It’s Britain’s call

I read this article, and the nonsense suggested by one Lord Ahmed. 

Controversial British peer Lord Ahmed has said he believes 15-year-old Pakistani activist Malala Yousufzai, who is awaiting reconstructive surgery at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, could have been shot as part of a government plot to discredit the Taliban.

Britain must answer why this nonsense is tolerated. What action are they taking against this man? I am deeply shocked and surprised that civilized world should allow such nonsense.  It is heinous. We will be watching very closely what Britain is going to do about this man.    

Karnad lambasts Naipaul: this blogger knows that Naipaul does have penchant for speaking on things that leaves one baffled, sometimes cringing. I recall in Delhi in one show he was quite rude to one panel member. Clearly it is sometimes difficult to tolerate fools but the panel member wasn’t one. I really don’t think Naipaul justified Babri demolition, atleast that is what I gather. This attempt to pigeonhole a writer (who has written some wonderful books) is rather sad. 

“Now Mr. Naipaul has written three books on India. If you read them, you find that not even one of them contains any reference to music. He has gone through the whole of India without responding to Indian music. I think that only means that he is tone deaf."  

 A writer has all the right to choose what to include what not to include in his/her writing. I find it shocking that RK Narayan’s fiction doesn’t contain any reference to lower section of society and their existential predicaments (this true for MT Vasudevan Nair too). The world he created seems to contain no such social blemishes. Does that make RK "social deaf"? How is Malgudi (though charming) quintessentially Indian village?


Mr. Karnad was actively involved in Malgudi Day’s adaptation why didn’t he question that, I am not even alluding to his Sarswat Brahmin upbringing. Mr. Karnad needs to apologize for his diatribe or need to put a better defense for his claims. These are juvenile arguments and doesn’t augur well for the writer of his caliber.  

Naipaul should be celebrated through his writing, particularly his early fiction. Such charming worlds he weaved...

A poem for dearest Malala

 Books are gift from dream land

When the soul dance

it doesn’t ask a thing.  

Sky is the roof

world our home.

In the periphery of eternal,

learning dwells in little steps of hope.

Words weave their magic

into pages of questions

that we quarry for answer.

And so we live infallible

in the shadow of faith

so we live forever…    

Blogs are published works

…someone the other day said “…but you haven’t published?”  I beg to differ. Publishers don’t decide who should be published and how to sell.  They no longer set the bench mark nor are they arbitrators on quality and content. I may be ignored. I may be unacknowledged. But I exist and exist in all my ferocity. Thanks to this medium, this space. I for a moment am also thinking of millions of brilliant lives passed by over the years, over the centuries …being denied a space. That is the civilizational loss I was talking about. It’s a collective loss that haunts this society.
 
We live in exciting times, and this is beginning of new history. These are times of common people; the access through social media has made it a tremendous world. I am so happy to be here when the history is unfolding into a world that is egalitarian, atleast in the assimilation/dispersal of views. Idea of self worth is amazing motivation. Though one must add that in India entrenched groups run the show (its quite difficult to trespass the family&friends&their Charter Accountant coterie!!)…but then the wonder is that social media is boundary less. Arab spring was initiated by people on the street using social media. It is happening all around us in increasing regularity. Malala too is a blogger….

So when we blog, we are putting our views on public platform and that is publishing. All the blogs are published work. The onus is on people who want to get connected and create a better world…

 

Institution builder is no more …

Yash Chopra was a colossal figure who significantly influenced the growth and direction of Indian film industry

Get well soon Malala dear…

…the world waits for you

Where acquiring knowledge was way of life

Nalanda’s literal translation would be “give lotus”, which loosely means “offer goodness”. About 1500 years back this was the place that became center of knowledge. It offered space for about 10,000 students and 2,000 teachers, and spread across many kms. I have come here in 1999, and this time too I could feel what this place could have been many centuries ago. Meticulously constructed dormitories with living space, bed, rack for study material, common ground water well and toilet, all these for set of 30 students each that consisted a unit, ventilation, kitchen so on. The library (know as treasure of truth) held huge collection of study material. Those were exciting times, of fervent discussions, sharing and knowing. Exalted thoughts and ideas that had started to grow independent of brahminical stranglehold and obnoxious structure. When you walk through these dormitories you could still feel so much care and compassion that went into building this great center of ancient knowledge. If you put this in context of world history, as barbarians roamed around the world, then we realize the significance of Nalanda.  

Even though structures may be destroyed and forgotten but collective conscience survives, that is what you see in subtleties and sensibilities that exist in certain societies. I see that it in zen, in haikus, in art (mandala or flower art of Thais are only few examples of exalted subtlety)…in peaceful people, in people who pursue knowledge to share, in contemplation and meditation, in worldviews that reflects universality of human spirit. That it couldn’t much percolate into Indian society is another instance of mediocre elites (Brahminical puss that gangrened Indian society), of course one does see shades of Buddhism in pan Indian  thought stream (also kerala murals and temples). Collective conscience of destruction too survives, it does in violent people and their ugly worldview. If Taliban is surviving conscience of marauding muslim invaders then sucking colonizers do trace its conscience through marauding market. The context changes but collective conscience does survive. Attack on 14-year-old Malala Yousafzai in Pakistan is another instance on attack on goodness, on society that seeks knowledge, therefore understanding, therefore compassion. When the marauders burned the library of Nalanda it ember for many months, what a colossal loss to humanity.  

Britain gets some lesson on propriety 

Britain’s arrogance at one point was such that they gave space to scum of earth in the name of freedom of expression and democracy. That these scoundrels caused much misery to people around the world was none of their concern. They even provided interviews of people who had nothing but vicious things to say (even BBC, which in recent times has become quite mediocre). What goes does come back, and sure does. Abu Hamza episode gave them a good lesson. Small grace for us people across the world.