”
 The characters are incidental, so is the story. It is deep philosophy, it is the story of spiritual search. It is a story that one ought to read, even though it is difficult. It is like life. We have to live, no matter how difficult it might be. For anyone, as an early reviewer wrote, it should be twice read. For a writer, one should read, re-read it many times, hoping some of the genius would rub off on your own writing. While being path-breaking and experimental, it attracted some scathing early reviews, I would only quote from this book itself, before you make an opinion about it- “To read this poem one must have myriad eyes… one must put aside antipathies and jealousies and not interrupt…Nothing is to be rejected in fear or horror…The lines do not run in convenient lengths…One must be skeptical but throw caution to the winds and when the door opens, accept absolutely..Let down one’s net deeper and deeper and gently draw in and bring to surface what he said and she said and make poetry.” This quote from this book is apt for this book.
Link to Amazon Page of The Waves  
Some initial Reviews to The Waves:
“It is important that this book be read twice. The book is difficult. Yet it is superb.” – Harold Nicolson- 1931
“ Ms. Woolf’s writing has always been difficult: by which I mean that it will yield motive, its clear and luminous core, only to a reader who is ready to empty himself of preconceptions and to become in the highest degree receptive, patient, searching..” – Gerald Bullett, 1931
“ Her genius is like a shaft of sunlight breaking into a room- a golden medium in which float a million fiery particles but beyond that enchanted area the darkness is darker than it was.”- L P Hartley, Weekend Review- 1931

“ Mrs Woolf has not only passed up superficial reality; she has also passed up psychological reality… A far cry from the ‘Biographic style’ but a very far cry from greatness.” – Louis Krorenberger- New York Times Book Review- 1931

Why I Hate Birthdays?

Don't get me wrong. I am not a depressed teenager contemplating death as a plausible way out of life. I have too tough a hide for that. There used to be a time when Birthdays excited me to no ends. A birthday is a perfect occasion to reconfirm and substantiate one's station in life. Friends embrace, kisses, blessings- your role as a father, husband, child is all settled once again. Your station in life is substantiated, reaffirmed. You are a prince (or the princess if you are a woman) for a day. 
But then you grow up, get wiser and broken from inside. You realize the inadequacy of the dream to keep you aloft. You no longer levitate, in spiritual terms. You dread the day, you drag yourself through it. It lies at your door, like a dead dog, in such an awkward fashion that you cannot walk around it. The pretense of your being a special person doesn't survive unblemished for even for an hour- an unadulterated, unbroken hour. 
You realize that the day is as crappy as any other day as the one that preceded it or the one that is to follow it. Social media makes it easier for people to make a wish. Even Linkedin connects, people you have never met or spoken to in person, start wishing you. You know they could as well be wishing a very happy birthday to a dead person. You are old enough, so old that life is tiring. I was reading Virginia Woolf's writer's journals the other day. She laments, ponder over the fact she is 45, and wonders how many books she still has left in her, yet unwritten. She is the Virginia Woolf. I think of it. I am 45. I have written couple of poetry books, I have just published a collection of stories. It is there up. I suck at promoting and selling them, even though I know I do have something to tell (which is why I wrote them). But the painful saga of awkward promotion of The Rude Tenderness of Our Heart is another story. Pertinent point here is that scathing, unforgiving thought that much of life's work is yet undone. And no, it has nothing to do with the career, the selling of IT, which I do for the upkeep of the family. How many books will I write? How many by the time I am 55?
I write in short jerks and between long breaks. Sometimes I convince myself that I am writing when I am spending long hours preparing to write, or trying to approach real writing in a hugely round-about way- reading interviews, twitter (author's platform) and all that nonsense. Time passes me by. I do not get fooled anymore. I am old. I know my station in life. A small cake is just an alibi of the value of a relation, value of a person. The ideas are uncertain, the voice is tremulous. I mutter what I want, slowly, hesitatingly. I am given a small, pale Pineapple cake to cut, and brief embarrassed clap follows. My daughter laughs. The laugh is pretty, as always, like clinking of crystals. It fills and lights up the bland day.
The day is over. I read Yeats. An aged man is but a paltry thingA tattered coat upon the stick, unlesssoul claps its hands and sing, and louder sing
I whistle against the night breeze, but the soul doesn't sing. The soul is tired, of years of neglect, of being relegated to good sense. I ran after happiness, a hope of an ideal life fades. People around me, do not realize that time is outrunning them quicker than it is outrunning me. Still stuck in their diminutive egos, they strut around. We smile, while hating one another. Civility or cowardice, the line is too thin. The fan, makes unpleasant sound, which rises, hammering the conscience. I end the day, reading Virginia Woolf- I have lived a thousand lives already. Everyday I unbury- I dig up. I find relics of myself in the sand that women made thousand of years ago, when I heard songs by Nile and the chained beast stamping. 

Will I once again hold this unruly beast steady, only time will tell? The hope is little, the adamant soul is unyielding. Phew, another birthday is gone. I am old. Last year have seen some younger souls than me leave this mortal world. Age rides on my soul. I always had an ancient soul, it is even older now. The era behind me is longer than the era ahead of me. The shadow of my past mistakes is longer than the dim Sun of my future can ever wash away. The shadows are getting longer by the hour. It is embarrassing to write about unhappy passage of the birthday in an age when pouts and loud celebrations mark the birthdays in very public celebrations. But that what it is. I found a quote which covers beautifully my feelings on a birthday. It is by Hemingway.
“His talent was as natural as the pattern that was made by the dust on a butterfly's wings. At one time he understood it no more than the butterfly did and he did not know when it was brushed or marred. Later he became conscious of his damaged wings and of their construction and he learned to think and could not fly any more because the love of flight was gone and he could only remember when it had been effortless.” 
He wrote it long back. I feel he wrote it for me.The shadow of silences walk in wearing heavy boots.The night is overwhelmed in those shadows. The night is drowning. It gasps for breath. The birthday is over. 

Writing on Independence Day- Yet Again

There is an advantage of being a blogger over being a columnist. One is not tied up to events and deadlines. I have earlier also written on Independence Day. This time, I thought I would take it easy. I thought, I would rather let myself laze out through Rain-drenched days of Delhi, read Virginia Woolf, watch kites flying high, and take pride in the sight of Tricolor fluttering in the enthusiastic Monsoon Breeze. But here I am writing again. On Independence day. 
I am writing on account of some unsettling things which have happened over the last two months, gets worse over the day. And no, I am not talking about the intolerance. In a nation, where soldiers are shot everyday on border, women get raped and killed, without a whimper, unless they fit the political agenda of political and thought leaders, the mass outrage on beating of people is more outrageous than the beating itself is. Further the same people who are working on the well-designed, although largely exposed agenda, are relentless in service to the powers-that-might-be hell bent on destabilizing the nation. If that breaks the nation so be it. A journalist, Rahul Kanwal, today wrote about Army symposium on Geeta, which is less of a religious tome, more of a philosophy. Immediately, a journalist with NDTV, with known leaning against the current government wrote asking if they also covered Quran and Bible? It is any day disgusting to communalize the Army, even more on 14th of August. Something snapped and I am writing this. 
This began with 2014 General elections. There was (and is) a well-oiled, well-crafted ecosystem which always wanted to maintain the status quo. Do not get me wrong. They do not love Congress and hate BJP. What they hate is change. What they loved was what Congress has come to represent over the decades of Independent India- a world-view stuck in history. It is a world of courtiers, a world of Zauq with no space for Ghalib. The spaces of public debate was allocated to them- The English-speaking, good-looking, stylized and suited for TV studios, DU graduates whose world began and ended in Delhi, and mostly Post-graduated from abroad with powerful connections. That anachronistic, monarchic world of Congress protected their Journalistic Zamindaris. That explains their loyalty to Congress, they derived their power from there. They were also OK with, to borrow from Arun Shourie, Congress with a Cow jibe on BJP, BJP with an Advani. They did not love Advani, rather hated him. Still he represented the old world, where the schemes of this intelligentsia could propagate unhindered. 
But then Social media happened, and while the Satraps of Mainstream remained lost in their Shatranj Ke Khiladi moment, deriding the unknown, unwashed masses, the tide turned and Narendra Modi was their in the driving seat. It is not that Social media was the making of Modi. On the contrary, it was democratization of social media, which created the space for Modi in National polity. To his credit, he did not fight it (unlike his ministers like Maneka Gandhi and couple of MPs), he rode the wave. When the interpreters are not there, honesty of the person stands. This is where Modi fared. He and his cabinet paid heed to those who earlier had not voice. This made the travelers through power galleries of Delhi redundant. 
This change in polity hurt the whispering, conniving cult of Lutyen's Delhi. The world changed for the unwashed natives who suddenly found their voice on Blogs, Twitter and Facebook. The established thought-leaders and opinion-makers struggled for relevance. The so-called custodians of national conscience suddenly realized that they were so out of touch with the reality. The had no space in changed regime, except as an equal to the citizenry. They had ignored the waves of change when some of them had threatened to run out naked in the event of Modi becoming the PM. Thankfully, they did not keep their arrogant and foolish word for it would have been a horrendous sight. The new dispensation did not speak to people through them, cabinet positions were no longer meditated through them, policy decisions were not disseminated through them. 
The change had come. Suddenly very-articulate, very well-read voices started to flood the public discourse. One can only wonder why we never earlier had read them in National dailies or heard them in Television debates. They were independent voices which defied the ground rules and refused to tow the line.  The melodramatic, fact-less, rhetorical drama of mainstream media was now routinely called out on nameless, faceless people on social media. While they lost their power with the change in style of governance, now they lost their repute by rhetoric and falsifying the information. With no hidden agendas, no ministers to appoint, no TRP to address, these truly neutral voices found friends in the government led by a leader who was not a part of Lutyen's Delhi. They were called "Bhakts" by intellectuals in derision, which is an irony, if one looks at how the same people took the government to task when they would it deviating from the idea of India- the popular idea of India. This further infuriated the cabal as their citadels of power crumbled about them. 
They sided with Congress, humiliated, defeated, out of power as a result of corruption and dynastic politics. Congress to them represented a world of absolute power, naive consumers of news and no voice to counter them. The game began. A sad, but innocent suicide (10th such in the University, 9 in earlier regime did not agitate media or Congress leaders) in Hyderabad became a stick to beat the government with. This was quickly followed by JNU, where the national media openly sided with those calling for the destruction of the nation. There was nothing hidden, gloves were off, masks were down. Old media went about threatening individuals, who pointed their dishonesty. Journalists were fighting with people for whom they wrote, who they claimed to represent, soldiers, students, professionals. Anyone who objected to their vile politics was a Bhakt. Student leaders with 300 votes in the University with 15oo voters, backed and funded by opposition parties, were propped up by media as an answer to a mass leader who rose to power with absolute majority, in election among 125 Cr voters. Anything and everything would go. People getting thrashed churned the stomach of a reporter who stayed blind to a Dalit girl, Jisa, raped and killed in Kerala, merely because that would have implicated the political party she favored. A decorated General made speech on military strategy, quoting 1971, calling for destruction of Pakistan, which has been sending more terrorists to India then Ghazal Singers. No national media thought of covering it. A student, under-grad called it hate speech and that was newsworthy.  
A public spat happened between journalist who decided not to call AK 47 trotting terrorist a terrorist and another who wanted to call the slain terrorist thus. Now is not the time to play neutral. Daggers are drawn, masks are off. Suddenly, being proud of being Indian is being old-fashioned, illiterate Hindu. How are the media, the now discharged-of-duty conscience-keeper intelligentsia celebrating the 70th Independence day? Questioning the size of the flags, calling an even of patriotic fervour hyper-nationalism. 
The old-world power ecosystem of Indian Polity are diligently designing the methods to fracture the society. Left-Liberals are making the narrative of Dalit-Muslim solidarity. It is so absurd and outlandish. It would take another post to cover that. Left is atheist, Muslims follow their religion to the dot, and they are friend. Muslims really think left will let them follow the religion if the nation of Leftist's dream is created, or Leftists really believe that Muslims will become Atheist comrade, once the idea of India- the democratic, secular India is defeated. And there does this leave the Dalits. Same place where they were in Pakistan and Bangladesh in 1947. Their choice is not between democratic India and Leftist-Muslim Government as in Pakistan, where they will become crowd to convert and chant, "Insha Allah, Insha Allah." That is no choice at all. Their choice is between Una- Model and Kerala model. Una model, can transform from thrashing (politically staged or not) to social equity, Kerala's Jisa model ends in death and silence. We escaped political slavery in 1947, Constitutional Slavery in 1977 and eventually, intellectual slavery in 2014. There is no going back. We need books and library to continue moving on this path and thwart the designs of demagogues with questionable integrity. We need to free knowledge from the clutches of few privileged ones and they are bound to not like it. The nation is its lands, its symbols, its forces, its citizens, but it is much bigger than all of it put together. We cannot let it fail for petty bickering. Let us overwhelm this bickering with a resounding Bharat Mata ki Jai or Jai Hind, if you like. Lets stand as one nation. Let us pledge to be the citizen, our soldier will be proud of defending. Let's pledge to be the soldier, our citizen will be proud of deifying. This is the day to celebrate. Happy Independence Day. Hold the flag high and don't be bothered about the questions on the size of the Tricolor.

My other posts around the same idea: 
Independence Day and Our Kids 
Patriotism on Social Media- Thoughts for A Soldier

Nationalism and Intellectual Priesthood

Why PM Modi's TownHall is Path-Breaking?

There are certain acts which are more important for the intent than for the content. "I had a dream" of Dr. Martin Luther King, might not have a blue-print a plan for liberation of the down-trodden in the American society, but the intent was so strong, so potent that the content was sure to follow. 
Yesterday's Townhall by PM Narandra Modi is one such event in the Indian politics. I am not sure if PM himself realizes that. He has set in motion the wheels of democracy in a direction which going forward, has the potential to create something bigger than he is. 
In one swift stroke, he has established direct connect with the citizens. When was the last time we saw the PM talking directly to the citizens? Let us look at what this Townhall does to the polity at a broader level, instead of trying to lazily assess Modi's body-language and analyse his dress for the occasion. 
One, he allows questions to come from citizens. He chooses to answer. In an era, where we have cash for votes and where we have dubious Cash for questions in the parliament, this is a great step. We cannot wait to reach to our representatives and then wait in humility to raise the issue of bridges not built, schools not functioning and doctors not being available, while they are busy turning up for sessions in parliament drunk and when sober, filming the security set of the Parliament. We know where the buck stops, and we can reach that very place and ask questions. He has set a wheel of accountability in motion in our democracy, which can not be reversed, unless we are too stupid and those driven by agendas are too strong to make us forget this moment. I have a feeling that this will be asked from all future leaders. Forget the PM, even the Vice-president of opposition parties with 44 or 4 seats have never had the courage or humility to stand before audience and answer the question from the citizens. 
Secondly, he eliminates the middle-man. He does not talk at you, he talks to you. Last time, the previous PM wanted to reach out to the people, he would call the journalists to his home for a luncheon. So these reporters-turned-journalists-turned- opinion-makers- turned-lobbyists, will decide what questions were most important for the unwashed natives and take them to the power that be. The anticipating masses will wait outside for the next- days newspaper, or the evening TV exclusives to know what concerns have been raised and how they had been addressed. This kept the intellectual priesthood flourishing and the citizen out of the process. How much a Karan Thapar would be worried about Dalits and tribals is anyone's guess if one has seen the huge, huge bungalow he lives in, irrespective of what he writes in his columns? These meetings were affirmation of the position of journalists in the natural order of things. This is one reason why they hate Modi. He is reaching out to the people and making them redundant. They do not hate me and you, or the questions we ask, they hate the act of our asking the question. It is not the merit of our questions which bothers them, it is our status as the questioner which agitates our intellectuals. 
Thirdly, Modi brings forthrightness back into the political game. He does not shy away from the questions. This could be because he knows for sure his constituency. No matter what we pretend to be, with fresh slogans talking about Hindutva ki Talvaar (Sword of Hinduism), Hinduism is one religion which is inwardly directed. In Hinduism, there was always a separation of State and the Church, the basic premise of secular polity. The king was not the source of religious legitimacy, it rested with the sages from ancient times, who lived in totally isolated from political power. He is asked about Cow Vigilantes, and he minces no words. He is not liking the fact, hooliganism is covered with Cow protection. In Ramayana, when Valmiki's Ashram is attacked, he by all implications, runs a huge Ashram with a lot of students and trained on various things which I would presume also include martial arts. But he does not raise his own students to arms, he reaches to the King Dashrath, for a legitimate action on the Asuras. This has two messages, one illegal action on illegal act doesn't become legal by the noble motives it carry. Secondly, for the liberals, it also tells that when you tend to offend the faith of not only other religion, rather the human faith, by killing living animals, enjoying their flesh as a proof of your emancipation, you are become Asuras or devils. So while Modi has spoken on the vigilantes, next time when you dance around celebrating beef festivals, remember to keep your receipts or be ready to be jailed, for you are being Asuras. There can be no alternative reading to exonerate you.
The responses to Modi's stiff and open response, also makes few things about his followers very clear. One, the power of Modi comes from followers who are not fanatics. This gives him room to operate, to govern. Had he been a member of any other religion, as open in his religious beliefs as he is, he could not have gone unpunished, for such a response, where he essentially enforces the supremacy of the constitution and the law of the land over self-appointed vigilantes, even if latter runs under the pretext of protecting religion. It brings home the point that irrespective of best attempts fake moral righteousness of people trying to strive a balance with fanaticism and religious terrorism, Hinduism and intolerance is incongruous and impossible.  His response, and support affirms Hinduism as apolitical and tolerant religion. It also illustrates the lack of imagination of the so-called intellectuals, who sat on thrones because they held the ink and the paper captive, when they derided Modi supporters as Bhakts. Modi supporters have been most neutral supporters and most fearless in opposing the Modi government, if one compares them with the supporters of any other political parties. The question on Cow Vigilantes was asked by Chhabi, a vocal Modi supporter. Can you imagine a Laloo Yadav supporter asking him about the perils of casteist politics with reference to the development, and the supporters of Owaisi on the ghettoisation of Muslims, and about why should Muslims not be an equal citizen with common civil code- on a public platform? I don't know if many would remember the spokesperson of AAP, supposedly representative of common people, on a news-channel, stating- "You cannot question Arvind Kejriwal. We have got 67 out of 70 seats in Delhi" (this 67 out of 70 is a part of all their arguments). This exposes the fact that when the media derides their own viewer (or consumer of news) thus customers, as Bhakts, they are not being objective, they are merely being arrogant and insulting.
This is a major step in our democracy. We are moving from elite governance to mass governance, and thank you Mr. Modi for this. This step is historic and cannot be redone. Let's do more of it, maybe at least a quarterly Q&A with the PM, for this government and for the governments to come. George Barnard Shaw said, "Democracy is the device which ensures that we shall be governed no better than we deserve." Let us raise ourselves, it is the week of Independence day. Let us raise the level of our questioning, let us raise the level of our governance. We cannot leave this in the hands of those who for long have kept the public intellectual mind as their captive tool by holding the tight grip over public discourse. 
My other posts on similar subject:
Nationalism and Intellectual Priesthood

Death and Dying

I write this post, sitting in a muddle of thoughts. There are times when one isn't sure what one wants to write about. Life is happening, suddenly the Earth rotates too fast for sanity.
A festival, a funeral, too many people. Good people, dressed in good clothes move about. A music plays. The tempo rises, and rises until it reaches a crescendo. Palms to the ears, a military band, the sound crushes the soul, and all that was soft, hopeful and fantastical lie about the life, dies. All that remains is the cynical, uncaring truth. 
And suddenly, it comes to a halt. From behind the silken curtains, a face lurks- Death looks at life. Cruel and smiling, a spine-shuddering cruel smile plays on his lips. The music now is sad, and a smell of death floats in the air. A friend looks at me, his face ashen, his smile broken. Till yesterday, his soul was younger than me, suddenly, in him, I find, sages from the past centuries. A moment is all it takes from a young soul to turn old, and then ancient; for a man, overflowing with life to turn into a dead lake with the cracks of a thirsty Lands, on its dry surface. 
We do not know when our moment will come, and our lakes will dry up. But it will happen suddenly, whether it happens today, or it happens many years hence. That is how death happens. It strives on suddenness. Life is sublime. It happens, we seldom notice it. It slowly arrives, months of wait, and it slowly flows. It flows so slow, we start believing it to be permanent, like a huge ocean with no ends in sight. As if no ends to it exists. When death arrives, with its coquettish arrogance, to flirt with our souls, it pierces through our senses. We sit back and take note, and cry and tighten our lips to bear it. Our palms cuddle into a fist, until it opens again, in a surrender of the spirits. It lingers and lurks from behind the curtains and awaits its moment. We are dying every minute while we are living. 
Death is not just, like any other forces of nature. It has no mind of its own. It is as arbitrary as life is. As Ghalib, aghast at friends dying, leaving him, one after another, wrote, 
रौ में है रख्श-ए-उम्र, देखिये कहाँ थमे 

ना हाथ बाग पर है, ना पा है रकाब में। (रौ- Flow, Movement; रख्श-ए-उम्र- The Horse of Life)
(the Horse of my Life gallops in its flow, Let's see, where it halts; Neither is my hand on the reins, nor have I my feet in the stirrup)
Ghalib says so misleading is our appearance that we are in control of our lives. While we sit on the saddle, we have no control over it. It moves with its own wishes and it halts, where it wants to. A friend is dying. In the death of every friend, I die a bit, until there is nothing left to die. 
"Die at the right time." Says Nietzsche's Zarathustra. And he laments, "Many die too late, and some die too early." 
He is dying too early. What are we to say, who hears us, we -the mere mortals. Death defines us, it calls us, Mortals, dismissively, deriding. We search meaning in what we leave behind as we walk into the oblivion, into nothingness. A thin smoke rises from the charred soul, heavenwards and loses itself in the air. Then, there is nothingness. We don't know about afterlife. We don't know if it was only to fool ourselve. Our sense of self-importance cannot accept, our eventual end into a nothingness. As if we never existed. We build our after-life during our lives. As Nietzsche would say- A goal and an heir. I would add, in love and memories. But the end and the nothingness, is inescapable. The silence, a fleeting silence, not even a speck on the continuum of millenniums stitched onto one another; and the music rises again, again to a crescendo. It repeats itself in cycles. We sit down in memories, memories fade. We prepare for our deaths, old, middle-aged men, slowly floating through our solemn silences, memories of lost friends surrounding us, appearing and disappearing like faces painted in smoke.

Markus Zusak writes in The Book Thief, "Even Death has a heart." And when Death take, Rudy Steiner, the boy with Orange hairs away, even he is heart-broken and says, "He does something to me, every time. It's his only detriment. He steps on my heart. He makes me cry."  I am sure, if Death had a heart, and he could cry, He would cry today for my friend as well, who soul is no less pure and loving than that of Rudy Steiner. 

Love and Time (The Passing away of) - Ghalib

दाइम पड़ा हुआ तेरे दर पर नहीं हूँ मैं
ख़ाक ऐसी ज़िन्दगी पे कि पत्थर नहीं हूँ मैं।

Daayim padaa hua tere dar par nahin hoon main
khaak aisi Zindagi pe, ke pathar nahin hoon main

(दाइम- Stationary)

क्यूँ गर्दिश- ए -मुदाम से घबरा ना जाए दिल
इंसान हूँ, पियाला-ओ-साग़र नहीं हूँ मैं।

Kyon gardish-e-mudaam se ghabraa naa jaaye dil
Insaan hoon, Piyaala-o-saagar nahin hoon main
(गर्दिश- ए -मुदाम: Constant movement, पियाला-ओ-साग़र: Glass of Wine)

यारब ज़माना मुझको मिटाता है किस लिए
लौह-ए-जहाँ पे हर्फ़- ए -मुकर्रर नहीं हूँ मैं।

Yaa rab, zamaana mujhko mitaata hai kis liye
loh-e-zahaan pe harf-e-mukarrar nahin hoon main

(लौह-ए-जहाँ: Page of the World, हर्फ़- Alphabet मुकर्रर- To repeat)
हद चाहिए सज़ा में उकूबत के वास्ते
आखिर गुनहगार हूँ काफिर नहीं  हूँ मैं।

Had chahiye sazaa mein ukoobat ke vaaste
aakhir gunahgaar hoon, kaafir nahin hoon main

(उकूबत- Tortures , काफिर: Non-Believer)
ग़ालिब वज़ीफ़ा-ख़्वार हो दो शाह को दुआ
वो दिन गए कि  कहते थे नौकर  नहीं हूँ मैं।

'Ghalib' vazeefakhvar ho, do shah ko duaa
voh din gaye ki kahte the naukar nahin hoon main.

(वज़ीफ़ा: Salary or Stipend)
Translations and Interpretations:Couplet #1
English Translation: I might not be able to wait at your doorstep forever,Pity, am not a stationary stone, waiting for your favor.
Interpretation:Time is passing. I am waiting for your love, patiently at your doorstep. I wait for your attention, as long as I can. But do not take me for granted. Unfortunately, pitiable as it might be, my existence is not of a dead stone. Spurned by you, I might move on, and you will be left without my love. I wish I could stay at your doorstep forever, like a dead stone, withstanding your neglect forever, but it is not possible. For the forces of life will eventually carry me away. I do love you, but, life happens, so waste not this moment of love.
Couplet #2

English Translation:
Why wouldn't I be troubled
 by constant turmoils of my life?
After all, I am not a glass of wine, 
holding little whirlpools, without a spil,
To calmly, contain my strife.

Interpretation:
Ghalib always advocated letting go of the emotions, to give to life as you get it from it. (Royenge hum hazaar baar, koi hamein rulaaye kyun- Trans. I will weep a thousand times, why would someone hurt me so). His was not the temperament to hide and pretend the real emotions. Here is says, Why should I pretend my life to be calm and composed, when it truly is in constant turmoil? Why would I not be troubled by it and be distressed about it?

Couplet #3

English Translation:
Why do these people come together to erase me altogether?
I am not a frivolous word written on the sacred page of life. 

Interpretation:
Ghalib was very aware of his place in the world, in his own world and the world which was to folllow him. He however, did not find much favor in the Emperor's courts for most of his life. Delhi, then as it is today, was a lobbyists world and networking, not sheer talent decided your place in it. Aghast at the attempts to pull him down in spite of being a brilliant poet, Ghalib penned several couplets expressing his amusement, and despair on schemes of people and courtiers to bring him down. He is sure of his own station in life, in the universe. It can be spiritually extended to include all of us. We all have our own role to play in the world, our own story to be written, our own mark to be created and left for posterity. It matters not that our contemporary world doesn't recognizes us, pulls us down. We are not an alphabet of frivolity, a mistake of the creator and no one should be allowed to erase us. Our existence is our cause and purpose. We only need to find it, and believe in it. 
Couplet #4

English Translation:
There are no limits of cruelty, my dear, which to me, you heartlessly deliver
I am only a sinner, an errant; still for the almighty God, I am a believer.

Interpretation:
Ghalib was much ahead of his time, an iconoclast, a moderate Muslim. In one of the couplets, he calls himself a bird of the garden which has yet not come into existence. He is known to be a master of very sublime satire, which oft comes into play in his poetry. Here he admonishes his beloved for the pain that she subjects him to. And he complains, that she acts as if he were a non-believer of the God who deserved no mercy. He was not religious person, not an orthodox Muslim. He maintained that he believed in a God who was not vengeful, who did not punish and who did not desire completely slavish surrender of his subject. His wife was very orthodox and religious lady and their life-long banter and interactions make a pleasant reading. Probably this deviation from the orthodoxy and fanaticism, is what Ghalib refers to when he agrees that he is a sinner, and an errant, but only that, nothing more. He maintains that he still remains a believer, a religious person, in spite of his liberal outlook.
Couplet #5

English Translation: 

Ghalib should thank the emperor, as he offered his soul for a stipend
The days of independent mind and pen, have, alas, thus come to an end.

Interpretation: 
Ghalib was fiercely independent mind for his time and I would think even for our times. He got the social and royal recognition much later in his life. He lived his life in penury and his fame and respect among the masses notwithstanding, he could not make to the royal courts till old age, as the Ustaad (Literary master) to the last Mughal emperor. Once he did, he realized the limits being a court poet imposed on him. This couplet refers to the perils of position, as valid today, at it was then. Commercial interests always stifled creativity. So it was then, so it is now. Every artist, every writer feels it. This surrender is often inescapable and that makes if sad. The inevitability of it makes every artist seem so vulnerable. Ghalib merely smiles at it, makes fun at himself. One can almost see him smirk through his dense white beards in these lines. 

Disjointed Thoughts On Writing- Blog Post on Writing

Writing in itself is a difficult task. No one wants anyone to write. Still people write. Some write expertly and leave their work for the posterity, some write shoddily, struggling like yours truly, and await readers. I try to write, as routinely as possible, if nothing else. I have been struggling with getting the manuscript of my collection of stories readied for publishing. 



Writing is easy. Being a writer is not. I have been struggling to edit the stories. There is a wonderful book- The Writer's Journal -by Virginia Woolf, which I keep going back to, now and then. No one impresses the difference between knowing how to write and writing better than Ms. Woolf. "..I think writing must be formal. The art must be respected." writes Ms. Woolf. 

I have come to realize how hard it is as I am editing my stories and trying to reach what could be a perfect name for the collection. However, the entire travel for a week could not find me finishing the task at hand. Writing is a task of huge discipline, more so if it is not your primary vocation (earns daily bread for you). She advocates diary writing if nothing else works. She says, "the diary writing has greatly helped my style; loosened the ligaments." Who am I to argue with her. So I blog. Travelling through the week in rainy mountains of Uttrakhand, I wrote a blog post in Ranikhet.............................................................................................................................

It was written on Tuesday. By then three days of vacation were already done and used up. While Corbett halt was much more beautiful than the Ranikhet, the weather was hot and humid. Sitting in the cottage was not possible as family would want to explore the magnificent mangroves, so writing was out of question. Ranikhet hotel was little bland so this could get written. My stories were to be edited, six stories, edit itself was turning out to be a task as onerous as writing them. Naming them also could not happen. I was toying between multiple names, and settled down on " The Pilgrim Soul ". A quick internet search had shown that it was already taken. So out it goes, with due apologies to Yeats. 

Naming of stories is a very complex task. It is not like a novel. Novel is easier to name. You pick a theme and name it around the central theme of the novel. A story may also be similarly named. It is particularly difficult to name a collection of story. They are totally unconnected and disjointed- Written at different points of time, with different emotions acting as a lever to drive the writer. They are not like a structured apartment, which may be named around some unifying idea around which it is built, irrespective of number of homes it may grow to hold within. These stories are like little cottages of various shapes, sizes and colors mushrooming in the hill-side. Eclectic- Yes, that is the word. 

Only thing which would link one story to another, only connecting thread is the author, his soul and his sensitivity which stands common. Unless you are a Joseph Conrad or Scott Fitzgerald whose stories masses would love to read even with a bland and unimaginative name  like "Stories by .xxxx " lesser writers like me need to have a name which will still tell people about the stories, with the title of anthology and get them interested enough to read them. 
Anyways, the writing remains unfinished amid disruptions. Ranikhet is not very cold. The valley rolls about in front of the balcony of large and poorly maintained hotel. The lines are drawn on the Earth as if nature has opened its palms exposing the lines of fate, green and orderly, patterned in a design in front of me. 

Silences spread, serene, with few birds chirping as the sunbeams take a slant. Birds are chirping as excitedly as they did at the dawn. A tiny, bird with black on the back and white beneath seems singularly happy in a bored, lazy day. It flies in jerks, like a writer's pen. Nonu reads her "Bedtime Stories". She reads loudly. It interrupts my writing. But her voice is so sweet, I do not have the heart to interrupt her. 

Wednesday arrives and we drive to Binsar. Writing waits. It torments me. Not writing torments me. It torments me further for I know my not writing, my not running is my own responsibility. You can call failed resolution and decadent lifestyle anything, you can't avoid that lack of discipline is slowly creating a tomb, not only for the soul, but for the body. I read Virginia Woolf. I open it suddenly, as if it were a book of fortune and opened fate will tell my fortune. I read. "The feeling of depression is on me, as if we were old and at the end of all things."  She writes. She is forty at the time of writing this. I will be forty-five this August. The sense of time passing by haunts me. As if I am getting crushed under the unfeeling wheels of an unforgiving juggernaut. The Sun slowly goes down the old pines, standing like old knights, living in a century to which they do not belong. Asynchronous to the times. I pant, I sigh, and close my diary. I die with every word I fail to write. 

Post-Script- I am back in sweaty hell of the capital and the demands on the soul descends from the skies. My spine cracks. Edit of the stories is done, I send it for content verification. I get a revert on copyright of lines of poetry I had added to start of poetry. I check each poem for expiry of copyright on the web. Those are poems from couple of centuries back, one even from BC, (Horace). I respond to the agency and await there revert. The name of poems, yet undecided. I am toying between few. Still.

Book Review: The First Muslim - By Lesley Hazleton

The First Muslim - By Lesley Hazleton"The fibers of  our secular hearts are bent and bowed beneath unaccustomed tempest."- Virginia Woolf- English Prose.


Ms. Woolf wrote the above sentence in some other context. I find it truer today than any day earlier. The fanatic fundamentalism is on rise, not in India, rather world-wide. Last week, we saw shooting in Orlando, which killed fifty people. The shooter, claimed allegiance to ISIS and asserted that he committed the act of terror as his service to Islam. In today's time, it is very difficult to be objective and to even mention the word without being ready to face a barrage of Bigot!, Islamophobe! and such, if you are lucky. If you are unlucky, you can, well, look forward to a bunch of gun-yielding crazy guys breaking into your place, hacking you to death. 
It is extremely courageous for Lesley Hazleton to chose to write about Muhammad, his life and his journey to the launch of the largest religion on the planet, in such times. The subject is intimidating, and Ms. Hazleton adroitly walks through the landscape full of landmines. She looks at the prophet with an objective lens, without ever being insulting or dishonestly respectful to the Muhammad. She analyzes his subject with the honesty of a psychologist. 
I am a secular with rightist bend of mind. I know it is an odd statement to make, but then, we find Liberals with leftist bend crowding the public discourse. I trust, this classification is as real. We have leftists, who are self-proclaimed atheists (like the JNU vice-president) sending notes on the feminism of Muhammad, then it would be absurd to negate my own Hindu leanings. It doesn't affect my objectivity or my secular sensitivity, so I would believe. In this regard, I can claim to be slightly better, more liberal than many of my Muslim friends who go silent on hacking of Hindu kids in Kerala or elsewhere and who would believe it is the question of human freedom to eat animals, contrary to religious faith of their neighbors, while writing eloquent essays on merits of vegetarianism on World Earth Day. They are the intellectuals and they guide and mold the thoughts of the world. The lesser mortals set their moral compass based on their words and when they say it is perfectly alright to sacrifice a goat and enjoy the beef as it is a sign of religious and intellectual freedom even if your next door neighbor is offended, the world believes them. They would suddenly go silent when Hari Kanzru was asked to be debarred from speaking at Jaipur Literature Fest for reviewing the book and Salman Rushdie banned from Jaipur and Hari and his writer friends be asked to leave Jaipur for reading the excerpts of The Satanic Verses.
They would often link world events of terror to the demolition of an outdated mosque in India, people believe them. They create outrage and then legitimize the violence arising out of it, while practicing Yoga to calm their nerves. They will tell us that Islam doesn't subscribe to violence and quote some of Muhammad's revelations from Quran. But then, the terrorists would also quote from the same holy book. A non-Muslim would stand confounded. That the history of Islam, the key articles of faith like Ka`aba are wrapped in mystery, does not help. 

This book unwraps those mysteries, untangles the web, with sincerity, respect and honesty. The First Muslim begins with the revelations  to middle-aged Muhammad on Mount Hira. There is a poetic expression to the principles of unity, equality and most significantly monotheism which comes about with the first revelation. The book delves into the ancestry, understanding the political and religious surroundings in which the founder of the newest religion tool shape. Muhammad belongs to the tribe of Quraysh, one out of the four families of Quaraysh, the Hashims, which controlled the polity and economy of Mecca. His grandfather, Abd al-Muttalib, discovered  Zam-Zam, the only source of sweet water in Mecca, a priced property in the desert, and controlled access to it, for all the visitors and inhabitants. It wasn't surprising that his lone ownership was challenged by other Quraysh tribes and was answered with a vow by Abd al-Muttalib to sacrifice one of his ten sons. 

The sacrifice after much dithering and debate, fell on Abdullah, who was to sire Muhammad. Mecca at that time was polytheist state, Al-lah being the Higher God and His three daughters, being principle deities of the Quraysh. As Abdullah grew up and the time of sacrifice arrived, Abd al-Muttalib was advised to spare his son's life in return of blood money (sacrifice of 100 camels). Abdullah was married quickly and Muhammad was conceived. However, as fate would have it, Abdullah would soon die in Medina, and Muhammad would be doomed to a life of an orphan. Amina, his mother, hires Halima, a Beduin (vagabond) as his wet-nurse. This makes Muhammad, much open in his outlook, almost a Beduin in a highly fractured, orthodox society. It was only apt that he was troubled by the inequality among people in his society. 

Muhammad grew up. In the meantime, Ka`aba formed the center and backbone of the economy of desert state. Traders would the make pilgrims once back from trading expeditions, chanting labbayka allah-umma labbayka (here I am, O God of all people, here I am). The success of any religious cult, or faith lies in its accommodation of the conventional past. It needs to fit in, even with all the revolution it promises to bring in. The key position on which popular faith hinges must be maintained. This we see even today in many cult-gurus today. They may declare themselves as Gods, but they never negate the traditional Gods. That would be counter-productive. Not initially at least. Thus, while Muhammad brings in a new way of spirituality, he still worships the Ka`aba and draws his legitimacy from the hold. In fact, the initial revolution begins softly, calmly, in all humility as a reform of the sort. 

Raised by his uncle, Abu Talib, he, twenty-five year young man, seeks to marry his cousin, Fakhita- Abu Talib's daughter. Promptly refused, Muhammad goes on to marry, Khadija, his first wife and longest partner, who was around forty at the time of marriage. As fate would have it, in 605, Kaa`ba was destroyed in flash floods. It was rebuilt and a major crisis came up on who would do the honor of placing the Onyx back in its place of worship. Muhammad, coincidentally was the first man to enter the precinct and became the arbiter. He suggested that the stone be carried on a cloak and carried from each corner by each of the Quraysh family. They brought it to the place and eventually, Muhammad, picks the Onyx and places it for worship. Families did not mind it much, since Muhammad then was neutral and largely, inconsequential in political scheme of things. 

The first revelation came in lucid poetic format to Muhammad. He says it came from Gabriel. (I follow Thomas Paine in this matter. A revelation is revelation to the man to whom it is revealed, to any other person it is hearsay ). Muhammad spent following days fearful and reeling in self-doubt. But Khadija believed in him, and said, "I hope that you may be the prophet of this people." Muhammad however, kept on claiming that he was- just a messenger, - just one of the people. He comes out with new, fresh, unconventional ideas, but he is totally non-confrontational. He is one of the people, he doesn't argue with those who do not agree with him. He invites his Hashim kinsmen to dinner, to share his verses (Aya) of revelations, including uncle, Abu-Talib and his cousin, Abu-Lahab. And then he recites his revelations, and Abu-Lahab walked out in fury. He asks them who all will join him, in his new journey. All held back except, Ali, the adolescent son of Abu-Talib. It makes Abu-Talib a subject of ridicule as the orphan, Muhammad, turns him into his own son, Ali's disciple. Still Muhammad remain non-confrontational. He does not propose a new God, he does not propose himself as a God. He continues asserting his allegiance to Al-lah, and maintains himself to be one of the other people. 

He takes only a thin diversion, a differentiation for his new religion. He declares the daughters of Al-lah, who were earlier worshiped as Goddesses, Uzza, Lat and Manat, as no longer divine, not worthy of worship. He brings in mono-theism, but to an older God. Abu-Talib refuses to denounce them stating that he cannot refute the way of his fathers. There the fault-lines appear. Denouncing the daughters of Al-lah as tribal gods, is denouncing the way of fathers,  continuing allegiance to Al-lah ( derived from Mesopotamian God El). It has no confrontation with any one, even Christianity.  Says Quran,"We believe in God and in that which has been revealed to us; in what was revealed to Abraham, Ishmael, Isaa , Jacob and the tribes of Israel; to Moses and Jesus and other prophets." There is no confrontation, no slaves, no free men, no men, no women in front of One God. Islam is the path to equality to a class-stricken Meccan society. And since there is no confrontation, easier to join in. It is the revelations from this period which is cited by liberal scholars of the world as the peaceful face of Islam. It comes from a period when it was weaker and still struggling to find its roots, in the face of opposition. 

Muhammad was still a small trouble to the Meccans of the time- a nobody followed by nobodies, like mushrooming cult ashrams in India. But then Abu Bakr, a Nobleman converts to Islam. Head of Makhzum clan reaches Abu Talib, asking Muhammad to be exiled. On his refusal, entire Hashim clan is boycotted. Hardships increased on those subscribing to Muhammad's ideas, Abu Bakr nearly saved an Ethiopian slave, Bilal who becomes the first Muezzin. Still his advise was of non-confrontation. "Turn away from them and wait. Ignore them; you are not to blame. Be tolerant and command what is right; pay no attention to the foolish." -is Mohammad's advise to his follower. He even accepts the three daughters of Al-lah, when he says- these are three great exalted birds, and their intercession is desired indeed. But then he has second revelation. He disowns the first one as having come through Satan, (thus Satanic Verses), and goes back to his initial position. We cannot know how muc of it was Gabriel and how much was the politics of keeping the now growing disciples happy. Eventually he is exiled and takes sanctuary in Medina. Positions are hardened though still non-confrontational- I will never server what you serve and you will never serve, what I serve. To you your religion, and to me mine. 

Things change in Medina. Medina (City of Prophet) at that time known as Yathrib in 621 AD was a place of incessant internal strife. When Muhammad was called into the city as a neutral arbiter between the tribes of Aws and Khazraj, he negotiates settlement for 200 of his exiled supporters. This is a marked change, he does not seek protection of a tribe, but is designating his tribe as independent. He gets his own tribe settled their, with allegiance to Islam, not to their forefathers. It is a new cult and new faith. Muhammad is no longer just a messenger, he is the head of a tribe- religio-political head. 

From here, the poetic and spiritual journey of romanticism turns to shrewd politics. This is the part after which extremists take over and the liberals Muslims cede the ground. It begins with Nakhla raids. It happened during the three holy months when fighting is prohibited (by laws of the forefather, which Muhammad, never fully negated). A raid by the follower of his newly established cult/tribe/faith ended up in the killing of Meccans. Murmurs of the discontent rose regarding the inconsistency between newly-found faith which said - "Fight in the way of God those who fight you, but do not begin hostilities, for God does not like the aggressors." and which sent out the followers to attack the caravans of the Meccan Merchants. Then came Muhammad's possibly first political revelation- "permission is granted to those who fight because they have been wronged...those who have been driven out from their houses because they said our God is our god." The author brilliantly puts it here when she writes- Offense was now sanctioned in the name of ex post factor defense. This was to be the narrative of extremists in the times to come. 

Battle of Badr was another such raid on Meccan caravan. This was serious, it was led by Muhammad, now as a Military commander, in addition to a spiritual and political one. He himself led an army of 300 followers to attack the caravan for two days. They successfully raided the caravan, defeated the Meccan contingent led by Abu-Jahl, Muhammad's most bitter critic and as Lesley would write, " The natural order of their world had been upended."

With strengthening of his military and political position, his relation to Jewish tribes was set to change. From his initial position where he advised his followers not to argue with Jews, except fairly and politely he kept on believing the two religions to have come from one source of monotheistic belief- Ibrahim. He was confounded with Jewish not joining Islam, while Jews clearly were happy with Jesus as the last prophet. The affair of Quaynuqa gave him an opportunity to demonstrate that he was losing patience. As the story goes, an Islamic follower quarreled with Jewish man of Quaynuqa tribe on the pretext of protecting the modesty of a Beduin woman. Jewish were original inhabitants of Mecca, and were close to the biggest tribe of Khazraj, and their leader, Abdullah ibn-Ubayy. Muhammad accused Qunuqua of disloyalty and ordered his followers to surround their villages. He was no longer a mere messenger, just one of the common man; he was a man not to be wronged. The seize ended up with the exile of the Jewish tribe. This was the first exile of non-believers, another would come soon. 

Muhammad second fight with Meccans, this time led by Aby Sufyan of Umayyad clan ended in loss for the Muslims. ibn-Ubayy and his force had abandoned Muhammad right before the battle. Muhammad called them munafigun or hypocrites- those he held beck. Absolutism was in the play. You are either with me or not. Their was no room for doubt or disagreement. Islam dug deeper than geographical loyalties. One of the Medinan confederate was asked to deliver the message of exile to Nadir, the second Jewish tribe to be exiled by Muhammad, and when questioned why, his response was- " Hearts have changed, and Islam has wiped out the old alliances. " 

Of all the claims of feminist equality, they ended up quickly becoming tools of polity, assets to be acquired and traded. Within three years of losing Khadija, Muhammad had three wives, and six more to come.  Aisha, daughter of Abu Bakr, first follower, was the youngest. As per her own account, she was betrothed at the age of 6 and marriage consummated at the age of 9. He was quite enamored  by her. And one of the oft-quoted infamous revelation, ironically was aimed to protect her. Once left behind in an expedition, she came back to Medina, rescued by a Medinan soldier, Safwan. Her necklace, the one given by Muhammad as wedding gift was lost and aspersions were cast. A revelation came at rescue, which meant a woman's crime of adultery cannot be established, unless four witnesses were to be produced. While this vindicated Aisha, it was later cited as necessary condition to prove grave crimes on the women. 

His marriages became a maze and it was a landmine to walk through them without the fear of offending someone or other. Lesley covers them sensitively and it also shows how, by this time, Muhammad was getting revelations, not in a broader sense directed at humanity, but to alleviate the complications in his own life. For instance, when Zayd, Muhammad's adopted son found him affected by his wife, Zaynab's beauty, he divorced her so Muhammad could marry her. Muhammad married and justified with revelation where he said the ban of father-in-law marrying daughter-in-law only applied to birth sons (the wives of your sons who sprang from your loins). Polygamy was initially granted to leaders only. It was also with means of discouragement stating, "you will never be able to deal equitably between many wives, so if you fear you cannot treat them equally, marry only the one."

We thus find that the spiritual messages that began, towards the end of Muhammad's life became getting twisted, political and self-serving. This best explains the contradictions that we hear when we listen to people talking about Islam. The same Gabriel who was passing on a message of co-existence when they were mocked and harassed in Mecca, now gave instruction to Muhammad with newly gained power, "To strike terror in the hearts of Qureyz." Suddenly the revelation was not spiritual, not even poetic. It was blunt, it was military, it was violent. I would suggest referring Thomas Paine again here. However, as the massacre approached, Aws (local tribe of Medina) approached Muhammad. He asked militant Saad Ibn-Muaad to decide in his stead, who was on his death bed. Under the pretext of honoring the dying words, massacre was ordered. Qureyz, the last Jewish tribe of Medina was massacred, with number varying between 400 to 900. It was not a battle. It was beheading. The rule of Islam was absolute in Medina where it had entered as migrant under exile. 629, Muhammad with his 2000 followers went on Pilgrimage to Mecca, and on January 11, 630 AD, Muhammad ruled Mecca. As Leskey writes, "for all the Quran's insistence that he was just a man, obedience to him was sworn in the same breath as obedience to God."  A new religion had breathed on the planet, which began with challenging the dogmas, supporting free thought, will end up opposing all that it represented at the birth.

It is a great book and is seriously recommended reading. Being late in coming than other religious figures and prophets, Muhammad had his life well documented. His life is an example of how a message that begins with political correctness quickly converts into a dangerously dogma driven life. This is also an example of how absolute power corrupts absolutely and how quickly the one who began with challenging orthodoxy and conventions, ended up founding the most orthodox and conventional religion we have, where a mere shred of doubt, a question, a deviant idea, is responded to most violently.  It also explains the concept of global Islam which at times supersedes regional/political/national identities (refer response by the Islamic messenger to Nadir above, their earlier compatriot and confederate). Pity that there are so many criticizing the religion, without knowing about it, and so many defending it, again, without knowing about it. No truth is beyond evaluation, not fact above scrutiny, nothing unchallenged. Please also remember, people are beyond religion. Humanity is the larger set we belong to, religion is but a sub-set. Read with rational minds, and without misgivings.  

Amazon Link for The First Muslim

(Lesley draws heavily from Ibn-Ishaq's Sirat Rasul Allah and Al-Tabari's Tarikh al-Rusul wa-al-Muluk)

My verdict: It is tiring and intimidating to review a book like that, but in search of knowledge, nothing should be out of bounds. Be brave and read the book.