गरीबी मत हटाओ

It may be a few months if not more for the elections but I've made up my mind. I'm going to vote for the party whose hidden agenda is to increase the economic divide between the haves and the have-nots! A counter argument to this point can actually be that each one is at it from 1947... Do I really have to rack my brains??

That's not the point though, I was struck by this *evil* thought, just as I was relaxing on my couch after a strenous couple of hours of house cleaning...

Lets face it... the reason that 24 hours a day are sufficient for us (after deducting 9 hours at work, 7 hours sleep, 2 hours food, 1 hour of other essentials and so on) is because someone is actually doing the so-called dirty work for us. It actually feels like I'm refering to some mafiosi organization... But our lives are more affected by the absence of the maid servant than they are by say anyone!!

Can you even imagine the scenario if the garibi actually goes away?

It'll be just as bad as the western countries... Even worse actually because of the excessive pollution and dust... I mean doing your own dishes, cleaning up your own house. Yikes!!

It's bad enough that our youth is spending their precious nights in office doing the dirty work for others... If we have to start doing our own dirty work... It'll feel like being in Nepal or Bangladesh or some such 4th/5th world country!

This should never happen. We need economic divide to stay... That's the only sure-shot way to happiness!

Cheers!

What did you do over the weekend?

One of the things that I hate about Monday is answering that question which everyone seems to be asking everyone else... What did you do over the weekend? What did you do over the weekend? Most of the times those who have actually had an exciting weekend (in relative terms) end up harassing the other majority who basically just saw 2 days go past!

I’ll tell you what I’ve been doing over the weekend… Nothing!

There should really some note put up that I'm in this state of weekend nothing-ness till the time I announce otherwise. But seriously speaking its not easy to do nothing... As good as impossible!

Well... I cannot do nothing over the weekend because in the process of doing nothing even if I do anything, it amounts to doing something which actually contradicts everything!

And even if I did anything which would sound as if I did something but in reality it was really nothing and that was the everything I did, I wouldn't share that with you because by knowing that there is actually someone who has done nothing would make you happy for something you did which was as good as nothing otherwise.

But what we fail to understand is that this nothing, something, anything are all relative entities whose definition depends on time and space. Today's something can be tomorrow's nothing and a nothing in one place can actually amount to something somewhere else & so on...

You guessed it right... Today I have nothing to do!

Cheers!

Nuke, I am your Father!

New Terms in Diction: Nuke, I am your Father!

Meaning: A proposition/deal which in the short term seems like a lucrative, profitable, alluring, fantastic venture, in the long term is an over-bearing, forceful, dominating, big-brotherly behavior which you’ll be subjected to. Though it seems like you’re being hailed as an equal it merely means you’ve got a NEW Daddy, which by any stretch of imagination is never a good thing!

Usage: LN Mittal announces to Arcelor employees, "We'll be aligning synergies and ensuring a bright and secure future together. Nuke, I am your Father!"

Source: News on the Loose (A News Parody Programme), CNBC-TV18

Picturisation: From here starts my original composition... I picturised George Bush in the Darth Vader suit fighting Manmohan Singh with lightsabers on a nuclear reactor thing or something. It is quite fitting that Bush carries on his tradition of adding new terms to the diction and adds this killer line. I'm not sure whether to classify this as a Bush-ism since it's not actually dumb! On this revelation, Singh actually starts dancing hysterically and hugs the Darth Vader. He's so thrilled and engrossed with the celebration that his own lightsaber chops off his LEFT hand!

For the uninitiated: For those who haven't seen Star Wars and don't know what the hell was this post about then here's the wiki to the Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back. And this is how the original sequence went...

...Vader and Luke's fierce lightsaber duel brings them to a narrow platform above the city's central air shaft. After gaining the advantage, Vader cuts off Luke's dueling hand along with his lightsaber. With Luke cornered and defenseless, Vader informs Luke that he does not yet know the truth about his father. Luke claims that Vader killed him.

Vader answers: “Luke, I am your father.”

Luke screams in denial. Vader tries to persuade Luke to join him, embrace the Dark Side of the Force. Luke refuses, lets go, and falls off the platform into the abyss, signifying that he would rather die than join him...

Cheers!

Is Left Right?

It's immaterial what I think about the Left front's ultimatum to the PM and the Government about the civil nuke deal with the US. However I do believe that the country has a right to know what it is committing to. The country or even the Parliament has no idea about what the deal is, how it is going to affect the lives of Indians. We're having diametrically opposite statements made by the US and India regarding the bill. What is happening?

Let's not get into a nuclear deal much the way we elect our President. This is actually an important issue!

From what I've read a bit in the media (not the most reliable medium for getting to know the truth) is how India's nuclear power production is going to go from XXX KW to YYY KW. How India is going to get access to the NSG etc. There is a list of benefits which the PM is stressing on but these are the main couple of points.

I have a few questions... Is this deal with the United States or The Red Cross Society? I mean... Why is the US ready to enter an agreement where India is the only (apparent) beneficiary? What is the US interest in this move? Is it technology contracts worth billions in an under-developed country? Is it nuclear disarmament or adherence to CTBT and NPT? Is it strategic interests in the South Asian region? What is agreement 123? Isn't there a need to table such a deal in Parliament? The US Congress had a discussion pertaining to this deal but we, who is the more significantly affected party, cannot have it?

I don't know what the reasons given by the left front for their stand are. I don't listen to opinion of groups/ideologies I don't care about. But sometime in life, much like in an objective Mathematics exam just the final answer matters.

It has led me to believe that may be this time the left is right!

Cheers!

Independence Day

Disclaimer: I'm writing this post with all due respect to those great men and women who laid down their lives to free our country from colonial rule.

Quite frankly I dont think we got independence on 15th August 1947. A mere change of hand-cuffs doesn't mean we're free. Even wasn't the situation in our case. It was a mere change in the hand which held the keys. We were no different than we were under our former rulers. In fact we were actually worse off in quite a few aspects. This was no independence.

We achieved independence, though quite accidentally I must add, on 24th July 1991. That was the day when we were reborn. It was as if a 44 year old nation had been "put-to-sleep" and the phoenix had risen from the ashes.

Just like I fail to understand the scenario pre-1947, the future generations will be bemused on hearing the tales of license raj and other legends of the pre-1991 era. I don't even want to recollect those dark-ages or write about things which are now gone for good.

Independence is a slow process since it takes generations to change the attitude towards everything. The knowledge of being independent cannot bring about a sudden attitudinal change overnight. The shifts are pronounced if a comparison of the attitudes of those born in 1930s, 1950s, 1970s and 1990s is to be made and responses are to be noted when each of them was 20 years old. A lot more change is yet to come.

It is only now that we have started seeing the sprouts of the seeds we had sown in 1991.

The most difficult part of being independent is indeed not being dependent in thought. Harping about our drawbacks and have a indifferent approach towards the country isn't the solution. Every nation has it's pain points but nations don't cure pain-points, citizens do! Only the future generations born in the self-confident India which doesn't really need acknowledgement from someone else to realize it's ability, which doesn't hide behind five thousand years of tradition and culture to prove it's greatness will do justice to this country. This is still not the case.

It may not happen anytime soon. It may take quite a few years but one day it will happen. That is the India I dream about. That is the India which those men and women who laid down their lives for our freedom dreamt about. That is the India worth working towards. Cynics would obviously scoff at this but the nation is finally awakening to it's true potential and that is a reality. It's only a matter of time before each citizen feels as proud to declare that he's an Indian!

I had written a more elaborate article but cut it short because it's time has not yet come. May be some Independence Day few years down the line I'll post my complete thoughts on this. For now, I'm just glad I'm here to build a nation which will be great some day!

Jai Hind!