Angrezzi

 While browsing through some videos, I accidentally stumbled upon a video in which a Bollywood actress indirectly made fun of another actress’ English accent. This small instance brought on many unpleasant memories that I have faced myself. Coming from a very small town of Bihar and being a byproduct of Hindi medium government school, I have always been at the end of such ridicule. Such arrogance is easily available everywhere we go. People make fun of your accent and sometime to an extent that they kept on asking me to pronounce a particular alphabet, just to laugh on my accent. But let me be clear on one point, not all people do that. A person who is intelligent and self-assured does not look into such trivialities. Only the people whose only achievement is to go to an English medium school, are compelled to show their language/accent superiority to hide their own insecurity and shortcomings.   

A Bihari regardless of his/her intelligence or achievements are always subjected to such ridicules for their accent (either English or Hindi). Don’t all these concepts reek of colonial mentality to you? Who decides on which accent is better or superior? Take an example of Hindi, there are millions of speakers for Hindi and it has hundreds of variants and accents. Why do you think the accent you have is better than anyone else? Similarly, there are millions of English speaker and accent differs for region to region and country to country. A conceited private schooled person from Delhi might find accent of a Bihari repugnant. But what about if the same person is subjected to some conceited foreigners from Boston (US), they will find their oriental accent repugnant. Same will be true when person from Boston meet a person from Oxford (UK). How can you ridicule any person thinking you are better than them, just because an accent?

Language is a skill. A skill every person should strive to acquire. I love different languages and one of my greatest ambition is to learn as many as of them. One can learn as many as language, but they will always be their 2^nd, 3^rd, ….. language never be the first one.  Its nice if you can speak a fluent English (or any other language) with superb accent. But that doesn’t make you superior while others inferior. As long as one can communicate and make themselves understood to others, that person is proficient in that language. Who care how they speak it, as long as you understand them. Knowing a language itself is an achievement and that’s what we strive to do. We don’t have to become a singer or linguist, we just need to communicate and for that it is ok even if its heavily accented.

So, if the thought of language superiority comes in your mind tomorrow, then remember, it’s because of your own deficiency. Accept it, you just can’t find anything else good in you to be proud of. 

Gun, Germs and Steel

If you try to summarize the history of human development and globalization in three words then the most appropriate three words would be ‘Guns, Germs, and Steel ’. Before you brand me as geek, let me be clear that I have not come up with this. This is a book (Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies) written by Jared Diamond. Quite an interesting read to explain why Eurasian and North American civilization was able to conquer others. Basic idea is that it wasn’t intellectual, moral or inherent genetic superiority of the Eurasian civilization but the gap in technology (aided and amplified by environmental difference) and not to mention the frequent aid given by the germs to wipe/incapacitate the native population.

Despite the title, I am not going into gun and steel but will delve into much relevant topic for today – Germs. An unprecedented crisis of 21^st century, COVID-19 has managed to grip the world into its clutch. Just yesterday we were celebrating arrival of 2020 and who would have thought that world will come to standstill in just two and half months and all of us will be in house arrest looking into an exponential growth of death and destruction caused by the GERMS.

Tracing the terror

History of Pandemics (by Germs) is as old as the history of human civilization. About 5000 years ago, an epidemic wiped out a prehistoric village in China (Germs love China. Sorry, no pun intended 😉). The archaeological site is now called "Hamin Mangha" and is one of the best-preserved prehistoric sites in northeastern China.

A war between Athens and Sparta triggered another epidemic that consumed around 0.1 million souls (rough estimation). It is believed that it was either Ebola or Typhoid and scholars believe the overcrowding was the main source of epidemics. Alas, if only our forefathers knew about social distancing 😉.

Jumping back to the modern time, who can forget the greatest of the all-time great pandemics: The Black Death (the 14^th century). The Black Death traveled from Asia to Europe, leaving devastation in its wake. Some estimates suggest that it wiped out over half of Europe's population (It killed some 75 to 200 million people in Eurasia). The plague changed the course of Europe's history. It not only caused the naked dance of death and destruction but also triggered a renaissance that turned the wheel of history by major advancement in science, art and technology. Some say that Malthusian theory was proved correct and surviving workers had better access to meat and higher-quality bread and in turn better quality of life (truth of that is the discussion for another day).

Source: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/history-of-pandemics-deadliest/

Let’s take another Jump, back to the ultra-modern times (20^th and 21^st century). Major epidemic of 20^th century was Spanish Flu (during 1918 to 1920, direct result of World War I). An estimated 500 million people from the South Seas to the North Pole fell victim to Spanish Flu. One-fifth of those died, with some indigenous communities pushed to the brink of extinction. Despite the name Spanish Flu, the disease likely did not start in Spain (one theory states that it came for China). Spain was a neutral nation during the war and did not enforce strict censorship of its press, which could therefore freely publish early accounts of the illness. As a result, people falsely believed the illness was specific to Spain, and the name Spanish Flu stuck. The Spanish flu was the first of two pandemics caused by the H1N1 influenza virus; the second was the swine flu in 2009.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) stuck in early 200s and was a viral respiratory disease of zoonotic origin (Origin in China's Yunnan province). It is caused by the first-identified strain of the SARS coronavirus (SARS-CoV or SARS-CoV-1). Currently COVID-19 is strain of SARS-CoV-2. At the end of the epidemic in June 2003, the incidence was 8,422 cases with a case fatality rate (CFR) of 11%.

The 2009 swine flu pandemic was caused by a new strain of H1N1 that originated in Mexico in the spring of 2009 before spreading to the rest of the world. In one year, the virus infected as many as 1.4 billion (around 20% of World’s population) people across the globe and killed between 151,700 and 575,400 people, according to the CDC. The 2009 flu pandemic primarily affected children and young adults, and 80% of the deaths were in people younger than 65 (in the case of the swine flu, older people seemed to have already built up enough immunity to the group of viruses that H1N1 belongs to, so weren't affected as much).

Ebola ravaged West Africa between 2014 and 2016, with 28,600 reported cases and 11,325 deaths.

Coming to the present where world is in grip of COVID 19, and already 700 thousand (700000) people are infected with 33000+ death. Count is still on. Fatality and infection rate are still a microscopic dot in comparison with the other pandemics in history that wiped out cities and sometimes the entire civilization. We fervently hope and pray that the dot remains a dot and the history is not repeated here.

Moral of the story – What do the Germs tell you:

Each pandemic tells us a unique story, but underline theme never changed.  Malthus theorized a positive check (or Natural check) that would correct the imbalance between food supply and population growth in the form of natural disasters such as earthquakes, diseases or the human-made actions such as wars and famines. Though his theory is not entirely correct, but pattern still exists across all pandemics to give an iota of credit to Malthus. When Black Plague stuck Europe, Europe was mired in corruption and ignorance, there was no savior to save it from the pit of doom. Though deadly, but Black plague certainly proved a savior in long term (I am not a sadist, I would rather have another savior than death and destruction) and it ushered an era of renaissance that ultimately resulted in greater prosperity. But we can’t say diseases is always a result of check and balances imposed by nature. Sometimes it was a weapon that was used by one set of humanities to conquer other set of humanities (another kind of Malthusian check that is human made). Millions of people died in North, Central and South America when this weapon was used to subjugate the native population.

What is COVID-19: A Natural Malthusian Check or Man-made Malthusian check? There are multiple conspiracy theories being whispered all around. Or it is just some random event with no impact on history of mankind? I guess humanity will only know the truth once it looks back and try to decode the history. My fervent hope is that it doesn’t leave any trace on human history and just die down quietly in the infinite page of history. I hope that human in future don’t have to travel back in time to Wuhan to stop the spread of Virus that changed the course of history 😉. 

Brexit – From ‘B’ to ‘X’

Often our generation don’t remember the fact that the it was not very while ago when we were governed by another small island. An island – made up of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland (now only north Ireland) – called Great Britain. The British empire in 19^th century was in command of 23% of world’s population and around 24% of geographical area, and its geographical area is equivalent to 4^th largest state of India (Uttar Pradesh). History of Great Britain has been glorious, as well as tumultuous. From the creation of union to creation of one of the 1^st parliamentary democracy, conquest of colonial territory in 1/4^th of the globe, disintegration of mighty empire, messy Irish conflict and a rocky relationship with mainland Europe, there have never been any dull moment. In this blog, I am going to explore a little bit of history that has led to the Brexit drama that we have all been witnessing for last 3 years and also uncover all aspects associated with it. 

Making of the mighty

Let me take you back some 1500 years ago before we move forward to understand the present and future. The origins of the United Kingdom can be traced to the time of the Anglo-Saxon king Athelstan, who in the early 10th century CE secured the allegiance of neighboring Celtic kingdoms and became “the first to rule what previously many kings shared between them,” in the words of a contemporary chronicle. Through subsequent conquest over the following centuries, kingdoms lying farther afield came under English dominion. Wales, a congeries of Celtic kingdoms lying in Great Britain’s southwest, was formally united with England by the Acts of Union of 1536 and 1542. Scotland, ruled from London since 1603, formally was joined with England and Wales in 1707 to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain. Ireland came under English control during the 1600s and was formally united with Great Britain through the Act of Union of 1800. The republic of Ireland gained its independence in 1922, but six of Ulster’s nine counties remained part of the United Kingdom as Northern Ireland.

Ireland

Ninety years ago, Ireland was split in two after people living there went to war against their British rulers. The south became a separate state, now called the Republic of Ireland. But the break-up led to decades of unrest and violence in Northern Ireland, which remained part of the UK. There are two main sides:

• Nationalists or republicans, who are mainly Catholic, believe the north should join a united, independent Ireland.
• Unionists or loyalists, who are often Protestant, think Northern Ireland should stay as part of the United Kingdom.

The period known as 'The Troubles' began in the late 1960s and lasted for nearly 30 years. Thousands of people on both sides were killed by bombs and bullets, while republican groups also launched attacks on England. The Good Friday Agreement (Belfast Agreement) was signed in 1998 and was seen as a major step towards peace in Northern Ireland.

Scotland

The Kingdom of Scotland emerged as an independent sovereign state in the European Early Middle Ages and continued to exist until 1707. By inheritance in 1603, James VI, King of Scots, became King of England and King of Ireland, thus forming a personal union of the three kingdoms. Scotland subsequently entered into a political union with the Kingdom of England on 1 May 1707 to create the new Kingdom of Great Britain.

Scotland’s relations with England have long been difficult. Although profoundly influenced by the English, Scotland has long refused to consider itself as anything other than a separate country, and it has bound itself to historical fact and legend alike in an effort to retain national identity, as well as to the distinct dialect of English called Scots. In 1999 a new Scottish Parliament—the first since 1707—was elected and given significant powers over Scottish affairs. A referendum was conducted in September 2014 on Scottish independence. The majority voted against the proposition, with 55% voting no to independence.

Integration with EU

The EU is an economic and political union involving 28 European countries. It allows free trade and free movement of people, to live and work in whichever country they choose. A monetary union was established in 1999 and came into full force in 2002 and is composed of 19 EU member states which use the euro currency. Britain opted out of the monetary union.

In 1987, Margaret Thatcher signed the Single European Act, which eventually becomes the world’s largest free trade area. In 1992, UK ejected from the Exchange Rate Mechanism, a forerunner to the single currency that limits exchange-rate fluctuations among members. It also negotiates an opt-out from the part of the Maastricht Treaty that would have required it to adopt a common currency. In 2002, twelve EU countries introduce the euro as legal tender. Britain set out five economic tests to be met before it joins. They were not met.

EU Single Market and Custom Union

The EU’s single market is more than a free-trade area. It aims to remove not just the fiscal barriers to trade (tariffs) but the physical and technical barriers (borders and divergent product standards) too by allowing as free movement as possible of goods, capital, services and people. In essence, it is about treating the EU as a single trading territory.

The European Union is also a customs union. It allows free trade between countries inside it and allows imports in to the area by setting common tariffs.

On and Off relationship

The "Inner Six" (Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, West Germany) European countries signed the Treaty of Paris in 1951, establishing the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC). 1957 Treaties of Rome establishing the European Economic Community (EEC) and the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom). In 1967, these became known as the European Communities (EC). The UK attempted to join in 1963 and 1967, but these applications were vetoed by the President of France, Charles de Gaulle. Sometime after de Gaulle resigned as president of France in 1969, the UK successfully applied for EC membership.

In their 42 years in the EU, the British have always been an awkward, Eurosceptical partner. But Britain’s semi-detached status was confirmed by the Maastricht Treaty of 1992, under which Thatcher’s successor, John Major, obtained (together with Denmark) an exemption from the requirement to join the euro.

Referendum

June 23, 2016, a referendum was held and in a result that was totally unexpected, voters chose by a small majority, 51.1% to 48.9%, for Britain to leave the EU. Although the Brexit referendum was non-binding, then-Prime Minister David Cameron’s government, expecting a vote in favor of “Remain,” had promised to honour the result.

In and out: Political uncertainty and leadership crisis

Brexit has cost Britain two Prime Ministers and several ministers. The first casualty was David Cameron who resigned both as Prime Minister and as a Member of Parliament after the unexpected result of referendum. Theresa May Took over as British Prime Minister, but neither Theresa May nor her Government have a clear idea of exactly what they want, apart from a vague "Brexit".  May called an unnecessary general election in order to get a stronger majority for her government in Parliament. She failed. Instead the Conservatives remained the largest party in Parliament, but they lost seats, and no longer had an absolute majority. Next Britain's Foreign secretary, Boris Johnson resigned from May's government. After failing three times to get her withdrawal agreement through Parliament, Theresa May resigned as prime minister on 7th Jun 19. Boris Johnson is currently at the helm of prime minister ship with uncertain future as Britain is again set to go for a poll.

Missing Deadlines

Theresa May promised that “We will deliver Brexit and the United Kingdom is leaving the European Union on 29 March 2019.” But she failed to deliver.

The UK triggered Article 50 on 29 March 2017, which means the UK was due to leave the EU at 11:00 pm on 29 March 2019. The first extension was granted on 21 March 2019. The UK and the EU agreed to extend Article 50 until 22 May 2019. Since then, the UK has asked for three extensions from the EU. Next extension was 31 Oct 2019 which again was missed.

Boris Johnson said he would rather "be dead in a ditch" than ask the EU for another delay, but like May, he too had to finally eat the dust and ask for the extension. The current Article 50 deadline is 31 January 2020.

May’s Brexit Deal

May had concluded deal with EU but she failed to get it ratified by parliament even after trying for three times. Theresa May’s deal consists of two parts: A Withdrawal Agreement covering the terms of the UK’s exit, and a Political Declaration setting out a framework for future relations.

• The legally-binding Withdrawal Agreement would establish a “transition or implementation period”, during which the UK would still have to conform to EU rules.
• A financial settlement (money that UK owes to EU in tune of €40 billion) has to be paid during the transition period.
• Freedom to move and live within the EU and UK would continue during the transition period.
• A “backstop” mechanism to guarantee an open frontier between Northern Ireland in the UK, and EU member the Republic of Ireland.

Conflict Points

The main contention in Brexit deal is the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, which after Brexit will also become the border between the UK and the EU (The republic of Ireland is part of EU). Because of the island’s troubled history, both sides want to avoid a hard border with customs checks that could become a source of friction. The problem has been that, because the prime minister promised in January 2017 to take Britain out of both the EU’s single market (so as not to be an EU “rule-taker”) and the customs union (to allow it to strike its own trade deals around the world), customs and regulatory checks became almost inevitable. Tory Brexiteers and Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) – which has been propping up the government — hate anything which sets Northern Ireland apart from the rest of the United Kingdom.

No Deal Brexits

There have been many talks of Britain leaving EU without any deal. A no-deal Brexit means the UK would leave the European Union (EU) and there would be no agreements in place about what the relationship between the UK and the EU will be like in future. This includes special agreements about how UK and EU companies could work and trade with each other. If a special deal between EU leaders and UK politicians isn't agreed, then the UK could leave the EU with no deal in place. This would be a no-deal Brexit. It's believed a no-deal Brexit could lead to a number of things happening. For example:

• Some border checks could be re-introduced
• Transport and trade between the UK and the EU could be severely affected
• Adults may not be able to drive in EU countries without a special driving license
• It would mean no transition period, which was part of the deal that the former Prime Minister Theresa May was proposing, and was rejected by MPs.

What’s Next

New Boris Johnson' deal

The new protocol negotiated by Boris Johnson replaces the controversial Irish backstop plan in Theresa May's deal. Much of the rest of that deal will remain. Under the deal:

• The whole of the UK will leave the EU customs union. The customs union is an agreement between EU countries not to charge taxes called tariffs on things coming from other EU countries, and to charge the same tariffs as each other on things coming from outside the EU.
• Leaving the customs union means the UK will be able to strike trade deals with other countries in the future.
• Legally there will be a customs border between Northern Ireland (which stays in the UK) and the Republic of Ireland (which stays in the EU), but in practice things won't be checked on that border.
• The actual checks will be on what is effectively a customs border between Great Britain and the island of Ireland, with goods being checked at "points of entry" in Northern Ireland.
• Taxes will only have to be paid on goods being moved from Great Britain to Northern Ireland if those products are considered "at risk" of then being transported into the Republic of Ireland.

The British Parliament has voted to hold a General Election on 12 December. Essentially, elections will be held around the question of Brexit. If the Conservatives come out of the elections with a working majority, Brexit will take place on January 31, or even before. If Labor, the Liberal Democrats and other anti-Brexit parties (Scottish Nationalists, Welsh Nationalists and Greens) win enough seats to form a coalition government, Brexit will be rapidly revoked, or a second referendum will be held.

We have witnessing the ebbs and flow of Brexit drama for last three years. It could be the one of the most historical moment of 21^st century for England and most definitely will be talked about for many years to come and by many generations to come. But hang on, climax is still to come and picture avi baki hai….

The burden of culture

Have you ever been nostalgic of your childhood’s festivities – aroma of food, infectious mood of joy, color and happiness in every atom of air? I am sure you do, without any doubt. Who will not love a little culture? After all isn’t this the culture that brings color in your life? But, stop picturing there, story is not all that rosy. After all there are many grisly nitty gritties hidden behind every picture-perfect nostalgic scene. Either it’s a blooming cotton field in Southern USA – Back breaking slave labor behind it, or perfectly decorated Victorian home – lots of servants and butlers behind it. You can ask why I am jumping from talking about culture to American slave or Victorian era Britain. I will tell you the similarities – each culture is nurtured and watered by labor of some downtrodden that are chained to pedestal by society by virtue of necessity of their labor. What is the picture behind a little culture of our Indian home? Do you remember your mom, your aunt or your grand mom stuck to kitchen, working like slave from dawn till dusk to sustain the atmosphere of festivity? Do you remember the villain aunt, who are just the villain because they want to enjoy festivities for themselves instead of facilitating that? A good and cultured woman is the one who readily sacrifice her own happiness, her independence and her life for people around her while the bad one (the villain) is the one who could dare to think about a little about herself and could care a little less about the children, husband, parents or in-laws (etc. etc.,).  A family where women work day and night to prepare different delicacies, decorate house and to keep each member happy in family (and their consolation prize is to see happy faces of family members, can you be more hypocrite) is the happy family, but the family where mom want to enjoy along with family by going out to celebrate are the broken families. That’s the concept of culture. Do you get a little bit of picture here? I am sure, you don’t. But I would keep trying.

The burden of upholding cultural value always falls on shoulder of women. The examples are ubiquitous. Either its attire (always enforced strictly for women), or its food, or its choices, or its festival, all has to be borne by women. All our rituals are heavily skewed towards male and largely misogynistic. Take the example of Hindu marriage – ‘Kanyadan’ (the term itself is so derogatory). Is Kanya (a girl) an object to be given as dan (donation)? Is there no difference between a Gau (Cow) and Kanya (Girl)? We have concept of Godan as well as Kanya dan. But saddest thing is that our richest model family (Ambani’s) blatantly exhibit this heinous concept in their ugly and exuberant wedding where our own Amitabh Bacchhan extol the merit of Kanyadan. Nothing could make me more ashamed as a girl to see this ritual being performed devotedly. Everything associated with Indian Culture is misogynistic to the core. The Mangalsutra is like putting a chain to girl that now you have enslaved for life. The dangling bangle and anklet is nothing but bell on a cat to know everywhere she goes. While the sindoor (Vermillion) indicates that she is property of some one (after all her parents has donated her as part of Kanyadan). Mind you, there is no symbolistic gesture or sign on a boy/male that they are married. Could there be any more glaring example of gender disparity fanned on the name of culture?

But who is going to realize this gross misjustice. You can’t expect this from a male as who will not enjoy that some one is fasting for you (Teej, Karwachauth etc etc.), or doing sringar (make-up) for you. Hell, I will enjoy all these attentions, had I been a guy. This we as a person, as a woman, need to understand. These things might just be a symbol, but symbols convey a powerful message. May be kanyadan is a 1-hour act, putting a ounce of sindoor (Vermillion), a hidden bindi might just be a symbol. But they are symbol of our oppression, they are the symbol of our weakness. We are weak, and we are dominated by other half because of those symbols.

But I do not accept that, we are not weak. We are every bit capable as any person on the earth (given the chance). We need to grab that chance and first step would be to disown these visible degrading cultural symbols. Culture are made by human and as infallible we human are, we always try to build a society where we can one can dominate others. Change is inevitable way of life on earth. Everything changes, hour, day, years, season, evolution, every aspects of life is bound change. Then why we need to preserve any archaic rule of culture. It’s not written on stone.  We can make world much better by creating our own culture. A culture that respects everyone equally, a culture that doesn’t chain any one by so called extolled virtue, a culture that let you find your own way without trying to compel you to a certain path at every point in your life. World will be a much better place for everyone when we could build such society, such culture. First step must be taken by women like us by disowning the burden of unfair culture that is placed on us by centuries of civilization.

One step to the happiness and beyond.

Reverse Gear

Last few months have been somewhat hard. I am not talking about me but about the humanity, about our collective future (may be a little about me too ;)). Its long time that I have written something, it is not that I do not want to write or I do not have anything to write. There have been millions of thoughts and words kept forming in my mind but feeling was so overwhelming that containing those in single blog was not so easy. Therefore, I capitulated; thoughts flowed and lost like a river in sea. However, I had to overcome that hesitation at some point of time, regardless of what my personal crisis is, so here I am.

If you are going to continue on this blog then I should add a disclaimer. Please do not relate your personal life with the content written in the blog. Please make a note that if I would have been in your shoes, I would have actually acted in the same way (I actually am in your shoes). This is just the sentiment expressed keeping the bigger picture in view, and you might have to open your other eye to experience that view.

By just having a cursory glance around me and a small effort to look at the world I get a déjà vu that I am looking at some scenes from Matrix. Every scenes are pre-scripted and people are like robots who are doing exactly the same things that they are supposed to do (Again ex-claimer – Not saying I am any different). The interesting thing is, this movie has only three recurring scenes – one - a constant exercise of facial muscle along with multitudes clicking of camera, two - frantic typing on the keypad of phone, three - many stone face statues travelling in car, buses and bikes with earphone plugged in their ears. It just gives a chilling sensation of being in a bad sci-fi movie where whole world is remote controlled by some mighty corporation through the tools like earphone, camera and phone. We are living in a uni-dimensional world with our sight limited to a 45-degree view. We are missing or willfully ignoring the other 315 degree. It is I, my future, and then my children and their future, and many of us goes long way and reserve future for some thousand generations ahead. Forget about the atrocities we are perpetrating on the mother earth in the process, we cannot even think of our own next generation (except for some material wealth that might not even have significance) and what future they might have if we do not stop and change track.

India’s population is currently 1.324 billion. We are ready to overtake China (1.379 billion) any day. Currently our population growth rate is hopelessly high (~1.7%) to even dream to stabilize it to optimum level. We are already beyond the sustenance level that the earth can support. 2.4% of land in India is already supporting 17% of world’s population which itself is a nightmare in current state. Think about all those stampede death in Mumbai, traffic jam in Bangalore, huge crowd in Kolkata, sea of human in Bihar and UP and so on. This is the chaos that we face at current population level. Think about next 50 years. Even if we manage to miraculously lower the growth rate to 1% (which is next to impossible), our population will still be 65% more than today (2.178 billion). That means 850 million more people (around the combine population of whole Europe and Brazil together). Think about situation of Local train of Mumbai, roads of Bangalore and street of Kolkata with those extra 850 million people. Think about what will happen to our water system, our forest, our biodiversity, when we have 850 million extra mouths to feed. We cannot even achieve that for current 1324 million after depleting all our natural resources. It is a nightmare, which should haunt each one of us. However, are we even concerned? Do we even think about it? All we care about is to get a degree, get a job, get married, and start family and proliferate the Vansh (I cannot even fathom the Vansh crap). We do not even have slightest compunction about our contribution in making this world worse and worsen. It is the high time that we stop swooning over babies. We should stop thinking about it as a boon and start treating it like a grim moment. A moment that keeps propelling us towards the doomsday. Five thousand years ago, human race was fighting for its survival and reproduction was integral part of that survival plan. 5000 years later, we have entered the 21^st century and human race is again on verge of survival war. Only difference is this time war will not be fought with other species, this war will be fought among us and we will eventually sink and will take every sign of life on earth along with us. In order to win this survival war and save humanity along with the biodiversity, we need to embark upon a different path. Instead of celebrating creation of new life, it has to be made as a somber moment. A moment to stop and think about the future of those new lives and their expected contribution to the ongoing eternal survival war. I know, the moment you read these words it might seem blasphemous to you. How can we even dare to pop those thoughts in our mind? That is not how civilization has ever worked. However, like rules of wars, rules to live also changes. These are the time, which requires backward movement. Our survival war started with a primitive Neanderthal who first learnt to make fire and then different tools. We started our journey from there and moved to achieve bigger things. There was always a next, hunting to agriculture, agriculture to industrialization, industrialization to a cyber-age. We kept moving, we kept getting better at everything but we never learnt to stop. We do not even know what lies beyond and when to stop. This is the time. This is the time to move backward instead of forward. We do not need entire humanity to understand that. Even if half of the world grasp the gravity of this problem and be ready to make sacrifices, we might have small chance to save this wonderful world. Or else we are doomed to our own destruction. In Gandhiji’s own word, we have ample for everyone’s need not greed. Our greed had run amok for so long that we have reached to a point where there will not be any left for the “need”. It is the time that we take the reverse gear and start on a new radical path that will not only ensure our survival but also will give us chance to live a worthy life. 

Stop Please !!

I have not written anything from past 11 months. Not that it matters in grand scheme of things, but it definitely matters to me. As the world is going haywire more and more, I am getting more numb day by day. Past 11 weeks have been so overwhelming that no amount of paper, time and space would have been sufficient to fill my emotions. I am just dumbfounded to pen down anything.

We live in hope that each of our tiny action will make this world a better place and that’s the hope that keep us nimble, alive, and active. But what happens when your hope is getting extinguished slowly, that’s when you lose your voice, you just become speechless. I am not a quitter, I never can be but that what’s scares me most. I can never stop to fight (or not), I can never be at peace.

Sorry, enough about my mumble jumble. I know if you ever dare to read this, your dare is fading at each advancing line. But hold on, I am coming back to the topic. Past one year, though it seems like one hour, but still I am going to ponder over the past 8784 hours. You may ask isn’t it too late to write about past year – But my numbness has made time flying for me. I am still living in Jan 2017 (or want to live). Jan 1917 would be more appropriate. World was in chaos then, but it still made more sense. Colonialism was at its apex, nationalism was just rousing its head, we were still dying in mass from diseases, hunger etc etc. Those were the terrifying but simpler time. Every events has a simpler explanation and we were standing at the juncture where we could have hoped for a better future. A better world where no one die of hunger and disease, where one can have freedom to express their thought and right to have a say in how they are governed. Those were the time when we were fighting for ideals, even though it was a terrible time, it was still an era of hope. We knew what we are doing now, will change the world and will make it a better place for generations to come.

Coming back to 100 years later (I have to literally drag myself as my mind adamantly refuses to come back to this glorious destructive era). “This is a very exciting time to live” - how many time we have heard this line on visual media. But is it? What excitement we are expecting in future? More sleek smartphone, our eyes as laptop screen, voice as command? More and more robots replacing human jobs with unhindered human population growth vying for ever depleting natural resources? Growth of regionalism, terrorism, regionalism, culturalism as culmination of increased competition for resource/jobs? Does that future seems exciting enough? Though our political and economic leaders, big corporates try to paint a very different picture for us, but in reality every phenomenon has a peak point beyond which it is impossible to achieve. “Impossible” word has become antithetical for human civilization and in 21^st century it attracts similar persecution as pronouncement of anti-Christ in medieval area. We are not allowed to say that it is impossible to achieve more growth, more technological achievement and we need to stop and retrace our steps a bit. We will be literally throttled by everyone and cast off as a big nuisance to society.

How good it looks when our statistical agencies come up with the growth number (any slide in number send us frenzy mood). Come at what cost, but we need maintain that figure. Mantra is very simple. Establish industry, cut forest, create more and more road, more and more flyover and buildings and growth will automatically fall into our bag. We are only looking at the curve of economic growth, concentrating only on that and forgetting that every other aspects are sliding out of our hand further, and further.

The industrial revolution, when the story of modern growth first started, it also started considerable conflicts in terms of resource sharing. In order to have a control over resources (man power and nature power), European nation started vying with each other to win over more and more land and slaves for themselves. They justified their action with moral euphemism of “obligation to civilize the 3^rd world”, “proliferation of science and technology, economic growth” etc etc. Hence we started seeing a logarithmic rise of economic growth but as well as also the growth of moral degradation. As soon as world power established their hegemony, there was the elusive decline of conflict as the world order was established by suppressing the weak and creating immoral pact with strong (remember the straight line division of Africa?). We still has ample for everyone to share. But this illusion of peace was not maintained for long and soon we witnessed many wars including war for independence by different servitude nations along with 2 world wars as last attempt to hold on to ancient world order.

As we reached mid-20^th century, we reached at the verge of high economic growth along with least conflict as ideal of world peace, democracy and equal opportunity were forefront in everyone’s mind. This was the time we started moving from social democracy to economic democracy. Very soon we achieved peak of everything – economic growth, technical growth, scientific growth, conflict resolution. This is where we started slipping. We reached an equilibrium but we could not maintain that equilibrium. We kept striving for more growth that started coming at price of other inevitable aspects of civilization – environment, peace, spirituality.  Where we stand today? Environment is worsening, we are losing biodiversity, forest, wetland at ever increasing pace. Habitable space is shrinking fast. Resources inevitable for a quality life are depleting/disappearing fast. As resources disappear, concept of globalization will be damned forever. In order to have control on resource, people will start looking more and more inwardly. There will be more polarization in the name of nation, region, religion, gender, race, caste etc.  Rise of phenomenon of terrorism is the direct result of this. Until now we have been witnessing phenomena of group polarization in terms of terrorism or race/caste chauvinism. We still had weapon of our democratic ideal against such evils. But then the year 2016 came and showed us that the weapon that has saved us hitherto is no longer effective. The long tentacle of evil has wrapped us from all around and has started the process of choking us. And we still believe that we are living in exciting time and hoping for a bright future. But be aware, next 3^rd quarter of 21^st century is going to be the most trying time of all the 5000 years of human civilization.

I am not predicting doomsday, but that is not far if we still don’t wake up and start calling a spade a spade. We are still living in illusion that was created after 2^nd world war. We are still striving for what western country achieved after industrial revolution. But time has changed, circumstance has changed but we are still not ready to acknowledge it and still blindly following the path that has been laid out after the industrial revolution. Industrial revolution was break from medieval past and that break made us to move forward. What we need now is to stop and break from modern past and take a different route towards a different civilization.

At each and every moment, my mind is crying aloud “Stop Please” and, funny, even I am not listening.

Our Culture their culture

Our culture their culture, our language their language, our religion their religion, the sacred line has been drawn, the tug of war has been started, the clueless game of mindless, substance less cultural superiority has begun. Beware the human race, gone are the days of natural selection, we have now new theory of survival – “Cultural Selection”.

Culture is a very complex phenomenon that encompass everything, from the religion to the food we ate to the cloth we wear.  Human being has always been choosing the subset (in form of either language, religion etc.) of this broad set to rally masses behind them to advance their parochial interests that could be either personnel or not personnel. It all comes to this, isn’t it? All this so called Jehad, honour killing, racism, casteism, communalism etc. etc. are nothing but just a one liner – my culture is better than yours, you accept it or perish to the doom.

The mindless quest of human race or individual to achieve cultural superiority is beyond my comprehension. It’s nothing but the two neighbors fighting with each other over their Garden’s Roses by saying my rose is better than yours. Why can’t they enjoy each other roses and be elated by discovering the varieties of roses in different gardens. Just imagine how boring it would be when every house in a village just have one type of rose. Just think how ridiculous it would be when both families start baying for each other blood, just to preserve the claim of superiority of bunch of Roses in their garden.

“These roses are part of our garden, our family for generations, let’s not be there one head on their torso who tries to defy honour of our roses, let’s all vow to protect honour of our Roses till our death” – This would be the passionate and rousing speech by the head of the family to their members.

This might sound ridiculous to the core but at the macroscopic level that is what nevertheless is happening in world around us. The senseless mob goes behind their leader for some reason which is nothing but matter of establishing cultural superiority.

Instead of rejoicing on variety all around us, instead of having curiosity to grasp a vast knowledge strewn all over world due to cultural varieties, human kind has always been engaged in tussle of imposing or protecting their culture on one or other or from one or other.

Just sometimes back I read a news where author announces proudly that “A Hindu has been appointed for so and so post in US”, for a moment I felt an emotion of pride immediately followed by a pang of pain. Our mind is so socially wired to have a huge socio-cultural ego in terms of the “language we speak, food we eat, cloth we wear, song we sing, god we worship, our customs, our rituals, our beliefs, our faith etc.”.  That socio-cultural ego overpower our sense of reasoning and power of understanding. Hence the sense of cultural superiority feed our socio-cultural ego and led us to believe in our own individual superiority over others.

The propensity to overpower the human being at the other end of cultural line (some time to the extent of killing them), just because they have a different set of cultural customs and belief, which rational human mind can accept that? Who are to decide about superiority? Why do I have to proud of my heritage, why can’t I simply enjoy those wonderful heritage provided by accumulation of centuries of cultural assimilation along with having admiration of heritage of people at other side of cultural line. Every cultures are wonderful. They are not creation of one day or one year, they are the cumulative consciences of thousands of people over thousands of years. None are superior and none are inferior and World will not be complete by omitting even a tiny part of them.

Then why this madness to prove your superiority? All these dirty schemes, plots, frenziness and obsession – just to prove that you are superior, the faith you follow is superior, the ancient civilization that you have inherited is superior, the custom you follow is superior, the god you worship is superior?

As Gandhiji had said that ‘The world has enough for everyone's need, but not enough for everyone's greed’. Greed could be either material greed or so called spiritual or cultural greed. Each and every one of us are supplemented by our ancestors with wonderful heritage that would be enough for us to sustain and prosper as a community. We do not have place for cultural greed to overpower others or proclaim to protect ours, that would only take us towards the doom of human race. Human race has survived natural selection, it cannot survive cultural selection.

Beauty and the Beast

How many times we have read the stories of beautiful princesses, ladies with magnificent beauty or a beautiful damsel in distress? Beauty has always been glorified to such an extent that it often overshadows any virtues that mankind may possess. All these overhype about beauty that I have been hearing since my childhood, left me wondering that what it would be like to live in a world that does not have a differentiation line dividing mankind based on their look?

It’s not that I am not enamored by the magnificence of the beauty. Story of Cinderella, Snow White and multiple other beautiful princesses has nonetheless dazzled me. It was a general accepted idea that any uncle or brother should have a beautiful wife. A simmering blindfold made up by millions of stories, movies and social heresy is on eyes of each of us that dazzles us to a divine effect of beauty. The effect of that blindfold has been wearing off for some time (For me) and in the process it has led me to realize the ugly truth behind the notion of beauty. Suddenly my mind has started hitting me with questions about the logic of the rules of this illogical world.

Why beauty is important? Why a beautiful person should be credited with extra merit that might tower all other merits. A person does not choose their look, they are just born with it. Why such a quality on which mankind has no control should be the dominating factor. We do not choose the way we look, and don’t earn our look too then why should be we rewarded/punished for something we never worked for.  

You might argue that talent count too. Nobody would like a silly and beautiful person. But that just an empty argument. We all know that the effort a simple looking person has to put to make an effect on society and how easy it comes to an attractive person. And what about “made-in-Heaven” marriages? This “so called” holy and life size decision is made purely based on look. “Looking for a fair, beautiful/Handsome Bride/Groom”, who want a non-fair and ugly one?

To a certain extent our professional life has come to be defined by our merit (though so called beautiful person still has some edge, which of course is regardless of their merit), our personal and social life is still largely defined by the way we look. Men kind has always tried to eliminate variable from their life. We have always tried to write our destiny since the time memorial. But why we have failed to eliminate the biggest variable from our life – “Our Look” – on which we have no control. If we closely look at this issue then we can narrow this problem down to the one half of the humanity. While the one half – male – has been able to successfully elevate their merit upon their look (not completely though), the other half – Female – is still being perished under the tight shackle of beautiness. Looking beautiful has been the prime motive of female since the time immemorial and this convention is only growing stronger. I often see parents brimming with pride on their beautiful daughter, as though she has won the biggest crown purely on her merit. Has she?

The chain of beauty has been throttling us, slowly and gradually sipping the life out of us. What worry you have in your life if you are a fair maiden, and how treacherous the life path is for a simple girl and that’s just because of an accident, an accident called “Gene”. The curse of beauty has been made permanent on the femalekind by trillion dollars of “Beauty” industry. All you have to do is look pretty to stand out in this world.  If you do not pass the eligibility criteria then don’t worry our trillion dollar industry is working hard to elevate you to that position, which has nevertheless been defined by them.

The biggest culprit are our art and literature. Why god/goddess, heroes/heroines etc are portrayed as beautiful and villain as ugly? Why a good person is to be beautiful and bad person to be ugly? Who defines the criteria of beauty? We have talked about discrimination based on caste, race, religion, gender, class etc. Why have we not yet added the discrimination criteria of “look”, which is the most prevalent form of discrimination all over the world? I guess we don’t have answer for that. We might achieve gender disparity in next 1000 years but we still wouldn’t dare to speak against “Look Disparity”. Ours is a society of hypocrites and we would continue to be hypocrite. The real tragedy is that, now I wish that blindfold is tightened on my eyes again so that I do get the courage of living in the world of hypocrites.

Innovation, Invention or Annihilation

I would hate myself for quoting the one of the most hated villain of Harry Potter – “Progress for the sake of progress must be discouraged”. But what was dangerous in that context is very much relevant in today’s context.

The meaning of progress might differ from person to person. For someone moving towards betterment, some might define it as finding solution and solving problem or for some it is just moving from status quo. We might not realize but in today’s world the term progress sugar coated in jargons like innovation, invention etc has reduced to nothing but giving push to “status quo”. A slicker phone, a device that could take command from your eye movement, making Nano devices into Pico, femto or atto device – it’s just how far you can think. It’s all about what next, not about what purpose the progress is serving.

Many of you sneer at me for being so anti-technological. You would love to brand person like me as anti-progress, traditionalist etc etc. Remember the middle century, when church used to persecute scientists. That was the religious crusade. Today is the world of science crusade, anyone having doubt about so called scientific progress deserve social and political crucification. I would still put my thought forward. Take a step back and think what purpose these 250 years (taking industrial revolution as base) of scientific progress has served? At first lets just talk about the indicators of Human Development Index (HDI), which is a generally acceptable criteria.

Mean year of schooling of the world as a whole is not more than 5 years (lowest being less than 1 year for Burkina Faso and Highest for UK 13.8 years). In Ancient Greece, China and India children used to get on an average 5 years of education. Worldwide life expectancy is 71 years but there are around 30 countries whose life expectancy vary within 45-55 years. That’s certainly not better than what we had in before and early Christian era. We have made phenomenal progress in terms of getting cure of diseases and controlling spread of many communicable diseases that has contributed in increasing life expectancy. But at that front also (which is actually a genuine scientific achievement) we have nonetheless become prisoner of our own so called broad mindset – “progress for the sake of progress”. Once we didn’t have enough problem to find solution we started creating problem and that is what is happening in world of pharmaceutical research today. One pill for every damn problem, who cares for the source of the problems or the consequences of solution being creator of more problems.

Moving to the next indicator – that is GNP per capita. Talking about wealth, are we wealthier or well off today? Wealth is a relative term and counting them in terms of rupees or dollars would be as misleading as terming Voldemort as source of all evil. Your wealth should be able to fulfill all your needs, wants and desires. If we quantify those criteria then certainly we are much poorer than our predecessors and our wants and desires are multiplying faster than increase in our wealth.

So all in all we are not better off than what we were before. There was a time when progress was necessary to save children, to ward off diseases, to remove ignorance etc. I wouldn’t list hunger, as earth has always provided us enough to lead a healthy life and men has always found a way to get it from nature either its primitive agriculture, hunting or gathering, technology has broadened the choice of food and that doesn’t mean it has made it better. So there was a time when technological progress was a tool to problem solving. When we had less problems, then technology transformed itself problem solver to problem creator. More the merrier, and hence it remained relevant, not only relevant it has become next god. We might talk and talk about human achievement but a cursory glance at our surrounding would tell us that nothing has changed. The more we are connected, the more distant we are, the more we are safe, the more prone to danger we are, the more we achieve, the more we are losing, the more we solve, the more problem we are creating. It’s just a battle of moving to and fro from your status quo. You move an inch forward and you are hurled 2 inches backward.

The hell has opened. I am ready to be crucified :P

Fact, Fantasy, History and us

I have always struggled with queerness of history. How do you come to term with something whose interpretation is wide open, whose horizon is limitless? Physical Science mostly deals with inanimate objects that can be categorized, characterized with clear distinction and any change in those characters can clearly be captured and predicted. History could be termed as an imprecise science that has to deal with human being and that’s what make it wide open for different interpretations by different people or groups.

What makes me wonder is how we come to conclusion and arrive at a sequence of events that are woven by historians based on inadequate evidence. Perhaps that’s the reason that different interest groups are able to come up with their own version of history. That’s the reason we have left, right and different other ideologies that differs enormously in their interpretation of historical events.

Mankind has always looked for an identity to cling upon, in short term its religion, caste, race etc and in long term it’s always their history. That’s the reason history has always been subject of political scrutiny. It has been tool to influence mind and gain political score and that’s what has been happening in India today.

History of India is as complicated as (even more than) its geography and its diversity. In 1947 when India breathed its long overdue free air, it was a broken nation, nation with widespread poverty, hunger, illiteracy and was mired in deep muck of caste, creed, regionalism and communalism. It has nothing to be proud of except for some moment of Gandhi and Nehru. It was nothing more than a free beggar in a wide world street. Nothing changed much in subsequent years, thanks to the inherited colonial mentality and administration (Though honest effort of many leaders cannot be denied). We remained poor and scorned by western nation and denial continued. Denial of what we are, what have we become, and we instead clanged on some ancient glorious past to get past the inferiority complex of holding beggar bowl in front of the shiny suited captain America. What does it matter what we are at present, when we have inherited a glorious colourful cultural past and these new wealthy western nations are nothing but some money seeking uncultured lot with no past at all.

It all reminds me of a scene from Harry potter and half-blood prince where Marvolo Gaunt (Voldemort/Tom Riddle’s grand Father) who was living in the filth and obscurity but was full of pride for being heir of Slytherin that made him in constant denial of his present situation. But at least his pride was based on facts, but I am not even sure of what versions of our history have ability to tower all our misery and pain – version interpreted by left or version interpreted by right?

I don’t claim to have all those intellectual capability to refute or corroborate any version but as an ordinary Indian with limited intellectual capability I would like to raise just one question that has troubled me from my childhood. With 5000 years of glorious history why we have so few achievements that we can count on our finger tips? With hardly 400-500 years of history why achievement of USA has filled pages after pages. With same age as ours China has much more to boast than us (at least it was never ruled the way we were). I tried to find these answers in many history text books but I never could. It was same as the advertisement on Doordarshan when India’s only achievements were counted in form of Sachin Tendulkar and Aishwarya Rai ( not even a real achievement), we didn’t have much more than Aryabhatta, Chanakya, Varahmira (those certainly are real achievements) etc.

We claim to command 1/3^rd of world’s GDP till 1700 (more or less).  What happens when a country’s citizen have so much money? They usually try to find new avenues to employ that money and that paves the way for innovation and invention. Nation and citizen thrives on those innovation and inventions and money keep getting multiply. But did that happen in India? I could hardly find mention of flourishing trade (its negligible compare to other nation, and mostly fictional rather than solid proof as we have in case of other civilisations). If that was the case India would have been different in 1757, when East India Company finally consolidated its presence in India.

A near closed economy with hardly and research and development, where did all the money actually go? Were we rich or prosperous? There are significant differences between those.  A prosperous nation can boast of prosperity and industrious citizen with ample activities going on in its economy. On the other hand a rich nation can have all the money with large section of its masses keep facing misery and poverty, as happening in modern gulf countries. And that is what the gist of social and economic life of last 1500 years in the history of India.

Our present lethargy is product of past 1500 years of near insomnia. I am proud of tolerant culture of India that made it receptive to different ideas, cultures, religions and people. But that receptiveness has also infused letharginess into our DNA that made us indifferent to happening around us. We readily yielded power to one elite section and kept ourselves busy in finding minimum sustenance for living. All riches went to rulers and all misery to ruled. That has been story of past 2000 years and it is still going on. The dazzling wealth that India has boasted did not belong to ordinary Indian like us but to the handful of ruling elite. That’s the reason we never could become inventive country despite of having enormous wealth. Ordinary Indians were busy in arranging basic sustenance for life. There is not much difference in ancient India and China but what small differences were there that made China a nation while India a consortium of fiefdom. I am not saying everything was wrong, I don’t even know if that’s true but one thing I can be sure of that something was wrong that made us to subjugate for hundreds of year despite having all the wealth and power.

My purpose here is not to belie or belittle India’s past. My purpose is to seek every question to cover 360 degree view of our history instead of just one sided view. We are not a mediocre nation and string tied to our history would not let us cross the line of mediocrity. History is like nostalgia that is good to cherish but could ruin us if we don’t let it go. As a nation we are still underachiever, we are performing below our potential; we have miles to cover before becoming a nation of achievers. We are here to create history for future generation not to submerge in deep and unknown water of our history.