Illusions of a realistic empty mind.......what???

Chewing up the nail, till there is none that can be bitten off. Gazing at the smoke from the still-burning....not totally crushed cigarette butt, the irresistible urge to have a sip, of tea and finish it all then and there. Listening to the "Call of the Ktulu", unsure of whether its playing in the head or on the player. Reading about Rajapaksa's crackdown on Tamils in Colombo, without discrimination. Thinking continuously, without fail to think of something. Checking up the mailbox for a new ray of mail. Bearing the disturbance of an irritating voice penetrating the sphere of the "Call of the Ktulu".

Checking the cell-phone, the killer of letters, for a text - message. Watching the pigeon outside my window, doing endless rounds. "Can I be of some help, you seem to be looking for something". Looking at the time at the system, "ah...the sun is shining beautifully". Looking at the cover of "Crime and Punishment", "yes honey i know, i owe you another 100 pages of reading". The source of the irritating voice seems to have been shooed away. "What?? its been just 30 minutes since the last cup of tea......"

Just another day at the office.....

Land, the ardent fool.

Hand in hand they ran over the fields
Land, the ardent fool,
Expects rain with just a cloud in the sky.
The day is bright and blue
The gold fields welcome them.

Land, the ardent fool,
Wishes to bloom flowers
“But you have gold”, said the sky
And thorns that prevail.
“I will write a song for you”, he told her.

The spring is where they will be
For its hot and there is no rain.
Land, the ardent fool,
Gives away all the water
Some to flowers other , to the sky

The wise ghost wished it was alive
Snow is on the land now
Land the ardent fool
Hopes foolishly, endlessly
Rain, rain, rain, it cries.

The Mind's Battle Victory and Me Gaining on the War

A hello - hi friend whose name isn't important: Aur bhai Mr. [my name here] kya haal chaal hain?

Me: Pata nahi

Thats when the cloud lifted yet another layer, and I "noticed" that I actually am the "Indecisive Bastard", as christened by MadMan..... Take this one up yours mind.

Death for Greatness

There may be either of the two things running through your head after you have read the title of this post and the content of the previous one. First(and the most common...haha read thy mind human), this guy has just lost it, he is on the verge of either a suicide or someone is going to kill him. Or(for the over smart ones) that the guy is obsessed with death, deadly obsessed.

Anywho, I neither deny nor accept both the schools of thoughts. But seriously my question is....Is greatness too big for life? Does it take a death to define the greatness. Can we spot greatness in its physical, materialistic form? Does death shoot up your greatness levels?

I know, I know, but naah..... I ain't in a hurry of being great....thanks for the option though.

Why don't you kill me??

Kill me, why don’t you kill me?? Am I not special enough to be killed, murdered. Killing is good and death is bad. The type of death I get will define what I had achieved in life. The worst form of death is the natural one. That means that you were not capable enough, even to find a way to die and nature or existence had to do the job for you. Still worse, of course, is the one by natural disasters/ man made disasters. It defines that nature thought of eliminating a whole bunch of nobody's and well I was one of them.

Suicide is of course far better than any of the above mentioned ways. At least I made sure that I cut nature’s work short and found a way of eliminating my own existence. Still a better category is that if I will be murdered. For I was important enough for someone or my death was, perhaps looked as a way for gaining profit and hence, before nature could get to me, they did. The best and probably the most high class (uptown) and satisfying death would then be assassination. Yes, doesn’t it feel great to hear it from someone that you were assassinated. A great feeling, isn’t it? Yes I would like to be assassinated and am sure most of you out there(whether you agree with me straight away or not) would love to be assassinated if given a choice.

The Deprived Generation..

What does one do with unused energy? A drive but none a driver in sight? They say ours is a deprived generation, with no great wars or no great depression to fight, no great cause or great leader follow. What does the youth of this generation do? The youth needs a direction to go... it needs to die..

Is it the fascination with death or the inability to accept that death is bad? In the absence of all the above mentioned great "causes" the youth's natural energy has gone disarray.. With no great hero to adopt a style or two from, the probability to fall for any mortal with a cap on was inevitable..



Long gone are the greater causes of serving ones mother/father land and lesser mortal of issues like, looking for real love, fighting for one's "space", to set the mind free, have taken center stage. No songs anymore make you realize the worthlessness of realizing, you have to realize it on your own. The "intellectual" ones seek refuge in songs of yesteryears the rest well they are uncharacteristically categorized as humans..No political issues get the same energy as it used to..Getting wasted is understood now..so getting wasted isn't hep as well.. Sex is just a compliment away..that too is no more of an accomplishment.. Money well...really you call that a cause??


No common cause for men/women to unite and fight for.. the deprived generation

Why Amitabh Bachchan is Amitabh Bachchan?

Something off the kinds of topics I usually write. But was sitting down the other day and was watching Kaala Pathar and came up with this thought.

So why is it that Amitabh Bachchan is Amitabh Bachchan? Acting is there but then I won't refer him to be the best actor that India has produced. There are a score of better actors, Om Puri, Nasiruddin Shah, to name a few. So it is not just the acting.

According to me Amitabh Bachchan is at such a position mainly because of the kinds of roles he played. He at the start of his carrer never played a "hero". He was played something related to it, but never the "Hero" itself. Mainly what he played at the beginning of his carrer was the role of an anti-Hero. The hero with negative shades or rather the hero with grey shades. While Indian cinema is all about a hero playing a completly idealist, Amitabh never played any such role, atleast early in his career.

Examples of the such kinds of roles are apt, Deewar, Don, Kaala Pathar, Laawaris etc. So the point is that he played roles that were more human. He potrayed that there is no such thing as idealism and that a hero is just another guy and that he too has his strengths and weaknesses. This is what the audience identified with and rose him to the level that he was.

Amitabh always had roles who were of a guy with high moral but was at times hard on luck or rather a guy who was forced to do wrong things because of the circumstances and he being human did it. This made the audience realise that things can go wrong and they are not completly bad or paapi if they do stuff to get on top. He potrayed roles which were more of idealism mixed with realism. A person true at heart but who may get beant due to circumstances.

All this packed with great punch lines made him a superstar. By the way the punch-lines also showed that his moral is high and even if he is down on luck he wouldnot take shit from anyone.

Another star that I think plays these kinds of roles aptly is Dev Anand. Whether its his role in R.K. Narayanan's The Guide or Kaalapaani etc. The only reason why he is not totally up there with Amitabh (although he is a total superstar in his on right and one of my favourites) is probably he(Amitabh) played the roles with greater energy and emotions.

Anyways this is all what I can think of right now.

Why am I an Atheist??

Worth reading::

Why am I an Atheist?

Child's Play

Last weekend my brother was here to stay over for a night as he moved back home for his college break. It was just great, it reminded me of the days we had when we were young and life was just too long. Although not very long back but I miss those days we spend at home together during the holidays, playing cricket in the midday hot sun, totally carefree and careless, the times we spent fighting.




When I sit alone in my room over the weekends and notice the street kids out there playing there hearts out, it reminds me of my days as a kid. The child out there playing in the sun doesnot bother about the heat nor does he/she worry about the boundaries. There are times when a car owner shouts and tries to scare away the kids. But the child was born free, born in a world where no boundaries should exist.

A child has a heart of pure gold and the heart is ever so enthusiastic and full of jows. Sorrow is unknown to it, for the mother is there to take care of everything.

Ah the good old days.....

How the mighty beat the law?

Today's newspaper contained an article as to how Shibu Soren, accused and currently sentenced for the murder of his secretary, is enjoying his life out of jail. The article talks as to how Shibu got himself transferred to the Raipur jail from the Tihar jail and is currently occupying a room ( two-rooms) at a Raipur hospital.

Well the paper just wrote about one of the many such cases. The well connected and the close ones of the ruling parties in India have made a joke of the Indian judicial system. And the judicial system acts too dumb or rather overloaded with work to notice any such indisperancies.

Not only is this evident the present case of Shibu Soren but also there is a similar pattern in all cases invoving high profile or well connected people. This pattern is not only ignored by the media but also by the people who have fought for the cause of getting the accused to the book.

The series goes on like this:
1. The accused is set free by a district court where the accused's case is handled for the first time. Mostly the reason given by these courts is lack of evidence or incomplete evidence. This happened in the case of Shibut Soren, Jessica Lal murder case, Priyadarshini Matoo case, the Pareira case etc.

2. Next the court is either brought to the High Court either by the victims of the case or the High Court intervenes on its own accord. Here the accussed is held guilty on all accounts and is sentenced accordingly. The same happened in all the cases mentione above.

3. The case is then moved by the accused to the Supreme Court where the court lets it hang on.

Now the catch is that the media is recording the case or giving it the top priority only thill the guilty is brought to the book. But moment this happens the media forgets about it. The accused and the well connected take advantage of this very fact and they quitely move the court to he Supreme Court. Once admitted by the Court there are several ways of getting out and staying free. One way is to get bail, another way is as our honurable politician did.

The ways of playing with the system are many. It is only us who keep a blind eye to it and don't try to find out whats happening behind the scenes.

The Revenge of the Ego

Its appaling how at times people tend to underestimate you. Just the fact that you have not tried something before doesnot give one the liberty of underestimating your potential. In such circumstances as I have so aptly been in the recent past the mind behaves in a manner that I have presented in this post.

The first reaction is that of a non-believer. Mind resents or rather the ego resents you from believing what the other person is mentioning. This set your mood off and hence work takes a back seat and you would rather think about the reason for the underestimation.



The next phase is thus born in which your mind plays with your ego. It makes you believe that the other person is right and that there are things that you are not capable of. This state of mind is even more harmful for work and work becomes a thing of the past and huge workload piles up.
What follows is depression of why am I unable to do certain things. And the ego gets all its bruises in this phase when the mind reminds the ego of apt number of examples from the past as and when you had been unsuccessful.

When the ego has had its share of beating there comes its revenge of doing the same thing that you had been accussed that you are incapable of. And then when the challenge is set for the ego....and another one rises for the mind when it watches the ego taking over and completing the task. The new challenge for the mind is to find out reasons that led to your success and to praise the ego and to learn the lesson that is not to underestimate the ego.

The Official Head of the State, who's next?

The biggest debate at the moment is who will e the next President of India. A question that Dr. Rajendra Prasad would never have dreamed would be the hot topic for all kinds of opinion polls and debate shows. But the question is not who would be the next President but whether he would be someone with a political background or not.

For those who are not aware the President is elected by people's representatives. Simply putting it all members of the lower and upper houses of all the states as well as Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha vote to elect the President. The candidates well they are the candidates that are backed by political parties. So they not only choose the candidates but also elect the one they feel is best suited for the job.

Currently the people who are the biggest candidates (as in accordance to the various news channels) are namely:

1. Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam
2. Bhairon Singh Shekhawat
3. Somnath Chatterjee
4. A K Antony
5. Narayan Murthy (though not really)
6. Amartya Sen (similar as above)

A little details about the various candidates.

Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam, the person presently holding the post. Ideally the best man for the job and also the least likely to be elected (though I can bet that he may not even be put up as a candidate). An eminent scientist and probably the wisest of all the mentioned candidates. But sensing the atmosphere and being disgruntled over his hands being tied by the government during his tenure, he may simply just bow out of the office without even trying his luck at the office for a second term.

Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, the present Vice-President and an ex-BJP politician. He would like to continue the trend of Vice-Presidents converting into Presidents as in the past. Although an ex-BJP politician, has little chances of being the candidate of the BJP, who would like to back Abdul Kalam if he is interested. But Congress may agree to back him as their candidate.

Somnath Chatterjee, the present speaker of the Lok Sabha, he follows a popular following by various politicians and would probably be the choice candidate of Congress, if it doesnot back Shekhawat.

A K Antony, the current defence minister. Has just come on the national scene as a minister and has slim chances of being even proposed as a candidate. His "clean" image is probably his biggest USP.

Narayan Murthy, the ex-CEO of Infosys. A person that the Indian middle class idolises and is probably the person responsible for internationalising Bangalore. His recent stints and outspokenness against the government shows his interest towards the post i.e. he wants to be popular now.

Dr. Amartya Sen, a nobel laureate and an economist at par. But would not be interested for the job.

But whatever be the choiced candidate of the governement or the opposition, the government has surely learnt one thing amd i.e. not to let a person without any political leanings to the office. Taking the example of our present President, he defied all limits that previous Presidents had set. Kalam has had his set of confrontations eith the government but due to the limitations of the powers of the post has not been able to make much difference. But his activeness to make a difference is a lesson that should be learnt from.

He had defied the government and the system on various occasions by being an example. Seeing this the government has learnt its lesson and will try to curb such a situation in the future by not electing a "wise" President. But with him leaving the post the situation will again go back to what it was earlier.

The problem is that even though people try to set an example, a very few people learn from it. President Kalam had on many occasions sent out message to the general public through his speeches, his books etc. But the outcome I am not sure that there will be any. People will do their own jobs when he moves out of the office and some puppet of the government takes his place. The fact remains that people will not do anything to change the situation.

A CPI(M) M.P. vividly told a TV show host that who will bw the next President will be ours (the people in power) decision and nothing will change with you holding opinion polls and people sending SMSs to show their choice. He is right in a way. It is the fault of us, the urban middle class. We don't exercise our right to vote and worse we donot want to enter politics to make a change. The usual reply is that politics is a sewer, but my question is who is responsible in creation of this sewer. It is us. Not only we donot except our mistakes we keep on repeating it. Change doesnot happen on its own. If you can't change yourself please donot complain about the system, for the system is because of you and not the other way round.

Jai Hind!

Stranger than Fiction

Well this is an incident that happened to the grandfather of a friend. Now this man(the grandfather) was in service with the Indian Railways post independence. This incident occured when he was posted as a station master to a far off station in some village. I am not too sure of the geographical details but here is the story( I am going to tell the incident in first person)::

India was at war, yes it was the Indo-Pak war. The village was very deeply located, so deep that many people had forgotten about its existence. And those who did well the war had brought on too many things to help them forget of its existence. But well anyways I was posted here and doing my duty. Not many trains arrived or left the station, just a few goods train here and there and well a passenger train once in a while. The station was usually empty, and that was one of the reasons I was surprised to see this old man on the station this morning. He had a very expression-less, wrinkled face. You get to see more of wrinkles on the faces of villagers in India, partly due to the fact that they worked all day long in the fields and partly because thay had seen too many dreams getting squashed and too many promises made to them had been broken. But still hope lingered on.

Anyways this old villager in ragged and dirty clothes walked towards me. He had three pink coloured papers in his hand. Well these coloured papers were very commom these days and I recognised them very well, they were the telegrams. They were perhaps one of the ways that the headquarters could actually contact me since the nearest telephone was miles away. Anyway as he approached me, my eyes kept moving towards those telegrams, the source of all the good and sad news that need to be told immediately.

"Sahib", he called me, "could you please read these out to me." There were three telegrams in his wrinkled and sun-burnt hands. "Sure", I said. I took the telegrams from his hand and started reading them, inorder to understand and translate the contents to him in his native language. The first one read, "Regret to inform you the desmise of your son, Sp. Mahinder Singh STOP He died in action STOP." The second one read, "Regret to inform you the desmise of your son, Hav. Bhagat Singh STOP He died in action STOP." By the time I came to the third one my hands were already shivering. The third one read what I had feared "Regret to inform you the desmise of your son, Hav. Ram Singh STOP He died in action STOP." Now my whole body was shaking as the old man looked up expectantly towards me. How could I tell him such a heavy news. Nothing is more sad as news than to hear the news of the death of your son.

Keeping a control over my nerve I broke the news to him. I had expected him to break down or faint down. But nothing of that sort happened, he took the news unexpectadely well. I asked him if he was alright and and without any emotion in his voice, he replied while taking the telegrams from my hand, " I am alright Sahib, you need not worry. They have died for their country. I have lost three sons. But I have two more and am waiting expectedly so that they grow up soon so that they too can join the army." I was left speechless as the old man walked away.

The Great Indian Middle Class--??

Its been abt 7 to 8 years now since the economy actually opened up to foreign investments(although officially in 1994). Since the rise of number of opportunities in the Indian "MNC" industry there has been a rise in a totally new genre of people and section of the society. The timid Indian middle class has attained a much more high profiled and what the call a "great" status. This greatness is all due to the opportunities given to the middle class because of large number of jobs in the private sector. Now the rise in these jobs has sent a new message into the society, i.e. study well and get some great degrees to get tagged along with your name and you will have enough money to blow your minds off. Not realising that the work that they do is actually going for the upliftment and the profit of big corporations that are the native of some other country. But this should not bother them for the salary reaches into the bank account on the last day of the month.

But in all this money minting scenario somewhere this suddenly risen class has forgotten its roots. It tends to move away from its own lifestyle to that of the so called "western" lifestyle. Some people may be offenced by the name that I have given to the lifestyle. So being politically very correct I will name it as the "corporate" lifestyle. Now the basic feature of this corporate lifestyle is to work for 5 days a week and party for the rest of the week. The work part may not be true but the party factor is a must. For if you don't then you are outcasted (now this is a feature that my fellow country men or the whole world have not forgotten or can never be taken out of them) and considered wierd.

The great Indian middle class now prefers to spend off their holidays in a suttle and quiet place rather than sitting home. They tend to have forgotten the necessity to work for the society and to work to improve it. Ofcourse this scenario tends to naturally turn opposite if you get a chance to be on the Page 3 of a famous daily. But the point is if you are earning all the money that you could not even have dreamed of then please make it a poiunt to give something back to society. For it is this society that has helped you rise and provided you with what you call the basic ammenities. Work towards making a difference rather than just sitting ona beach and sipping martinis and enjoying your weekend.

Candle in the Storm

Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamaare dil mein hai
Dekhna hai zor kitna baazu-e-qaatil mein hai

Karta nahin kyun doosra kuch baat-cheet
Dekhta hun main jise woh chup teri mehfil mein hai
Aye shaheed-e-mulk-o-millat main tere oopar nisaar
Ab teri himmat ka charcha ghair ki mehfil mein hai
Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamaare dil mein hai

Waqt aanay dey bata denge tujhe aye aasman
Hum abhi se kya batayen kya hamare dil mein hai
Khainch kar layee hai sab ko qatl hone ki ummeed
Aashiqon ka aaj jumghat koocha-e-qaatil mein hai
Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamaare dil mein hai

Hai liye hathiyaar dushman taak mein baitha udhar
Aur hum taiyyaar hain seena liye apna idhar
Khoon se khelenge holi gar vatan muskhil mein hai
Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamaare dil mein hai

Haath jin mein ho junoon katt te nahi talvaar se
Sar jo uth jaate hain voh jhukte nahi lalkaar se
Aur bhadkega jo shola-sa humaare dil mein hai
Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamaare dil mein hai

Hum to ghar se nikle hi the baandhkar sar pe kafan
Jaan hatheli par liye lo bhar chale hain ye qadam
Zindagi to apni mehmaan maut ki mehfil mein hai
Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamaare dil mein hai

Yuun khadaa maqtal mein qaatil kah rahaa hai baar baar
Kya tamannaa-e-shahaadat bhi kisee ke dil mein hai
Dil mein tuufaanon ki toli aur nason mein inqilaab
Hosh dushman ke udaa denge humein roko na aaj
Duur reh paaye jo humse dam kahaan manzil mein hai

Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamaare dil mein hai.
Dekhna hai zor kitna baazuay qaatil mein hai.

Whenever I go through these lines I am constantly reminded of the hundreds of martyrs who gave up their life for the independence of the country. The things that they did to get independence. When I talk of these martyrs then I talk of the ones who were not recognised for their effort and have been long forgotten. Theres a very famous quote probably by Ashfaqulla Khan. It says:

Shahidon ki mazaron per lageinge har baras mele,
Watan per mitne walon ka baaki namo nishan hoga,
Agar yeh samajh sake,
Toh samjhoge kyun maine hai kurban hona sikha,
Kyun maine hai kurban hona sikha.

These lines send a chill down my spine. I am actually appalled as to how noone cares about them any more. I share similar kind of sentiment as these martyrs and similar kind of love for my country. But its really sad to see people around me who couldn't care less. They are just worried about their salary and ways to increase it. But its not their fault as well. All of us have actually inherited freedom and have every right to take it for granted.

Me, how can I turn a blind eye to things that are so wrong. Corruption has infested every level of the infrastructure of our country. Who will free it from this cancer. No one is willing to move forward and try to make a difference. They all call the bureaucracy and politics a gutter but no one wants to clean it, simply denying the fact that somehow somewhere they themselves, all of us, are responsible for the state the country is in.

Its simply disheartening at times to move in a direction where no one accompanies you. But then I try to remember these martyrs and this encourages me that they(the martyrs) will always be there in spirit with me. I am actually encouraged by the extreme love that these people felt for the country, something that I have started feeling more and more as i try to move towards my goal.

Jai Hind!

Religious Perceptions

Well here is a conversation between me (Kapil) and Madman...Sorry for the irregularity in use of punctuation and proper grammar...as it has been taken up right from chat logs.

Madman: mornin kapil., do we get to the religious boundary now?

Me: well my thoughts on religion can well be explained by the quote::"Religion is for those who believe in hell and spritualism for those who have been there!!!"

Madman: nice quote.,in a way U hav shut me up.,but I aint gonna let tht happen.,U wnt do drugs cuz U promised someone makes complete sense.,its gud for ur health too.,but U get religion into this too..

Me: well not me.....had it not been for my mother i wouldn't have kept my hair as well.....well religion comes in b/w 'coz my mother believes in religion and its boundaries not me

Madman: ahaan.,so U do it cuz of her.,n U see the kinda risk Ur gettin urself into.,once U succumb .,U enhance the expectations.,but on the other hand U can have ur way from now on since U can claim that U do certain things for them.,I tried gettin into this trap but cudn.,so got a hair cut.,this route was easier for me..

Me: well sometimes the easier and convinient path is not always the best....well more than anything i have started believing in relationships that actually matter...i can and will do anything my parents ask me to do whether my personal beliefs are against the request is a separate thing all together.....i may decline the request if i feel strongly against it but then if by doing certain things one can actually make a person happy and i dont find anything totally offensive against it then i might as well do it.

Madman: Is this not an escapist route then?

Me: is it? I ask you by actually makin someone happy and smile makes me an escapist....let me put it this way....i believe that there is nothin purer than a relationship between a man and his mother....a mother would never seek something harmful for her children... i may not believe in religion but don't have anythin against it as well.... I believe it is good that religion is there to some extent it keeps a control over the animal called man.....Although it may at times provoke the animal as well when religion takes the face of riots but then my guess is that ppl need riots and wars to make them feel that they are alive.....and so they go and get it

Madman: escapist in the way., that even if Ur correct wit ur belief n thought process U readily change it.,I never understand the logic behind the same, but that is how most parents like to perform.,they love to compromise n try to force us for the same..another., the reason why I am being so straight forward in the talk is cuz I m assuming that Ur open to this conversation.,if at any point U feel offensive or confused lemme knw

Madman: well U have put forward ur point really well.,n wat U say abt a mother is true., she wont harm Us.,but the deal is she decides most things on the basis of her upbriniging.,.wat worked for her mite not work for U.,and as far as religion is concerned., i think it shud be by choice n not forced.,happiness is again a debatable issue.,the thing from wat I knw abt my father,he is way too religious.,n most religious tend to philosophize most other peopl on the basis on religion.,my father wud have talked a lot abt religion and at times maybe taunted some peopl in the society.,as n wen I grow up.,he starts feelin insecure.,in my age gropu of say 18 - 24 .,that I mite get a hair cut., start trimming my beard., n peopl mite start givin him the same bull shit ( religious lessons ) that he gave them.,sole idea of religion is make U a good human.,someone good in deeds n at heart., and to metruth and abiding by the truth is more important than praying every mornin.,U can take it this way .,i believe in religion., but i am against religions

Me: well my beliefs are somewhat opposite....what i feel is that parents expect their children to do things that they could't achieve themselves.....At another end there is a continuous feeling of keeping their children close to themselves.....somewhere in their hearts they know that all their beliefs in religion etc. are somewhat society bound. But at the same time they know this as well that anything or anyone against the society is generally crushed..... Being aware of all this they continuously feed their children of morals that are adherent to the society....this is all because of the love that they have for you....they are scared for you....all this is beautifully potrayed in the lyrics of the song "Mother" by Pink Floyd in their album "The Wall"

Madman: ahaan., interesting put forward again.,U in a way summarize the insecurities parents go thru..,and in a way brief their reasons behind their actions.,

Me: Well what ppl dont understand is that praying is not something to be done as they say "religiously" but the most important thing is to understnad what the person, who wrote the religious teachings actually meant and then try to remind yourself everyday of that and try to abide by that......And just for the record my parents had given me the choice of trimmin my beard but i didn't coz i knew in the end its not what they wanted.....my mother is somewhat way too religious but my dad is much like me....'coz he is more experienced and knows how to handle things tactfully n to make ppl bend in favour of his points in the end...

Madman: how do U decide as to wen our thinkin is inspired.,or is it always inspired?

Me: Well depends.....at times I feel it is inspired all the time by either your experiences or someone influential in your life...but then I guess all this in the end adds up to only your perceptions.....even to think that our thinking is inspired might just be a perception....perhaps a perception that the person who inspired you has a thinking so deep.....but never underestimate your brain...its the best and the worst thing you got, depending upon how you utilise it....but one thing is for sure, you think of one thing but then it depends upon you what direction do you give it......

Madman: interesting but no complete.,n the reason being.,U give me all possibilities.,n the problem here is to define authenticity.,wat U say can be summarised this way.,humans discover most of the things n not invent them

Me: somewhat...yea...in the beginning it is discovery but who knows in the end lies an invention

If life were a song??

If life was a song what would I be…? Or rather which song will most aptly apply to my life(uptil now)? Well there can be different aspects to this point as well. What quality of the song are you looking at? Is it the lyrics, perhaps tempo or may be even music? Well if its total music quality then probably it would be Layla(unplugged) by Eric Clapton. Well the best reason I can think of is that even though the lyrics are totally in contrast to the music. Well if I base my judgment on the basis of lyrics then the best I can think of is Learning to Fly by Pink Floyd. The lyrics are as below:

Into the distance, a ribbon of black
Stretched to the point of no turning back
A flight of fancy on a windswept field
Standing alone my senses reeled
A fatal attraction holding me fast, how
Can I escape this irresistible grasp?

Can’t keep my eyes from the circling skies
Tongue-tied and twisted just an earth-bound misfit, I

Ice is forming on the tips of my wings
Unheeded warnings, I thought I thought of everything
No navigator to guide my way home
Unladened, empty and turned to stone

A soul in tension that’s learning to fly
Condition grounded but determined to try
Can’t keep my eyes from the circling skies
Tongue-tied and twisted just an earth-bound misfit, I

Above the planet on a wing and a prayer,
My grubby halo, a vapour trail in the empty air,
Across the clouds I see my shadow fly
Out of the corner of my watering eye
A dream unthreatened by the morning light
Could blow this soul right through the roof of the night

There’s no sensation to compare with this
Suspended animation, a state of bliss
Can’t keep my eyes from the circling skies
Tongue-tied and twisted just an earth-bound misfit, I



The song in itself makes me think only of life. How there is a continuous process of learning to fly or rather learning to live life……I will try to describe my interpretation of the lyrics of the song.

The first paragraph describes how you look forward for happiness into the future and move towards it till you move to a point of no turning back. You are all alone in the battle of life. What keeps me going….a fatal attraction to play with life…..learn about it or try to make interpretations about it based on my own experience. Can I escape this irresistible grasp?

But I can’t keep myself out of it(life). So I play it through with its own, unmentioned but underlying rules…..I am tongue-tied i.e. I may cry foul but still my prayers fall on deaf ears. So what do I become…..an earth bound misfit.

I move on and what do I see, unforeseen circumstances…but I thought, I thought of everything!!! Is there anybody who can help me…no.
But I am a fighter who wants to just learn to fly……even if things are against me….can’t just let the distant dream move away….but still feel somewhat out of place!!!!

And if I am good enough I succeed and man what a sensation it is…(am not in quite a position to explain this as have not been there yet!!!)

But this is what I feel life will be all about!!!

The boo hoo around victimization and the judicial system.

I was watching this debate last night on tv on one of the news channels. It hosted a lot of prominent personalities like Kiran Bedi, C J Thakker(ex – CJI) etc. The debate was about whether the people should react as the lawyers of the Ghaziabad court did in the Pandher case. There were a lots of points exchanged. The debate also included an audience of the “victims” of the Indian Judicial System.
There were a lot of interesting views exchanged. Some of them I have mentioned below:

1.”How many people here in the audience know about the Police reforms proposed by the Supreme Court rulings of September 11 and January 22.”
-Kiran Bedi on being asked the shortcomings in police role in the Nithari killings.
2. “The change has to be made at the core of the system.”
- C J Thakker
3. ”The women killed Yadav because he was released on bail 14 time and he had raped 22 women. And such incidents will happen again.”
- A social activist from Nagpur who was defending the action of 5 women who had killed a serial rapist in court.
4. ”Why is there time to attend to high profile cases and not the regular ones.”
-Barkha Dutt
5. ”Its been 10 years that I have been waiting for justice, this is despite the fact the Supreme Court in its ruling had put forward to dispose off the case by 2002.”
- A victim and a mother of one of the victims of the Upahar cinema.
6. ”Do you know how the rape victims have to go through when the appear in Punjab and Harayana High Court?”
- A victim and a mother of one of the victims of the Upahar cinema.

This discussion got me thinking again. And I thought of the following points:


Whenever such cases (Nithari killings) come up the blame game starts up. The people blaming the police. The police blames the judicial system and finally the blame lands on the politicians as in this case as well. Except here there was no representative from the politics side, so as expected the whole blame landed on them. We as a country are all responsible for any of such negligence. Isn’t it true that the accused has come out from one among us the “society”. They all talk about improving the system but you can’t change the system unless you try to become a part of the system. Is it not true that you will grab the first opportunity that comes your way to cheat the system for your own personal gain? If you want to improve the system first improve yourself. Stop taking the easy way out!!

There was an argument that such examples of taking law in your own hands as in the case of Ghaziabad is just the beginning of many such cases to come. That the middle class society is now arming itself for a future revolution against the system. But my thoughts are otherwise. According to me people do not care as to what happens to others and the attitude is such that its not our problem unless it happens to us. And when it eventually happens we all cry foul and cry for victimization. Tell me how many of us will be willing to carry a man hurt in an accident and lying on the road to the hospital. We all believe in social activism, such a simple and hip word isn’t it. But wearing a kurta and jeans and walking around with a jholla is not social activism.
Social activism begins with being socially aware and then followed being socially active. You have to become a responsible citizen first and then wait for results rather than becoming a “victim” first and then striving for social justice.