On Friday (February 19, 2016) at 9 p.m. NDTV Hindi channel went blank and dark. Not a power cut. Just a nation in eclipse. In a darkness, said the brilliant Ravish Kumar. For about 40 minutes he spoke in darkness of dissent, decency and democracy before coming out into lights and pleading ' abhi aap so jaiye'. It has not happened ever on Indian TV. Ravish Kumar has a pleasant madness. Did not or rather could not sleep; woke up ahead of koyals and sparrows; am not brave Vemula and Kanhaiya Kumar and Umar Khalid; cannot stand up as Ravish Kumar, Rajdeep Sardesai, Barkha Dutt, Sagarika Ghose, Swami in a ET blog and the IIT-Bombay faculty; ever scared of a police constable and a government clerk. Friday morning was at the Borivili post office to get to know the fate of a saving certificate of daughter Vidya; the clerk at the counter bawled Rama and me out; he explained once; we did not grasp; refused to repeat. That's India today: India bawling. You are safe if you hold a national flag, have a Hindu Brahmin name, pray and seen to pray to Ram, buy Patanjali products, stand upside down in Yoga at Rajpath, pack your wife in a veg kitchen. With Pakistan and Bangladesh on either side, BJP wants India to be a Hindu Rashtra. Thats it. BJP wont say it, it will do it, is doing it. A long ago looks like today and tomorrow. A black Indian by the name of Gandhi was necked out of a train in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa by a white man. That old man and his good friend Jawaharlal Nehru made a space, a nation for all, with all, the same; or at least they worked for that idea. In 2016, the same old man called Gandhi and Nehru have been red carded by the nation they were born in. They have no place in India. Rambhakts alone have a place in India. It is not right versus wrong. It is many rights and many wrongs and an unsureness. Ravish Kumar and The Indian Express are musts for me. The Indian Express writes: 'By seeking to wrap itself in the national flag, as it stands on the wrong side of a building confrontation between those who seek to protect the citizen's constitutional right to freedom of speech and those who would curb it in the name of nationalism, the government does a disservice not just to its mandate, but above all to the tricolour.' For a change, Mani Shankar Aiyar in The Indian Express invokes Atalji. Yes, me misses him, badly; his compassion, his laugh, his dearness. Atalji could never be crude. CN Annadurai demanded a separate Tamil Nadu; a Dr. C.P. Ramaswami Aiyer declared Travancore-Cochin a separate state; they are not styled seditionists today. But a Vemula, Kanhaiya Kumar and Umar Khalid are. Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi, you were fair, when the other day you flew into Pakistan for peace. You talk with PDP in Kashmir. Perfectly okay. Is it then so wrong to declare peace with Kanhaiya Kumar and Umar Khalid, call them for talks, have tea and a few laughs. A long ago looks like today and tomorrow. It need not be, Mr. Modi. Some Insaniyat, please.
Friday, February 19, 2016
Insaniyat
On Friday (February 19, 2016) at 9 p.m. NDTV Hindi channel went blank and dark. Not a power cut. Just a nation in eclipse. In a darkness, said the brilliant Ravish Kumar. For about 40 minutes he spoke in darkness of dissent, decency and democracy before coming out into lights and pleading ' abhi aap so jaiye'. It has not happened ever on Indian TV. Ravish Kumar has a pleasant madness. Did not or rather could not sleep; woke up ahead of koyals and sparrows; am not brave Vemula and Kanhaiya Kumar and Umar Khalid; cannot stand up as Ravish Kumar, Rajdeep Sardesai, Barkha Dutt, Sagarika Ghose, Swami in a ET blog and the IIT-Bombay faculty; ever scared of a police constable and a government clerk. Friday morning was at the Borivili post office to get to know the fate of a saving certificate of daughter Vidya; the clerk at the counter bawled Rama and me out; he explained once; we did not grasp; refused to repeat. That's India today: India bawling. You are safe if you hold a national flag, have a Hindu Brahmin name, pray and seen to pray to Ram, buy Patanjali products, stand upside down in Yoga at Rajpath, pack your wife in a veg kitchen. With Pakistan and Bangladesh on either side, BJP wants India to be a Hindu Rashtra. Thats it. BJP wont say it, it will do it, is doing it. A long ago looks like today and tomorrow. A black Indian by the name of Gandhi was necked out of a train in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa by a white man. That old man and his good friend Jawaharlal Nehru made a space, a nation for all, with all, the same; or at least they worked for that idea. In 2016, the same old man called Gandhi and Nehru have been red carded by the nation they were born in. They have no place in India. Rambhakts alone have a place in India. It is not right versus wrong. It is many rights and many wrongs and an unsureness. Ravish Kumar and The Indian Express are musts for me. The Indian Express writes: 'By seeking to wrap itself in the national flag, as it stands on the wrong side of a building confrontation between those who seek to protect the citizen's constitutional right to freedom of speech and those who would curb it in the name of nationalism, the government does a disservice not just to its mandate, but above all to the tricolour.' For a change, Mani Shankar Aiyar in The Indian Express invokes Atalji. Yes, me misses him, badly; his compassion, his laugh, his dearness. Atalji could never be crude. CN Annadurai demanded a separate Tamil Nadu; a Dr. C.P. Ramaswami Aiyer declared Travancore-Cochin a separate state; they are not styled seditionists today. But a Vemula, Kanhaiya Kumar and Umar Khalid are. Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi, you were fair, when the other day you flew into Pakistan for peace. You talk with PDP in Kashmir. Perfectly okay. Is it then so wrong to declare peace with Kanhaiya Kumar and Umar Khalid, call them for talks, have tea and a few laughs. A long ago looks like today and tomorrow. It need not be, Mr. Modi. Some Insaniyat, please.
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