Posts

Who is listening?

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As the day dawns to the ninety-seventh day of the protests at Shaheenbagh, there has been no respite whatsoever to the demands of the protesters. We all have become mute spectators to the indifference towards these people who have braved the chilly temperatures of Delhi since 14th Dec 2019 and are now vulnerable to the infection of Coronavirus which has already killed over eleven thousand people around the world. How long can one be motivated to continue this agitation without having the final outcome? The government has turned a blind eye and the only thing they work on is to get these protestors out of the area and be shunned out of sight and out of mind. They sent interlocutors as the representatives from the Supreme Court not to discuss their concerns but to know when they will clear out the blockade for normal traffic to run. There has been no initiation from the government body or the Supreme Court to chart out any plan to discuss on their dissents. The protestors have be...

The Mute Spectators

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How many of us actually go to an election rally to listen to what our candidate wants to say? Well, I don’t think many of us see this as a mandatory or an important event from an attendance point of view. Basically, if we look at it, it appears to be one of the most crucial platforms for a political party to address millions of voters in one go. The irony is that in many cases, the majority of the crowd needs to be artificially created by giving out free transport, meals and even money so that the attendance appears all swollen up. There are statistics on the number of rallies attended or conducted by the star campaigners showcasing their footprint before the campaigning phase ends.  Frankly speaking, the campaigns have not succeeded in creating interest among the common man or a woman to attend with all excitement. By now everyone knows each parties’ tricks and manipulation in statements. While one political party is termed as pro-rich, the other is termed to be pro-poor o...

A Gradual Awakening

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The last few weeks have been quite encouraging as well as tormenting at the same time. On one hand, there have been thousands of young students taking over the streets to protest against the citizenship amendment bill and on the other hand, they have been beaten, harassed and killed for speaking up their minds. Freedom of speech and expression appears to have taken a beating. A peaceful protest goes through the scrutiny by the policemen. They wait with tear gases and lathis and of course the rifles and other ammunition to ward off the protesters. So, a protester has to be mindful of all that can harm oneself physically and mentally. Young student protesters in Delhi braved the biting cold this winter season which was the lowest in the last 118 years. They sang the national anthem at India Gate in the chilling weather during the last hours of 2019 when the whole world was celebrating the New Year’s Eve.  These protesters do not have any vested interests. They only want the...

Weight Matters

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As a child, I did not have any inclination towards sweet eatables. Be it mithai, chocolates or ice cream, I was a child with no such typical demands. I was lanky and never ever thought that I will have to one-day face weight issues.  When your mom says that you need to reduce weight, then that’s the penultimate situation. Moms are normally extremely tolerant and see their kids as kids. They find everything perfect about the kid. So when she says that yes you need to reduce weight, it needs to be taken very seriously.  All this while I was running hide and seek from fitness routines and to add to my woes, I have developed a subconscious habit of eating something sweet after lunch and dinner.  I have become so stringent with my habit that after dinner I dutifully ransack the refrigerator for something sweet to pop into my mouth. As it is rightly said small minute droplets of water make the ocean and therefore these small bites of chocolate etc have slowly an...

The Powerhouse Of Talent

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The world of drama has intrigued me all my life. During my childhood, the natural channel was the school dramatics. I remember enacting Alibaba during a drama class and getting a good score for it. As soon as I thought I was good enough to get a lead role in the upcoming  play for a drama competition, I got a role of a king’s guard and there I was holding a spearheaded stick and shouting my throats out announcing that the king is arriving at the court. This was it. There were no more dialogues.The night before I couldn’t sleep thinking how I could enact that scene differently so that it could catch eyeballs. Alas, my act did not have much scope and it had to go with a flat emotionless voice.Now when I think of this incident I feel how people playing a very small role or a blink and miss role in an act must be going through. There must be a feeling of an identity crisis but if these small parts do not exist then a play cannot be complete. Drama is ultimately a collection ...

The Dynamics Of An Opponent

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The most talked about 2019 Lok Sabha Elections got concluded last week and as usual, there could be only one winner! After months of giving one's blood and sweat to campaigning vigorously all across the country, if one wins the people’s mandate, then it gives such an ultimate satisfaction. On the other hand, if one equally struggles for several months battling unfavourable weather conditions thinking that one has given his or her best to echo the grievances of the people and yet loses, then it does become quite demoralising. While election pundits and political analysts and many other experts would have clear reasons to justify why someone lost or won, the fact remains that with an Indian population of one hundred and thirty-seven crores, no one can really know what runs on each and every voter’s mind while performing the clandestine act of voting through the electronic machine. Analysts would talk about the source of the election outcome until the new set of cabinet ...

The Brutal Webspace

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When Sonam Kapoor shared a post written by Humans Of Hindutva on our soldiers paying the price for the grave situation created by Hindu and Islamic fundamentalists, she was severely trolled. I never could understand the entire brouhaha of a tweet which was targeting the fundamentalists of religion. People started calling her anti-national who should go to Pakistan. I mean, why are we so raged? If there are fundamentalists in Islam, why can’t we talk about the fundamentalists among Hindus? Look at the new concepts of Love Jihad, Cow Lynching, Mob Lynching. Aren’t these creating wide communal disturbances? It is quite shameful to see the kind of language used on social media platforms. Everyone has their opinion and their point of view. If one does not agree to a person’s point of view, constructive feedback from them would be acceptable rather than making it a personal affair. The basic discipline should be to behave like educated people. Sonam has received all kinds of obnoxious...