Saket Suryesh's Blog, page 4

What About WhatsApp Snooping?

A new thing exploding today on the media is the charges of the Congress about snooping on WhatsApp of some 1400 accounts using some spyware, Pegasus, from a private Software maker from Israel, NSO. Congress de-facto chief, Rahul Gandhi was on foreign travels, when the campaigning for Maharashtra and Haryana elections started. He was back to oversee the rout of Congress in the two state, and having planned havoc on the nation with country-wide protests on the sinking economy, which as per reports is not able to purchase underwear. 
Rahul Gandhi is, in the meantime, on another round of holidays, ostensibly, to meditate. That the Rock gurus from the West would travel to Rishikesh in India to meditate is another matter. However, as is usually the case, I believe absolutely unrelated, when Rahul Gandhi is abroad, which is often, some controversy or another will come up. Earlier it was a message parlour in the UK which, with its three employees also doubled as a news agency, run by a Rumanian woman with no Social Media presence, but had an Indian name eponymous of the News channel launched by Senior Congress leader, Kapil Sibal, which came out with scoop, on which a Press conference was quickly called by the Senior Congress leadership to attack the Narendra Modi Government. The antecedents of the three employees of Erotic Tantric Massage agency in London, who also doubled as the defender of Indian democracy, were quickly out and the fake news died its quiet death.
              This time again a news has come which has made Congress come out in full force to attack the Government. Thankfully the source of the charge this time is not a massage parlor, rather a new age Social media behemoth, Facebook. Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerburg, being global boss of a highly-valued American Company had confirmed that he runs a company much better than the shady joint in London. Facebook told the world that they respect individual privacy and will never do anything like recording the private conversation of the people, as is allegedly done by an Israeli Company, NSO Group Technologies Ltd. Mark himself made this statement in 2016. Who are we to disrespect such a sweet lad? We believed him then, and we believe him now in 2019, when he admitted listening to the conversations on Facebook Messenger.
On that note, Mark is such a nice guy that his company has also agreed to pay the fine for the Cambridge Analytica. Cambridge Analytica used that data to manipulate the decisions impacting democracies across the globe. Cambridge Analytica also allegedly had Rahul Gandhi- led Congress as its client, running campaigns deepening the caste and communal fissures and pushing for NOTA, as a targeted campaign on social media based on secretly gathered and analyzed user Data. The Congress-Connection to Cambridge Analytica never was proven, though the Logo of Congress was prominently placed in the office of the CEO of Cambridge Analytica. Unless the CA Chief Alexander Nix follows some cult in which Rahul Gandhi is a deity, this placement of Congress Logo is pretty interesting.  alleged sharing of the subscriber data to a propaganda and lobbying company called

The IT minister in erstwhile Narendra Modi government was very upset and asked for apology from the Facebook, Congress, the Gods in the heaven and the humans on this Earth. None of them responded and he went about fighting election. BJP won, Congress lost and we left the episode behind. An interesting part of the testimony of whistle-blower's testimony in the UK Government investigation which I remember was when he says- “In any sports, if you take drugs, you will be punished, irrespective of whether you won or lost.” Well, since we are not talking of sports; we are only talking about non-serious matters like democracy and Indian politics, surely we cannot have such stiff standards.
              Since the Cambridge Analytica milked and manipulated the data of millions of people, it should have mattered a great deal, but it allegedly involved common-folks as victim and Grand Old Party of India as the culprit, the Government and the media quickly fell into line. Now the news has come out that WhatsApp, a company owned by the same, old sweet guy who owns FB which solddata of millions across the world to manipulate democracies across the world, has sued an Israeli Company for snooping on people and extracting their data, the matter gains significance as the alleged victims are not like you and me.
They are human rights people and obviously people fighting world over for transparency had much of the sensitive data which runs the risk of being revealed. Indian National Congress, with a history of having pushed India to a state of Martial Laws under the Supreme leader whose death we mourn today, as quickly jumped in this new, interesting debate, attacking the BJP Government. One has to trust Congress on this, given their history of press-censorship under Indira, Social media censorship under Sonia, and unsuccessful attempt to censor mail communication through Postal Amendment bill under Rajiv Gandhi (last one failed as the then President Jail Singh refused to clear it). Ultra-left activists like Bela Bhatia, Anand Teltumbde claimed to have been snooped. NDTV quoted Bela Bhatia in its report that Whatsapp told them that many Indian accounts were targeting in this international snooping scam involving 1400 users across 20 countries.
However, as per the complaint filed by Whatsapp and Facebook in a California District Court, dated 29th of October, 2019, seeking 75k USD in damages from NSO states the extent of snooping in the complaint as below:
1. Between January 2018 and May 2019, Defendents (NSO) created WA accounts that they used to target Devices in April and May, 2019.
2. Between April and May, 2019, Defendents used and caused to be used, without authorization, WhatsApp signaling servers, in an effort to target devices.
3. Between 29th April and 10th of May, 2019, Defendents caused their malicious code to be transmitted over WhatsApp Server in an effort to infect approximately 1400 accounts.
4. The target users had WhatsApp numbers with country codes from several countries including Bahrain, UAE and Mexico.
There are reports quoting reports that Indian accounts were also in the list, though they do not figure in the complaint filed. This is not to say that those jumping to claim that they are those human rights activists of hallowed houses whose holy names figure in the elite list of the snooped, are lying. They have charged the Government of having snooped on the enlightened select few from Indian media and Naxal elites with ulterior political motives. 
However, it is pertinent to note, amid hearsay and rumors, there is a written compliant of Facebook, full of people far more technically competent than Shri Randeep Singh Surjewala, who in their infinite and unmatched western wisdom have found that the snooping was undertaken in the period between 29th of April and 19th of May, 2019. If someone intended to use the communication between the comrades for political gains, in my limited and modest wisdom, they should have started before the four phases of elections and campaigning had already ended. 
I am not doubting those who maintained a silence regarding the snooping until this whole thing blew up in public, since I have no way of knowing either way. My contention is that number of Indians snooped could be more than the famous few or they may not be there in the list at all. If the list is bigger, it has wider implications in terms of security and social implications and in such a case, an apology to the minister famous for seeking apology will not suffice. Both the leading SM platforms are notorious for their political and ideological leaning and how they use the charade of free speech to further propaganda is known to everyone. India forms a huge subscriber base for both of them, and a vast majority of Indians do not get, what can be termed as level-playing ground on them. It is a time that India shows to the world a spine as big as the market it represents. This needs a thorough investigation and a public statement by the government as to who was snooped, if they were, by whom and why? We have had Twitter and FB of the world refusing to acknowledge, respect the law of the land in which they happily operate. The ignorance of the people is such that we go back home happily once the new Government is formed, without worrying about what evil played behind in our electronic lives. In a healthy and aware democracy, such global conspiracies need to be quickly investigated and quashed, successful or note. If it is another Sibal-esque drama like Tiranga News Network, riding on an international technical glitch, then also, the Government must clarify. 

The Pattern Behind the Propaganda- Creating a Narrative for Pakistan on Kashmir

By Internet Archive Book Images 
Historian Writer, Chitralekha Zutshi, writesin “The Print” – The idea of Kashmiriyat is dead . The article is shared across multiple digital portals including The Scroll.That apart, this article comes up almost forty days after the abrogation of Article 370 in Kashmir. Another Article came up in The Print, written by Zainab Sikandar, wherein she lamented the loss of voice of Muslims, making it impossible for anyone to raise a voice of protest against the killing of Pehlu Khan or Tabrez Ansari because of Jinnah, as the article claimed in the title, however, eventually she ends up blaming the fact that the Muslims did not take Jinnah’s invitation to join Pakistan, the Land of faithful, the Islamic republic for eventually landing in this situation in a Hindu majority state. She carefully forgets that both Pehlu Khan and Tabrez Ansari case hogged both national and international headlines for months if not years. She also forgets while the well-coordinated, media-left nationwide protests in both the cases remained constant fodder for Prime time debates on Mainstream channels and source material for editorials in national dailies, there was a studied silence on later investigation results declaring that Junaid case had nothing to do with beef, that the meat found in Akhlaq’s home was beef (it is banned by the law promulgated by the Congress under Indira Gandhi as per the directive principle of Indian Constitution in the state), that Pehlu Khan was a Cow smuggler engaged in the illegal cow-slaughter industry and that Tabrez Khan died three days after he was beaten up, in Police custody. She will not talk about Chandan, killed by Muslims for asking the price of Lassi he was selling, Dhruv Tyagi killed for opposing molestation of his daughters by Muslim neighbors, Ramalingam, slaughtered for opposing conversion and three ascetics killed by splitting their bodies in the middle in Kanpur, a six year old killed by Muslim neighbor in UP and another in Delhi, Dalit burnt alive in UP and Dalit raped in Rajasthan. People taking law in their hands is a sad thing and can never be supported. Any lynching is a failure of law to act, or a manifestation of lack of faith of common people in the legal system of the society. It is not a new phenomenon, and it goes long back in the history, even to pre-independence days when a well-known freedom fighter Ganesh Shankar Vidyarthi was lynched by a Muslim mob when he went trying to pacify people during a riot. His body was only to be discovered few days later and no one even had the tendency to hand his body over. Even on the day Tabrez was beaten, a Dalit tribal, Mangru Pahan was lynched by three rowdy Muslims outside his house. Unlike Tabrez, Mangru’s antecedents were clean, he was an honest, hardworking, daily-wage labor working in the same state of Jharkhand and was in his own house when killed merely for asking to three drug-addict men to move away from his house where he lived with one teenage daughter and two other kids. He never made it to the headline and his ancestor never gave him an option to move to a Hindu land unlike the parents of Zainab Sikander who could have but did not move to Pakistan. Bharat, Dr Narang, Ramlingam, Dhruv Tyagi, Riya Gautam have this land and this land only, whether they die in silence without a drop of tear shed for them. The organized protest around half-baked propaganda around Rohith Vemula to Junaid might not be to the violent standards of Azad Maidan protests for the co-religionists in faraway land to gain the approval of Ms. Sikandar; they are enough to raise an angry disgust against the hypocrisy of these thought-leaders among the common people and no one will buy her argument that these deaths, unfortunate as they are, have been met with no protests across the country. If anyone ought to protest Jinnah, it should be the Hindus of India who out of some inherent guilt at having accepted Jinnah's charge of being an aggressive majority have almost been apologetic of their own faith. 
              I was wondering why such articles are again suddenly appearing, with such propensity in such marked platforms. Then I realized that Pakistan address in UNGA is about to come and just as a child does the revision before the examinations, Indian tutors are tutoring the child who fails all exams, merely on account of dishonesty of his answers. Pakistan’s key arguments in UNGA on Kashmir is likely to revolve around intolerant Hinduism, the validation of two-nation theory (It was put forth in first session in Pakistan Parliament after abrogation of Article 370, that Kashmiri leaders who first did not join Pakistan as per Two-Nation theory, must now understand their error), Secularism in Kashmir threatened by abrogation of Article 370 (Don’t ask me how restoration of secularism is a cause for Islamic world, since one cannot expect consistency from Pakistan as a nation and Imran Khan as the leader of it). So Ms. Zainab’s article did the first two chapters as a refresher for the dim-wit student and the third that of Kashmiriyat is expected to be done by the latest article of Chitralekha Zutshi who lives in London and writes about Kashmir. This is another round of fire on behalf of Pakistan is evident from the fact that both the articles are brazenly selective and openly partial. Both Zainab and Chitralekha are well-read people, I wonder what drives them to write their little half-truths to fit in the Pakistani propaganda. There will be more to come until this theater of absurd after stand-up, sit-down and lie-down drama of Pakistan culminates into a drama of desperation, reaches its last scene and the haggard handsome of Pakistan has sung in the UN Assembly on 27thof September, 2019.
              Chitralekha Zutshi begins in a somber and sad tone, stating Kashmiriyat is dead. She says Kashmiriyat has been dying through decades, claims it had secularism and human values associated with it and now Indian Government’s decision to abrogate Article 370 drives the last nail in the coffin. I am often confounded with this sense of elitism with which the term ‘Kashmiriyat’ is oft-repeated in terms of State of Kashmir. Romantic writers created this illusion to hide the inconvenient truth when an entire generation of one particular religion was wiped out from Kashmir. No, Ms. Zutshi, Kashmiriyat did not die today. It died long ago and today the Central Government has only exorcised the ghost of an idea which was glamourized to defend religious fanaticism which demanded to be treated differently from any other state, merely because one particular religion was in majority in that state. It is really strange that Ms. Zutshi credits the state that used Article 370 for special and exclusive treatment, to keep even reference to the term ‘Secularism’ out of state constitution is credited with secularism under the same Article which kept secularism out of the state. For an ordinary fanatic to utter such lie is acceptable, but for an academic to lend weight to such a fake narrative with her hefty credentials is almost criminal. She laments that Kashmir is no longer special. She does not explain why it should be special and not Bihar from where Ashoka came to lay down the founding stones of first city of Kashmir, Srinagar with its Vishnu temples. In Bihar too, Hindus and Muslims live together in harmony, have lived together; it is a poor state and monetary assistance from the center pales in comparison to what Kashmir gets on per-capita basis. Why Bihariyat doesn’t deserve special status and Kashmiriyat does, is hard to understand except that special interest Kashmir gets from Pakistan, being a Muslim-majority state in a Hindu-majority nation. 
              It is really sad to find the learned academic struggling through the contradictory commentary she writes in order to establish a narrative – of wronged Kashmiri, of righteous Jihadis. She write, for instance, and I quote- ‘Islam has made inroads into Kashmir not through force but rather peaceful means.’ In the next sentence she writes- ‘Beginning with the Mughals, alien rulers had destroyed Kashmir’s peace and plunged its people, regardless of religious affiliation, into a benighted state.’ She says this helped National Conference to distinguish itself from Muslim League and their Two-Nation theory. Writers have written that Two-nation theory was a hoax. Sheikh Abdullah almost achieved what Maulana Iqbal and even Maulana Mahdudi dreamt of- an autonomous Muslim state within India. This would have created an exclusively Muslim state with its rules and governance, funded, protected and supported by Hindu India. Maulana Mehdudi wrote that his idea of Pakistan was to be- ‘ Only a Muslim cultural home and not a Muslim state, but if God wills it, the two may become one.’ This possibly explains the lack of administrative and political readiness of leaders of Pakistan when they eventually got a state to build and rule. The article, supposedly attempting to trace back the history, moves from pre-independence era when Muslim Conference became National Conference (post a split, which she doesn’t delve upon) to post-independence. She credits this transformation of MC to NC to secularism inherent in Kashmiriyat which Sheikh Abdullah discovered suddenly, forgetting that while claiming Kashmir to be a Muslim cause and invoking the Ummah all along, Imran Khan too covers it up with cries of secularism and democracy. With a splendid sophistry and creative craftiness, she writes, ‘ As India and Pakistan battled over the erstwhile princely state’ making it sound like it was an aggression towards Kashmir which was equally shared by Indian and Pakistan. It is strange the even Indians, after some time in the west, slip into this tendency of hyphenating world’s largest democracy with a rogue state which has found the sole reason of its existence in the creation of chaos for the whole world. She ignores that Kashmir acceded to Indian not because India and Pakistan went to fight for it, rather because it was attacked by the Tribals from North-West Pakistan, backed by Pakistan Army. A desperate King reached out to India and India agreed to step into the fight only if Kashmir were to become a part of India. The participation of Pakistan Army regulars in this tribal invasion could not remain hidden for a long time and within months UN mission discovered this. It is great intellectual dishonesty on the part of the writer to have bent the facts to fit her narrative. She fleetingly refers to terrorism in Kashmir and rather brushes it under the alienation of Kashmiri Muslims. This argument of alienation on account of neglect by the centre always sends me back to people for Bihar, UP and Odisha, braving the rain and sun, sometimes hostility and beatings in other state for the sake of mere sustenance in the face of abject misgovernance and state apathy. They do not feel alienated enough to threaten leaving the union, and Kashmiris, in spite of being the most pampered lot, feel so alienated that the answers of alienation can only be found in the ISIS flags raised by the Kashmiri Muslims now and then. She then links Kashmir insurgency with what she calls Hindu majoritarianism of the BJP. She forgets that the genocide of Kashmiri Hindus in the valley began when BJP was a notional entity in the national politics. Thankfully, she ends her essay there else she would have linked slavery in the United States, Mao’s Long March, Stalin’s Purges and Hitler’s gas chamber with the BJP. There is no point rebutting such a fake article but then there is purpose and design behind not only in the written word, rather in the hidden hands which propagates such a shoddily written pieces on an industrial scale. It is meant to mold the western minds in favor of Pakistan and against India in the most subtle manner. They will pretend to act as a voice in support of secularism, while demanding special treatment for the majority community in Kashmir; will act like advocate of democracy while supporting Pakistan which has sent the previous elected PM to the prisons, the gallows or to exile. And they all know what it is that they are actually supporting. If you name that word, you will be termed bigot and Hindu nationalist, as if the latter was an abuse for the Hindus who are nationalists. It is a pity that Hinduphobic is still not a word in the English dictionary.  
             

दो जोड़ी नन्ही आँखें

अनदेखे ख़्वाबों की दो जोड़ी नन्हीआँखें, जिन्होंने स्वप्न देखने की आयु से पूर्व दु:स्वप्न देख आँखें मूँद लीं। जो क़दम अभी चलना ही सीखे थे, लड़खड़ा कर थम गए।
बचपन के घुटने पर लगी हर खरोंच, व्यस्कों के गाल पर एक तमाचा है।

धर्म के आडंबरों से अछूता बाल मन जो मंदिरों और मस्जिदों को अपनी आत्मा में रखता था, धर्म की दरारों पर अपना नन्हा शव छोड़ निकल पड़ा। कहीं दूर,दग्ध शरीर के ताप से दूर, जब यह अकलुषित हृदय पहुँचा तो एक और निष्पाप दूधिया आत्मा दिखी, जिसकी पलकों के कोरों में उसकी आँखों के जैसे ही अविश्वास से सहमा हुआ अश्रु रूका था।

एक दूसरे के गले लग कर दोनों बाल मन दरिया के टूटे बाँध की तरह बह निकले। घाव बाँटे, एक दूसरे के हृदय में चुभी धरती की किरचें निकाली और न देखे हुए स्वप्नों का श्राद्ध रचा।

उसने थमती हिचकियों में अपना नाम बताया - ‘आसिफा’।

और दुख के साथी की ठोड़ी थाम कर कहा - ‘मत रो, न्याय होगा।’

धरती की तरफ़ नन्ही गुलाबी उँगली दिखा कर कहा- “देख, भले लोग लड़ रहे है मेरे लिए, न्याय होगा। तेरे लिये भी लड़ रहे होंगे। तू मत रो”

फिर बोली, “मैं पश्चिम से हूँ, तू पूरब से, पर हैं तो दोनों बच्चे। हमारे बँधी हुई मुट्ठियों में मनुष्यता के भविष्य की संभावनाएँ हैं। हम बच्चों को हार कर मनुष्य भला क्या जीतेगा? हम से मुँह फेर कर मनुष्य कहाँ जा सकता है। न्याय होगा, मन छोटा मत कर। चल हम भगवान से न्याय माँगें। वो जो उड़ती उजली दाढ़ी वाले हैं, जिन्हें तुम भगवान कहते हो, हम उन्हीं को अल्लाह कहते हैं। मैंने अपना नाम बता दिया है उन्होंने कहा है न्याय होगा। तुम भी कह दो।”

उसकी सहेली हिली नहीं, कुछ बोली भी नहीं, पाषाणवत् स्थिर रही।

बस इतना बोली- “मैं क्या कहूँ, बहन। मैं कहाँ शिकायत लिखाऊँ। मेरे शरीर के साथ मेरा तो नाम भी धुआँ हो गया। मेरा नाम लेना सांप्रदायिक है, असीफ़ा। मैं अलीगढ की अनाथ बेटी हूँ, मेरा कोई नाम नहीं हूँ। मैं नैतिकता के पन्ने से मिटाई हुई इबारत हूँ, मिट्टी पर लिख कर पुँछा हुआ अक्षर हूँ। तू एक नाम है, मैं एक संख्या हूँ। मैं राजनैतिक असुविधा का पर्याय हूँ। मेरा धर्म, मेरे अपराधियों का धर्म, राजनैतिक असुविधा का धर्म है। मैं उस सदा-शर्मिंदा धर्म की बेटी हूँ, मुझमें किसी की रूचि नहीं। मैं वह रक्तचिन्ह हूँ जो सूख जाने के बाद दाग नहीं छोड़ता। मैं राजनैतिक समीकरण में नहीं जुड़ती, मेरा कोई नाम नहीं है। मैं अनामिका, क्या नाम लिखाऊँ। क्या शिकायत करूँ, क्या सोग करूँ? मुझमे राजनैतिक कथ्य को शक्ति देने की सामर्थ्य नहीं है।  मैं एक कटाक्ष हूँ जो एक पक्ष दूसरे को मार सकता है, इससे अधिक न मेरे जीवन का मूल्य था, न मृत्यु का।  मुझे तलवार बना कर तर्क किए जाएँगे , छद्म युद्ध लड़े जाएँगे।और बहस के बूझते छोर पर, एक शोर के अंतिम किनारे, हारा हुआ उच्छवास बन कर मेरा नाम मृत, मूक मानवता की तस्वीर पर माला बन कर चढ़ जाएगा।  मैं सत्ता और शक्ति के कारोबार का सबसे छोटा सिक्का हूँ। मैं संधि प्रस्ताव के जिस पत्र के साथ मुग़लो को सौंपी गयी थी, मैं आज भी वही संधि पत्र हूँ।"

यह कह कर असीफ़ा की नई सहेली उसके गले लग गई। और आँसुओं में भीगी सिसकियाँ धरती से आकाश तक लौट-लौट कर दौड़ती रहीं, वैसे ही जैसे बाबा के पुकारने पर कभी वो दोनों दौड़ा करती थीं ।एक समाचार पत्र का मुखपृष्ठ बनी, दूसरी मूक सत्य बन कर रह गयी, किन्तु दो नन्ही चूड़ियाँ कलाइयों के बिना रह गयीं।  यही सत्य है, अधूरी मनुष्यता का।  यही कहानी बरपेटा की थी, यही अलीगढ की।  शहर बदलेंगे, पात्र बदलेंगे, इंसान और समाज वही रहेगा। 

The Return of Narendra Modi- Meanings and Implications

Reams of paper has been put to worst use by denigrating Narendra Modi as the choice of world’s oldest and largest democracy in foreign magazines like New York Times and Washington Times. There used to be a time when media was meant to report on what people thought, in the current age of cultural colonialism, the Western media has taken it upon itself to define the democratic choices for the people of India. The fear of Hinduism which the West keeps on alluding to borders on plain Hinduphobia. While writing this piece, I did notice one interesting thing. If you write the word “Hinduphobia”, MS word marks it as incorrect word. Such a term does not exist in the Western lexicon. Not acknowledging something does not mean that it does not exist. It merely means that this is one phenomenon, not a new one, but a real one which no one wishes to acknowledge. In this land, Hindus were ruled for centuries, in spite of being a majority, by the minority foreign religions, counting on the peace-loving nature of Hindus. That said, I try to look at what the return of Narendra Modi with an overwhelming mandate might mean to different people. I may be wrong, I may be right or I may be somewhere between being totally correct or totally incorrect.
What Modi’s return mean to India That is Bharat?It is an opportunity and occasion to be what they are supposed to be, the modern believer in a long, line of cultural history, the continuum, often called Sanatana. When Hinduism began, it was not a religion per se, rather a philosophical zeal to understand the world and to establish a system of existence in otherwise an otherwise disorderly world. There was no other competing religion. Dharma, what was then called, was nothing but the right way of living- respectful to the people and the world around us. It was a commitment to truth. The ancient Vedic philosophers did not want to convert others to their beliefs, did not want to rule other lands. When empire-building religions came about with Military Generals cum philosophers, the Hinduism of India found itself at loss. The very diversity which Hinduism celebrated became its curse. Wedges were drawn from one Hindu against another, and slowly and slowly the land under the world’s oldest religion shrunk. The antagonism against Hindus was unprecedented. The Christian and Islamists were confused by the people for whom religion meant invading the unknown, the realm of truth, and who had no idea of using religion for invading lands, converting people, gaining numbers. In an era when the fight for supremacy was going on as Crusades, the separation between the King and Sage, which was termed as separation of the Church and the State in the secular western world, a new thing in the west, but long existent in the east, was odd for the foreigners. It took centuries for Hindus to come back to the unifying nature of this religion. It also took them centuries to understand that Satantan was termed Sanatana or Eternal at the time when there was no competing religion, when the thirst for truth was ever-expanding and the compass of morality ever stretching to include people from Iran to Indonesia to Vietnam, as tribes moved into the fold of civilization. As the land shrunk under the feet of Hinduism, the hollowness of the word Sanatana started ringing loud in the minds of people in the only land in the whole globe which still had Hindus. The land of the origin of Hinduism was handed over to the Hindus, broken, fractured. In a world, with 50 Islamic nations, and 15 belonging officially to Christian religion, the now much-demonized third largest religion in the world, Hinduism, has no Hindu nation on the face of this Earth (even though the partition of India was done on the basic premise that since India will become a Hindu nation under Congress, Muslims need a separate nation). Not being an imperialistic religion and being inherently secular, Hindus have not minded it much. In fact, any demand of Hindu nation has been most opposed by Hindus themselves. Hindus of this nation were widely split across caste and language. However, what this election has proven that Hindus have not got tired of ceding space and are now intending the hold on to their last citadel of Sanatana.  In Modi, we hope the Christian antagonism towards Hinduism we find in the West today, will give way to the affection of Emerson when he wrote affectionately about “the genius of Hindoos, whom no people have surpassed in the grandeur of their ethical statement.” We can hope that in the next five year, the editor of Washington Post and New York Time stop demonizing those very people about whom Voltaire had written as “Peaceful and innocent people, equally incapable of hurting others or of defending themselves.” They are only embarrassing themselves by trying to create demons out of one of the most peaceful race and the most accommodating religion.
What it means to Political Pundits : Indian media, in particular, and Indian intellectual space, in general has been largely captured by the left-leaning and West-facing people. They considered the first tenure of Narendra Modi as an aberration to the natural order of things. They had worked hard to keep the dictatorial tendencies of earlier Congress leaders, primarily from the first family, hidden from the people with a dishonest narration of history. Largely conventized, they hated anything Hindu and would look down at anyone with a bent towards Bhartiyata. Such is their intellectual arrogance that they believed that the larger masses will simply follow them as far as electoral choices are concerned. They tried to split the choices and then tried to figure out if the masses will chose nationalism over issues like employment, farmer crisis and such. Little did they understand that the two are not cross-purpose to each other, not mutually-exclusive desires for the people. In reality, both work together. If you love your nation, you will want it to succeed economically as well. They somehow missed the point that a Rahul Gandhi who stands in JNU with those who raise slogan to break the nation, and represents a constituency still stuck in prehistoric age of development, represented neither. Rahul Gandhi, as an opposition to Narendra Modi, stands a failure both on Nationalism and Development and the split which the intellectuals tried to effect was of no use. They tried to downplay the upsurge of cultural revivalism and got it all wrong. Even today, they think Modi is the factor. Narendra Modi, the man, is not the factor. It is what Narendra Modi represents, matters. He represented execution of policy, he represented honesty of intention (which made people forgive him biggest difficulties imposed by something like Demonetisation). They tried to fan outrage, but the poor of India stood by Modi, solemnly, silently, decidedly. When the intellectual mafia hit out at Modi, ostensibly moved by the plight of the poor; the same poor common folks stood up to defend him. They identified themselves with Modi, as Indians, beyond caste, creed and religion, and they understood that these elite classes with their champagne glasses weren’t after Modi; rather they were against the ordinary man who could not speak eloquently in English and who went about work to make ends meet and Modi merely stood in the middle of this cross-fire between the Haves and the Have nots. By crediting the win to his Charisma, they are trying to hide their failure in reading the winds of change. They got so busy in reading between the lines that they forgot to read what was written on the walls. They still continue to delude themselves as if Modi was some pied-piper of Hamelin and the people of India mesmerized kids.
What it means to Opposition and the Congress:
It means to the Congress and the collective opposition that they must stop fooling people. It is amazing looking at the Congress manifesto which reeks of pathetically low opinion they have of Indian masses. The elitist minds who advised Rahul Gandhi should be sacked for making such a shoddy agenda paper and Rahul Gandhi should be sacked for accepting and releasing it. The position they took on AFSPA, article 370 and Sedition under the garb of Freedom of Expression somehow gives one an idea as if the election was fought in Kashmir where majority people hated the Indian Army, hated the idea of India. Such a manifesto might have given them some seats in Kashmir, but to expect this manifesto to bring them vote in India was absolutely stupid. Someone ought to have told Rahul that being in opposition doesn’t mean opposing everything that BJP does. It could also mean countering it by better promises. If BJP promised removing Article 370, If Rahul Gandhi had sense, he should have cited the failure of Narendra Modi to do it in last 5 years and promised to remove it in first six months of gaining power. And then, there is another message for the Congress. The elite birthday party club of Vadra family does not hold any meaning for the masses of India. The ship has sunk under the weight of its own entitlement with Jyoiraditya Scindia, Vaibhav Gehlot, Deependra Hooda, Sushmita Deb all going down, including Rahul Gandhi in Amethi. It shows that India is coming out of the new generation Princedom and will not be subservient to a slavish sense of loyalty. Then Candidates like Kanhaiya Kumar and Atishi Marlena going down with a pathetic performance shows that the candidates propped by media houses win only in literature festivals, not on the ground. There is a ShivpalGanj of Rag Darbari out there in India whose inhabitants far outnumber the inhabitants of Middlemarch. These Ganjahe, much to the chagrin of the strategists of the opposition, are not much impacted by the vicious and vile editorials in Washington Times. They are beyond Cambridge Analytica.
What it means to Modi Supporters?
The wars of civilization do not end in one season. They run through centuries. When Islamist invaders started spreading Sufis around promoting conversion, they weren’t looking at five years. When the missionaries landed in Kerala, they were not looking at next five years. These are civilizational wars which run into centuries. It is not only the Government which will do it, it is the people who need to become a participant in this. We have ceded much and need to say, this much and no further. We have to be one, be great people and continue to demand great leaders to lead us. We must not fall into the trap of fighting amount ourselves. We all, who are the product of a shared history and shared civilization stand as one. If we start running now, there will not be enough Earth for us. Let is pin our heels down and stand guard, irrespective of Caste, Language, region and Religion. There will be attempts to guilt trip the Hindus for standing up for the political party which has for the first time openly embraced their cause. Hindus must guard against that. The Constitution has been changed much and secularism has been used by the political parties to create vote banks. Hindus must be watchful against that as the Left which in the dark forests of Chattisgarh raises an army to overthrow the constitution, throw the same at Hindus. It is important to read and know the facts. Even in 1947, apart from atheist Nehru, we had great many men in the Constituent Assembly who were not ashamed and embarrassed about acknowledging the expectations of Hindu majority. Somewhere down the line, possibly to compensate for the popularity of Patel which Nehru did not have or later to over-compensate for the atrocities against the Muslims by Indira Gandhi during Emergency, narrative was stitched in which Statesmanship equaled appeasement. Arun Shourie once famously said, BJP is just Congress with a Cow. One needs to see to it that the Cow doesn't wander away.  
The Curious Case of Missing Muslims:
There is very little Muslims representation in the Indian polity. It does not augur well that whatever little representation is there, is limited to people like Azam Khan. Instead of Muslim leaders, we should have leaders who are Muslims. This is little confusing but it makes perfect sense. A Muslim leaders will advocate cow slaughter because it rubs Hindu noses in to dust. A leader who is Muslim will be representing Hindus of his constituency and will take care of the faith of his Hindu electorate.  He will of course, be loved and voted into power. Once his electoral success is sure, he will not be ignored by the leading political party. Congress has been chiefly responsible for the alienation of Muslims from the electoral process. Muslims of India have been relegated to the role of rubble-rouser and vote bank. The intellectual class has been complicit in the act with its pronounced hypocrisy and selective outrage. They have used the pulpit of intellectual priesthood they hold to tell the Muslims that it is alright to be concerned exclusively with Muslim causes or the issues where Muslims are victim and be blind to the cases where Hindus are victim. How often do we find vocal Muslims on social media condemning a killing of Dhruv Tyagi? These intellectuals in fact, through their writings, utterances and behavior, tell the Muslims that it is alright not to be concerned about atrocities against their fellow Hindus or Sikhs, that their embrace of otherness is perfectly alright. Funny that they are the first to complain about the alienation of the Muslims. In a nation, where Hindus and Muslims worked together for common causes, from Nana Saheb to Savarkar to Bismil, we have come a long way where Muslims are not bothered about say, Sabarimala and only concerned about Haj Subsidy; not concerned about Colleges being run well, but are concerned with Madarassas.
An example of this is APJ Abdul Kalam who was a leader who happened to be a Muslim. Just as Modi is an Indian leader who is a Hindu. Just as George Fernandes was not a Christian leader, he was an Indian leader who was a Christian. His issues were national, his causes were of the collective. Muslims need to find such leaders and Hindus must support such leaders. We need to work out ways to outnumber Owaisi with Ashfaqullah Khan. It is a time for the Muslims to step out of the Ghettos and vote and work for India, not for the community.We are at the cusp of a new dawn. Let us, as Indians, rise to the occasion.    

Emergency in India

As the electoral fortunes of the Indian National Congress under the leadership of Rahul Gandhi goes bleaker every day, owing the the public disenchantment fast transforming into public disgust towards the entitled first family of the Congress which refuses to take any account of Public opinion and continues to stupidly drive the rhetoric-based campaign, they cling back the theme which has served the Family in all these years- Democracy is in danger. 
Today,  parachuted into the leadership, Priyanka Vadra, wife of Robert Vadra charged with the major corruption during UPA, spoke of stepping into politics as a savior of democracy, projecting her own desperate move as some sort of act of benevolence towards the nation for which the unwashed masses ought to be eternally indebted towards her and the first family. Rahul Gandhi, arriving in Manipur claimed that the political plank for the party will be saving the democracy. This is in continuance to the campaign conjured up by the Congress in association with the communist with fact-less fashionista Arundhati Roy writing that the current regime is worse than Emergency. Yesterday, a bunch of young techies were arrested in Bengaluru for raising slogans in support of Narendra Modi during a Rahul Gandhi meet. These fake news creators supported amply by fake news peddlers work on the presumption that the Public is idiot and unaware of the past. It is on the premise of short public memory that their propaganda is based. It is therefore important to know and remember our past.
Emergency has been imposed thrice in India. Emergency was declared for the first time in India on 26th of October, 1962 by Jawahar Lal Nehru on the ground of external danger. Since the reason for the imposition of Emergency as put forth by Nehru was war with China, it ought to have been removed post the declaration of ceasefire with China. However, to the demand of the opposition seeking removal of emergency, Pandit Nehru responded in the parliament, "Emergency would last a considerable time, whether there is actual fighting or not." As Nehru, who was later painted and white-brushed by the family loyalists as defender of democracy, dragged feet on the question of revocation of Emergency, 1965 was with Pakistan came about. Eventually, in February 1966, 33 eminent Indians, including ex-judges and vice-chancellors of universities came together, under the leadership of Ex-Attorney General, Mr. M C Setalvad  to urge Nehru to revoke the emergency which by then was four years old, calling the regime a constitutional dictatorship. Nehru, however, could be convinced of revoking Emergency only in the year 1968, two years after the war with Pakistan ended. Second Emergency was imposed by Indira Gandhi on the pretext of external danger due to Pakistan war, on 3rd of December, 1971. This again should legally have been revoked once the war ended, that is on 17th December, 1971. Mrs Gandhi, like her father, allowed it to continue till June1975, when another Emergency was imposed on 26th of June, 1975. The Constitution did not allow the President of India to impose overlapping Emergency proclamation (one on the account external danger to further be continued under the ground of internal disturbances). Anticipating challenges on account of Constitutional breach, a constitutional amendment (39th Amendment) was hastily brought in inserting Clause (4) to article 352, allowing the President to proclaim overlapping Emergency. 
The Third emergency was not only unconstitutional, (earlier two were unjust still constitutional), it was far more tyrannical. The provisions of the dreaded MISA (Maintenance of Internal Security Act) , an act enforced during the earlier of the overlapping Emergency, in 1971, were widely and injudiciously imposed to arrest dissenting people. At the time of passing of MISA act itself, on June 16th 1971, Atal Bihari Vajpai had called the passage of draconian act as, "the beginning of Police state and blot on democracy..the first step towards dictatorship." Amendments to MISA were made making it further stringent through Presidential ordinances dated October 17th 1975 and November 16th 1975, eventually replaced with amendment Act no. 14 on 25th of January, 1975. This broadly meant the following:- Government officer could make arrest of a citizen basis some information or material with him with the officer was not bound to disclose to the citizen. - The ground of arrest to be treated as confidential and not to be disclosed.- The arrested person too is not entitled to the disclosure of the grounds of arrest. 
This amendment also removed the applicability of Habeas Corpus to MISA detainees. The state government had the authority to free the detainee after examining the grounds of detention. However, as the matter stood, this was seldom the case. Out of 113 arrests in Goa, 1 was released; in Tamil Nadu, 1 out of 1027; in West Bengal, 1 out of 311; in Haryana, 5 out of 200; in Rajasthan, 8 out of 542; Gujarat, 188 out of 1655; Maharashtra, 98 out of 5473; in UP, not one person out of the arrested 6956 people was released. Similar was the case of Bihar where 2360 arrests were made under MISA. Around 4600 people were arrested in West Bengal under unnamed sections of MISA, apart from 311 under 16A. In total 34988 recorded arrests were made under MISA and 75818 arrests were made under DISIR during the third Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi. 
When the leaders of such a party speak about defending democracy, without having the moral courage to denounce what they have done previously, they are forgetfulness of the citizens. They pretend as if their past never existed counting on the ignorance of the people. India has see not only one emergency, but three, all imposed and prolonged for dubious reasons by one party, only to perpetuate its stranglehold on Indian polity. One may argue as to why hold the current leadership to the mistakes of past leadership. The point is that the current leadership of Congress stands on the evil legs of the past and neither apologizes for its past, nor tries to break free of it. Current Congress leadership goes around pledging to take care of those supportive of RSS ideology once in power. The same Congress, Shah Commission observes in its report, arrested thousands under MISA during emergency, merely on account of their allegiance to the DMK. They are capable of repeating it again. They pretend that nothing had happened and they lie in connivance of a corrupt media, which whitewashes the past for them. They have no guilt either about their tyrannical past nor about their lies about their own past. As Lysander Spooner wrote, "Those who are capable of tyranny are capable of perjury to sustain it." 
As the compromised media tries to resurrect the Congress as protectors of democracy with all the history telling us otherwise, one is reminded of George Orwell's famous passage from 1984- 
“And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.”   
Let us not pass off the arrest of techies of Bangalore as one off thing. The danger is grave, real and too close to be ignored. 
Reference: 1. States of Emergency and the Law- By M. Ehteshamul Bari2. Shah Commission report

Ganjhon Ki Goshthi- Why and Wherefore?

From the world of Self- Publishing, where I have been writing, publishing and struggling to propagate my book, finally I have meandered into the world of formal publishing with the nudge, push and support from Indic Academy (http://www.indicacademy.org), with well, Hindi satire, Ganjhon Ki Goshthi . 
My previous books were in English, and with serious content, for two reasons, one, I was not sure about the receptiveness of readers towards Hindi and secondly, I did not know that I have in my writing style something which could be considered as the funny streak. I would read with awe and admiration of an apprentice and a student, the brilliant writing of great Triumvirate of Hindi Satire- Sharad Joshi, Shrilal Shukl and Harishankar Parsai. 
I have been wondering where has all that, sarcastic yet serene, brutal yet beautiful, writing in Hindi gone. Why is the humor scene, in general, so full of abuse and innuendo? I pondered and pondered and as Modi ji decided to pick up the broom to clean the nation, I decided to pick up the pen, rather smartphone during my Metro commute to work and write. 
Many people ask my why the name of the book- Ganjhon ki Goshthi? The term comes from the immortal book of Shrilal Shukla ji, Rag Darbari. Rag Darbari   narrates the story of the residents of a fictitious village Shivpal Ganj, which can be any village in the hinterlands of India. The residents of the village proudly call themselves, Ganjha. No one can explain it better than Shukl ji as he mentioned in his book. 
The time of the when the book eventually went in for the print, the social media world, in particular, and Indian politics, in general, was reeling under the expose around Cambridge Analytica. There were vested intellectuals, pretending to be concerned neutral citizen, crying hoarse about the problems with privacy, on account of Unique Citizen Identification, but were cryptically silent about exposed links of data theft and outrage manipulation and unrest creation with data on social media. 
The hope and idea was to create outrage, unrest, chaos and then somehow return to the old regime and the old world order. As we found, it did not work. It did not work because India is largely populated by people with keen understanding of politics. India lives in villages and small-towns and as the distance between the thinker and the doer increased, the college lecturer, AIR working, columnists gave way to the courtier intellectuals, the chasm between the intellectuals and those they claimed to represent widened. So much so, that they read all the prospective moves of the masses wrong. They got on Social media, to get closer to the general populace, but there disdain for the masses was to pronounced that instead of learning from them, the tried to set themselves up on the pulpit. The spaces shrunk and their ivory towers moved into the sanitized spaces of swanky TV Channels. The people who called out their bluff, underlining the stupidity of these City-dwelling, self-proclaimed pedagogues, election after election, surprising and annoying them, were the quintessential Ganjha. 
Ganjha is the common Indian citizen who struggles to make ends meet, who commutes in a metro or crowded local to the work. He is not the one to be swayed by the propaganda. He has utter disdain for people who try to teach him the unreal. My book looks at the events around with the disdain of that man in Arrah, Lucknow, Indore, Bhopal, Raipur, Guwahati, Patna, Bangalore, Gurugram, Vizag, Bhuvaneshwar, Mohali and Tiruananthapuram. This book looks at the world which unfolds around us with the cynical humor of a Ganjha. A Ganjha knows the games being played and still indulges the players with the rare blend of cynicism and hope. He is the Indian who refuses to become the pawn of nefarious political maneuvers, driving wedges among the citizen, in the name of Caste, Religion, Language, so that they could once again rule over the nation. It is not only about political supremacy. It is about cultural and intellectual supremacy. The moves are swift and smooth. But as long as Ganjha  is on the watch, the nation is safe. My book celebrates the Ganjha, who has lost hope in politics but has hope in the Idea of India. He is the one who works on the ground to create the new India and is derided as troll by the intellectual mafia of the yesteryear. They don't like him for that and hate that he slowly, while earning an honest bread, is breaching the intellectual apartheid, one step a time. But do not get me wrong, Ganjhe are there to stay. They are our last defense, as a nation. I invite you to join in to this Ganjhon Ki Goshthi. 
The book is available on Amazon: Click Here

Know the Naxals- A brief look at the History

There have been many debates of late on the television, in the wake of the arrests of those who are now increasingly mentioned as the Urban Naxals. I am both shocked and amused at the same time to look at the audacity of the sympathizers of Naxal terrorism, in all their starched Saris and handloom Kurtas, when they hide behind the same constitution, that the want to overthrow. They are shrill, sophisticated, eloquent and deriding. They hate the common folks, and their disdain for those who work, create and make a living, peeps through their elitist smiles. They are mostly ideologues (yes, that is some work for sustenance in the modern scheme of things), academics and well, ostensibly, writers and poets. The fact remains that when communism is the scheme of things, Naxal notices mentioning Jan Adaalats in the villages of Chattisgarh too become work of art, and corpses hanging from the electricity poles, become equivalent of art work on the roof of Sistine chapel.
The other day, Ms. Aruna Roy, came on NDTV to defend those who were arrested by the Government on the charges of conspiring against the state, planning the murder of the Prime Minister and attempting to engineer the riots. Ms. Roy's primary argument which I could gather in the shrill rhetoric of hers was that these commoners have no idea about Naxalism and Communism and therefore are driven by a co-opted media to create a Quixotic windmill out of the kind and benevolent Naxals. Ms. Roy, is daughter of a Government officer, has been herself privileged to be driven in a red Beacon vehicle as an Administrative officer and is married to Mr. Bunker Roy, a Doon School and St. Stephen's Alumni. I wonder, why all those fighting for the tribal and downtrodden never come from the poor society and are always having a pedigree school, prized professional background of either an IAS or an IRS and a privileged childhood lurking behind their carefully-crafted "Oh, I do understand poverty" faces. She was later made chairman of National Advisory Council, which advised the Government run at the behest of Ms. Sonia Gandhi for almost a decade. This was the closest the Maoists came to the seat of power, under the kind guidance of Ms. Sonia Gandhi of Congress. This also meant that the outrage they express today was largely muted when UPA Government went about arresting many Naxal sympathizers in the UPA regimes, some of the current ones being the same as those arrested earlier. Ms. Roy sat through it when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh addressed a conference of Chief Ministers in 2006 and said that the problem is Naxalism is the single biggest internal security challenge ever faced by our country.  She sat through it conveniently when UPA Government went about arresting 7 members of Kabir Kala Manch in 2011. She did however resign in 2013. She might have expected to be brought back, as was the case in her earlier resignation attempt. As things turned out, Neither she returned nor Sonia Gandhi after 2014 elections. However, what stood out in her debate in the current outrage on the arrest of people for alleged charges of association with Naxal terrorists, is her claim that people who are justifying the arrests know nothing of the Naxal movement. This is true. We do not know and those who play around with lives of useful idiots capitalize on our ignorance. While in her anger, she might be cursing us for our lack of knowledge; it is the same ignorance which has helped the shrill shape of sophistication which lives in these privileged princes and princesses whose perfumed hearts bleed for the poor, project the terrorists as some kind of Robinhoods and angels. Let us therefore, learn.
Although Congress under Jawahar Lal Nehru made necessary fashionable noises of socialism, for the poor and downtrodden, all along the years, before independence as Communist Party of India, struggled since formation on December, 26th, 1925 in Kanpur, under the guidance of Soviet Socialists. This CPI was wound up in 1951. The founder, MN Roy lived a disenchanted man through Indian independence and died in 1954, another founder Abani Roy died in Russia, under the Communist, in a strange twist of times, during the Great Purge. Official figures of the people killed by the Communists during the great purge is around Six-Hundred And Fifty Thousand people, unofficial number hovers around one million people who were put to death by the Communists in the Great Purge of 1930 in Russia. Not surprising that one of the founder of Communism in India, fell victim of the Communist state he held as his ideal. The independence of India in 1947, not only saw religious bloodletting across the country; it also witnessed a slowly-simmering discontent among the farmers being used by the Communists lamenting having been reduced to "mere appendage to the Congress" to leverage themselves into a prominent role, often failing due to internal conflicts. Telangana Movement in South and Tehbhaga Movement in the East were the visible tips of the icebergs which were to hit a nation which had just left the port. The Communists always working through various fronts and faces, led the peasants' movement in Andhra Pradesh under the name of Andhra Mahasabha. While multiple false-faces makes Communism quite confusing and hard to pin, it also causes multiple internal schisms. As we see in this letter written by Andhra Mahasabha to the Central Committee, where they contend that the situation in India is less closer to Russia in 1917 and reflects closely to China and therefore, a protracted protest with strikes and demonstrations is less likely to work in India as compared with the Chinese civil war model. It was a fight of Marxist Communism with Maoist Communism. Well, these are not one and these are not different. If one wants to look at an example of multi-headed hydra and politics, one only needs to look at communism. The then president, BT Ranadive, retorts attacking Mao, "Mao's formulations are such that no communist party can accept them."  The then communist party, then could not resolve and take a clear ideological line. The fountainhead of intellectualism failed and then reached out to the great mind of his time,  Joseph Stalin for guidance on existential questions of Communism like who is the enemy? Who are enemy classes? and such. BTR was removed from the Politburo and Andhra Secretariat took over in 1951. BTR was later brought back in the Central Committee in 1956. His nephew Vivek Ranadive is a multimillionnair businessman running TIBCO and another one, Ajit Rangnekar is the dean of ISB. Apparently, those who are witness of communism from close quarters, refuse to become useful idiots to an anachronistic ideology. Communism in India, leaning at one time on Russia and China at other, makes an interesting history. Unfortunately, history is the biggest sufferer with the communist hegemony on the academia.
Coming back to the Naxal movement. It all began from the farmland of an influential Landlord and a Congress leader in West Bengal, on the foothills of Darjeeling.  The place was a small village called  Naxalbari.  Tebhaga movement was led by Kisan Sabha. Kisan Sabha was the farmers' front of Communist party, which had initially started as a non-communist peasant movement under the leadership of Swami Sahajanand Saraswati. Their key plea was to increase the share of landless laborer from half to Two-Third. Bigul Kisan  was tilling the land in 1967 as landless laborer. He was a part of Kisan Sabha. Under the Communists, Kisan Sabha decided to reduce the share of landowner in the crops to Zero. Bigul Kisan  was tilling the lands of an influential man in the area,  Ishwar Tirkey.  It was then he decide to claim those lands which he worked on. He forgot the fact that the man who owned the land at the time was from the Party in power at the center, Congress. It did not matter to Shri Tirkey that some day, the daughter of the man at helm of his party, will some day force the word Socialist into the preamble of Indian Constitution. An entitled and influential Congressman, Ishwar Tirkey, promptly sent across his henchmen to beat up Bigul Kisan on 23rd of May, 1967.
Irony of the ironies, United Front Government (a combine of CPI and CPI-M) ruled in the state of West Bengal. We will soon discover that the multi-headed hydra was also a dual-faced Janus. The Communists pushed the unsuspecting farmers to forcefully acquire the lands from the landowners. On 24th of May, 1967, the same Government sent Police force to arrest the miscreants. Armed police action was responded by the tribal farmers with bows and arrows. Inspector Sonam Wangdi was hit by the arrows and died. The police under express instructions of Communist Home Minister Jyoti Basu, attacked the village on the 25th of May, 1967. As the Police sent in by Bad Communists attacked the villagers, the 'Good' Communists forced Women and kids walk in the front - a human shield. The police fired and Nine women and children were killed. This was the beginning of Naxal movement, the errant brother of the gentlemanly Bhadraloks which would in the times to come have to its credit the deaths of around 7000 innocents in past decade only (The year 2000 onward ).
Naxalbari movement marked the giving up of Soviet ideology by the Indian Communists, in favor of the Chinese one. Here it is pertinent to understand the three things, as there is a tendency of painting Indian freedom fighters and attempting to club them with dreaded Naxal terrorists of today. This is not an innocent mistake, when people go on social media and tag someone like Bhagat Singh as #UrbanNaxal . There are three things- Socialism, Communism and Naxalism. Socialism is more of an economic principle, a philosophy, coming from Karl Marx. This ideology was not violent about opposition to Capitalism, rather was even accepting towards the need of Capitalism to make socialism possible. It is an ideal Utopia of a class-less society. A beautiful but impossible dream since it ran against the principle of survival of the fittest. Men, said Nietzsche, are not equal and our best happiness, as said by Napoleon, is the complete realization of our potential. This reality of human race, in specific, and life, in general, makes socialism impossible dream. Communism is more of Russian politics. Here the social change comes about with legit social protests, strikes and such political means. Naxalism is more reflective of an evil forceful armed revolution which neither seeks to convert or convince, rather wants to overthrow the current order to come into power. That is the Chinese order of communism. When the Naxalbari event happened, a watchful and happy Chinese media reported that "By integrating itself with the peasants, the Indian Proletariat will be able to bring about earth-shaking changes in the vast countryside of india and defeat any powerful enemy in a soul-stirring people's war. Armed struggle is the only correct road for the Indian revolution, there is no other road whatsoever. Such trash as "Gandhi-ism," "parliamentary road" and they are like an opium used by the Indian ruling classes to paralyze Indian people." (Ref. Editorial in People Daily, 5th of July, 1967).  The leadership of Naxal movement, then in September, 1967, travels to China, meets Mao and the M in the movement had nothing to do any longer with Marx. 
Supported by Mao's imperialistic desired, Charu Majumdar came back with his faith on complete annihilation bolstered. He had earlier articulated it quite eloquently in August 1966, when he said  "the meaning of party activists group today is that they will be combat units. Their main duty will be political propaganda and to strike against counter revolutionary forces. We should always keep in mind Mao Zedong's teaching  that Attacks are not for the sake of attack merely; attacks are for annihilation only. Those who should be attacked are mainly: 1) the representative of state machinery like Police, military officers 2) the hated bureaucracy 3) Class enemies. 
This excessively violent idea did not go down well with the cadre which though wanted to fight for their rights, did not see the oppressors as a homogeneous block to be annihilated. We must remember that unlike Slaves in America, India never had such kind of animal oppression in the social sanctions. Ashim Chatterjee who was one of the initial members of Naxal Movement, aligned with the Bihar unit chief and secretary Satyanarayan Singh;  the latter sacked the founder of the movement,  Charu Majumder  in 1970. In a prompt response, he too was sacked by Charu Majumder. Ashim Chatterjee, Student Naxal leader of Kolkata's Presidency College, behind the poster campaign in Kolkata, making the slogan, Chairman Mao, is our Chairman, is now a member of Trinamul Congress. This was a big fall for Charu Majumdar who is also often called as the father of Indian Naxal movement. By the media and academics who are sympathetic to the communist causes, these internal conflicts have diligently been kept away from public view, lest the group would look nothing but a band of outlaws. 
Charu Majumdar was son of an affluent landlord and a Congress leader. He joined Tebhaga movement early in 1946 and was promptly sent to the prison, not by the British, but the blessed doyen of democracy, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru in 1948, for three years after CPI was banned by Congress Government. The same angelic leader again jailed Charu Majumdar in 1962. In 1967, he was at the forefront of Naxalbari's peasant movement which was to eventually become the Naxal menace, we are struggling with even today.
In 1971, there was Congress government both at the center and the state. Operation Steeplechase was Launched by Mrs Indira Gandhi government. The nation-wide hunt of Naxals across the country, in which around 8400 Naxals were arrested (compare this with the current arrests made by Narendra Modi government on which there is so much noise and drama in the media), culminated with the arrest of Charu Majumdar on July 16th, 1972 from Kolkata. The man, by then, in his fifties, was declared dead within twelve days of arrest in the Lal Bazaar Lockup. He was allowed brief meetings with the family, twice in the twelve days detention and was not produced in the court.  The dead body was not given to the family even for the last rights. The judges in the Supreme court did not take any notice and the democracy was not in danger even when it was thrown under the bus by the all powerful Indira Gandhi. The voice of protest for the father of Naxal movement was muted, the silence of co-opted ecosystem spoke loudly, when we compare it with the so-called brave voices of dissent protesting against the arrest of alleged terror sympathizers who are nothing more than courier boys of a failed movement. Charu Majumdar was no saint. He was the most adamant supporter of theory of annihilation. Beneath the innocent and cultured demeanor of the Naxal supporters of today, sipping champagne, speaking eloquently in TV studios on the greatness of democracy, invoking Gandhi, there still lies a blood-thirsty supporter of theory of annihilation of Mao, wanting to gain power by overthrowing the democracy or breaking India, into small pieces to be won over, bit by bit. Another of the initial founding leaders, Kanu Sanyal, was arrested in 1970, after Congress Government came to power. One of the most prominent ideologue and the one who went into the rough and tumble of the failed revolution, was then put in to the prison for seven years, in Vishakhapatnam. He was first arrested and Jailed for showing black flags to then Congress CM of West Bengal, Bidhan Chandra Roy and his meeting with Charu Majumdar in Jalpaiguri Jail would eventually give birth to the most dangerous extremist movement in Independent India. He was on the forefront of the opposition against the land acquisition for the left government's industrial drive in Singoor. He was found dead on 23rd of March, 2010 in his house in Naxalbari Village.  Another one of Initial activists, Shanti Munda, an Adivasi, who barely escaped death as a 23 year old in the Police Firing in 1967, still lives in a thatched hut in Naxalbari. The world around them moved on, the generals of the Leftist movement moved forward with kids studying in London, leaders getting treated in the United States. The foot soldiers, on whose bravery and sacrifices, poems were written, stories were scripted in the air-conditioned convention halls, remained stuck in the squalid socialist poverty. Those cultivated by the academia and media to play the foot soldiers, those who get front row seats in Press club meetings in Delhi, neither are aware of nor are qualified to share the ideological dreams of the first revolutionaries. As we compare those who initiated the movement and those who represent it now, we find a failed revolution, and failed soldiers, capitalized and utilized for the benefit by the generals and ideologues, in the national and state capitals. 
It is their predecessors, the predecessors of those elite crusaders of the poor, who on 17th of March 1970, descended on the Sain residence in Burdwan. Sain brothers were Congress loyalists. The three brothers were killed in the most gruesome manner. The eyes of the eldest one were gouged out and the other two were hacked to death. The eldest one was killed in the following year, blind then. The blood of the slain was mixed with rice and force fed to the women of the family, including the mother. This is the face of naxal movement, the failed and deserving to fail movement which is currently people are trying to resurrect. What is most striking is that Congress, now out of power, is standing with the terrorist movement, it gave birth to. The Bhadralok, ever so eloquent, would come on the television in their beautiful attires, speaking in their beautiful accept, acting surprised at the violence, they would claim they had never see until Narendra Modi government came into power at the center in 2014. They are counting on our short memory. That is why Aruna Roy admonishes haughtily "What do you know about Naxalism/ Communism?" She counts on the fact that you would not know that there was once a Vice-Chancellor of Jadavpur University named Gopal Sen who was killed within 100 meters of his campus residence merely because he refused to give in to the Maoist demand for boycott in the university.  People like Rahul Gandhi, Sitaram Yechury, Aruna Roy and Prakash Ambedkar would assume that you would not know that in 1997, then Communist party CM of West Bengal, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee admitted on the floor of the assembly, the number of political murders in the years between 1977 and 1997 to be 28000 People. They are the same well-dressed people speaking eloquently how one unfortunate death in one obscure place should be a justified reason for the Narendra Modi Government to call it quits, and for India to be shamed internationally.
Let us not be fooled by their charms, and by the desperation of rootless prince of Congress, who does not know where he stands. Difficult times bring out the best and worse of the people. We are looking at it as the political divisions, the loyalty towards the dead, everything is fluid, confused and filled with the stench of mendacity which is strong enough to even overpower the stench of the dead corpses which are sewn along the last five decade long journey which began on an ordinary day, in an ordinary village near Darjeeling. We need to stand by our nation, if not by our Government, as this nefarious conspiracy is being unearthed.


Links and References :Voices of Naxalbari, Caravan, June, 2017 (Click Here)Naxalbari Revisited, The Times of India, 25th April, 2015 (Click Here)Burdwan Sain Bari Massacre: The Times of India, 17th March, 2013 (Click Here )Census of Political Murders in West Bengal under CPI-M rule. Mainstream Weekly, (Click Here)Charu and Son, Revisiting the legacy of a revolutionary father 70 years after Naxalbari (Click Here)
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बुद्धिजीवियों की बारात

बुद्धिजीवियों की बारात
शरद जी रिटायर हो चुके थे। आधार का भय आधारहीन मान कर आधार बनवा चुके थे, और पेंशन प्राप्त कर के भोपाल मे जीवनयापन कर रहे थे। एक बार बिहार जा कर शरद जी नरभसा चुके थे, पुन: नरभसाने का कोई इरादा था नहीं, सो मामाजी के राज में स्वयं को सीमित कर के रखे हुए थे।इस्लाम आज कल ख़तरे मे नही आता था, संभवत: इमर्जेंसी के बाद से, इस्लाम सबल हो चुका था, और कल निपचती जींस और लोकतंत्र के ख़तरे मे रहने का दौर चल रहा था। न्यू मार्केट के कॉफ़ी हाऊस मे चंद बुद्धिजीवी लोकतंत्र पर आए संकट पर चर्चा कर लेते थे, जोशी जी वहाँ भी नहीं जाते थे।एक दफे वहाँ के मलियाली वेटर्स को जोशी जी के हिंदी लेखक होने का पता चल गया और उन्होंने जोशीजी को यिंदी यिम्पोजीशन के विरोध मे कॉफ़ी देने से मना कर दिया था। कहाँ शरदजी सरस्वती से ब्रह्मप्रदेश तक लिखना चाहते थे और कहाँ उन्हे बड़े तालाब के उत्तर भाग का लेखक घोषित कर दिया गया था।इस से क्षुब्ध जोशी जी अपने बग़ीचे मे टमाटर उगा रहे थे। जानने वाले कहते हैं कि इसके पीछे उनकी मँशा महान किसान नेता बन कर उभरने की थी, किंतु उन्हे पता चला कि आधुनिक किसान नेता किसानों को पुलिस के सामने खड़ा कर नानी याद दिलाते है, और स्वयं पीछे से दुबक कर विदेशी ननिहाल निकल लेते है।जोशी जी राजनीति से किनारा कर चुके थे। लेखन भी अब कम ही करते थे। एक दफ़ा प्रकाशक को पांडुलिपी भेजने के संदर्भ मे प्रकाशक से बात की, प्रथमत: तो प्रकाशक फ़ोन पर ही ऐसा उद्वेलित हुआ मानो संभव होता तो तार से निकल कर ही चमाट मार देता। उद्विग्न हो बोला कि आप हमें सँघी प्रकाशक समझे हैं?हम क्यों पाँडवो की कथा छापेंगे? हमें ना चाहिए पाँडुलिपी। पिछली ठँड मे हिंदी विशारद का सागर हिंदू अकादमी से मिला पुरस्कार फ़ासिस्ट सरकार के विरोध मे लौटा चुके हैं। एक ही वाक्य मे प्रकाशक महोदय ने हिंदी ज्ञान और विद्रोही व्यक्तित्व का परिचय दे डाला।शरद जी ने सकुचाते हुए बताया कि वे पांडुलिपी मेन्युस्क्रिप्ट को कह रहे थे और महाभारत पर उन्होंने कभी कुछ नही लिखा है। व्यंग्य संकलन है जिसे प्रकाशित करने के इच्छुक हैं। प्रकाशक ने झड़प दिया। कहे व्यंग्य का बाज़ार बचा नहीं है अब।तमाम आय टी वाले बेहूदे ट्विटर पर व्यंग्य पेलते हैं। इंफ़ोसिस वाले मूर्ति जी कहते है भारतीय तकनीक मे नवरचना नही है, इनोवेशन नही है। अब तमाम अभियंता व्यंग्य लेखन मे जुटे है तो इनोवेशन कौन लाएगा। हिंदी वाले ट्विटर पर व्यस्त है, अँग्रेजी वालो ने गाली गलौज को व्यंग्य विधा बना रखा है।आप मानेंगे नहीं, जैसी बातों पर पुराने भोपाल मे दँगे हो जाते थे वही बातें अँग्रेजी मे लोग पैसे देकर सुनने जाते हैं। बहरहाल, हास्य की स्थिति पर आँसु बहाकर प्रकाशक ने शरद जी से पूछा- आप करते क्या है?जोशी जी बोले - लेखक हैं? व्यंग्यकार हैं।“वो तो समझे पर करते क्या है?”
जोशी जी कुछ समझ ना पाए। प्रकाशक जी ने समझाया। ‘देखिए, आप क्रिकेटर हैं, नेता हैं, पत्रकार हैं, समाजसेवी है, पुलिस मे है, सेठ साहूकार है,  मानवाधिकार कार्यकर्ता हैं, स्वयं अभिनेता है या धनी अभिनेत्री के पति हैं। व्यवसाय क्या है? हम उन्ही की किताबें छापते है जो मूलत: लेखक नही होते।
‘वही बिकता है। सफल लेखक से अधिक किताबें असफल अभिनेता और छुटभैये नेता की बिकती हैं। आप कुछ तो लेखन के अलावा करते होंगे?’‘जी, घर के पीछे टमाटर उगाता हूँ।’ ‘आप दलित लेखक बन जाईए। उसमें भी पैसा अच्छा है ।’
‘हम आपकी पुस्तक तो दलित विचारक, कृषक के नाम पर प्रचारित कर सकते हैं। इसमें अश्लीलता कितनी है?”
‘क़तई नहीं।’‘अरे भाई, कुछ तो बिकने वाला माल लिखते। आप पुराने आदमी है, कुछ स्लीज़ी वाला डालिए, मसलन फ़लाँ कवि सम्मेलन मे फ़लाँ कवियत्री के आँचल के खिसकने पर फ़लाँ साहित्यकार क्या बोले?
‘किंतु मैं तो समाज पर लिखता हूँ।’
‘अरे प्रभु, समाज ही तो लोगों के शयनकक्षो पर कान लगाए बैठा है। उन्हे कुछ तो मसालेदार दें। आधा आधुनिक साहित्यकार वर्ग आपसे रूष्ट है, इतना आपने काँग्रेस और इंदिराजी के विरोध मे लिखा। इतनी सुंदर हैंडलूम साड़ी पहनने वाले के ख़िलाफ़ भला कोई लिखता है?’
‘किंतु उस समय तो अत्याचार की पराकाष्ठा थी। सब स्वाभिमानी लेखक उनके ख़िलाफ़ लिख रहे थे।’
‘अरे जोशीजी, लिख के क्या उखाड़ लिया? इंदिरा जी वापस आईं, जो गोद मे थे लेखक, अकादमी के चेयरमैन हो गए, आप जैसे टमाटर की खेती कर रहे हैं।‘प्रकाशक महोदय आगे बोले- ‘हिंदी भी शुद्ध लिखते हैं आप, हिंगलिश लिखते तो आपका एक शो करवा देते। किंतु आप तो गाली भी देने को तैयार नहीं है। देखिए, दुनिया आगे निकल चुकी है। आज लोग श्रीलाल शुक्ल और परसाई अख़बार मे छुपा कर पढ़ते है, और शोभा दे ड्राईंग रूम मे रखते हैं।’
जोशी जी थोड़ी देर शाँत रहे। प्रकाशक बोले, “एक तरीक़ा है। आप बुद्धिजीवी बन जाएँ।’ 
‘उसके लिए क्या करना होगा?’प्रकाशक महोदय सोच मे डूब गए। अचानक बोले। ‘सबसे पहले तो दाढ़ी बढ़ा लें। और ये क्लर्कों जैसे क़मीज़ पहन कर घूमना बँद करें। फैबइंडिया से बढ़िया सा सूती कुर्ता ख़रीदें।सिगरेट पीते हैं? नही पीते तो शुरू कर दें। गाँजा मिल जाए तो अति उत्तम। चिलम थाम कर सर्वहारा पर चर्चा करें। सरकार के गरियाएँ। आप के आस पास कुछ ग़लत हुआ गए दिनों?’
‘पड़ोस का पप्पन केले के छिलके पर फिसल गया था। और तो कुछ ख़ास नहीं।’ शरद जी शर्मिंदा से हो गए’
‘उसी पर लेख लिख मारिए’
‘उस पर क्या? वो तो दुर्घटना थी।’‘अब यह भी हम बतलावें, लेखक आप हैं। लिखिए, पप्पन का गिरना सामाजिक पतन का सूचक है। सवाल यह नही है कि पप्पन गिरा, सवाल यह है कि पप्पन क्यों गिरा। पप्पन फल के छिलके से गिरा, पप्पन यदि माँस खाता तो फल न खाता, छिलका ना होता और पप्पन संभवत: न गिरता।
हम पप्पन तो गिरता हुआ देख रहे है, किंतु पप्पन का गिरना अपने आप मे एक घटना नहीं है, सामाजिक पतन का सूचक है। हिंदुत्व के ठेकेदारों ने माँस भक्षण पर इतना प्रतिबंध लगाया है, कि उनके भय से मीट चिकन खाने वाले घर के सामने फलो के छिलके फैला कर रखते हैं और देर सबेर उन पर गिरते हैं।
हमें मोदी जी के राज मे फैले उस भय के वातावरण पर ध्यान देना है जिस मे एक पप्पन घर के सामने केले के छिलके बिखेरने को मजबूर है। हो सकता है कि छिलके फैलाना मोदी जी के फ़ासिस्ट स्वच्छ भारत अभियान के विरोध मे पप्पन का एकाकी विरोध हो, किंतु आज के आपातकाल-सरीखे माहौल मे बेचारा मूक है।
एक दृष्टि से देखे तो हो सकता है पप्पन उतना भोला भी ना हो। पप्पन उत्तरभारतीय हिंदी भाषी भगवा आतंकवादी भी हो सकता है, जिसने केले के पत्तों पर खाने वाले दक्षिणभारतीयो के विरूद्घ विष फैलाने के लिए गिरने को केले के छिलके का उपयोग किया हो। आख़िर पप्पन संतरे के छिलके पर भी गिर सकता था।
एक भोला भाला बेवक़ूफ़ भारतीय ही होगा जो पप्पन पतन काँड मे संतरे के छिलके के ना होने को नागपुर और सँघ से जोड़ कर ना देख सके। हर जगह सँघ का हाथ है, कोने कोने मे पप्पन केले के छिलको पर गिर गिर के विषाक्त सांप्रदायिक वातावरण बना रहे हैं। लोकतंत्र ख़तरे मे है।
‘किंतु सब एक सा लिखेंगे, एक सा दिखेंगे तो यूनिफार्म नहीं लगेगा?’ शरद जी हिचकिचाए।
प्रकाशक ठहरे, ठिठके, सँभवत: मुस्कुराइए। जोशी जी को फ़ोन मे प्रकाशक जी के उदारतावादी फैलें हुए दाँतो से झाँकता छायावाद दिखा। 
“परसाई तो पढ़े होंगे?” प्रकाशक बोले।
“जी” जोशीजी बोले
‘तो का कहे थे वो? बुद्धिजीवी वो शेर है जो सियारों की बारात मे बैंड बजाते हैं। सो बैंड बजाने के लिए, सुर और संगीतकार दोनों को यूनिफार्म मे होना ही पड़ेगा। पप्पन गिरे या उठे, नैरेटिव फ़िक्स होना चाहिए। बुद्धिजीवियों की बारात का रंग तब ही आएगा’  
शरद जी ने धीमे से फ़ोन रख दिया।
अचानक एसएमएस की सूचना बजी। प्रकाशक का मैसेज था। “एक और एडभाईस था, नाम बदल कर देखें- शरद जोशी ‘जोशुआ’ काँचा इलैय्या शेपर्ड की तर्ज़ पर लिखवा कर साहित्य अकादमी को भेजें, अवश्य छपेगा, विदेश से भी फँडिंग मिल सकेगी, सोचिएगा।”

Remembering the Forgotten - On 15th of August

The year is 2018. It is 72 years since we made the tryst with destiny. Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru made that tryst with destiny, and as it turned out, with the passage of time it became a tryst with dynasty. The history was appropriated with a clinical precision. My intention is not to judge, or reduce the exalted stature of those who fought for the freedom and eventually came to believe that the nation they had emancipated is their fiefdom, and that the people of the nation are bound to remain indebted to them, in perpetuity, generation after generation, for their real  or imagined heroics of the past. 
Every independence day is marked by two things- perfunctory remembrance of the heroes of the past who could add to the glory of a pathetic polity of the present, a new tendency of the people to belittle the nation on the grounds that we are not the best nation in the world. The first category of people will appropriate the glory of the past, claiming the credit of all the good that is a part of Indian history, another category would be listing out the failures of the nation, making a case for gloom and shame. Since the change of power in 2014, we find that the two categories of people mentioned here are often the same. You will have a slew of articles on the history and Congress, circling around Nehru and Gandhi. Unfortunately, the line which divides the loyalty runs so deep that people are outraged when Narendra Modi as the PM celebrates Sardar Patel or Ambedkar and we see often the stance- "how dare he touch our heroes?" notwithstanding the fact that Congress, during all its ruling years, worked diligently to erase any past leader not connected directly to the first family of the Congress. It took a non-Congress Government to even honor Congress leaders like Ambedkar and Patel with Bharat Ratna. 
My intention of writing this post is to wipe some dust off the mirror of public memory, to remember to forgotten. Let us go beyond the usual quotes of Nehru and look at other worthy sons of India. 
Ram Prasad Bismil: Ram Prasad Bismil, born 11th of June, 1897, walked to the gallows on 19th of December, 1927, not yet Thirty. Bismil lived through a childhood of penury, but through his diligence became master in Urdu, Hindi and English. He was arrested on the charges of Kakori Train robbery where the Government treasury being carried in the train. He, with Ashfaqullah Khan, Roshan Lal and Rajendra Nath Lahiri, was sentence to death. He was a shade under 30, when he was hanged in Gorakhpur Jail. In the part of his autobiography he wrote on 16th of December, 1927, three days before his death, he writes, " " When our mercy petition was turned down by the viceroy, I immediately wrote to Shri Mohanlal that all Indian leaders, and Hindu- Muslims should come together to plan a memorial in the next session of the Congress. Government has declared Ashfaqullah Khan as right-hand man of Ram Prasad. If a staunch Muslim like Ashfaqullah khan can become right-hand man of Arya Samaji Ram Prasad in regards to a revolutionary organization, then in the name of India's freedom can Hindus and Muslims of the country not forget their selfish interests and come together?...I request the young men that till the time  a large number of Indians are educated, they do not understand their duties towards the nation; they should not step into revolutionary activities. 
Revolutionary Shiv Varma narrates the last meeting of Bismil with his mother. It was a day before the hanging. Bismil's father went to Gorakhpur Prison, without taking his mother along, worried that the pain of losing a young son will be too hard to bear for the mother. Shic Verma ji then writes'In the morning, when we reached the Prison gates, mother was already standing there, waiting for us. I was quite taken aback looking at the calm and composure of his mother. When we were worried as to how to get me into the walls since only relatives were allowed inside, she asked me to keep quiet. When asked, she promptly told the prison authorities- "He is my nephew." We went in. Ram Prasad broke into tears looking at his mother's face. But the mother's eyes remained tearless. She spoke sharply, " I thought my son to be brave, whose name would bring shiver into the British spines. I did not know that he would be afraid of death. If you wanted to walk to the gallows weeping, why did you step on this path of revolution?Bismil responded, "These tears are not out of fear of death rather out of love for my mother. I am not afraid of death, mother, trust me." Mother then embraced Bismil and directed him to me, saying, " He is a man from the Party. You can tell him if you have any message for other revolutionaries."
This comes from a letter by Shiv Verma, he wrote after meeting Bismil's mother in 1946. This was the time when Congress leaders were busy in the mechanization of forming the Government of new, Independent India. Bismil's funeral was organized by another revolutionary, Haldhar Vajpayee in Gorakhpur. 
Lala Lajpat Rai: Lala Lajpat Rai was the grand old man of Indian freedom struggle. He was the part of venerated Lal-Bal-Pal triumvirate of Indian Independence. During his study at Lahore College, he came in touch with freedom-fighters like Mahatma Hansraj who lost his father at the age of twelve, still through sheer perseverance was able to complete his graduation from Government College, Lahore. He became an Arya Samaji there and supported Lala Hansraj when he started the first DAV (Dayanand Anglo-Vedic) School, steeped in Vedic knowledge with Pandit Gurudatt Vidyarthi. The school was converted to Islamia College post-partition. He died during the protest against Simon Commission in the year 1928. His death brought in a new of wave of revolution, with Bhagat Singh and his revolutionary friends attempting to avenge his death by killing the British Officer. Always an eloquent speaker and a towering intellect, he spoke in Bombay in 1920 in the presence of Lokmanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak , Annie Besant and MA Jinnah , "India is like a sleeping Lion. Once it wakes, it wakes with a momentum that carries the force of its ancient greatness. We have never been, in spite of many revolutions that we have undergone, a selfish people, we have never been an oppressive force. We have behind us the righteousness of scores of generations and hence, though we may be fallen, though we may be downtrodden, thought we may be weak, though we may be treated with humiliation, we have the potentialities to rise and be great once more. ...In the today's polarized polity and propagandized intellect, there is a great tendency to throw the greats of the past on one side or other of the ideological divide. I would like to quote Lalaji here, from further in the same speech,
" I must tell you that henceforth we should recognize it as a fundamental doctrine that the unity of the Hindus and Mohammedans will be great asset to our political future. In this unity, we shall not be guided by the temporary benefit of this community or that. We shall not adopt it as a measure of political expediency. But we shall adopt it as a fundamental doctrine of our faith, to stick to, to our deathbeds, until we win our freedom. Not till then only,  but thereafter too, we shall live in this country as brothers determined to work together, determined to resist together, and determined to win. ...
...The two great imperialist assets are: First to change the psychology of the people whom they want to govern and secondly, to change their own psychology. They want it to be believed that they are the choice of the world , and then want to believe that you are the refuse of the world. Therein lies the Imperial psychology. You have unfortunately for 150 years been believing that you are really inferior to other people. Rise up, Young India, you are inferior to none.  ... Freedom must come from within. Freedom must come from within the Mother India. Freedom won't come from without. Freedom won't fall from the heavens. Freedom will rise Goddess-like from our Earth; and we shall rise, and with our own hands we shall offer flowers and we shall worship her. "
I often wish modern Indian intellectuals read more people who served India with their lives. 
Bipin Chandra Pal: Shri BC Pal was the third of the Trimurti of Lal-Bal- Pal. Born 7th November, 1858, he died 20th May, 1932. He is also one of the great son of India and earliest founder of the Congress, now largely forgotten, not being conducive to the current brand of communal politics played by the current version of Congress-I. He was greatly respected in the initial days of Congress and was called a prophet of modern India by Aurobindo Ghosh, even when he left Congress towards the end of his life owing to the differences with Gandhi. He believed in the greatness of Bharat and believed that our true emancipation lay hidden in the resurrection of that faith in our national character, history and glory. 
In his much acclaimed speech in the Madras convention of Congress, he spoke something which remains true even today, 
"We have been told we are disunited, and we believed in it. We have been told we are weak and we believed in it. We have been told we are ignorant and we cannot understand politics, and we have believed in it and this belief has been cause of all our weakness; and it has a hypnotic cause. It is induced by magic, by Maya..... Maya can be dispelled by original knowledge whether it be Vedantic or Political. 
On this day, this is a solemn pledge I take to learn more about theses hidden heroes of our past and also pledge to share with my fellow countrymen, all that I could gather from them so that we can see the bright face of Indian renaissance in its completeness, free of the dust and fog of modern politics and propaganda. Happy Independence Day and Vande Mataram!

क़र्ज़ की पीते थे मय

धर्म संकट में है, धर्म ध्वजा धूलि-धूसरित हवा में कटी छिपकली की पूँछ की तरह फड़फड़ा रही है। लेनदारों के भय से,चेहरे पर रूमाल बाँध कर पिछवाड़े के रास्ते से घर से पलायन करने वाले भी राह चलतों को पकड़ कर दरयाफ़्त करते हैं - भई, देश का क्या होगा।उदारीकरण के पथप्रदर्शकों ने उधार दिया, और जम कर दिया। बाज़ार में ऐसी तरलता लाई गई कि आज भी राष्ट्र कल्लू हलवाई की तोंद की तरह थिरक रहा है। एक चकाचौंध भरी तरक़्क़ी यूँ चमकी सारे देश ने करूणानिधि वाले चश्मे चढ़ा लिए। उदारिकरण के अँधे को सब हरा ही हरा दीखता था।
जैसे मुग़ल सुल्तान गले से मोतियों की माला बेहतरीन रक्कासा की ओर ऊछालते थे, लोन उछाले गए और तत्परता से पकड़े गए। पिछली सरकार से यह स्नेह भरी भेंट प्राप्त करने वाले लोग उत्पादकता में कम विलासिता में अधिक विश्वास रखते थे।
अमीर के घर के कैलेंडर पर अल्प-वस्त्र धारिणी के वस्त्र और ग़रीब के घर के गैस सिलेंडर कम होते गए और राष्ट्र उधार की उन्नति की आनंद लहर में हिचकोले लेता गया। समय की मार देखें कि सरकार बदली और जो भारतीय संस्कृति की बात करते थे उन्होंने ही भारतीय संस्कृति की विरासत को विराम दिया।
हिंदुस्तानियत का आनंद ही उधार में है। ये कोई ४७ के बाद की बात नहीं कि नेहरू जी अपना सम्मान और इंदिराजी गेहूँ उधार में लाती रहीं। उधार, पड़ोस से माँगी हुई एक कटोरी चीनी से लेकर वित्तमंत्री के मंत्र द्वारा विश्व बैंक से प्राप्त किए हुए हज़ारों करोड़ तक, उधार ही समाज को जोड़े रखे था।
नरसिम्हाराव जी के राज में जब कडछुल कठौती की तली को लगा तो हम घड़ी भर को ठिठके और कुछ प्रयास किये। राव साहब निकल लिए और उनके मुँशी जी - मेरी ज़िंदगी सँवारी, मुझको गले लगा कर, बैठा दिया पलंग पर, मुझे गोद में उठा कर- के अंदाज  मे तख्तनशीन हुए।
किन्तु लेनदार की बेहयाई और देनदार की शर्मिंदगी हमारी सांस्कृतिक विरासत बचाए रही। कामधेनु का दोहन चलता रहा, कल्प वृक्ष फल खो कर कलपता रहा। एक जनेऊधारी सरकार ने इस परंपरा का कर्तव्यनिष्ठा से निर्वाह किया।
ऊधार का सामंजस्य हमारी राजनीति, समाज शास्त्र और अर्थव्यवस्था की रीढ़ है। और यह आज की बात नहीं है, यह हमारे इतिहास का वो हिस्सा है जो सनातन और सल्तनत काल से समान रूप से जुड़ा रह कर गँगा-जमुनी सभ्यता की नींव रखता है।
चार्वाक ने ६०० ईसा पूर्व कहा - ऋण कृत्वा, धृतं पीवेत - अर्थात ऊधार लो और घी पीयो- हम शताब्दियों तक ऊधारी का घी पीते रहे। ग़ालिब आए तो उन्होंने कहा - क़र्ज़ की पीते थे मय और समझते थे कि हाँ, रंग लाएगी हमारी फाकामस्ती एक दिन। आवश्यकता घी से शराब पर पहुँची पर सिद्धांत स्थिर रहे ।ग़रीब वोट महँगे कर के क़र्ज़ माफ़ी का प्रयास करता रहा, अमीर वोटों की खरीद के लिए धन मुहय्या करा कर क़र्ज़ चोरी की व्यवस्था करता रहा। सरकारी योजनाएँ बनती रहीं, धन के अभाव में रेंग रेंग कर दम तोड़ती रहीं। सरकार टेनिस मैच के रेफ़री की तरह लेनदारो और देनदारो के बीच का खेल देखती रही।
सब कुछ बराबर परंपरागत तरीक़े से चलता रहा, कैलेंडर छपते रहे, पार्टियाँ होती रहीं। उधार लेने और देने वाले का स्नेह पिता पुत्र को स्नेह से भी ऊपर होता है। ऊधार पर टिका समाज बढ़िया चल रहा था कि सरकार ने बदल कर सामाजिक संकट खड़ा कर दिया।
नियम कड़े हुए और चौकस व्यवस्था को ठेंगा दिखा कर चौकसी निकल लिये, विजय माल्या अश्वमेध के अश्व की भाँति जो निकले महारानी एलीजाबेथ के अस्तबल पर ही जा के रूके।
चार्वाक घी से डालडे पर आ रुके और ग़ालिब साहब को बस ठर्रे का सहारा बचा। सामाजिक तारतम्य तार तार हो गया। युवराज फटा कुर्ता पहन रहे है । पूछ रहे हैं - क्या चार्वाक को डालडा खिलाने और ग़ालिब को ठर्रा पिलाने के महापाप का उत्तर देंगे मोदीजी। युवराज का गला, जनता की आँख भर आई हैं।