Challenge, our greatest Heritage

Delhi’s weather does not keep up to date. The Meterological department’s forecasts often go awry.   But the best barometer of weather change is the seasonal illness that besieges Delhi with a clock work precision. Gastroenteritis and typhoid herald the onset of summer.  If it is dengue, chickenguniya and malaria, it is monsoon season. If it is flu, it is the transition period from summer to autumn(through monsoon)  or winter to summer. Hence it is prudent to get a flu shot annually and it is best to take it before the rains arrive. The vaccine, priced rather high, is available in a few private hospitals but seldom in a government hospital. Since this vaccine is kept in deep freeze, it is advisable to buy it wrapped in ice and take it straight to the OPD/ Emergency services of the hospital and get the shot before the vaccine loses its potency. To ensure there is no malpractice (like buying it off the counter and selling it at exorbitant price outside, the vaccine being a scarce commodity) the hospital needs the doctor’s prescription, before administering the shot.

I was asked to get it from the chief physician of a private hospital who has his consulting room in the ICU where he is always hemmed in by scores of relatives whose family members are  patients in ICU. I was nervous as my case was nothing so life threatening to disturb an overworked doctor, but I had to get his endorsement before going to the OPD for the shot. It is easier to get the permission of Nandi( the bull, the  gate guardian of Lord Shiva) and meet the Lord than get past the sentry at the ICU door. When I reeled off my  health selfie in response to the sentry’s one hundred questions, I detected a Eureka flash on his face when he discovered that I was neither a  patient nor an anxious relative to trouble his ‘saheb’ but a seeker of his signature on the OPD form to get my flu shot. He went in and came back in a jiffy and grinned: “Andhar chalo, Der muth karo:(Go in and don’t take too much of the doctor’s time). I walked in gingerly, a little awkward to disturb a top physician for as trivial a thing as a signature. The chief physician was far from intimidating as I had feared. Contrary to the picture the sentry had drawn of the doctor looking irritated, harassed, impatient and churly, he had a gracious  smile, putting me at ease. He signed after I told him that I had come only for his signature and added that my family members and I had been fortunate in being spared a hospital admission all these years. In the same breath, I wistfully added who knows, we may run out of luck in the future, as we were all advancing in years. He smiled and though much younger in age, he wisely said: “Challenge”. I could not understand what he meant by that word.  Sensing my confused and vague look, he said “ Yes, madam, just   keep challenging yourself ever so slightly- both mentally and physically- and you may, god willing, not have any  need  for hospitalization in future also .

 I felt reassured that all is well with me and I need not unnecessarily worry about old age illness and hospitalization if I followed his advice.  “Keep challenging ever so slightly”- these words echoed through my mind and I recalled Robert Browning’s famous line “A man’s reach should exceed his grasp, Or what’s a heaven for?” Just stretch, maybe just a micrometre everyday to remain shipshape physically and mentally. Challenges are an indisputable part of life. The greatest challenge is the challenge of illness and death. Here the challenge is not challenging another but challenging oneself and finding the inner strength to cope with the decline that comes with age.

We age, we grow old. That is an irrevocable truth. Age like price rise, can only go up and not come down. This is again an unchallenging fact of life. No use fearing it or feeling anxious about it.  Billy Graham said: “Old age may have its limitations and challenges, but in spite of them, our latter years can be some of the most rewarding and fulfilling of our lives”. One may sneer at Graham’s optimism, but the truth is age brings with it experience; age teaches us many lessons and age expects us to learn from them. Graham’s words are not meant to flatter grey heads but they speak the truth that life is fulfilling if we practice what  age has taught us. Then we need not fear growing old. Once more I go back to Browning who said “Grow old with me. The best is yet to be”

I suddenly had my Eureka moment when I felt I was no longer afraid of old age. “Keep challenging” is more vital in old age than in our younger days. I felt the need to challenge death which is the end point of old age.  I realized that life is nothing but a journey to reach where we started from. The end is the beginning of a new life just as the beginning is the end of a life past. These are my words  to millions of sons and daughters) who fear the day of separation as their parents hair turns greyer every day, their ears hard of hearing, their  eyesight dimmer and their  limbs stiffer and threatening to go on strike.

My dearest ...,

I write this letter with a strong affirmation that I am fighting fit and the letter is not meant as some kind of premonition within me.  I write this not to frighten you or even to counsel you but only to fortify you as my day of reckoning may not be too far(who knows, they may be far too far)                                                                                                   

 You were not born to rejoice when I came into the world and therefore you don’t have to mourn when I depart. We do not know where we will go, just as we do not know where we came from. But we were brought together in this life and that too, without our knowledge and without our consent. This is what we call Rinanubandha. Sai Baba whom many of us  revere and worship defines Rinanubandha as the relationship that exists between all living beings on earth and which is the root cause behind all our physical and emotional bondages. It is indeed strange that we meet and come close to people who neither belong to our family nor connected with the place or region or even nation we belong to.  But we have been told from our early days that whomsoever we meet in this life is in some way linked to us from our previous lives about which we remain ignorant.  Sai Baba said more than a hundred years ago: “ Treat everyone we meet in a caring and loving way as everyone of us is tied to every other being, all  emanating from universal oneness.” Death is not the end; it is the beginning of a new phase of life. When my mother died and we went to the sea to immerse her ashes collected and wrapped in a towel, we noticed how in the blink of an eye, the towel travelled far across the sea beyond our sight as though the departed soul was in a great hurry to shake off all ties of this life. The beggar sitting on the shore mused: “Your Amma has fled. Go home and don’t cry as she has no intention of returning.”I was struck by the wisdom of his words. The mother who was so dear to us had opted to move out and no one on earth knows where she has gone. As for her, she will not remember all those she had left behind. It is foolish to cry and pine for the restoration of all sundered ties as death marks the end of the old and the beginning of a new tie.

But strangely, in some way, in some unexpected manner, on some day we may come across a stranger with whom we strike an instant rapport.  This is how Rinanubandha works. It is not necessary to correlate the new bond with the past. Human bonding is spontaneous and does not depend upon reason or logic for its formation. Death is the harbinger of regeneration or revival of life. It marks the end of one chapter both for the living and for the dead. We have to be thankful for the lovely years of living together, sharing the joys and challenges of life. It is foolish to think that the dead father or mother will visit their children on their death anniversary. The relationship was good as long it had lasted. We should have the courage to let go of that relationship when the time to end arrives. Who knows when and how I will come back to you. The only certainty is neither you nor I will recognize our earlier bond when we again come together and start afresh a new tie. This is borne by the fact that the population of the world at no time diminishes even after a catastrophic war or any natural calamity. The only indelible occurrence is the return of the tie that we had lost. As  Sai says, we should have shraddha (faith) and saburi(patience)-faith in the regeneration of ties and patience to wait for it to happen.

Death poses the greatest challenge to human beings. But let us not think that death is the ultimate victor. No, it seems to triumph over those who refuse to accept the cessation of bondage. It was John Donne who wrote the famous sonnet “Death, be not Proud”. I have italicized the key lines of this sonnet.

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee Mighty and dreadful,

for thou art not so;

    For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow

……………………………………………………………………..

   Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

  One short sleep past, we wake eternally

  And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

Let us accept the truth that men must endure their going hence even as their coming hither. Ripeness is

all.  In accepting this simple truth, we shall challenge death and triumph over it.

Your own

Amma

Governance is Plus and Minus

It is a truism that governance of any kind is not always wholly right or wholly wrong; it is a mixed bag. There are always quite a few hits and an equal number of misses in any form of governance. Similarly the voters or the beneficiaries also do not get everything right all the time and they experience the mixed assemblage of good and bad governance as they vote this or that party to power. India’s tryst with democracy runs true to the above observation.

 With open eyes, the nation had welcomed Pt. Nehru as the first prime minister and gave him two more consecutive chances that gave him an unstinted period of Prime Ministership for 13 years. He did not complete  the last two years of his third 5-year term because of  his sudden demise. In spite of his success at many levels both within and outside of the nation, he died a broken man with the Chinese betraying the trust he had reposed in them. Lal Bahadur Shastri was Prime MInister for less than two years. Mrs. Gandhi, like her father, had her share of three terms between 1966 and 1984, though it was aborted between 1977-80  for three years as a consequence of her declaration of emergency. Her last innings from 1980 was cut short in 1984 by her assassination, giving her the reigns of the country for a total number of 15 years. Rajiv Gandhi, Narasimha Rao, Atal Behari Vajpayee and ManMohan Singh had five years tenure, though the last mentioned had two five year terms. Three others had very brief stints, of not much import. Now it is the first term of Narendra Modi and soon he will be seeking a second term.

I am not attempting any thesis on political history of post-independence Prime Ministers. The only point of my submission is they all had their share of plusses and minuses in their political reign. It had always been a good and not so good a tenure and seldom did it reach the bottom of turning bad or ugly. If Nehru brought stability after the partition massacre and modernized India, strengthened its infrastructure, ushered in green revolution and white revolution and set up  higher education portals like IITs and IIMs, his failure was due to his honest and deep trust of the Chinese who betrayed it and his socialist phobia. Shastriji gave India a boost with his clinching victory over Pakistan, a clear shot in the arm after the defeat of the Indian forces by China. Within a short period, he boosted both the agricultural and the defence sectors living true to his slogan Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan. Indira continued her father’s liberal and catholic outlook and lifted the morale of India by winning a decisive war against Pakistan and gave Bangladesh its independence from the oppressive and autocratic rule of Pakistan. The telecom revolution ushered by  Rajiv Gandhi, the economic liberalization of Narasimha Rao (that continued under Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh), the rise in GDP growth and pragmatism of Indian foreign policy of Atal Behari Vajpayee and  Manmohan Singh’s Right to Information, Right to Education , Aadhar identification document , and putting the aam admi at the centre of the political economy development- all show  how India’s progress as a modern welfare state had been effectively served by all the Prime ministers though the present government denies giving credit to their contribution. No doubt, the collapse of Panchsheel concept, the sudden death of Shastri, the emergency declaration of Mrs Gandhi, the Bofors scam under Rajeev Gandhi, the fall of Babri Masjid during Rao’s tenure, the uneventful and pedestrian governance under Vajpayee that had no  impact on the common people either positively or negatively ,  the disunity among the BJP leaders in the aftermath of Gujarat riots and the scams that rocked Manmohan Singh’s tenure were the negative factors during the period from 1947-2014.

What has happened in the last four years is the total discrediting of all the earlier achievements in order to show that the new government under Modi(-it is not even referred to as NDA government, but Modi government)alone has been working to develop the country. Unfortunately quite a few ingenious masterstrokes as claimed by Prime Minister as his singular contribution have tumbled like bubble bursts. One is reminded of Mark Antony’s speech which with a little adaptation can well suit the present Prime Minister’s oratory:

Friends, Indians, countrymen, lend me your ears;

I come to bury all the mis-governance of yester years.

The evil that PMs did lives after them;

The good is oft interred with their bones;

So let it be with the PMs of the past.

The scams that clouded their reign

Bofors,2G, Coal et al have shown my predecessors’ fault,

And grievously hath their Congress paid for it.

Here, under leave of Manmohanji  and the rest–

For Manmohanji is an honourable man;

So are they all, all honourable men–

Come I to speak at Congress’ funeral.

And ensure a Congress mukht Bharat

So was Advaniji  my friend, mentor and guide

But I say he was ambitious;

And Advaniji is an honourable man.

He did bring  BJP to power in 1999

But Atalji and not Advaniji ended as Prime Minister.

Advaniji was desperate to be the Prime Minister

Did this in Advaniji seem ambitious?

When Gujarat burnt, Atalji wept:

A PM should be made of sterner stuff:

Advaniji then held my mask to save me

And sought in turn my help to be Atalji’s successor

Was Advaniji  ambitious?

No, he is  an honourable man.

.

I speak not to disprove what Advaniji spoke

To be the next PM,

But here I am to speak what I do know.

You all did love him once, not without cause:

What cause withholds you now not to accept him as the leader?

O judgment! thou art fled to Indian hearts

And they have found their reason in my macho image

To trust me to be their PM.

My heart is still with Advaniji

He is our Marg Darshak

And I must pause to seek my mentor’s blessings.

    I now turn to the opposition which is baying for Modi Mukht Bharat. Both the ruling and the opposition   party have chosen their single respective goal as freeing Bharat from Congress or Modi. It is time the opposition stops sniping at the PM for anything and everything. The twitter is being used only to lambast the PM as with its 140 or a little more word count, there is no space to list out the causes. Twitter is only to simply shoot and scoot. It is time for the opposition to follow PM Modi to remain silent even when thunder and lightning strike and only open up at the right moment to pour vitriol when it is needed to poison the electorate against the opposition.   Congress and in particular Rahul Gandhi should not go ballistic against one man who is the PM of the country. One can question the government’s policies for their merits and demerits, but not go for personal vilification even under the gravest provocation. Modi Government has continued many of the previous governments’ policies and improved on them like construction of roads, electrification of villages, retaining Aadhar and above all ensured  a corruption free government at the top level. The Congress and the opposition should acknowledge the plusses of the Modi Government even when they see its failures in not arresting social disharmony, its failed Kashmir policy, its flip flop policy against Pakistan etc. Let Congress and its allies focus on spelling out their practicable policies instead of critical remarks all the time against Modi Government. Let them list out an alternate Kashmir policy, a new foreign policy in the wake of US belligerence and China’s cunning, a sound agricultural policy to give the farmers  a real  incentive, a visionary policy to synthesize development with environmental safety, a pro active policy to meet the growing water crisis, and an intelligent educational policy that makes education horizontally expansive and vertically progressive,  a far sighted policy to bring a resurgent India that believes in the concept of Many in one, one in Many and other policies that have a direct impact on the well being of all sections of society.

     India is a vast country, a conglomeration of many heterogeneous people of diverse cultures, diverse castes and religions, speaking a variety of languages. It is difficult to govern this nation as it demands catering to different classes and different segments whose needs and requirements are varied and often  incompatible with those of the rest. Every government including the present has made efforts to provide decent governance. It is not all plus or all minus, but a mix of plus and minus. The electorate decides whether plus outweighs minus or the other way around. Time for all the parties to stop whining, complaining and fault finding; time to strategize for the rise of India as conceived and aspired to by Gandhi, Nehru, Patel and millions of honest freedom fathers whose gift of an independent nation is today our proud heritage.

To Quell the Killing Spirit

                                                                 To Quell the Killing Spirit

Shujaat Bukhari is the latest victim of mindless violence that has gripped not only  Kashmir, but our entire  nation for the last few years. It is now a daily routine in many households to hammer a nail on the wall to keep alive the memory of their beloved persons whose right to life had been aborted by frenzied killers. Today is the turn of the Kashmiri editor, a peacenik whose cold blooded murder has jolted not only the media world, but the entire nation for its brutality and purposelessness, unless the purpose is for the terrorist organization to thumb its nose at his  efforts to broker peace in violence hit Kashmir and to generate  fear among those brave voices who, like him speak for restoration of peace in the valley. In the hour of his death, amidst the shock and sorrow of fellow journalists, the media had given a passing reference to the gunning of his bodyguards whose families, away from the media glare are grieving in shocked silence and anger. The same day there was the death of an Indian soldier, abducted and killed by Jaish aka Pakistani force. These are not one off killings; they are daily happenings. The frequency of the killing spree that is flashed on the TV news channels and on the print media have made us immune to this daily savagery and inhumanity. A strange sense of numbness grips us today as we go about our daily chores, but helpless to the point of resigning ourselves to the truthful reality of having no alternative to this mindless brutishness.  Shujaat’s is not the only moderate voice that has been silenced. Many more voices have been muted that include both the dead and the living.  A single voice silenced forever triggers the silence of many living voices. The nation from Kashmir to Kanyakumari,  in a state of nervous palpitation hears the sound of silence. It has witnessed not only the  silencing of Gouri Lankesh, Kalburgi, Pansare  and Dhabolkar, but of many voiceless voices by frenzied mob for alleged crimes of eating or storing beef, of lifting cattle and children. Kerala and Kolkatta have been the epicenters of political killing between the right and the left. The shocking confession by the murder accused in Gouri Lankesh’s case that he killed her because she was “anti-Hindu” is a chilling echo of jihadi terrorists who claim to kill people because they are “anti- Islam”.  All sane people abhor Hitler because he was anti-Jew while the world looks askance at Trump’s outlandish efforts to enforce anti-migrant laws. In today’s game of politics, every politician ups the ante to be anti-something to get elected. S/he does not care if in the bargain this arouses irrational passions of hatred and vengeful fury. It is dreadful to see contemporary politics ruled by vengefulness, intolerance, anger and extreme hostility- which is not just an Indian, localized phenomenon, but one that is world- wide pervasive. The more we go about shrieking that Pakistan is a terrorist state, the more we arouse their animus and enmity. Though I fear being lynched,  I cannot help agreeing with the young Einstein who in his early twenties commented that Indians were stupid. Indians, Einstein seemed to have believed were "biologically inferior" and were hampered by the subcontinent's climate that "prevented them from thinking backward or forward by more than a quarter of an hour." If we study our ancient history, we had been stupid and had never forged unity as one nation except for a brief while during Gandhiji’s freedom movement. It has always been a clash of different kingdoms and the notion of ‘Akhand Bharat’(united Bharat)was time and again betrayed by warring kings. What we see today is a continuation of the same conflict as  states fight over water and power sharing, on crop burning and raising pollution levels in neighbouring areas, on linguistic minority as against linguistic majority within a state etc. Whatever may be a pejorative exaggeration in Einstein’s comments, the truth is we can neither match the Chinese in industrial, scientific and military advancement, not to leave out their achievement in sports nor match the cunningness and word mastery of the Pakistanis nor the doublespeak of the Nepalese and Srilankans nor the resilience and progress of the Bangladeshis. We are simply people of empty words ,unmatched by action. Merely citing our ancient scriptures to illustrate all wisdom was here and nowhere, we are cutting a sorry figure with nothing great to showcase our superiority. We seem to lack killer instinct to achieve great heights,  but have replaced it by insensate killing instincts. While we go about shouting from the roof tops that Pakistan is a rogue state, the World Report of 2018 by Human Rights Watch is far from flattering to India. Vigilante violence carried out by fringe groups claiming to support the ruling party aimed at religious minorities, marginalized communities, and critics of the government, besides their  threat to freedom of expression, fake encounters etc have been highlighted, though ,no doubt with considerable exaggeration. On the same day, CIA from US has even branded VHP (Vishwa Hindu Parishad) as a militant organization. There may not be much truth in these criticisms as they are based on perception but still the core truth remains that there has been in recent years, an increase in the level of intolerance and in the visceral hatred of those who are opposed to the majoritarian ideology. In this sense, one cannot help accepting with embarrassment the criticism of Einstein,( though in his later years he had decried racism and said “racism is a disease of the white people”) that shows us to be inferior by privileging passions over reason and humanity.  It is one thing to dismiss all negative perceptions as engendered by prejudices, but if we claim to be wise, we should see the mirror image as reflected in these criticisms and seek to remedy wherever we have fallen in world’s esteem. This alone can refute Einstein’s criticism of Indians being biologically inferior.

It may not be out of place to mention one of the latest TV serials on Sai Baba to commemorate the hundredth year of his Samadhi. One of the episodes has direct relevance to us today - his role in re-uniting the divided Hindus and Muslims during British rule.  For Sai humanity is one and cannot be divided by religion. All religions lead to God, the ultimate Truth and he asked people not to fight in the name of religion when Ram of the Hindus and Rahim of the Muslims were one and the same. The plurality of Hinduism has been eroded in recent years leading to a divided house that is witness to the killing of many moderate and sane voices. Shujaat Bukhari had braved all assassination bids with his belief that gun cannot silence the pen. Though he has been eternally silenced, his voice still rings in many of us who mourn his death. If Sai’s stress on Shraddha and Saburi(faith and patience) is followed, our faith in humanity and our patience to harmonize with other religions will bring some solidity to the strife torn nation. In this context Sun Tzu’s advice is worth recalling: “Walk in the path defined by rule, and accommodate yourself to the enemy until you can fight a decisive battle” The only injunction is that the decisive battle should be a fight for peace.