“If you want to shine like a sun, then burn like sun” – the exemplar, Mr. APJ Abdul Kalam truly lived his own words. The former President was not born with a ‘silver spoon’ in his mouth; yet he was born with a great ‘incentive spoon’ which drove him to the crest of the wave.

A lad eked out a living by selling newspapers and today news and obituaries of the same fellow have occupied the newspapers! Ironical. Isn’t it? The hapless newspaper vendor rose like the Phoenix from the abyss of poverty to the pinnacle of success and demonstrated the world that if you have strong determination, colossal dreams and the strength and will to achieve them, then no soul can clip your wings. The dreamer and the visionary carved his own destiny from very humble origins to the summit which was not a low hanging fruit.

In the fictitious world of the novel “A Woman of Substance”, a bildungsroman by Barbara Taylor Bradford, Emma Harte was born to an impoverished Yorkshire family who rose from rags to riches; from servant girl to become one of the richest women in the world. It was only her unshakable faith and implacable will power to achieve something that made her unbolt the portals of success. The phrase - nothing succeeds like success –seems apt for the protagonist.

Anyway, before I digress all the way off the cliff, let me get to the point. I recall Einstein’s words about Gandhi ji and further dedicate them to Kamaal Kalam ji, “Generations to come will scarce believe that such man ever walked upon this Earth.” The news of the demise of the Missile Man was bolt from the blue to millions. A pall of gloom enshrouded the territory. Bharat has lost a ‘Ratna’ ; the Ratna who radiated light throughout his life and would continue to do so, enabling the posterity to bask in his goodness!

People remember Mr. Kalam as their former President, scientist, writer etc., but for me he was a complete teacher. The sweetheart of students , he was rightly hailed the People’s President. In fact, the great man once said, “If people remember me as a good teacher that will be the biggest honour for me.” Perhaps, his one of the last wishes would have been to breathe his last while teaching and it did fulfill. Dr. Kalam never compromised on his penchant for teaching. He repeatedly urged the kids to never hesitate asking questions. In fact, while running short of time, he could not take doubts from all students on his visits to various educational institutions. But he made sure to give his e-mail id to them and responding to their e-mails in a couple of days. He had amalgamated the honesty of a child with the energy of a teenager and the maturity of an adult. A mourner said , “He had a childlike curiosity and wisdom of a sage.”   In truth, Kalam ji was neither a Muslim nor Hindu; he was a learner with a down-to-earth approach.

Few lines directly from the heart for the nation’s great son:

“Chamka jahan mein tu bankar atal sitara,

Ae Kalam tujhsa hoga nahi dobara…”

KALAM KO SALAAM !

JAI HIND…

‘I am a peaceful soul’

A few moons ago, leafing through a book, I came across an effectual poem whose lines detained my pupils:

“…We move faster than the lions,

Cut through the skies above,

Dive so deeply in the ocean…

…Something is missing

…We created all the boundaries,

Yet we wonder where the peace has gone.”

At times, my heart sinks in gloom on beholding the rupture of human values, mad rush in life, people treading lives in jet speed, unscrupulously. The world is plunging deeper and deeper in mire of crisis. Like the spider caught in its own web, the individual becomes intertwined in the nets which are consequences of the hassle’ful’ life. But ‘yoga’  is like the light in the tunnel that rekindles the soul and opens the eyes of wisdom one can see the peaceful future rising like a Phoenix from the ashes of perplexities.

Yoga is similar to the sorcerer’s stone which leads to the transformation of the self. Nowadays even schools are laying emphasis on yoga. Ramdev baba, the yoga guru, is a mammoth inspiration for millions of people, lending them an invisible helping hand to live in peace by crossing the serpentine life effectively.

The other day, I happened to watch the ‘Art of living’ programmed on TV while flipping through the various anxiety laden channels. The two golden words, Om Shanti, seemed to give an inner satisfaction and pacification. The soft voice of Brahamkumari Shivani is still lingering in my ear drums. One thing I understood is that yoga s not self-improvement, it is about self-acceptance. Accepting that, I, the soul, exist in peace is much like bolting doors for unnecessary sufferings. To steer better I life and build ourselves physically, emotionally, psychologically and spiritually, yoga is an elixir. Robert Frost’s poetry, The Road Not Taken, helicopters around the dilemma a person confronts in the process of decision making. Our mind is like sand dunes shaped by the wind of choices and wise decisions which can be made through yoga.

So allow yourself to see deeper into your inner self. Let the outer world continue in its own way. Untether the rope of thoughts for a few moments and feel the feather weight of your soul…......OM SHANTI

A child is a lamp to be lighted not a vessel to be filled…

“A child is a father of man.’’ This famous line is from William Wordsworth poem, The Rainbow, which refers to the importance of a child for the development of the human race. Childhood is the time to garner the best physical, intellectual and emotional capacity to fulfill the duty towards the nation and to one’s own self. However this simple rule of nature has been crippled by the ever growing menace of child labour.

“Fight for the future of young lives. Who knows we may find the next President working in a hotel…”

Child abuse is one of the most heinous and inhumane crimes done against humanity. It means to maltreat a child psychologically and emotionally. In the modern era of machine and technological advancement, children in every country are callously exploited. In our own country, for making crackers and ‘bidis’  , small kids are engaged because of their nimble fingers. In fact, India has a high threshold when it comes to child labour.

These children need to spend their days in the fantasy world of fairy lands and should weave the garden of dreams, but the irony of fate is that they are either working in the dingy cells of factories or working on roadside ‘dhabas’ just to scratch a few coins in their hands!

Can we weed-out this stigma of the society? Though it is a desirable goal but the eradication of child labour seems to be a herculean task in the current scenario. The Indian government is committed to the task of ensuring that no child remains illiterate, hungry and sans medical care. When this ideal will be achieved is a million dollar question!

Poverty is the root cause of all evils. Affording even one square meal a day is like climbing Everest for the poor and deprived families who then compel their children to work. In the process, the childhood of these children is stolen, who roll with the situation and chip off bits of them to prop up the family members economically. Households may have to suffer pangs of hunger if the children are withdrawn from work.

Let’s have an action replay. 1954 film, Boot Polish, had clear glimpses of child labour and also, how children lose out on their childhood. No doubt, India has so many children but very little childhood!  “…nanhe-munne bachche teri muththi me kya hai?....muththi me hai taqdeer hamari…”  is one of the songs in the movie which compel me to cook a question – is the destiny of the victims of this cruelty really in their own hands?  In the matter-of-fact, their ‘taqdeer’ is in the hands of the employers of child labour.

The movie ends on a happy note as the young protagonists (who acted as cobblers) are adopted by someone. From their clothes to education to the pettiest of things...everything is taken care of by their new parents.  But in real life, not in the reel one, things are not so welcoming and bright!

“Dollar Bahu”

“Experience has taught me that honesty is not the mark of any particular class nor is it related to education or wealth….It cannot be taught at any university. In most people, it springs naturally from the heart.” Sudha Murthy fits quite well in these lines written by none other than her only. Honest thoughts ooze out from her tales and this thing arrests readers’ interests in her books. She leaves no stone unturned in making her writings absorbing and also in adding fervour of authenticity and originality which steal the hearts of the people. This prolific writer is praiseworthy whose works are always laden with some or the other social message.
 If ever in life you feel drained of inspiration, pick up her books, read them as they are the slimmest and trimmest source of inspiration especially “Wise & Otherwise”. You will get so wrapped up in Murthy’s books that you would not realise that flies have started hunting your disheveled, tangled hair and hover  over your head. To tidy up yourself (which you didn’t because of the engrossing stuff), you will have to put down the book which would be no cake walk….The statement does not seem to be exaggerated! “Dollar Bahu” – one of Murthy’s attention-grabbing pieces, is a beautifully scripted story of how life gets higgledy-piggledy in the process of reaping money at the cost of relationships; how money (Dollar) rules somebody’s ideas, perspectives and demeanour and creates gaps; how gold is mistaken for copper and copper for gold!
 A good girl with a soft heart, Vinuta, ties knot with Girish, a bank clerk. She adapts herself to the air of the house and as a docile ‘bahu’ takes care of everyone with heart and soul. Gauramma, the typical Indian ‘saas’ reeks of hunger for money and consequently, gives more preference to her elder daughter-in-law, Jamuna, who lives in US with her hubby, Chandru. As a token of financial help, both send Dollars to India and that’s why Jamuna is an apple of Gauramma’s eye. The mother-in-law makes constant comparison between the two ‘bahus’ and this takes toll on Vinuta’s physical and mental health. But time is dear to none and is mightiest of all. The cruel realities of life flash before Girish’s mother one by one whose morale had quake in front of Dollar. It dawned upon her that everything that glitters is not gold.  The story, laid down in Karnataka, specifically doesn’t only paint the scenario in Karnataka, rather it can be implemented to all parts of India. It also eyes the NRIs who leave their homelands to scratch a few Dollars in their hands. They actually transform into “Never Returning Indians”. This is a big problem the country is facing as the brains get drained into some other nation. In fact, this thing often keeps, the children who live on foreign lands, in a fix as which culture to adopt. They oscillate between Indian and western culture.  The story is effective and proves that-“Man alone has a choice between good and evil, and he reaps his rewards according to what he chooses.”

“Girl”

Jamaica Kincaid was a very powerful writer whose writings compel the readers to ponder gravely on the subject matter. Her works are slammed for its simplicity and anger. Kincaid’s strong piece, “Girl”, hinges on femininity in which the mother tries to nail into her daughter the values of responsibility as the latter is ascending in the first flush of youth.

“Girl” is so capsule that it ends in a blink but the impression it leaves on the readers’ minds is profound. The honest thoughts run in a single string which keeps the readers engripped throughout causing them anguish, frustration and frown on the sheer lopsidedness of the society.

The story blooms with the caustic and razor sharp advice of the mother to her daughter, who according to the former is hard bent upon becoming a ‘slut’. The way the mother conditions her child about things to do or not to do, make the write-up no less impactful.

No matter, the story was penned-down almost four decades back, but the matter can be fitted in the present scenario as well. The readers can relate themselves to the characters. The language used is simple, nothing ornate, yet the sense of isolation and detachment from emotions is tangible. Also, the words are stinging which leave the readers stifled.

In various households, girls are often castigated as how to live. Their very way of living is defined by the parents, especially the mother. No doubt, the prejudices are hidden in the roots of the society. The anonymous mother in “Girl” too speaks in a similar tone, thus dictating so-called sense of decorum to her teenage girl.

“…you must not speak to wharf-rat boys…this is how to make a good medicine to throw away a child before it becomes a child…” These lines depict how insecure the mother is about her child. Through her long unending breath, she is trying hard to reinforce her past experiences on her daughter. She expects her to have the strength of her mother…ironically the strength that came from experiences, not instructions!

In W.B. Yeats poetry, “A Prayer for My Daughter,” the poet thinks her daughter to be a plain slate on which he can scribble anything he wishes irrespective of the girl’s choices and desires. Throughout the poem, any number of things has been rubbed against the ‘bud’ that has just entered the world. And this is why, the poem is deemed offensive. Hence, it may be chalked-out that ‘Girl’ and ‘A…Daughter’, both raise a question on gender equality. For one thing or the other, the catapults are aimed at the ‘fair-sex’ only. In both pieces, it is the ‘girl’ who is subjected to so many conditioning. Why could it not be a boy? Why is it always the girl who has to suffer? Why are the morals of a girl challenged most of the time?

Think.

Think wisely.

Think sincerely.

Think impartially…to change the picture!

“Language is a nail to which we fasten our inner thoughts.

Language is itself an art…”

Language has dual character as it has two aspects – language as communication and language as culture. It is not just a mode of communication but , it also sustains one’s culture as it mirrors and injects the ideas, history, images and experiences of a particular culture. It gives us an identity.

History is replete with the instances in which the language of the conquered nations was squashed. The example is under our nose only – India where there is diversity in languages; where not even handful of population speaks chaste Hindi that is our tongue but an amalgam of various languages.

Alphonse Daudet’s poignant and heart wrenching story, The Last Lesson, hinges on the pathos the people experience when they have to bid adieu to their own mother tongue. Significance of one’s language has been held on the top of the pedestal; language that defines us and keeps our individuality alive and vivacious….thus brushing us under one shanty.

Life is a Harlem and no one can prophesise what would happen next. So, make hay while the sun shines, for time is a big slut. Don’t shirk work or wait for tomorrow to do things as tomorrow never comes. Enjoy life to the fullest, respect people around you, love your culture, your mother tongue, love your country and take pride in being what you are!

“Tonight I Can Write…” -by Pablo Neruda

Neruda was 20, in the first flush of youth, when he wrote ‘Tonight I Can Write…’. Every word in this poem is a monosyllable, nothing fancy or flowery, yet the sense of loss and solitude is so clear. This reflects how passionate was Neruda for poetry and maybe this passion used to inspire his poetry as well. His way of presenting the emotions, sentiments immediately charms young people, specially those who themselves experience similar emotions and hence, they relate themselves to his love and poetry. Perhaps, this is the reason of his being called the poet of common people!

Woven in simple words, ‘Tonight…Write…’ possesses deep meanings. Throughout the poem, the poet is in a state of inner tension and both him and his love are on a roller coaster of emotions. The readers find paradoxical emotions of love in the entire poetry. The poet loses his beloved to someone so he pens down his sorrow in the hope that it will lessen his pain and lonliness. It seems writing the thoughts is a therapy to him. He still misses her but pretends as if he hates her. Actually, he himself is oblivious to the fact that the profuse love for ‘her’ is still lingering in his very heart and soul. Had he not loved her so much, he would not have written a poetry partly in remembrance and partly out of seclusion, for her. Also the way he over and over emphaises the fact that “… he no longer loves her” tells us that even till date he has not weeded out her memories from within himself.

Poet’s admiring her ‘still eyes’, her voice, ‘bright body’…give us an idea that his wounds are still fresh. He is in a dilemma and not ready to accept that he loves her intensely even now.

What makes the poem particularly no less beautiful and interesting is Pablo Neruda’s deliberate juxtaposition of emotions that compels us to believe that is the pain that has enunciated the poem. “My heart searches for her,” “ she is not with me”- these lines bring an added poignancy to the piece.

The poem opens with a recalling mood. Neruda reminisces the past events and memories with his beloved. “I held her in my arms,” “sometimes she loved me too” etc. are the phrases that reveal poet’s retrospection. The fragrance of his love is spread in the entire poem.

So, we conclude the poem by dishing out that the poet’s life is an unfulfilled one. He is hapless. His love could not reciprocate his love which he desired.

To drench yourself in the beauty of the poem, visit the link given below. 
Have a nice read....

http://www.fsgworkinprogress.com/2014/04/tonight-i-can-write/

Lament for GOP

It is not a fallacious argument that there is a steep degradation in the Congress party from its Nehruvian heyday. The credentials of this ‘Grand Old Party’ are now into question.

Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru did lend his big hands in the development of the nation after the independence which was not a low hanging fruit. He had his critics too but his errs were bleak before his contribution in India’s soaring development at that time.

After his demise, Lal Bahadur Shastri emerged as a new leader. But to our dismay, he expired much earlier than his tenure. Following him, the ‘Iron Lady’ ( Indira Gandhi ) took the reins of Congress and Prime Minister’s seat.

The current scenario: strong, charismatic, grand – to hunt these words in Congress’s dictionary is no cake walk!

The destiny is running hard on Congress. After its downgraded performance in the recent elections, the dynastic party has trampled its reputation by its own ‘evil’ hands which manifest itself in its dwindled and thinned popularity among people. The reason is that it has frittered away its idealism and glorious legacy of the past. It could not uphold the principles of liberalism, plurality and concern for the downtrodden which used to be its cherished ideals.

WHO IS BACKWARD?

The incidents like the death of 19-year-old Nido from Arunachal Pradesh in January 2014 and the attack on two Manipuri girls at Kotla the following day often bring the plight of north-east Indians in Delhi into spotlight.

Racial discrimination is the term coined by some TV news channel. We often count the eastern states among the backward regions but as a matter of fact, we Delhiites who deem ourselves to be forward, are actually backward as we still practice prejudice against our own blood; against our own comrades!

As far as the backwardness of East is concerned, my ideas are still vague. Theirs is a women dominated society; matriarchal system exists there. Men are often seen puffing ‘bidis’ , making clouds out of it, squatting on trails; whereas women go out and fetch money. The ‘fair-sex’ is generally the head of the family.

This highlights how empowered women are in the eastern society!

Have you ever heard about the Asia’s Cleanest Village? I doubt if your mind is conjuring the images of Singapore or Japan! It’s Mawlynnong (India) which has got the ‘clean tag’. One gets stumped to see this spotless clean village near Shillong. Having soaked the beauty of the village, my friend says, “Living my entire life in the urban jungle, I just loved to stay at the village for a night which was the cherry on the cake.”

Children as young as four learn to keep their surroundings spick and span. Each and every household has a TOILET and proper public toilets as well that too clean and fresh, not stinking. I emphasized the word toilet because in Delhi, there had been a lot hue and cry over public toilets. In our so-called forward society, unabashed people draining their bladders on roads are a common sight. And ironic, we call ourselves as the developed ones!

There is this ‘Weaver’s Village’ on the outskirts of Guwahati. People residing there have elegant taste buds. Their elegance reflects in their houses, furniture, crockery, clothing and speech. They are so very down-to-earth that the simplest and the most decent family of Delhi with a tag of the most down-to-earth ones seem to abuse every sense of the word.

Their traditional occupation is weaving and they have preserved it till date. People make handsome money out of it; not even a single house is sans a car (not like Maruti or Alto). But the situation juxtaposes in Delhi where even a decent Swift Desire owner stays in high spirits; s/he flies in air looking contemptuously at others.

So here comes the moot question…who is backward??

幸せな ホーリー

-Dedicated to a very special person who is close to my heart…Miss Arushi Singh!

“Look at nature! There is Existence enjoying Holi every day – colours flow afresh every day, new flowers open each morning. The festival does not stop for a moment – every moment is Holi” - Osho

Halt all your work. Take a stroll hand-in-hand with nature and you will realize that you are, from top to bottom, drenched in the colours of nature. There are umpteenth number of shades in which the nature’s canvas is painted astoundingly.

Mother Earth is bundled-up with bountiful flora. The herbs, shrubs, canopies, etc. beautify the ecology. The flora contains multifarious colours of human emotions like pink rose symbolizes joy, water lily symbolizes pure heart and the list is tall enough.

Nature expresses her show of transition outwardly in the form of seasons which herald new hues with themselves. Spring bottles-out a fresh start; renaissance. The earth reawakens from her slumber and explodes with new buds who debut on the stage of life.

Life remains in full swing during summer. Summer encapsulates joviality, liveliness, light, energy and the like. Followed by summer, fall embodies the retirement of nature into winter’s drowsy mood. Life is reaped. In winter, life is dormant and its dreary days are often equated with cold emotions like anxiety, anger, resentment and so on.

A million dollar question shows green shoots in my mind. Is nature only about plants, trees and seasons? NO is the rebuttal!

The mortal beings are the most vibrant colours of nature. They are not ‘apart’ but ‘a part’ of nature who add additional stars to the nature’s  beauty.

There are various races and colours of human beings. The variety in colours manifests itself in the white people of Caucasian race, yellow people of Mongolian race, flame-coloured people of American race, brown people of Malay race and black people of Ethiopian race. In fact there are sub-divisions as well. For instance, less or more black people.

The most vibrant colours of nature have most vibrant and complex nature too. Multiple psychologists like Chomsky, Maslow, Freud, Piaget etc. tried to spade-out the multiplicity of human nature. Each one had a different view in their stores on humans.

There are negative as well as positive emotions experienced by them which are not like an open book to be read with ease. There are sea of emotions that remain bottled-up within them. Life conjures an amalgamation of hues of joy, ecstasy, generosity, aggression, hatred, immodesty, stupidity, insanity and so on.

人間性 ....HUMAN NATURE….Isn't understanding it a hard nut to crack? ;) ;) :P

SPIRITUAL HEALTH

We cannot help everyone but everyone can help someone!

Since childhood, it is instilled within us that we should help others first. For instance, if you are standing in a queue on the bus stop waiting for the bus and the bus arrives. All of a sudden you see a frail, skinny old fellow plodding with a staff in his hand. At that point of time, what you do (in fact most of us do) , you allow him to stand out of the way in the queue ahead of you. But what if you yourself would have been handicapped? For sure the scene would have been totally different!

Similarly, how can a psychiatrist counsel others if she herself is the victim of stress and depression? By the same token, how can you help others emotionally and intellectually and spiritually as well when you yourself are in a state of darkness?

The gist of the matter is that in life others can seek your help only when you are able yourself. Prior to lending hands for help to others each one of us should see to it if we are spiritually sound as it steers our mental, physical and emotional health.

Now the million dollar question is – how can we improve ourselves? Inculcate a certain values and feel the change. Always feel grateful to God who is blessing us with such a wonderful life. Maintain distance from those who propagate negative energies and seek the company of people having elevated thoughts. Eventually, uplift your soul so that you will be able to uplift other mortal beings….as Gandhi ji said, “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.”

Remember! A good head and good heart are always a formidable combination.

NATURE MIRROR

My nani’s house has always been an alluring place for me since the time I started understanding the things around the world. This is neither because I feel like an untethered calf there nor because I savour nani’s earthen stove’s ‘roti’ with butter milk and green chilli ‘chutney’, but because of the bewitching natural beauty and vibrant plus breezy atmosphere pervading there.

Monsoon showers are the most conducive time for the visit. The terrace is the one which I usually haunt at my nani’s place.

As soon as the rain relents, I find myself admiring the panoramic view from the roof. The broad vistas of paddy and mustard fields…the exuberant beauty of the place enthralls me a lot. It seems as if Mother Earth has come out in plain lush green clothes to woe her beloved - sky, who just showered his love in the form of rain.

In addition to this, the air, thick with the fragrance of parched earth and that feeling of fresh breath, are the most exhilarating of all. The gusty winds, ruffling the smooth surface of the fields and the leaves on the trees give us a feeling as if nature is interacting with us. The background music given by the melodious ‘koel’ makes the surroundings all the more musical and refreshing. But the very sight of the elegant peacocks dancing and warbling joyfully in the ‘saavan ka mahina’ is cherry on the cake.

Seeing the enumerable benedictions and knowing the fact that we actually are in the fail proof lap of Mother Nature, the below lines appear to be written for her only-

“Mere mehboob ki soorat khuda se milti hai,

Mohabbat ki mohabbat hai,

Ibaadat ki ibaadat hai”

I think I am at my best when I can feel the nature of NATURE !

Global Citizenship Begins At Home

“Each one of us has the potential to be a global citizen, but it need to be unearthed.”

As a citizen of a country, I have a birth certificate, an Aadhar card and an identity card. I am entitled to certain rights and privileges. I obey country’s laws and I enjoy the convenience of social policies and so on. What about a citizen of a globe? Is there anything to characterize the global citizenship? A birth certificate, any card or certain rights? …Not really! Global citizenship means a world where people are treated and respected equally for who they are. It is about an outlook on life, a belief that we can make a difference. It is about inclusiveness. We need to realize how important our connections are with our friends, our neighbourhoods, our communities and with our planet. In other words, Global Citizenship is about people’s awareness of seeking the common good. It is about everyone.

Is my idea too abstract? Here I would like to expound more on the gist of Global Citizenship. Mother Teresa, what to say about that noble lady! She, the self-actualized soul, devoted herself completely to the sufferings of the needy and poor. She volunteered her valuable services to humanity and inspired others by setting an example of a benefactor and a real global citizen.

The crux of the above matter is that the deserving soul is the one who understands the need to tackle the sufferings of the disadvantaged ones. That’s why I call “to do a global citizenship,” not “to be only a part of global citizenship.”

Global citizenship is not only a word to spell or a thought to think. It is more than a feeling to feel. As it is well said that charity begins at home, so are the words rightly said, “Global citizenship begins at home.” The seeds of global citizenship need to be sown right in the minds of children at home.

Let’s take an example of Diwali. If we celebrate Diwali with our craze, not bothering about others like bursting crackers in front of our neighbourer’s house, it would nothing more than tormenting and pissing them off! So here we can play our role as a global citizen by keeping in mind such things. That’s why I said, “we should do,” not “we need to do” global citizenship that begins at home, then neighbourhood, followed by city, state, country and then…world !!

To become  global citizens, we need not to be like Bill Gates who donated crores of rupees for polio affected children. That means that when we are at sight of human’s tortures, we can respond with humanity, not to gloat with smile. Let it spread through children and their parents; through schools and institutions and through government. Let us start by joining hearts and hands across the continents and boundaries. In short if I say, education must be a priority as it instills a feeling of camaraderie and responsibility. And this can be accomplished by the media, I was talking about. They can teach the world to treat people around them with respect, and setting the motto to be the utmost use to the needy and help everyone, everywhere, anywhere and anyhow sans believing and disective theories like caste, creed, colour, region, country or continent.

We are needed to seek a common good beyond our common comfort serve the world, beginning with our neighbourhood, to become global citizens; global citizens, not spectators; global citizens, not subjects; responsible global citizens, seeking the common good…. Let’s act now!!

Portals Of Success

Life is not a pot full of honey. It is a serpentine track on which we can never stop being startled. Situations can come along that are brand new to us. So, it is the man alone who has the choice between good and evil and he reaps his rewards according to what he chooses. It is his decision making that carves his destiny, his life and then him!

For me success does not refer to turning of signature into autograph. Rather, success is when you aim for something and to achieve the same you put your heart and soul into it and strive hard with immense valour and fortitude.

One can find him/er on the portals of success if s/he inculcates a few habits of highly effective people:

Habit-1  Be proactive

Habit-2  Begin with the end in mind

Habit-3  Think win-win

Habit-4  Seek first to understand and then to be understood

Habit-5  Synergise

Habit-6  Sharpen the saw

ALL THE BEST!!

Do You Dream?

"Dream is not what you see in sleep.
Dream is which does not let you sleep" -Dr Abdul Kalam

Each one of us dreams. A student may dream of getting high marks in an exam; an athlete might dream of running as a tiger; a labourer may dream of a big house and so on. These dreams or we can say visions can be ‘soul-motivational factors’ urging one towards the accomplishments of one’s goals. Action without vision is merely passing time. Many only end up dreaming and live in a fool’s paradise. The one who realises his/er dreams and work on them can only see him/herself on the pedestal of the success. This is true that goals are set when we begin to convert our dreams into reality. And this happens when we turn our ‘cants’ into ‘cans’ and dreams into plans!

Ghastly!

The homicide that followed the Bhopal Gas Tragedy in 1980s quakes us from within when we reminisce the horrid images of countless innocent beings being in the lap of death, lying on roads, streets, railway tracks… The grim aftermath of that tragedy is still experienced by people till date. They are still suffering; paying off tall prices. A commoner from Bhopal whose father had victimized the heinous gas leak, shares, “The gas, carbon monoxide, is so gruesome that it inflicts the pain of 100 chilies in the eyes at once… so just imagine the plight of people on that gray day!” This horrific event is haunting people even today; the wounds of the past are still fresh. The shroud of gloom still exists.

The evil, ominous and terrible thing that happened in Bhopal is shockingly repellent. It inspires terror in the very hearts of the people.

What’s more? Khaled hosseini’s  novels, ‘The Kite Runner’ and ‘A Thousand Splendid Suns’, hover around the havoc that war creates in a person’s life. In the latter, the teenage Laila loses her parents in bombing at a tender age. The way her life takes sharp turns; the way her happy life changes into a nasty one because of the futile wars infuses grief in oneself.

Various novelists have painted the extremely sad pictures of wars in their novels from which we can get an idea of the barbarity and futility of wars and the human predicament that follows. Another poignant story is ‘Glass Palace’ by Amitav Ghosh which is an on-foot journey of 100 years with three generations, who become hapless victims of war and the families break into shreds.

WARS CAN BE THE GHASTLIEST OF ALL as they leave the lives of people in tatters!!

Ghastliness also reflects in the egregious tales of plague in middle ages; the tortures conceived by madmen; the grisly murders; insane acts like rapes; terrorist attacks and the list is endless!

Nature is the most beautiful creation of God. But I am still in a quandary.

Recently, in Jammu and Kashmir, hell rained on the heaven. Thousands of people got swayed by the furious water; lakhs of people lost their shelters, got displaced too; thousands of poor animals died (shockingly the ones which were tethered)… We say that nature is beautiful, but what happened in Jammu and Kashmir back then was ghastly. Sights of reclining and rolling huge buildings which were stood with great pride earlier; the sad preys of the flood perching on trees, rooftops, poles and towers; people’s face smitten with fear of death… these things stir us thoroughly. Don’t they?

Remember! A garden contains all colours of human emotions…even the darkest of all.  If there are flowers, there are thorns too. If there is beauty, there is ghastliness too.

Cleanliness Fosters Spirituality

“Cleanliness is next to godliness”- this aphorism is with us since ages. Various holy books say that God loves the clean. It means that the one whose self (mind), environment and nation are clean can only reach the portals of spirituality.

Cleanliness of self or mind is most important of all as it steers the rest. If our mind is not at the right place and is stuffed with all sort of negativities, then the journey towards ‘godliness’ gets hampered and we move towards ‘godlessness’. Even Buddha’s eight fold path too emphasizes on the purity of mind. Hate, rage, jealousy, vindictiveness, anger, etc should be at bay for making way for God.

Cleanliness of mind is followed by the cleanliness of the environment. We, the evil creatures, have almost crippled the ‘nature’ for the fulfillment of our own selfish needs and requirements. Wiping up all sorts of pollution (be it water pollution, air pollution or land pollution) is the need of the hour for the clean , safe and healthy environment. We can refer it to Mr Modi’s ‘Swachh Bharat Abhiyan’ to a certain extent which is the best example of some concrete steps towards cleanliness. Soaking the filth of our stinking surroundings, it is quite hard to believe that Asia’s cleanest village is in India, Mawlynnong (Meghalaya) !

The next is the cleanliness of the nation. This is actually the weeding up of , violence, riots, crimes, terrorism and corruption, illiteracy, poverty etc which make a country ailing.

 Every day we find newspapers over brimmed with news of crime against humanity; be it a murder, harassment, loot, burglary or rape case. Arushi murder case in 2008, Nirbhaya case in 2012 or the latest cab rape case… all of these highlight the poor mental health of the nation. Moreover the  Muzaffar Nagar riots, the racial discrimination entertained by the north-east people outside their homeland which also culminated into the death of Nido in January 2014, terrorist attack on the teenaged Malala in 2012 and how can one forget the fresh Peshawar massacre which is a sufficient enough testimony to prove critical health of ‘the most beautiful (in reality the most ugly) creation of God’.

Corruption, illiteracy and poverty too have deepened their long roots in our country. Until and unless we chop their roots, development can never be ensured; cleanliness can never be ensured.

The ‘Sunshine’ resides in the place where there is purity, serenity and peace! Peace of mind has been threatened by the deteriorating value system in our country which is because of absurd and fiendish mental make-ups of sundry. Finding peace has become a hard goose chase as people are restive be it at HOME (the heated arguments among couples or tussle in the families), in the SOCIETY (crime, violence, say road rage) or in the NATION (terrorism). So for settling peace cleanliness is must!

CLEANLINESS IS NOT NEXT TO GODLINESS; RATHER IT IS GODLINESS !!

Freedom

G.B. Shaw’s “Freedom” begins with the proposition that the person can be called completely free in such a condition in which s/he will be able to “do what s/he likes, when s/he likes and where s/he likes or do nothing at all if s/he prefers it.’’ Shaw firmly denies the possibility of the existence of such a person as human beings are all ‘slaves’, either to nature or to man.

No matter if we like it or not, “we must all breathe, sleep, eat, drink, dress,” and so on. These ‘natural jobs’ can’t be shirked!!

The slavery of man to man juxtaposes the natural one. Our poets too loath it: they proclaim that no man is good enough to be another man’s master.

 Slavery begins at the very grass-root level i.e. in our homes. There is a head in each family and the other members have to obey him/er. In tangible words, we become victims of latent slavery in our own houses, sans knowing and realizing the same. Then, this is followed by the school where the class monitor has his/er upper hand on us. Similar is the case in the offices where we have to work under our seniors who keep on making a puppet of ourselves.

So from these instances, we can dish out (as it is crystal clear) that one person has to sacrifice his/er freedom to the other.

In a vast democracy like ours, the promise of freedom is redeemed by giving people the right to vote and having general elections after every five years. We are provided with choices to elect our representative. But many a time it so happens that we find all the candidates unsuitable for the seat. Despite this fact, we have to cast our valuable votes.

After getting elected, the elected person does whatever s/he wishes to. Their hypocrisy then unveils. Their actions no more match their words. But the newspapers assure us that our votes have decided the election and that this makes you a free citizen. The amazing part is that we are foolhardy people to believe them!!

G.B. Shaw also highlights in his essay, “From our earliest years, we are taught that our country is the land of the free and that our forefathers won the freedom for us…” But on second thoughts we do realize that we are actually not free at all! Though it’s been 67 years, we have gained freedom, but in reality we are not free!

A Very Merry Christmas!

“There was chaos in the corridors. Our teacher locked the door and screamed at us to duck on the floor. But the long-bearded fiends, clad in baggy clothes, broke down the door and began spraying bullets. After a flash of moments, I felt searing pain as I was shot in both legs.” A teenage survivor of the Peshawar massacre shared the ‘classroom terror.’

The brutality on December 16 speaks volumes about the growing scourge of extremism in Pakistan. Killing innocent children is a crime so heinous that there is no word in the human dictionary to describe its barbarity. This dastardly attack on school children also highlights the threat that children face in that “morale tattered” country, Pakistan. Bullet was pumped into Malala Yousafzai in 2012 as she was fighting for the girls’ education there and now the same terrorist group made children the soft target. Ironical! Isn’t it? Just a few days ago, Malala was honoured with the Nobel Peace Prize which was followed by the Peshawar ‘innocence killing.’ Pakistan has suffered any number of terror attacks in the past but none as gruesome and compelling in its brutality as this one. On this Malala says, “I was heartbroken by this senseless and cold- blooded act of terror… I along with millions of others around the world mourn these children… but we will never be defeated.”

The bare-faced slayers said, “ We want Pakistan to feel pain.” Remorse is at bay , but unadulterated sadism has taken the front seat.

The unimaginable carnage in the Army Public School has left everyone in an eerie numbness. Just imagine the plight of the distraught parents who lost their kids. Groaning and lamenting has overpowered them. Father of late 14-year-old Abdullah says, “My son was my dream. My dream has been killed.” No doubt, there can be no bigger tragedy on earth for parents than to carry the corpse of a child!

In Peshawar, condolences have been pouring in from different countries of the world as the tragedy has struck the human chord across various geographical boundaries. Suffering of innocent children and parents is a universal pain which has united the global citizens through the bonds of ‘insaniyat.’ To pay homage to the innocent souls, various institutions around the globe observed two minutes silence and mourned the deaths.

“What you sow, so shall you reap.” Pakistan gave shelter to the cannibals of humanity; nurtured and pampered them. But the consequences juxtaposed; Pakistan itself was bitten by them!

Wake up Pakistan! Wake up from your comatose. I said “wake up”, but I doubt because it is already too late. So many children have martyred but Pakistan is still blind to it.

December 16 has become infamous on the pages of history. The ominous day refreshes the painful memories of “Nirbhaya Case” as well. The extreme‘st’ height of blatancy and monstrosity could be seen in this case. This incident in 2012 had left every single citizen stunned and agaped. The whole nation had drowned in the sea of grief and anxiety at the sheer fiendishness of the crime.

We all know that December is the month of Christmas. Christmas is the hodgepodge of celebrations and is the hallmark of the beginning of new creation. The son of God was born on December 25, Jesus Christ, which was deemed to be a possible renaissance of humanity. “He” was born at the time when crime, greed, hatred, ignorance….i.e. all sort of negativities had shadowed the humanity. “He” took ‘rebirth’ as purity was forgotten and morality was neglected, in fact crippled.

 But as far as the present scenario is concerned, all these things sound baseless as hate, rage, anger, hypocrisy, greed, ignorance, envy, etc have become the order of the day.

On Christmas, we exchange gifts; celebrate the birth of Christ… but what the terrorists have given the world in the last few days, will keep on haunting us throughout!!

Fruits of Action

Each one of us is engaged I our own perplexities. In the process, we don’t pay much heed to manage our “karma”. In the “Bhagwad Gita”, Krishna explained Arjuna that Arjuna’s fight was a dharmic one and he should not hesitate. Krishna talked to him about the indestructible ‘Atma’ that he did not have to worry about fighting Bhishma because Atma would not be destroyed by him but body. Krishna’s reasoning to Arjuna’s dilemma was like air under his wings due to which he soared high and thus, did his ‘karma’ sincerely.

In Shakespeare’s poem, “The Seven Ages”,we see that life is like a stage and we are mere characters who come, enact our respective roles (do our karma) and exit. Similarly, one should stick to his/er ‘swadharma’ (personal law). As stated in Bhagwad Gita –“karmanya wadhikarastey ma faleshu kadachana…” It means that one’s bull’s eye should be the “quality of action” rather than the “fruits of action”.

We get fruits in accordance with the activities which we perform in our lives. The result (fruit) of action (karma) is divided in two categories - one is material and the other is non-material. In today’s world, we give more emphasis to the materialistic things i.e. the so-called affluent life, position, name and fame which have become all in all for us. We feel quite unoccupied sans these things.

Moreover, we are becoming spiritually bankrupt. Whatever we are getting; be it happiness, prosperity or contentment; it is all because of the “Supreme One”. But we often forget to show our gratitude to ‘him’. God has endowed us with a beautiful nature which should be more than enough for us. But we continue to feel ungrateful. Our unbridled greed for ‘more’ remains insatiate.

This is a hard truth that the one who encroaches his/er desires becomes prone to troubles and quakes in life. In sharp contrast, the one who cuts his/er coat according to the cloth leads a smooth and a hassle-free life.

Play your role of life to your level best with full capacity, brushing aside the weeds of selfishness, greed and ego, and excell in the Art of Karma Management.