Human Being or the Hypocritic being

Every morning while going through the newspaper I encounter at least 10-15 advertisements which boast of making your skin as soft as silk and your hair thick and dark as night. I know people who has readily agreed to burn a hole in their pocket for getting a thick mane through a hair transplant procedure.
What I don't understand is we do so much to take care of a dead tissue that is a physiologically a nominal part of our human body,but do we actually look after the parts that play an important role in our survival? Our heart for instance,we go for treatments or hair transplants for damaged hair,but do we go for treatments for a broken heart or do we actually stop smoking when we know that this activity is doing a permanent damage to our lungs.Do we stop thinking negatively and switch to positive thinking for so that we can have a healthy stress free heart!!We don't eat oily food or junk food reason being that it will result in weight gain and these might cause our skin to look dull,but how many of us really think this much before downing a pint of beer or expensive wine that too in a fine dining restaurant?
The core of all these deeds is we,human beings in the lines that what others think of us,our appearance,our lifestyle,we act under peer pressure,but we don't think for ourselves.We believe so much in outer appearance that we forget what we ought to be from the inside.When I am saying this I can quote an incident here which I happened to read in The Daily Mirror,the writer was the mother of an affluent socialite and she happen to visit her daughter's apartment wearing chappals.She was promptly stopped by the watchman and asked to return to where she has come from without being asked as to whom she wants to see and why.
So much so that,even in our daily lives we usually get attracted to people who are well dressed and fashionable irrespective of the fact that how they are as a person.This makes the saying apt that the world is a stage and we,the actors should know to play our part well wearing the apt makeup,because the audience is least interested in who is behind the mask,they are more interested in what they see on the stage.

Get Out of the CaR!!!!!!!!

(This is supposedly a true log recorded in the Police log of Sarasota, Florida.)

An elderly old lady did her shopping and, upon returning to her car, found four males in the act of leaving with her vehicle.She dropped her shopping bags and drew her handgun, proceeding to scream at the top of her lungs,"I have a gun and I know how to use it!Get out of my car!!"
The four men did'nt wait for a second threat.They got out and ran like mad.The lady, somewhat shaken, then proceeded to load her shopping bags into the back of the car and got into the driver's seat.She was so shaken that she could'nt get her key into the ignition.She tried and tried and then she realised why.It was for the same reason she had wondered why there was a football, a frisbee and 2-packs of beer in the front seat.
A few minutes later, she found her own car parked four or five spaces further down.She loaded her bags into the car and drove to the police station to report her mistake.
The sergeant to whom she she told the story could'nt stop laughing.He pointed to the other end of the counter, where four pale men were reporting a cat jacking by a mad,elderly lady described as white, less than five feet tall, glasses, curly white hair and carrying a large hand gun.
No charges were filed.
Moral of the story?
If you are going to have a senior moment...... make it memorable.

The Super Woman

In the suburbs of Kolkata is a small town called Charghat and ten miles from this small town is a small village called Chunsura.
This village is not the native land of any national celebrity nor has it produced any renowned political leader in the past years. It is non-extraordinary in every aspect one can think of. In this ordinary village lived this extraordinary woman whose name was Bhaswati.
Why was she extraordinary , we will get to kno in the due course of this post……
Bhaswati was an ordinary girl who was born in a poor farmer’s family. She had 3 younger sisters. When she was 10, her father was taken away as a victim of cholera, further pushing the family into dungeons of poverty. When she was eleven , she had to quit school to help her mother in housework and to look after her sisters when her mother was away at work .
Her mother used to work as a domestic help in the Zamindar’s household. By the time Bhaswati entered her teenage , she grew up into a skinny yet beautiful dusky village damsel. She joined her mother in her work with the hope to double her family’s income. But destiny had some other plans for her.
On the first day of her job, she was spotted by the Zamindar’s lecherous elder son. He started to tail her around th ehouse and one fine afternoon hell broke upon her when she was working alone in a room. The beast left no stone unturned in deflowering her feminity and pillaged her till she was only half alive as a shattered and trampled flower.
When the Zamindar came to know of this, Bhaswati was sent home with her mother with a sum of hundred rupees –as damage concession.
Vy God’s grace, she was successfully nursed back to normal health by her siblings. But after 2 months of this incident, her mother discovered Bhaswati’s pregnancy. When the Zamindar was informed about this, as things happen in our country , the Zamindar proposed Bhaswati’s marriage to his son. The son who had married three times before this, complied to his father’s request as he knew that the girl won’t last longer than six months under his customary tortuous physical activities and physical abuses.
Bhaswati’s mother, who was no more than an innocent poor lady, was more than flattered by this proposal as there was nothing she could do to save her family’s name from social abuses. Bhaswati on the other hand surprised everyone by straightway refusing to the marriage proposal.
On this refusal, she was not only taunted by her own mother but also by the community. The so-called NGO’s who were setting up Bhaswati as their brand-ambassadress for their campaign of violence against women, dumped her saying that she must have seduced the Zamindar’s innocent son into the sexual act.
Bhaswati’s life was further made difficult by the second decision she took. When she refused to marry the Zamindar’s son , the abortion of her child was demanded by the village Panchayat. When she refused to oblige, she was made the victim of a terrible outrage amongst village elders. Bhaswati, when she was in the 5th month of her pregnancy was bitten brutally by the village women folks saying that she is the bearer of sin and then kicked out of the village premises by the village elders.
Uncertain as to what to do next and where to go, she took refuge in a shanty that belonged to a leper. There also, in the darkness of night she was hunted down by the Zamindar’s son who came along with a group of goons and further defaced her by throwing acid on her bare skin.
Tolerating the acute pain and extreme mental agony, Bhaswati reacted in a completely unexpected manner. Any other woman in her situation would have decided of ending her life and hence the pain , but Bhaswati decided the contrary. Her willingness to give birth to the baby in her womb turned into a strong determination . Bearing the extreme pan she walked bare-footed for the next 25 kilometers where she was spotted by a mobile medical rescue team. She was taken to a hospital in the nearby town where she gave birth to a baby girl. Because of the physical tortures inflicted upon her, the baby was born with dysfunctional limbs.
Through fifteen long years, Bhaswati worked at different places, first as a rag picker, then as a domestic help, then as a baby sitter and many other odd jobs. Since she had a little formal education, she used to help people fill money order forms and savings forms outside a post office which used to fetch her a petty income. Through various means she and by tolerating her own hunger and thirst she saved enough so that her own daughter can go to school. She not only educated her daughter but also saw to it that she attend college.
Today Bhaswati is no more, as the hunger and thirst that she was tolerating finally gave into tuberculosis. Her daughter is a schoolteacher in the same village from where her mother was kicked out. She is the most respected person in the same village which had once labeled her mother as a sinner. This is an apt answer from an extraordinary woman to our society’s irrelevant norms which have led to many girl’s death.

The Common Man

People write diary entries, writing down their experiences and the important events of their lives “in their own words”. But the guy about whom I am going to tell you about today wrote things “as they happened” as in who spoke what and in which context etc. Without taking up much of your time I would like to present here some of his diary entries. Why I am doing so and who is this guy- you will get to know all this at the end of this post.

5th April, 1986
My 4th class results are declared today. I managed to pass in the academics – 61.327%. My school calculated it as 61.3%, they missed out the 0.027%. These people don’t realize how each percentage is hard-earned. Here though it is one-thirtieth of a %- still, I earned it.
*****- whole 5 stars. Why because I got a first prize in Calligraphy and my Kabaddi team won by 10 points in the final match – after all who’s the Captain? Me of course.

Father: “ Poltu, where’s your report card?”
Me: “Coming baba.”
Father: “So? 57 in Maths, 42 in Science, 39 in Hindi, 79 in English and you failed in Social Science? What’s this?”
Me: “Baba, I came first in Calligraphy and in Kabaddi my team…”
Father: “Shut up! For what do I send you to school? To learn how to shove and run about like an ox and what this calli-whatever is going to help you with? Are you going to paint the walls for 555 chap Bidi or Tiranga chap chaddi when you grow up? And you have just passed in your mother tongue- aren’t you ashamed of it? Look at you- still standing here with your chin high. Get out of my sight.”

6th June, 1988
During dinner-
Father: “The peon at our office- do you remember him Sarla?”
Mother: “Sure, he came to us to ask for financial help so that his son can study. What happened?”
Father: “That very son Sarla, he has scored 89% in his class 10th examination. What a gem! Distinction in all subjects. And look at this fellow- dreaming of painting the walls red and blue with tiranga chap chaddi ads.”
Me: “Baba please. Calligraphy doesn’t mean painting cheap ads on walls and I am in class 8th ……”
Father: “Shut up! How dare you open your mouth! Look at this fellow Sarla. My peon’s son- his father is crunched up for money , yet he is doing so well and my son!! Disgusting!!!”
Me: “Ma can I have half an egg more please?”
Father: “Yes why not, that is what you were having and will continue to have in the future it seems- not only for dinner and lunch but also in your marksheets, Egghead!! Feed him a dozen eggs everyday Sarla- then only his hardshelled brain might open up.”

7th July, 1990
Father: “You are going to opt for Arts and Humanities and that’s final.”
Me: “No Baba, I cant do that, please, you remember I failed once, no twice, no I think …..umm yess 3 and half times, i.e., if you consider the half-yearly results as well- in Social Science. How can I take it up for the rest of my life?”
Father: “Great- look at him. People count their achievements, and this fellow here is so proud of his failures he is remeniscising about them as if counting his gallantry medals. What good are you going to do in science? Paint designs on a dead frog? There is no place for people like you who have dog turd for brain in Science group.”

8th May, 1995
My to-be wife’s family visited our place today to carry out the final negotiations about our marriage.
To-be Father-in –law : “So I hope you won’t demand any cash and what can you demand for a nerd like your son. My daughter is a BA and MA (both from an open university with three attempts at each exam respectively- this part is of course added by me) and she has done a COMPLETE course on MS OFFICE from Yeduppa Computer Academy. I wonder if your son has the slightest idea as to how to start a computer! ”

In case of a common place simpleton like me roles across the table are exchanged even in the marriage market.

14th December, 2003
My Wife: “Agarwal ji got his wife a new mobile and Maitra bhabi , the one who lives down the lane, got a stone studded dog collar for their spaniel …..”
Me: “What is a dog going to do with a stone studded collar? Show off to his bitches?”
My Wife: “Shut up! You don’t have a sense of style, rather you don’t have a standard. You don’t think in ‘those’ levels. A government servant like you-mediocre, O hell! Why did I marry you and …..”
Me: “I got a recognition letter for my outstanding work in my department.”
My Wife: “Mehra ji got his wife 5 saris in sale- WHAT! What recognition? Did they give you an increment for that? Hell with your penniless recognition.”

If one evening I come back home and tell her that I have killed an ambassador, she would ask me if I got paid for that.


No further entries were found after this. Because he was captured and terminated in the year 2004. His factual name ( the one in the official records ) is Devdoot. His original name is not recorded and hence is not disclosed. He was a government servant working in the records archive of the Foreign Ministry. What was his actual work? Not to look after the archives but to bring information to be put in those archives. What kind of information? The illegal (officially) and the trans-national uncensored information, in short, he was an under cover top notch intelligence officer who was persona-non grata
at the official Intelligence departments.
There are many officers like him, who work as clerks. Devdoot started as a common place agent carrier who would work as an interface to transmit highly confidential messages across the border to Pakistan. He was chosen because he was least likely to be suspected. Like the rest of his family, everyone thought him as a common place, ordinary, good-for-nothing, clerk who used to work for the Foreign Ministry, New Delhi. Occasionally people would see him making short trips to Amritsar (the trips were actually made to Karachi, Lahore, Baharain etc).
In a short period he became an actual spy. He used his calligraphic skills to the fullest to carry out stinging operations across the border and in the Middle East. Later he went on to become a Spy Master and a recruiter of agents.The very person whose father doubted his intelligence to take up Science as his core subject successfully masterminded many counter-insurgency operations. His recruits had worked successfully to bring down many probable terror attacks , insurgency and counter-insurgency operations.
Today, though he is no more, his past activities are not disclosed to safeguard the identities of his recruits and informants.
However common place he was, he was finally spotted by the wrong people .
Till this date, his family know nothing of his actual profession and believed that he was killed in a car accident.
People like Devdoot do not receive gallantry awards , neither is a salvo fired for them, yet they form the intelligence of our country’s Military services, without them the services are as bad as a blind man amidst a busy highway.
This post is a tribute to people like Devdoot and to their services for their nations.

The Common Man

People write diary entries, writing down their experiences and the important events of their lives “in their own words”. But the guy about whom I am going to tell you about today wrote things “as they happened” as in who spoke what and in which context etc. Without taking up much of your time I would like to present here some of his diary entries. Why I am doing so and who is this guy- you will get to know all this at the end of this post.

5th April, 1986
My 4th class results are declared today. I managed to pass in the academics – 61.327%. My school calculated it as 61.3%, they missed out the 0.027%. These people don’t realize how each percentage is hard-earned. Here though it is one-thirtieth of a %- still, I earned it.
*****- whole 5 stars. Why because I got a first prize in Calligraphy and my Kabaddi team won by 10 points in the final match – after all who’s the Captain? Me of course.

Father: “ Poltu, where’s your report card?”
Me: “Coming baba.”
Father: “So? 57 in Maths, 42 in Science, 39 in Hindi, 79 in English and you failed in Social Science? What’s this?”
Me: “Baba, I came first in Calligraphy and in Kabaddi my team…”
Father: “Shut up! For what do I send you to school? To learn how to shove and run about like an ox and what this calli-whatever is going to help you with? Are you going to paint the walls for 555 chap Bidi or Tiranga chap chaddi when you grow up? And you have just passed in your mother tongue- aren’t you ashamed of it? Look at you- still standing here with your chin high. Get out of my sight.”

6th June, 1988
During dinner-
Father: “The peon at our office- do you remember him Sarla?”
Mother: “Sure, he came to us to ask for financial help so that his son can study. What happened?”
Father: “That very son Sarla, he has scored 89% in his class 10th examination. What a gem! Distinction in all subjects. And look at this fellow- dreaming of painting the walls red and blue with tiranga chap chaddi ads.”
Me: “Baba please. Calligraphy doesn’t mean painting cheap ads on walls and I am in class 8th ……”
Father: “Shut up! How dare you open your mouth! Look at this fellow Sarla. My peon’s son- his father is crunched up for money , yet he is doing so well and my son!! Disgusting!!!”
Me: “Ma can I have half an egg more please?”
Father: “Yes why not, that is what you were having and will continue to have in the future it seems- not only for dinner and lunch but also in your marksheets, Egghead!! Feed him a dozen eggs everyday Sarla- then only his hardshelled brain might open up.”

7th July, 1990
Father: “You are going to opt for Arts and Humanities and that’s final.”
Me: “No Baba, I cant do that, please, you remember I failed once, no twice, no I think …..umm yess 3 and half times, i.e., if you consider the half-yearly results as well- in Social Science. How can I take it up for the rest of my life?”
Father: “Great- look at him. People count their achievements, and this fellow here is so proud of his failures he is remeniscising about them as if counting his gallantry medals. What good are you going to do in science? Paint designs on a dead frog? There is no place for people like you who have dog turd for brain in Science group.”

8th May, 1995
My to-be wife’s family visited our place today to carry out the final negotiations about our marriage.
To-be Father-in –law : “So I hope you won’t demand any cash and what can you demand for a nerd like your son. My daughter is a BA and MA (both from an open university with three attempts at each exam respectively- this part is of course added by me) and she has done a COMPLETE course on MS OFFICE from Yeduppa Computer Academy. I wonder if your son has the slightest idea as to how to start a computer! ”

In case of a common place simpleton like me roles across the table are exchanged even in the marriage market.

14th December, 2003
My Wife: “Agarwal ji got his wife a new mobile and Maitra bhabi , the one who lives down the lane, got a stone studded dog collar for their spaniel …..”
Me: “What is a dog going to do with a stone studded collar? Show off to his bitches?”
My Wife: “Shut up! You don’t have a sense of style, rather you don’t have a standard. You don’t think in ‘those’ levels. A government servant like you-mediocre, O hell! Why did I marry you and …..”
Me: “I got a recognition letter for my outstanding work in my department.”
My Wife: “Mehra ji got his wife 5 saris in sale- WHAT! What recognition? Did they give you an increment for that? Hell with your penniless recognition.”

If one evening I come back home and tell her that I have killed an ambassador, she would ask me if I got paid for that.


No further entries were found after this. Because he was captured and terminated in the year 2004. His factual name ( the one in the official records ) is Devdoot. His original name is not recorded and hence is not disclosed. He was a government servant working in the records archive of the Foreign Ministry. What was his actual work? Not to look after the archives but to bring information to be put in those archives. What kind of information? The illegal (officially) and the trans-national uncensored information, in short, he was an under cover top notch intelligence officer who was persona-non grata
at the official Intelligence departments.
There are many officers like him, who work as clerks. Devdoot started as a common place agent carrier who would work as an interface to transmit highly confidential messages across the border to Pakistan. He was chosen because he was least likely to be suspected. Like the rest of his family, everyone thought him as a common place, ordinary, good-for-nothing, clerk who used to work for the Foreign Ministry, New Delhi. Occasionally people would see him making short trips to Amritsar (the trips were actually made to Karachi, Lahore, Baharain etc).
In a short period he became an actual spy. He used his calligraphic skills to the fullest to carry out stinging operations across the border and in the Middle East. Later he went on to become a Spy Master and a recruiter of agents.The very person whose father doubted his intelligence to take up Science as his core subject successfully masterminded many counter-insurgency operations. His recruits had worked successfully to bring down many probable terror attacks , insurgency and counter-insurgency operations.
Today, though he is no more, his past activities are not disclosed to safeguard the identities of his recruits and informants.
However common place he was, he was finally spotted by the wrong people .
Till this date, his family know nothing of his actual profession and believed that he was killed in a car accident.
People like Devdoot do not receive gallantry awards , neither is a salvo fired for them, yet they form the intelligence of our country’s Military services without the services are as bad as a blind man amidst a busy highway.
This post is a tribute to people like Devdoot and to their services for their nations.

Neo Valentine Saga

In spite of what you have been told by everyone, the truth is that Valentine’s day originated hundreds of years ago in India and to top it all in Gujarat!
Gujarati men, especially the Patels, continually mistreated and disrespected their wives (Patelianis). One fine day, it happened to be February 14th, one brave Pateliani, having had her enough ‘torture’ from her husband, finally chose to rebel by beating him up with a ‘velan’ (rolling pin). Yes, the same velan which she used daily to make chapattis for him – only this time, instead of the dough, it was the husband who was flattened. This was a momentous occasion for all Gujarati women. A revolt soon spread like wild fire, with thousands of housewives beating up their husbands with their velans.
There was an outburst of moaning by ‘chapatti-ed’ husbands all over Anand and Ahemadabad. The Patel menfolk quickly learnt their lesson and started behaving respectfully with their Patelianis. Thereafter, on February 14th every year, the women of Gujarat would ceremoniously beat up their husbands to commemorate that eventful day. Soon the Gujarati men realized that in order to avoid this ordeal they needed to present gifts to their wives…… and so they brought flowers and sweetmeats. Hence the tradition began.
As Gujarat fell under the influence of Western Culture, that day was called ‘Velan-tine Day’. The ritual soon spread to Britain and many other Western countries, specifically the catchwords “Velantine”. Of course in their foreign tongues, it was first anglicized to ‘Valentine’. And there after, February 14th came to be known as “Valentine’s Day” !

-Take this post with a pinch of salt and an ounce of humor, this is not meant to hurt communal feelings.

When Kids "take over"

I read this post at Mr Rajiv Chakravarty's blog which is about green revolution and clean energy. This is an example as to how a child is the father of man-

All this while I have been writing about trees and green things. Today, I am spell-bound to know that a six year old has done a great thing. Here is an email that was received by Janet's Trees for Free foundation. Friends, if it has touched your heart, join hands with Janet or maybe some other organization for planting trees. Its the need of the hour.

Dear tree planters,

Our daughter, Maaike, just had her 6th birthday party. At her party, she asked friends not to give gifts, but to make donations to their choice of 2 charities. One was an orphanage, the other was planting trees in Bangalore. She has been talking about how to stop pollution in Bangalore. This seemed to me to be something concrete that she could do safely. (She talks about going out and picking up garbage.)

She has raised just about 3500 rupees for planting trees and would like to plant some trees now. We live in Whitefield, so, planting somewhere out here would be easier for us. We have some friends who volunteer at a government school nearby teaching english. That might be a good location for planting. Another idea is that the orphanage that we hope to identify this week might have some need of trees.

Do you know of any good sites in the Whitefield area? How do we proceed with you to organize a planting? We can organize some of her friends and their parents to help.

If a six-year old can think of this I think all of us can think better. Unfortunately I dont have a photograph of this little girl! Anyways, all the best!!