THE SAME ROOTS, THE SAME GROUND- YET DISCRIMINATED !

The hot evening silence was broken by the creaking sound of an old rusty gate. A lady of about sixty stepped out and tied her hair in an untidy bun.  She looked to the sky, the sun melted a part of her neck into sweat which she wiped off with her handkerchief.

She was lucky that day, a rickshaw stood right in front of her house. She pushed up her golden rimmed glasses up her nose bone and woke the dark rickshaw waala, who was surprisingly basking under the ridiculously hot sun.

“Bhiya, A.P market chaloge”

“Betho” he replied in an uninterested voice.

“kitne loge”

“25 lagenge”

And this, predictably led to an argument that lasted forever, but then the old woman gave up. Holding the nicely painted red rod, she managed to climb up the rickshaw with a great difficulty.

The hot loo hit her wrinkled face as the rickshaw waala peddled as slowly as he could. Twenty five rupees was not reasonable at all and she was not someone who would not care. She was certainly angry, a cold frown on her criss-crossed face drip disgruntlement.

The rickshaw stopped at her destination. The lady slowly brought her thin feet down to the ground. She turned to the Rickshaw waala and handed him two notes, of ten rupees each.

He looked at them and then her, his eyes were enough to tell her that he wanted five more rupees. For the lady, it was not just about money, it was about what was moral. Like every elderly person, she had a lot “good things” to tell the rickshaw walaa, which she did but then the whole thing ended with a five rupee coin!

She looked around the market to find ‘Sharma Dental Clinic’ where she had an appointment for a root canal.  

While the dentist did his job, the clouds outside wrapped the sun in them and a cool breeze set out for a walk.

The lady came out of the market to look for a rickshaw. For it was a lucky day, she spotted one near the nariyal pani waala. She raised her arm to call him but then she suddenly stooped.

She re fixed her spectacles. That man’s head had a Taqiyah, his chin was covered with a bushy beard. He was a Muslim! By no means was the old lady going to travel in a rickshaw of a Muslim!

For fifteen minutes she waited for another rickshaw to come and then she spotted one on the other side of the road. To catch it before another lady walking towards it, she tried to walk a little faster but the poor old lady twisted her ankle!

And now she had no option. She buried her ego and strict anti- Muslim sentiments deep inside her and quietly took a seat. He looked at her and asked where she wanted to go. She pursed her lips  and precisely told him. Not a word more than that! How could she talk to a Muslim? She started planning a good bath and a prayer after she reaches home to get rid of all the ‘impurities’. She fished out twenty five rupees out of her little purse. She did not want to argue with a Muslim for five rupees!

When her house was in sight she asked him to stop, she got down and in haste handed him the money from a distance. She turned around to pace towards her house when a decent voice stopped her. It was the rickshaw waala. Her feet stopped but she did not turn.

                                                     “Aapne 5 rupe zyaada de die”

She was stumped. She turned around and within that span of two seconds, all her negative opinions about Muslims ascended out of her into the endless skies. She was too moved to say anything. Taking that little coin, which transformed a strong headed woman, she walked away.

This time, the old rusty gate stood there to welcome a new lady, who had just realized that-

We all have a soul and a heart, we just look different. We all believe in a supreme power, we have just given it different names. We all love, live, smile and cry, we just have different names.

THE SAME ROOTS, THE SAME GROUND- YET DISCRIMINATED !

   

  

THAT GIRL IN A RED DRESS

That was a bad morning. I was woken up by the squeaky voice of my maid, who wanted to make my bed.
Before I could tell her not to disturb me, she pulled away my sheet and started jerking it so hard, that I had to wake up.

A bad start to my day usually turns me off. But then it started raining and rain always make me feel happy, ALWAYS !
I pulled up the blinds of my window. The roads were all silent, but there was a  blissful bitter batter of falling raindrops. Everybody had taken to some shelter, except  a girl in a red dress and a few other girls. She was neither dancing in the rain nor taking shelter.
I reached for my glasses on the side table, so that I could see more clearly.

Credits- Hari Menon Photography

 She was a short, young dusky girl with a basket of bright yellow flowers in her hands. She was not pretty, rather she was very shabby but her eyes were beautiful. She was selling those flowers. The next thing I remember is that she started singing to attract people to buy her basket of flowers. Her voice was enchanting, though I could not understand what the song actually was. The language was unknown to me.
It rained for long that day, but she kept standing right there with undying hope. Her clothes were dripping water and her hair were all wet. But the yellow flowers were washed and bright!

                                                               X- X -X -X

My maid pushed me aside to the sweep near the window. She would never let me live in peace! After it was dry, I came back to the window. The rain had stopped and the roads that were deserted a few minutes back were flooded with cars and scooters. The girl in red dress would have been lost in the hustle bustle of the city, but my eyes found her. A middle aged lady with curly salt-pepper hair was buying flowers from her. I noted that she bought the whole basket. The flower seller was pleased, so much so that her dry lips parted for once to flash her teeth. She smiled for the first time since I had been observing her.
A long truck obstructed the view for a minute. From beneath the truck, I could see her bare feet  making way for themselves. She suddenly tripped and fell. A few kind people helped her get up, and then I realized -

   She was Blind !
I felt so sorry for her. The eyes that kept me captivated for half an hour could not see, see the world around her, the  blossoms she was selling and the vibrancy of her red dress.

                                                               X- X -X -X


Next evening, I watered the money plant near my table and opened the window to find her right there, yet again, in the very same red dress. It was a marriage in the colony  that day, so the streets were decorated.
 This time, her left cheek had a big cut. The blood was dry though,  I am sure it would have been hurting her. That day I saw her talking, for the first time, to a balloon seller standing by the lamp post next to her. They became friends, I think,as they chatted for long.

Credits- Audi Photography

                                                               X- X -X -X

She was there everyday for the next one week. Listening to her songs and waiting for her to pack, gelled into my routine and became a part of my everyday.
Out of curiosity one day, I couldn't stop my self from asking her name, but I got no answer, just a faint smile.
I bought a bunch of flowers from her. She was trying to hunt for change from her little bag, but I told her to keep it with herself.
I tried communicating with her after that, but maybe I was too shy.
But now I regret that because she never came back with her basket of flowers after that. She just vanished.
I did not know anything about her. Who she actually was? And maybe I will never get my answer.
I remember  those days when I observed this girl whose name I never knew, with a sigh.

                                           For me she is ' That Girl in a Red dress'

Credits- Audi Photography

                                                       

AN ART CALLED 'CREATING'

Enter a carver's workshop. You will see a place too simple, lit up by a bare bulb, filled with  chisels, axes and blades, ruled by an eye for intimate detail.

Around the place, you will find, the works of the master, each of them dripping thousands of emotions. Works so splendid, it seems like creations of some spirits.

                              His chisel work among the stone,

                                        Persuading it of petal or of limb

                                     Or starry curve, till risen anew there sang

                                        Shape out of chaos, and again the vision

                                     Of one mind single from the world was pressed

                                        Upon the daily custom of the sky

                                    Or field or the body of man.

       But what gave birth to the splendid carvings is the stone.

A stone that would never catch someone's eyes, until it comes to rest in the magical hands of the carver. He carves out emotions from a mere rock and turns it into a mortal masterpiece that says a hundred stories and reflects a million feelings.

That is the art of creation that transforms something very insignificant to something that can leave anyone astonished.

Now step outside and enter the street just adjacent to it.

  Enter any one of the hundred small mud huts and you will be carried away by the beautiful fragrance of Incense sticks.

It is quite fascinating to realize that a mere black thin stick can take you to a land where fragrance takes birth, where scent and aroma live and where redolence drifts with the wind.

In a corner of the hut you will find some ladies rolling ugly yet aromatic plant material into thin sticks.

Under the stiff and still sunlight tip-toeing through the window

sat a lady in pink and gold, her wrinkled hands making sticks

turning the rolled plants into a house of essence

breaking the black walls spread the aroma

making her a magician !

This is the art of creation that can give rise to something that holds within it million experiences

Now let me take you to this place where garlands are made.

Short bamboo sticks hold the blue plastic sheet making a satisfactory protection from the sun.

Behind the site is a huge temple of Goddess Pullikaringali.

A basket flooded with pink tender flowers is disturbed by sun tanned fingers of a lady. She picks up one of them and pierces it with a needle.

She pushes it down the thread and it joins the other flowers, making it ten times more beautiful. 

 One by one, the needle of the garland maker 

   goes through a flower and soon it becomes a garland

which is much more alluring

much more admirable

and much more sublime.

This is the art of creation that hold the power of making something pretty, prettier.

It not a task, not a job, it is an art.

An art called 'creating'

THE PASSION THAT 'DANCED' AWAY

                                               photography credits - Manya Ahuja



There is a blinding white light in the apartment. Streaks of marble are shining under rivulets  of sunshine.
The wind is staging it's own opera outside and the chirping birds on the branches of the oak tree spectate a fair young lady dancing to it.
Clad in her pink Tutu dress and her foot wreaking pointed ballet shoes she slides through the area like a soap on the wet floor and ends gracefully with a smooth pencil turn.

Adia Greene - a  passionate ballet dancer, who's toes can never stop doing a grapevine and her hands always flowing in air practicing her first love- dance.
She has been dancing since she was seven and this is what she wants to do till the day she dies.
She grooves with the wind , moves with the music and stoops to elegance.

The next day was a big day for her and her dancing career.  It is the largest dance show of the city! Tickets had sold like hot cakes.
The first ray of sunshine waked her up and like any other day the dancer in her woke up with a eagerness to improve.
She danced to the auditorium, where her dreams were going to take a flight of glory.The auditorium seats were filled with dance hungry audience and the lights were turned on!
She changed to her new Tutu dress and spent an hour on the barre, which is for strengthening. There was something going on in her stomach, out of excitement and nervousness. Every dancer before presenting himself on stage does go through a series of emotions- excitement, the hunger to perform, nervousness to name a few! Her hands and legs did not rest while she kept practicing to perfect her steps.
It was on her favorite song by Richard Maddock and Herbert Von.
" Ladies and gentlemen, please take your seats the show is about to begin"
She stole a peek through the wings at the hundred people craving for a supple ballet performance.
She has to do her best!
All the dancers, with their hair tied up in neat buns adorned with a white Lily
 lined up to take to the stage.

          Adia looked like a fresh Lily herself!

Adia was ready to dance to glory

The music started and they trotted to the stage on their toes.
Adia was in full swing. She perfected every moment from piles, tendus, jites to battements.
The dancers jumped into the attitude position, took a piravid turn and came to rest on their knees.
The beat became fast and now Adia danced to a platform much above the main stage.
She smiled as the spotlight fell on her. She took to her toes, ready to fling her left leg up to her head. In the mid way she lost her balance. She tried to regain control but her foot twisted and she fell down from the great height!
The soft ballet beats ended with a loud thud added with horrified yells of the dancers and the audience!
Down lay Adia, her face still shining under the yellow light but her body all numb . She was immediately rushed to the hospital.

                                             X-----------X---------X

It has been a fortnight since her apartment was locked but now it opened  and Adia slowly entered with wet eyes. She is on a wheel chair guided by a nurse and not on her dancing feet.
The doctor says she has displaced her pelvic and shoulder bone, and will never be able to dance again.
Adia's eyes fall on her pink dancing shoes, covered with layers of dirt. She advances towards it but rolls down the wheel chair and lands on her elbow. The nurse help the crying Adia back.

the shoes lay unused covered with dirt

  Dance is a drug, once you take it, you get addicted to it, but when your dreams don't support your desires you end up in frustration and helplessness.

She sniffs and the realization of the fact that she may never be able to dance again crushes her inside. No matter how much she wanted to dance, her body did not move and when it did it was painful. She wished she would have died because for her, life without dance was hollow.

Once a dancer forever a dancer.
 But now only her heart dances and she reaches her former glory only in her dreams. Though her tryst with dance was short-lived the dancer in her is immortal. She still jigs a little when music falls on her ears. Her soul never rests. It keeps burning in love for dance.
Adia feels herself drowned in the fatal waters of helplessness, after all, she used to dance in joy, in sorrow, in excitement, in agony. She used to dance every moment and she wished to dance her life away. !

Adia kept seeing the pictures from the days when she could dance

 She and dance were like ships that passed each other in the night but they did cast a healing light on each other that will last    forever.

NOT ALL GODS ARE VEGETARIAN

                                              picture credits- Hari Menon Photography    

While many call it a 'ritual' , I call it a SLAUGHTER.

  India is God's own land, where people go to any extent to impress Him. We have been successful in showing some diversity here too, while some reach Him through poojas and idol worships or by Havans
many see self torture as a divine medium and some keep themselves in a safer position by constructing the path to God by using the corpse of animals.

  In India, from smaller animals like hens and goats to larger ones like buffaloes, all have got a 'divine' cause of death- for the Almighty.

Devotees who worship by burning, torturing and piercing themselves are any day better than those who shed blood of animals because they are doing it to themselves by their own will!
 The poor animals are killed to be presented as an offering or a tribute or an oblation to the God.

Some Hindus believe  sacrificing an animal can wash away their sins.
I would rather suggest them to 'wash away' their sins in the holy waters of Ganga than in the blood of animals.
 In the Phulpati festival, a goose is sacrificed.
 People gather in a temple where the priest first worships the goose, tilaks it and bathe it.
 The goose, would have been feeling good at the special treatment until its neck it chopped and the                         blood is offered to the idol of Goddess Durga.

Animals are usually killed using the 'Jhatka' method, where the animal is killed in a single blow.
This is because Hindus believe that it is a bad omen if the animal makes a sound before dying.
Some may sacrifice the animal  by piercing its heart with a a spike or by choking it!

'God lives in his own creatures' is a line much unknown by the devotees who sought to impress their Deity but end up killing His own creatures.

The worst instance of animal sacrifice, I could discover was the Gandhimai festival.
This slaughter is held in Nepal but witness a huge participation of Indians.

This cruel way of worship takes place once in five years where 250,000 animals are killed in a month!
It is not one of those where a single small animal is killed, it is a MASS SACRIFICE where buffaloes are killed. As the dawn breaks, the festival officially opened with the sacrifice of two rats, two pigeons, a pig and a rooster in the main temple, to cheers of "Long Live Gadhimai".
In the main event, 250 appointed residents with traditional kukri knives began their task of decapitating more than 10,000 buffaloes in a dusty enclosure guarded by high walls.

And to make things worse and more inhumane this blood is not offered to the goddess but is drunk by the priest directly from the body of the sacrificed animal.

 

   During, Ed-ul- Adha, Muslims of the country sacrifice a large mammal like a goat or a camel or sheep. Over 100 million are slaughtered during this 48 hour period

 It is sad to know that we are foolish enough to believe that taking the life of an animal who does not have the tongue to protest can fulfill our wishes, wipe away our sins, make us stronger and can impress the God.

While animal sacrifice, in many places is no longer a popular creed, it is widely practiced in several parts of our country because it is not easy to explain the conservatives that it is NOT  a ritual or culture it is murder and slaughter.


Maybe they would realize this only when God himself would descend and tell them -" I AM A VEGETARIAN !"

“Could a being create the fifty billion galaxies 

each with two hundred billion stars 

then rejoice in the smell of burning goat flesh?” 

― Ron Patterson

     

                         India is INDEED God's own land !

THE ACTUAL SIN

His eyes were dry
 and his face like a morning flower, which was yet to bloom
Like a snail he crawled
His entangled legs seemed be fooled
He didn’t want but could not stay
 His heart had a sea of words
 But not a word he could say

The bright sunshine could not compel him to blink,
The fluttering butterflies could not snatch his attention
 Even the color soaked kites in the sky could not for him to admire them.
The fragrance of fresh crêpes could not change the path he walked
His direction was determined and he walked along the tall trees that seemed to pluck balls of cotton from the sky.

Finally his feet came to rest and he raised his head to see a white church amidst the busy market
He stepped into the chapel and looked around. A tear dropped on his polished shoes. His heart melted like the candles that burned in the glory of Lord Jesus
He seeked the blessings from Jesus and turned towards the confession box.
 His heart had locked in a sin, a sin he could not forgive himself for. He dragged himself into the close both. It took him a great effort to unseal his lips that stuck together because they were too dry and in a shaky voice he spoke –

“ It is not a murder Nor a robbery, for which I am here to confess
It is worse. It is darker. It is unforgivable.
It is something that eats me inside. It is something that hollows the emotion of love.
I have committed a sin, for which no punishment is severe I have committed a sin for which no confession can cover up.”

 But son, what sin have you committed? -Echoed a fragile voice from the other side.

“The sin of BETRAYAL- the actual sin.
   I stood in the witness box, and in the witness box just in front of me stood the accused-my dear friend  The prosecutor questioned me while my friend’s yearning eyes dripped hope. I glanced at the public and other witnesses present in the court.  A man in the jet black suit signaled me. I crossed my heart and declared:

Yes my eyes saw my friend murder the victim at the party last night, who fell from the roof
A friend accusing a friend is more than any evidence or proof
 He is a devil. He is a murderer.
This is all I have got to say
 Punish him, so that justice may prevail."

  I lied! I lied oh Father! My friend is innocent but my job was at stake. My boss pushed that girl at the annual bank party But he stuffed my mouth with the fear of loosing of loosing my job and lured me by tempting me for money and promotion. Today my friend is behind the bars because I betrayed him Today he is considered guilty because I lied !  My tongue shivers when I call myself his friend because I am no friend of his.  I am a traitor, a betrayer, a deserter. I must be hanged, I shall not live

The next thing father could recollect was a loud shout. He rushed to the other side of the confession box to see a dead body He had killed himself. he could not live with the guilt of committing the actual sin – Betrayal.

SHE IS STRONG

"My Maariamma bays for blood.My Kali kills. My Draupadi strips. My Sita climbs on to a stranger’s lap. All my women militate. They brave bombs, they belittle kings…. Call me names if it comforts you. I no longer care. "


Writes Meena Kandasamy, celebrating the loud, slutty sensibility and the new discovered power in women.
She lashes out at a Toronto police officer’s remark – “Women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimised” – to York University  students during a campus-safety briefing.
Men need to understand- that a short dress is NOT a yes! But unfortunately, its nearly next to impossible to expect this from half of the male population in India. 

Kandasamy further quotes:  
It is flawed logic to expect Indian men to not indulge in leching, leering, groping, harassing, molesting and raping women on the streets when they are seasoned wife-beaters at home. According to UN statistics, more than two-thirds of married Indian women have experienced domestic violence; when our homes are unsafe, it is impossible to imagine our streets will turn safe unless we address the fundamental assumption that men have a right to control women’s bodies.

"Nazar teri buri, burkha main pehnu ?"- were the headlines in Delhi Times as hundreds of women took to streets to protest against explaining or excusing rape by referring any aspect of a woman's appearance.   

If a house is robbed because the window was open, who is to be held responsible for it? Obviously the robber and not the robbed. But alas, here many will accuse the robbed for keeping the window open as an 'invitation' to him. Same is the case with the women.

Eve teasing froze the nation. In the day-light, with hundred cowards as spectators, women are pushed into their graves of shame. Many watch with anguish in their eyes, while others with the desire to call for help, yet no one steps forward to save the innocent soul.
 

I am a dead woman,

 A victim who became a show for many

Yearning for a Krishna to save this Draupadi

now my heart stops me to step out

' you might become a prey again' it shouts out loud.

Life was squeezed out from many women souls returning form work at three in the morning. Yet hundreds of women work at call centers, BECAUSE SHE IS STRONG.

Drunk men harass girls at bars. Yet many women work there and serve them without any fear, BECAUSE SHE IS STRONG

Short dresses are a 'come and molest me' for millions. Yet women have the courage to dress the way they want to, BECAUSE SHE IS STRONG

Domestic violence and demand for dowry still surface. Yet every women wishes to marry and live peacefully. BECAUSE SHE IS STRONG

There  is light at the end of the tunnel and she will feel it one day

she will rise up, beyond harassment, worthlessness and slay

She has the right to live the way she wants, and she will

call her a slut or whore, her lips will stay still

If a man can go to bars and discos, so can she

time is changing , today she is equal to he

Let our tongues unite, not to call her names

but to give her respect and uncover her from shame

She has arrived to prove every man wrong

that She is not weak, she is STRONG!