Random reflections

Coming through a lower class locality in Delhi was revealing. A little kid, barely 7 or 8 came pulling the rickshaw carrier. Empty plastic cans at the back and the lad was just going almost half way down on each side to complete the circle. More child self-bread earners washing dirty plates by a kulche stall. It was early in the morning and instead of getting breakfast before going to school they were earning their tit-bits. Littlest of lids taking a bath at a public tap after a late night stint at the eating point. Childhood had withered in them. These were dhaba boys. Getting their skins hardened with antisocial strains...fed by the scorns and abuses of their merciless masters. Well Delhi has so much to cheer about....but far more to ponder about sadly.

                                                    **********

Thank God life is not just a smooth road, taking us uninterestingly to a plain destination! Guys be thankful that it is pot-holed and bumpy. The vehicle of our life gets jolts and jerks which are in fact the lifelines for our material being. It tests the vehicle of our being. The latter responds and this see-saw battle releases energy for the engine of our survival. So guys if your road appears bumpier than others, just feel the sea-storm of energy your system is creating not just for your own survival but for the common cause of creation and survival at the universal level as well. As a struggler you contribute far more to a great unseen cause than it appears on the common plain of our material existence.

                                                 ************

There are times when our long-held beliefs sound untrue. It is however just a smoke-screen. If we just project our hands over our eyes and try to look into the haze with a bit of more focused look, we will see the faded glow of the sun of reality. It not only consolidates the beliefs very close to our soul, but allows more perspectives to our struggle to see through the cloud. Long-held beliefs are generally true. Their mere survival around the epicenter of our being authenticates their validity. Temporary ones just glow for a short time and fade out in jerks. So do not allow you long-held beliefs to die or fade out during the periods of crisis. Believe it or not, they are like life-belts tied to our endangered selves during the sea-storm.

God: Beaten and Banished

God comes to me in my dream (or was I awake early in the morning, I am not sure) and says, ‘Seem to have gathered lots of guts these days fella. U no longer cringe before me like earlier. Don’t pamper me through daily worship anymore. Why have you changed all of a sudden son?' 'No I haven't changed Old Man! My present is born of those penanceful meditations I did before your stony avatar for years on end,' I said softly. But God was visibly irritated. Even at this early time in the morning, when all His statues and stones were being bathed with milk, dahi, scented with perfumes, getting redecorated for another hard day in office. 'No you have certainly changed!' His tone harsh. 'No Sir! Earlier I was just doing my duty like a helpless beggar. Constantly haggling, bickering with you. Bombarding you with relentless questions from across the fragrant smell of incense. Darkness spread around me even though the lamp of my faith lit by me flickered and tried to light my path and show me the way out of my pathetic situation. But there I sat like a donkey on its dirty ass....floundering...falling....running helter-skelter,' I had almost tears in my eyes. 'So you think that was in vain!' God was still terser this time. 'No Sir...no plz....for heavens sake...don't jump to such early conclusions...It’s humanly to make such a judgment. I mean that my present shape was begotten only on the anvil of those very moments. At least I considered right and wrong parameters while I sat before thy Scriptures. And spending a lot of time in Puja saves you from putting you head in earthly shit. It gives you the heavenly fragrance and a dream to get blessings by you.' 'Mark your words well fella...you seem to make comments on me....,' His eyes had started to burn now as if I was some demon on my path to shake the religiodom and His status. 'Plz mighty father...plz...am I worthy of disturbing you so much as to make your eyes fiery like this,' I pleaded remembering well from those TV serials when supernatural powers of Gods burned the daityas to ashes. Humans are humans after all. If those very Gods whom you have been trying to appease for so long show you eyes instead of giving their blessings straightaway to prove their powers, then you feel irritated. Well, my dear human beings don't think that I commit a sin here. I just prove my human status by getting irritated with God for showing such a human tendency. So I also got my own share of humanly fire in my eyes. 'Mr. God I was always right in my suspicions that even your powers have been diluted during the present Kaliyuga age. You too are afraid of the bad ones who cock a snook at you and never ever put feet in a temple...nor spare even the least time for you out of their immensely fruitful time in worldly success and pursuits. You just act to scare weak ones who are ever pleading by your temple gates. And now you get offended with me because I too have been gaining some irreligious muscles.' Dear o dear, I never intended to speak in such hot terms to my once0-dear-God. But his humanly behaviour facilitated my becoming a bit overconfident of my newly gained worldly muscles. Here I threw a challenge to him. 'Do u have the guts to even disturb the sleep of Mr. ---(sorry cannot name the fellow because I fear him even more than the God I am arguing with) who has been to nasty things till a moment ago and is now spread out as a robust stud....can u…,' God became even angrier. His facial expression told me man. I got a bit scared. Man is still more fearsome these days. At least God is supposed to have some limits to indecency. With man you just cannot take the chance. 'These days you just scare weaklings who throng your citadels in the blind hope of getting redemption,' my courage was dangerously hurtling towards a pernicious peak. His hand tightly squeezed the thunderbolt he was holding. OMG! Sorry have been used to blurt out this latest crazy phrase about him, the God! So in order to avoid sounding to plead I stopped it somehow from escaping out of my scared guts. But then if God is really God then he is not supposed to be aware of all these slangs doing rounds on earth. ‘Oh My God’ I won’t say at any cost. So I took my chance with OMG in a low, half-afraid voice, staring at the supernatural weapon in his hand. 'OMG!!!' I blurted in a strange voice. Lo man! Even God gets his moments of self-doubt. His grip loosened around the weapon. I took my chance. ‘That is not justified God…it just isn't done…you wander around to clobber human beings with this mighty weapon of yours. Be a man when you are dealing with man,’ I baulked. Like a real man he dropped his demon-slayer. I salute you man! Everything is fair in love and war, they say. All love lost between us, we had war staring us. Believe me I would have preferred to fight him as God instead of a plain human. But anger takes us in strange directions. Out of his majestic, divine aura he jumped out like a worldly being...ready to crush me like a worm. Having flexed my muscles I had no chance of a retreat. Self-respect man...it has to work even if it gives you a few broken bones. 'Well, I hope his ruffled soul will be satisfied ones he gives bone-rattling blows. After all, at the core he is still God...cannot be demon and murderer,' I counted my hopes on this presumption. Man...he was still powerful...even in manly avatar! He gave such a nasty blow in my groin. I cried foul, ‘This is not allowed man.’ Really he was the man…in pain I called him such. In terrible pain, I gave a swipe at his legs. God is God after all man...it takes few really serious blows to even think of hitting any of his other parts. He was agile like a cat. 'The God of cats!' I cursed meaning to hurt him through words now that I had failed to do with my blow. By non-God! That was self-injurious! He roared like a lion and gave such a feisty blow in my ribs that I fell like a log. Element of surprise! That’s what I was thinking while his proud figure approached me. I pretended to be faint. His vaunting figure approached me, prodded my body like a cat pawing a dead mouse. God as a man you are not omniscient, I mused. He was standing oblivious to my plans. 'Yes God when you decide to come down for man to man duels…be ready for humanly surprises as well,' I pounced up like a still better cat and hit him as hard as I could. God grimaced with pain. In that momentary phase of a temporary victory I mused, 'God...the painless, attributeless entity...now feel what it means...the pain...feel the feeling to be a human being!’ But even in his humanly avatar you cannot keep God in that position for too long. He fired on all cylinders. Do not worry humans…I too gave a valiant fight. For his 10 mighty blows I gave 1 mild one. For his big blood-drawing gnawings at my skin, I gave at least visible bruises on his holy skin. But God cannot be a murderer man...he just cannot. So my presumption was OK. 'I will force you to commit a sin of murderer!’ I was adamant. He was thinking that after some time my pains will force me to plead for mercy. 'He will be the same tamed devotee,' he must have been thinking when he degraded himself to the status of a common human being just to satisfy his ego. But I was a tough nut to crack. Knowing that he cannot kill me, I took my guts to extreme and clung to him like a mad dog. I clung with so much force that the only escape route for him would have been slaying me right there. 'You fool why do u want to die at my hands?' he sounded pleading. 'God why in the first place you should have so much of time to disturb early in the morning a former daily puja paaath vaalah of yours? At least I had stopped haggling you with my beseechings. I had decided to take care of my own interests by developing a few muscles. And this you find irreligious1,' I blurted. 'But this is wrong path son,' human-God became a bit emotional. Damn it, wrong path, if this is wrong then who is right there in the world presently. All successful people are doing this Mr. God! He let me go and sat brooding in a corner. His hair disheveled and the Godly aura totally missing. Scratch marks faintly visible on his face as a testimony of his worldly war. I also brought up my bashed up bloody body and came to him. I appeared smashed and meshed up at the physical level only; he but sounded meshed more seriously at many higher levels. My heart melted for him. The invincible God sitting so dejected in the corner of my filthy room. 'Do not be so sad God!' I consoled. 'If a weak and helplessly pleading-before-you-worshipper is better than a muscled social lion ready to take on this world on his own terms, then I need to seriously rethink my new-found logic.' 'No son...you are within your rights to take on this world on your on terms...I should not dictate terms in this regard. Anyways now I do realize that humans no longer need me to lead their lives in the modern times,' he was teary-eyed. 'Yaa Old Man its better that you leave we humans to decide our fate on our terms now. And do not feel dejected. You started all this and for thousands of years you have been taking so much of pains for your creations’ cause. You need rest now old man.' 'Ya you are right man, I am no longer required. A weakling like you gives me such a tough fight. I fear if I continue meddling in you peoples' affairs then some real bad one even might slay me some day,' he realized. So without caring for this world anymore he bid adieu to take rest somewhere in cosmic cave and I stood there as the first person having the knowledge that it indeed was a Godless world now.                 

Friends and Foes

My time slips out of my pocket and takes vicious circles around me. Its horrible whizzing leaves me in a maddening frenzy. I run around and around to catch it. It leaves me dizzy...drunk....dead. I open my eyes to find it still buzzing around like a nasty bug. Well..I will definitely try to get my buddy time safely in my pocket.

Time now runs back...fastly in reverse mod. I run out of my present skin to catch up with it. Well both of us might crash into a muddy gutter. or worse into a bottomless well out of which it might b impossible to come out!

Well fall into a gutter any way...nd come out like fools...muddy...dirty. Grinning at each other. He blames me and I him. And then we fight. He is worth hi ba*** this time buddy of mine. Fool pinces me down where my nose has no business to be in..into a shit. I plead for mercy. He lets me go. Bt man see what you have done to me!

Man u r no longer my time, I say. I hve nvr been anybody's, the idiot beams. Bt I thought u were my buddy. Dnt cry red-nosed fool, he consoles wiping the shit off my face. Anyway I am nvr fools and weakling's friend. At the mst I can e a slave. I like strong masters not soft buddies. I am paranormal..those who lynch me most..i like the most.

Well this is a revelation man. Time u fool. now i give u what u deserve most. A hard punch..and that too on ur nose and make it meshed up even more than mine. I do the same...hard..bloody. It staggers falls down...gets up slowly.. embraces me nd says..oya man u r worth ur ba***.

Now we walk forward. Tired...dirty..shit nd blood on our faces. V can no longer run..only walk with failing strength. He supports me and I support him. Well forced to support each other. We hesitate...initially support each other with cold hearts. A fight is after all a fight man...it takes time to forget bloody noses.

U fool why in the first place u escaped out of my pocket to run wild like this and that too in reverse mod. It grins...wiping blood and shit off its face...I put out my hanky with sympathy...It gets teary eyes. U were killing me man, it weeps. U were jst busy flaunting ur status that time is my best buddy and doing nothing in practice. So jst felt like giving u a hard run.

Snake

I came across a brown-eyed human snake. A kashmiri pandit. More venomous than any kobra in the world! He just knowns how to bite...instinctively like all the slithery reptiles of his species. Its just impossible to come across a more spiteful person. It is simply your folly to expect a friendly kiss from a snake...the helpless creature is bound to bite only. Well, I wish he should have stayed back in the valley and try to bite militants there...he would have been very effective in waging war against the scourge of terrorism there..

Sun playing hide and seek behind clouds..humid air wispily telling a smart secret..land lying languidly; its pining thirst quenched by sky's countless kisses and love-drops..a dove pair mating lost in the silent majesty of innocence and peaceful nature!! Life can be far far better provided we have the eyes to spot such marvelous ecstasies adoring the stage set around us. Be at ease with the universal harmony..the  ultimate melody will certainly reach your ears.    

Rivers and we share a great symmetry in our life flows. During youthful stage, a river full of energy cuts through the mountainous rocks. It is vigorous, torrential, fast, furious. adamant about its path. Aren't we like that as well in our youth? Then middle age sets in. During this phase the pace gets mellowed down. Through flood plains it takes gentle curves, meanders, building its reputation on the sediments cut in youth from hardest rocks. The flow is at ease with itself. There is comfort, peace. Then the final drowning of its existence in the sea. So in youth gurgle with enthusiasm. Tear apart as much sediments as you can. It will be after all the material for you middle life flood plains when other types of responsibilities set in on this fertile ground. 

Corporate career

Corporate career is great..it keeps you on razor's edge. You are forced to grow your skills at all levels. But it's dissipating as well..it saps you in the long run. So its always advisable to slowly built an alternate pedestal in the medium term--say for the nest 5/10 years--so that when things get too hot in your present position you can easily jump onto that one. This new platform can be based on the real passion. So while you are toiling it out against your real interests, don't get frustrated. Its a sort of investment for future. Just cling to your dream. Keep your dream alive. Slowly and systematically chalk out a medium term plan..invest time and money in moderate amounts and when the things ARE RIPE jump onto your creation.

Yamuna

Well Delhi is a stinking hell...undoubtedly. Look at Yamuna...its just a big drain of mucking filth and sewage. Monsoon...it kisses its dirty, pugnacious, purple-faced layer...the facepack....nutritious sand from the hills. A new avatar...Yamuna the holy river....but for how long? Just for  a month at the most! After that its again the same sad drainage. The name but prevails...from road nd railway bridges people throw coins...it blesses them..blesses like the uncomplaining mother....all forgiving...all pious...

Donky

I think it always (without exception) helps not to lose your temper. When you lose your temper, you not only deprive somebody’s chances for more happiness; you in fact deprive yourself of the same. So why fall in the trap of such a bad bargain. If nobody gains anything out of it (except perhaps that hypothetical and flimsy enemy of ours, called “ego”) why invest in such a loser scheme?  —Sandeep Dahiya

                                       *******

May be there is a fixed quota of suffering in the cosmic account book of karma to be doled out to the humanity. If that be the case then feel proud for bearing the heavier load from the destiny’s side, while so many others trudge ahead with unjustifiably lighter weights on their shoulders. Feel proud that God considers you as a tough guy capable of handling the issues on the wrong side of the fence. While you sweat it out with the larger issues, possibly your each and every step paves the road for some easy stroll by a frail fellow human being. Just carry on mighty guys! No use in browbeating now! You have been chosen for breaking the tough nut so that many a weak teeth can munch survival crumbs.    —Sandeep Dahiya

Happy New Year

I sing a hymn for the departure of this year. It deserves full honours. Premature welcome notes and hasty obituaries are seldom feasible. So I pray for the dying year and try to recall how much I m to be blamed for its death!!!

India Shines

A cow—dung-smeared and fat on garbage diet—was busy in eating the stenching muck of a colony’s garbage house. Devoid of the entire mythical aura it appeared a big pig just munching the leftovers! A well-off gentleman stopped his car, pulled out a chapatti, offered it to the humble and forgiving creature and fulfilling his quota of religiosity sped away! Hats off holy mother! Even though we have forced you to eat garbage, you still give us a chance to fulfill our fleeting religious duties.

A poor man’s daughter, beautiful in her own way, was singing in a bus. The slate pieces tucked in her fingers chimed with melody as she sang a beautiful melancholic song! When it came to rewards, peoples’ reaction made it appear like she was begging. See the badness of this world, a girl, an artist, a daughter losing respect in a crowd of we relatively well off idiots!

We are the polluters. Just see the rivers of kaliyuga we create. The poison, black, muddy and stanching flowing into the guts of our holy rivers! Where is Ganga? No its not there! We have killed it.

Cow, women, holy rivers—we have just dome irreversible damage to their once holy status. Shame!!!

Democracy

What is more democratic? Just clinging to a particular family or putting down a patriarch who totally formulated the present avatar of a big national party? I think BJP has paid a huge respect to the Indian masses by asking Advani to go. Can Congress do the same if they also fail twice consequently?

I beg to say no to this! In India Nehru family is virtually the definition of Congress. Peoples’ emotions have been put on a stranglehold by erecting a well-functioning system of loyalists ever-oiling the causes of first political family in the country. Accept it or not its impossible to think of Congress without Gandhis! What Advani did for the resurgence of BJP was no way short of Nehru’s efforts to make Congress a family set-up post independence. As far as the efforts are concerned Advani has been as great as Nehru in erecting a national level political structure. But still when it comes to BJP, its possible to smell its chances beyond Advani clan. This is what we mean by democracy. Now the issue just trickles to the question, is it possible to imagine the same fate for the Gandhis? Not as long as the Congress we are acquainted with!

So the dirty blame game is on in Copenhagen regarding climate change and all that. Anyway the issue is just fit for politics because we have done irreversible damage to the environment. Let them just accuse each other now. Things will never be the same. We are up for nasty times! Our best of sincerity is just not enough to undo the blind massacre of environmental systems for the last few centuries.

                                                         *************

Today by mistake 5 laborers got into AC DTC bus. It meant Rs. 125 to destination—more than a full day wage earned by each of them. Pain was evident on their faces. Neither in a position to go back (because so many eyes were expectantly ogling them for their next move) nor able to stand there because of the economica pinnch of the mishap, they just stood there trying to come to terms with the reality. At least you have got some space to stand comfortably and reach your workplace without much pains, I sympathesized. But these were futile words. Its a very costly bus, costing Rs. 55 lakhs. So we have to contribute, I further tried in vain. Feel proud that you are giving the largest chunk of your salary to the govt. of India, I further tried to save the day for these lesser fortunate brothers. Believe me, there was pride on their faces now.

                                                        ***************

Now that unprecedentedly high living costs are eating into meager salaries of laborers in Delhi, isn’t it suitable that they move to smaller cities to give bigger chances to their tiny dreams? I think they should opt for this. Instead of rotting like garbage items, they ought to fight it out in smaller towns and cities. Delhi is too big now, and equally bad. Just see the countless humans lying around even more worthlessly than the garbage dumps! Let the big people enjoy the polluted, viciated air in the national capital. Poor people, let us just go back to our roots!

                                                       ****************        

Poetry was dying in Delhi. Dying like a fish without water. Luckily Amit Dahiyabadshah has created a lifeful pond in the form of Delhi Poetree for the survival of this soft carrier of our emotions. We salute the great poet and wish him good luck! Doing the exceptional task of surviving and thriving on earnings from his poems, this creator of 17 books of poems is now leaving no stone unturned to give poetry another chance in these times of hard talks. One of his poems has been purchased for Rs. 10 lakh. Now this news has restored the lost pride and hope among the contemporary poets. The steely man with softest of emotions has the great mission of creating 100 poets in Delhi who will be paying intome tax through their poems by the year 2015. A great vision indeed! Let almighty give him the power and vision to accomplish this amazing feat!

                                                     *******************  

We need special care as we enter and fade out of life. Mostly kids have parents to protect them from all dangers. But normally elders aren’t in the same safe hands as they fade out of life. Kids and elders are the same. Pamper them, protect them.

Dilemma

A tiniest of puppy was stranded on a busy road. Before it added to the sins of a fastly moving wheel, I picked it up and placed the tiny being on pavement. Driven by larger selfish cause of reaching office on time, I hastily moved ahead. But the obliged little thing was running after me as fast as it could. I just ran myself out of its reach. But while doing so I felt like doing more bad than good.

Now the dilemma arises. Is it possible to do a good deed in part? Or goodness requires the completion of a cause? Just because most of us are incapable to see through our act of beneficence to its destination, is it justified not to take that littlest of step which might keep the chances still alive for someone in need?

Pseudo-secular drama

Well so much for deliberately leaking the Liberhan Commission’s report to divert the public angst against the Hindutva proponents. What about massacre of 5000 innocent Sikhs in 1984. Any takers for justice in that? In 1992 a structure was stage-managed to be broken for political gains. In 1984, it was the real flesh and blood that spattered streets of Delhi. Who was ruling at centre in 1992? How can the central government wipe its hands clean of an act perpetrated in a state when there were intelligence reports regarding the impending destructive task by the Kar Sevaks? It was just like allowing your enemy to commit a murder so that the foe can be held guilty. Congress government did only that. And ask the pseudo-secularists isn’t it just plain communalism to politically appease a particular section always citing the wrongs committed against it by the political opponents? Political action and reaction mean the same as far as communalism is concerned.

Thoughts and Feelings

If you can’t respect other’s thoughts, not a big problem with that. Just slog it out—even egoistically—to prove your point. But never do the same in case of feelings. Respect other’s feelings. There is a big difference between thoughts and feelings. You can trample your fellow human beings’ thoughts. But please spare their feelings. Feelings are sanctimonious. Leave them unstigmatised and pure on the altar of heart.

The only thing you can be sure about life is that there are going to be problems. So just accept it as any other law in nature which you bear with without any grudges. In fact when in the face of problems, we as humans ought to think from the solutions perspective. Still there are times when the wrong dice cast by fate just puts you in most difficult of a situation. These are the times when its even futile to think of a solution. During such times, all you need is just to be there for the sake of future. Just do not back out. I am not preaching to put up a valiant superhuman fight. Just maintain the routine. It requires a little effort to do the barest minimum to see through the turbulent waters. Be guarded, be defensive, but donot leave the field. I call it putting yourself on autopilot. When you find that your being serious about the issues is not going to help you in any way, just try to live life according to the tide. A plain assumption here! Always assume with 100% belief that things are going to be normal. Equipped with this belief, just slog it out at the lowest morsels of your mental and physical levels. There are solutions, rewards, opportunities and suitable circumstances. Just be patient enough to be there to receive them. As you assume the inevitability of better things awaiting you, most of the presumptions about the futility of things will be cut down to their real size by the natural forces always there to help you survive and prosper. Call it belief in God or the superior cosmic forces. All it needs is your trust and belief. Just invest this much. It will just shower you with rewards.        

Always there are easiest of routes to the toughest of destinations. Every hard situation has the softest of a solution. So there is no hard problem in the real sense. Our solutions make them so. When in the face of a tough situation blame your solution not the situation. Isn’t life all about taking smart short-cuts to beat the puzzling array of problems randomly cropping around us? So be the solution provider. Behind most complex of a phenomenon there is amazing simplicity. Read that. Those cute fundamentals will tell you that every situation is a living being. It has a soft and sympathetic message for you only. Listen to these delicate murmurs and it will help you in breaking hardest of superficial, outer cores.

Just try to do one good deed per day. Hey, don’t worry; it’s not that classical preaching and all that. It’s just about one of the commonest thing coming your day on a daily basis. It can be just a coin given to a really deserving old beggar. Please forget about those stylish naysayers who will spew out millions of anti-beggary words and won’t do even a single deed to justify their theories. Forget whether your one coin will change the life of that person or not. All you need is a big heart and genuine sympathy. A coin given with respect to a fellow human being is far-far more valuable than a hundred rupee bill given we some inhibitions. The lesser fortunate will feel the humanism behind your gesture and reciprocate in equal measure.

Your daily good deed might even include sincere sympathy for someone in emotional turmoil. Just look around and you will find so many ways to fulfill your daily quota of a good deed. Believe me it will require so little from your financial, physical and emotional pockets. Just imagine billions of such little stars of goodness being lit in the lives of countless unfortunates. Don’t you think it will remove so many darker shades from the nooks and corners left out of the mainstream of progress? Give it a thought. Please forget about the larger perspectives. These are simply tiny means to escapism. If you are a real miser and are plainly helpless to dole out anything out of your daily scheme of things, still you can at least give a genuinely good thought. Some say thoughts are things. For the real misers even thoughts will do. But as it can be safely assumed, if you can’t act honestly, how can you think with a pure heart. So be on the safe side and do a tiny Good Deed Per DAY.

Anyhow, a political talk always rejuvenates. It might be a fact that our kitty of woes at the hands of our chosen governments just piles up like never before; still political discussions are taken so seriously by the people as if Indian democracy will crumble to pieces without their tongue-tiring part in it. So the smoggy, polluted wintery bride in Delhi is being welcomed by so many political bickerings. The man on the street is afraid of an impending living-cost disaster. Most are convinced that if things are not controlled, the already polluted air in Delhi will become plainly suffocating.

Go anywhere in Delhi and you will find people muttering. Yes, the common man is just groaning with the pain of almost unprecedentedly sky-high cost of living. Bus fare is high enough now to give this pinching feeling to any laborer that he/she is contributing to infrastructural growth of Delhi just for free. The same people, the people on the street and roads—almost antagonized against the capitalist class, the class of well-to-do families supporting the BJP—are now just rubbing their hands with helplessness. Just six months ago they had come out so proactively to give the new iron lady another five years to further consolidate the first political family’s roots. Common man just wanted to define Indian democracy within the strictly defined loyalties to the Nehru family. Well, is it a real democracy? I have serious doubts. Anyway, the acceptance by the masses of the undisputed axial status of the First Family in Indian democracy meant the Prime Minister in waiting was not allowed to change his status. Now, after so much of polluted sewage has gone down the drains to merge the holy waters, the illusions are giving way to harsh realities. I can see a pleasant smirkness on the faces of rich people from the safe confines of big cars. ‘It’s your government buddies!’ seems to be the message from their side. In a suffering a tone laborer was muttering, ‘Only if there would have been elections as of now!!!’ ‘Spare your voter fury for the next five years!’ a portly fellow mused. Evidently the latter one appeared hit to a lesser degree.

Everybody believed I had all that requires to be a civil servant, so driven by this belief, I just gave peak years of my life preparing for civil services. Got interviewed once, but the real dilemma started when I came to the bitter truth of having spent all my four chances. Then PCS was left to keep the flame of the undying passion still alive. I belong to Haryana. As all of us well understand, our choice of PCS is just limited to the home state, because the way SPSCs function it is the least of secret. Well, in India most of the corruption breeds from the safe corridors of constitutionality. State public service commissions function as personal fiefs of the ruling party. It was Chautala government when I put up my well polished claim for the state civil services. Easily I crossed the hurdles to reach the interview stage with very high marks. But the all-sweeping powers of the interview panel saw me being rejected with just 28 marks out of 75. There were cases where candidates got as high as 70 marks. Anyway, I learnt a few political lessons, so during the next recruitment, I knew exactly well how to go through the interview stage. But believe me it did not involve any money going out of my already famished pockets. So, all cheers. I went comfortably home with an SDM rank (HCS, 2004, Roll. No. 1093) and the future all bright. Everybody knew that nobody deserved to have his say in any type of favor done to me, because I thoroughly deserved the post.

But Chautala proposed, Sonia disposed. Before we could join, she had the CEC Krishnamurty dashing down to Chandigarh, announcing state assembly elections, putting all appointments on hold under election code of conduct. And during this time the type of wanton drama played by the Governor, state principle secretary and everybody else, it does not even deserve to be narrated by the civilized being like me. Congress came to power. Only after entering the precincts of Punjab and Haryana high court I realized what a powerful entity state is. It is a big behemoth. The way proceedings were monopolized in the court made me so helpless and victimized by the same state which is constitutionally obliged to protect my rights. But here I was paddling like a skinny dog, trying with my meager financial resources to beat the mighty current of state. Is judiciary fair? I always had doubts. But with each day, the realization dawned how fascistically this system of justice acts. Who appoints the judges in the first place? Directly indirectly the politicians hold the string of the puppets dancing on the political stage. Each day for a talented unemployed is torturous. Here after spending thousands all we got was a few minutes stay in the house of justice. For two years the Lord of justice did not even open its ears to our ever increasing clamor for justice. And then the verdict came, it had all the loopholes to make us sit out of employment for as long a possible. We went to Supreme Court, but I don’t have any hesitation in saying that like state high courts are playing puppets to the state governments, the citadel in Delhi is always under the influence of central government. After all who appoints and promotes the judges at all levels. It’s just a well oiled machinery of mutual benefits, that’s all…nothing else.

Chautala had been wrong in installing his stooges in the HPSC before being voted out of power, because many board members were made to resign just in the middle of their term. So when Hooda came to power he found a board full of members with terms for the next 6 years. One unconstitutionality gave rise to another. The new iron lady of India easily got the hand-made President to issue a notification suspending all the HPSC members. Meanwhile, while all these stronger wheels clanked on the high road of power, ego and what not, our heads rolled.

Congress said Chautala had manipulated the selection process. Ask them what they have been doing all these five years. For one wrong of Mr. Chautala they have ended up doing tens. In both supreme and high courts, government of Haryana had given the plea that it has not any vacancy to fit us in. But see what they do. In January of this year, they put up this notification for fresh recruitment. Isn’t it the contravention of their own pledge to the court that they do not have any vacancies. We went to get a stay on the fresh recruitment. But the great legal luminary—having the infinitely open-ended space to write anything suitable for whatever ends he might deem fit—just smartly said no, the government can do as it likes.

Now, having robbed of a decade of my penance for a cause, I do slog out in the private sector. Believe me, my pain is double, because as an educated and law-abided citizen of this country, I always had this notion—born of my bookish knowledge—that state is there to protect my interests and courts are there to save my skin from the larger forces. I but stand robbed of my fundamental belief. Its not just a matter of losing a job, it is the matter of losing your identity as an empowered citizen of an independent country. Now when I slog out in most crowded buses, where getting a foothold is as precious as getting bonus from the government, I certainly don’t feel like an Indian. I feel like an emigrant in my own land. I REFUSE my office colleagues when they try to put the tricolored toy on my desk. Sorry, but this is my tiny revenge against my own state. Somehow, when terrorists strike against state in any part of India, against all my wishes, I find myself giving them a silent salute.

Sorry, but its as natural as this. Just wanted to say something on this. Thanks if you have borne the trouble of bearing with my brow-beating thus far! All in all its just sham democracy in India. We are just puppets dancing on the make-believe stage while the real game is behind the scene.