Bucket List

How I wish I was ambidextrous, being able to use both my hands equally efficiently. Most of us use our right hands for all our routine tasks, some with a creative bent of mind, use their left hand. Why this sudden urge, well actually since it is the right hand which wields the razor for the morning shave, rinsing the razor has to be undertaken by opening the tap with your left hand. Now typically most bathrooms are fitted with two taps, the one on the left is for hot water and the right one is for cold water. So every morning one has to indulge in a rather complicated task of opening the cold water tap with the left hand. If I could shave with my left hand, it would be so much easier.

Bathrooms or washrooms as they are referred to these days, throw some other challenges especially with those who  find  handling the shower systems insurmountable. Invariably with a turn of the knob to the wrong side ends up drenching a suited booted person, if that was not enough, the modern day fitments, have jets at all possible places streaming at your  torso from most unexpected directions. In the confusion you end up turning those knobs every which way, but there is no respite and you end up resorting to the good old bucket and mug, the traditional "Lota"(globular water container) bath. 

These showers have gained currency in the last about three odd decades, barring the metros, the rest of India, bathed with the bucket and lota or in the rural areas straight from the hand pump, in the step wells, ponds, rivulets and so on.. We were blessed to be raised in that era in towns in the heartland where we too indulged in these luxuries, drawing water from the well with a pail and pouring it straight over your head is the most refreshing bath I have ever had. Pouring a whole bucket of cold water during peak winters is a sure fire way for building immunity against cold and cough. We resorted to that quite often. In the Army, fauj also provided us with ample opportunities to revert to the bucket and mug scene, all high altitude areas are devoid of running water during winters, hence it is the good old bucket to our rescue. In fact not just the mountainous regions of our country, even deserts, jungles, wherever we camped, we enjoyed these rustic pleasures.

Although the buckets which interest the spirited lot is the ice bucket for bars with champagne and KFC buckets of chicken. A couple of years ago, the "Ice bucket challenge" went viral on social media, where the individual was expected to pour a bucket of ice cold water on the head in support of some cause. It actually had nothing to do with personal hygiene though.  Buckets play a major role in our lives and even in our preparation for the journey to Valhalla.......A bucket list of things to do and enjoy before we finally kick the bucket!!

Delhi Belly

So we are at it again, if it was not for the Virs and Kanganas life would be so dull. We must actually be grateful to them rather than pouring scorn. The electronic media will then have to do some real reporting and research, which is oh so boring! After all, there are more such entertainers ready to pounce at any and every controversy to keep them relevant. With the advent of social media, there are adequate number of platforms which are available to every Swara, Vir and Kangana. Vir Das is just one among many such smart alecks who are aware that such an act is bound to pitchfork  him/her to the centre-stage. 

While Kangana is entitled to her views about when and how did India break the shackles of colonialism, she obviously has taken on the mantle of Rani Jhansi rather seriously and started to charge at windmills in a rather Quixotic manner. She is gutsy and has made a mark as an actor with some outstanding performances, but that does not make her a historian. Although, politicians are also great actors, not all actors are good politicians. Then  why do we take our entertainers so seriously, when they are only meant to entertain us? Though we are not alone who are so gullible. The oldest democracy in the world and the largest one have this common trait of electing film industry personnel to high offices. They have had their Reagan, Schwarzenegger, we have had MGR, Jayalalitha, Rajesh Khanna, Shatrughan Govinda, Hema, Jayaprada and so on....In fact most of them were not serious about their duties as elected representatives with some of them even bowing out like Amitabh; barring MGR, Jayalalitha, Karunanidhi and NTR who were a force to reckon with not just in their states but also at the national level, all the other were there only for fun and to win favours with the ruling party in power. 

Vir in Hindi means brave, but actually he is “Bheeru” which is the opposite of brave i.e. a coward. Why do I say so, well he chose a foreign soil and a foreign audience to vent out his ire on his perceptions of the existing state in the country.  May be he was suffering from Delhi Belly, no wonder his monologue was a byproduct; 'constipation of ideas and diarrhoea of words'(!) Freedom of expression is a funny fundamental right, that provides me with immunity to express my impressions and stick to them even if I am factually far from the truth. So he has exercised his right, chosen his own arena well aware of the consequences. A minority may agree with his version, personally I don’t agree with his views, probably so do majority of Indians, again a personal choice.

The Rajputana Rifles Regiment of Indian Army has its motto as "Veer Bhogya Vasundhara",  excerpted from a Puranic shloka, meaning "Only the Braves enjoy the Earth", this Vir is enjoying his infamy. Unfortunately for him, his 15 minutes of infamy was too short lived with PM Modi's repeal of Farm laws taking centre stage the very next day; the hungry pack of news channels just moved on and suddenly  no one gave a damn about what some Vir spoke somewhere. How I wish, our media barons had the wisdom to separate the wheat from the chaff  and refrained from raising such storms in tea cups.

Life is a celebration

 'Jashn-e-riwaz' was recently in the news for all the wrong reasons, a Happy occasion such as Diwali was marred by a silly controversy. I wonder whether a Diwali Mubarak would cease to be "shubh" or happy, or for that matter, a 'Shubh Eid' be unpalatable to the Ummah for having adulterated the puritanical Eid Mubarak"! Imagine the mess a mubarak or shubh Xmas would create rather than the usual Merry Xmas! Would Santa Claus be left sulking for having spoilt his merry HoHoHo and refuse to slide down the chimneys just because of a slip of the tongue. Have you ever wondered, as to why did homo sapiens firstly invent spoken languages for communication and how did these languages evolve over the years? While languages fulfil the basic need of communication, the intricacies or finer nuances of each language were refined by the litterateur. The lingua franca today is English, despite the Italian origin of the phrase and its early usage to describe the French-Italian jargons or pidgin. English is ruling the roost because it proved to be the most flexible and adaptive by choosing to adopt more foreign words as compared to its competitor, French, which too was running neck in neck for a number of years, until the emergence of US as a superpower tilted it in the favour of English.We Indians had at least one benefit after  the two centuries of colonial Raj, our prowess in the Queen's language!

Any guesses, as to why Hindi despite being our mother tongue and the national language has been restricted to just formal official correspondence that too with diktats of the 'Rashtrbhasha Prachar Samiti'   ( National language publicity committee).  Hindi which was taught in schools and colleges was highly sanskritised Hindi, not the popular Hindustani written in Devnagri script. For any language to be adopted, it must be easy to learn and speak, thereafter it should be flexible to adopt words from other languages and enrich itself by being more inclusive. Jungle, bazaar, pyjama, bungalow, chutney, guru and so on, there are hundreds of words which have found a place in the Oxford dictionary. Unfortunately we remained steadfast in our usage of correct Hindi, thereby discouraging others and impeding its natural growth. Hindi films, songs and entertainment industry by and large have done a yeoman service by spreading the language even beyond our borders. Soft power of this kind plays a major role in winning over the populace rather than forcing it down the throats of unwilling citizens. Yes, there is a lot of politics in the languages conundrum but if the powers that be are really keen to spread the reach of this beautiful language, they must release the shackles and let it bloom....

Anyway let us get back to the 'jashn', which in Urdu means celebration and riwaz is simply tradition. The ad itself is inspired by the vintage Siyaram ad where the Prince is welcomed in a Royal homecoming. So let the celebrations continue whether we call it Jashn, tyohar, utsav or festival…just a matter of semantics(!).Call it what suits you but celebrate we must…after all life itself is a celebration!

Name Calling

Each one of us gets a unique name given to us by our parents, some of us are more fortunate and earn different sobriquets over the years.  Most of us have a pet name at home, especially so if the formal name is a tongue twister and has more than three or four syllables. Pet names are typically smaller and easier to call out, while Pappu, Munna, Babloo, Guddu, Munni, Guddi were the common names for the middle class kids, Bobby, Tina, Rick, Mike etc were anointed on the suave aspiring Upper middle class progenies.  My siblings are twins and were christened Chuchu and Chiraiya being a boy and girl, which was rather sweet, as Chiraiya is a bird and Chuchu essentially is the tweeting of the bird. The Bhadralok have a practice of daak nam and bhalo naam alluding to pet name and formal name. Daak naam are most unusual sweet and dripping with affection, Titul, Poltu, Babal, Popon and so on. There wasn't much thought given while picking up these pet names as against the formal ones, it being a formal ceremony, "Namkaran sanskar"! Most of us grew over these pet names, however in some cases these stuck on for life, not everyone was pleased to be addressed by his pet name in public. Imagine the CEO of a multinational being called out as Dodo by his friends or relations while he is in august company. In private though he wouldn't mind. We had a senior officer being chided by his better half, "Guddu, that was not what was conveyed!", you could see an embarrassed Guddu squirming!

We also acquire nick names during our sojourn while pursuing our respective careers. Teachers, bosses, political leaders, sports persons etc invariably land up with a nick name which characterises them at times even caricature them. So we have a Ganje for every baldy, Sexy for every Saxena, Harry for every Harish and so on.. In school we had to devise ingenious ways to christen our venerable teachers without them getting a hint. However, over the years, the masters are aware of these nicknames and don't really mind them. We had "Gullu" for Mr Singhal, legend has it that he would promise gullucose (glucose) to the athletes, while Mr Kaushal Kumar was called 'KKu', Mr Nene was 'Ganju', after his shining bald pate. The names which our course-mates acquired were quite unique so we had Sanjay Verma aka 'Guni' named after a shloka in Sanskrit, 'Varmeko guni putro, na cha murkh shatanyapi, Ekashchandrah tamohanti na cha taragano kwachit', meaning it is better to have one bright son than have hundred fools, as one moon is adequate to conquer the darkness, thousands of stars can't. We also had Yash as the 'Champion', the seniors recognised his potential early on and named him such. We have a Jat who wasn’t one and a Mundu, which survived four plus decades, the others simply formalised. The other prominent ones were 'Pondy' 'Psycho' which may offend the sensibilities of the uninitiated but, for them it was perfectly normal. Their spouses of course did not take kindly to being addressed as Mrs Psycho. 

A number of them end up with names opposite to their profiles, so you will come across a 'Tally', who is barely 5 feet and a six feet guy being called a 'Shorty'. Bosses invariably end up at the wrong end of name calling and hence 'Grouchy' suits most of them with the permanent frown. Politicians of late have stolen a march with Pappu and Feku ruling the roost in name calling!!

Enfant Terrible

Bailed out finally....obviously it is Aryan I am referring to. The world had suddenly come to a standstill since the day the ill fated cruise left the shores of Amchi Mumbai, at least the electronic media would have us believe that. Indian social media and TV channels have outdone each other yet again by setting new benchmarks in minute to minute telecast of the most ridiculous pieces of news. They did it for Sushant Singh Rajput's case a couple of months ago. So now we are wiser about Ananya Pandey's whereabouts, her business acumen in getting Aryan hooked onto weed. Only hitch being the chats on Whats app being admissible as incontrovertible proof of guilt.

Bollywood industry of course played its role to perfection of the much aggrieved innocent bystander who was at the wrong place at the wrong time. All fault of stars, not Bollywood ones, the astrological ones, must be Rahu Kalam or may be the Saturn "Saade Saati", the seven and a half years cycles of "Shani ki Maha Dasha"! Gauri and Shahrukh will soon be making a beeline at the doors of the astrologers, numerologists, Tarot readers and so on, after all their "Mannat" for their prodigal son has borne bail fruit. 

The forlorn philosopher looks of Aryan could have melted any heart, wonder how heartless these NCB types were or they simply closed their eyes and swooped down, after all such a catch is rare, with loads of publicity and public adulation. Sachin Wankhede's ancestry and marital life with none other than a  Shri Nawab Malik Hon'ble minister from Maharashtra giving us these newsbytes himself.This Sachin thought he would outshine the Master Blaster himself, his surname Wankhede of Wankhede Stadium of Mumbai fame, (though they have no connections whatsoever), was too much of a coincidence. He did execute a stupendous catch, but alas, the third umpire kept a close eye on his feet, which probably overstepped. Slow motion replays are inconclusive as yet, so the million dollar question is whether it is a six or has the poor kid succumbed to his hook(ah!) temptation.

"All men are created equal, some are more equal than others!", thus spake George Orwell in his satirical allegorical novella "Animal Farm" penned in 1945. In deference, Judiciary has finally got over their Shakespearean dilemma of "To bail or Not to bail", after all it was the yesteryear cutie Juhi Chawla who was standing surety for the 'enfant terrible'.."bachha ghar aa jayega!"

Girls in NDA : The Final Bastion

 

The final citadel has been stormed, leaving in its trail bruised egos, unsure soldiers and all at sea veterans. The hierarchy simply caved in without even a semblance of a fight. Yes I am referring to the entry of girls in NDA, now that the judiciary has issued a diktat, like it or lump it, gender discrimination has been buried. At least the legal eagles would like to believe that. Wish it were that simple, then by now we would have been a caste less society with no religious persecution,  crime free utopia, in fact we would all be living in  the proverbial “Ram Rajya”.

I can understand the anguish of the veterans, they are peeved as to why did it take so long for the high and mighty to open the floodgates; they  were after all an “all boys club” in the academies and even later on. As by the time, the ladies made their foray as short service commissioned officers, they wer
e already senior in ranks much married and father figures, a role which they played to perfection mollycoddling the young ladies in the initial days. It is believed that one of the Commandants in OTA Chennai in the initial days walked in with a box full of chocolates for the opening address to the LCs (lady cadets). It is to the credit of the young ladies that they imbibed the ethos in the units they served in, as also the unit officers ably led by their Commanding Officers who groomed them that they started proving their worth in the organisation. The armed forces and chivalry are synonymous, ladies were always treated with utmost respect, to that extent ladies joining the Armed Forces were safe. 

The Fauji hierarchy has also tied itself in knots, now that permanent commission has been granted to women officers, the mode of entry through NDA or OTA is actually immaterial, except the functional issues which are more administrative in nature, which given time can be addressed.

Then why was the organisation not keen on taking them on board for a permanent commission and kept them from harms way by restricting their employment to so called sedentary duties and did not let them see action in the combat arms. Obviously there must be strong reasons and if that was so, then why did they give up so easily and accept the writing on the wall.

Having been an instructor with Lady Officers as trainees and having commanded them in units in peace, field and exercises, I can say that by and large they made good officers. However, one had to be mindful of their physical limitations and assign them tasks commensurate with their capabilities. A leader is expected to know his officers and men and should be able to motivate them to excel. The lady officers were happy if they faced professional challenges successfully without being given any preferential treatment. Would I be a vocal supporter of this cause then.....I am afraid, no. 

Despite all the positives, there are a few major issues which can't be overlooked. First and foremost is our society and culture, and the unreasonable and illogical pressures by the public and media. The Kandahar hijack  episode is a blot not only on our security establishment for having failed to  Abhinandan's capture by Pak during the post Balakot incident is still fresh in everyone's minds. There was a clamour to bring him back at all costs. 

Kandahar hijack and its aftermath is still not faded from our memory, when the media and general public went ballistic demanding immediate capitulation to secure the release of the passengers. If that is not enough, the mutilations and torture of Lt Anuj Kalia during Kargil and Sqn Ldr Ajay Ahuja who was also brutally tortured and murdered despite being captured alive……..God forbid if such an eventuality was to occur with the adversaries we face who do not respect any human rights, wouldn’t we be putting ourselves as a nation in a very delicate situation of our own making. 

The second issue pertains to the elitist nature of elimination of gender discrimination, effecting only the officer cadre, how about the rank and file. If the ladies are as good as gentlemen officers then why not induct them as sepoys in all the arms and services? Worth pondering!! The honourable Supreme Court compared St Stephens college permitting girls with that of NDA, with due respect My Lord, while the former is just a college and the latter is a military training institution. Obviously a case of comparing apples and bitter gourd (karela), not oranges as they are at least in the same genre of fruits(!). 

Well then, now that it is fait accompli, welcome aboard girls but tread with caution…..the path from here on will  be tough and toughs are expected to get going..

 

 

Rancho

 So the Yanks have turned their tail again, what’s new one may ask? The mighty US of A, the global hegemon, policeman, watchdog of democratic values, the saviour of the world from all kinds of catastrophes, be it the aliens, meteors or even invasion by the zombies….the Avengers!! 

If wishes were horses.Hollywood stories would come alive. It always amazes me that aliens do not land anywhere else in the world, except US, be it the Independence Day or Martian Invasions. Some of you may be surprised to note that Americans had been fantasising about alien wars immediately after the second World War and produced movies on the theme including a 3D version way back in 1953.  Most of us of course recall the more recent ones War of the Worlds, Avatar etc, where they have saved the Planet a million times. So obviously, Americans find mere mortals too lowly for a fight, be it Vietnam or Afghanistan, these are not their wars. They simply took it on themselves to rid the world of communism and Islamic extremism, even if they had to befriend the Middle kingdom itself; their communists were better than the Russian ones. Similarly  Pak and Saudi extremism is acceptable but Afghani is anathema. No, it had nothing to do with the Military Industrial complex, which made a cool three trillion dollars from this venture. A couple of million lives lost, displaced refugee crisis are mere collaterals. In fact, actually it is an investment for future as they have sown the seeds of discord amongst the people displaced, who would be the cannon fodder for future conflicts, creating a demand for the same weapons again, so a win-win for everyone!!

We can’t blame them really, there are only two industries which Americans can be justifiably proud of Arms and Entertainment, which too incidentally is beholden to the Chinese, with many productions houses already owing their allegiance to them. So Men in Black would rather seek fictional  aliens and monsters who can be handled on celluloid with computer aided digital effects rather than roughing it out in the rugged and unforgiving mountainous arid Afghanistan. The superheroes Batmans, Supermen  women and even the Rambos have discovered to their chagrin that when things get tough toughs don’t get going ….they just turn back and run….

Rancho from 3 Idiots was actually Ranchhoddas Chanched the character played by Amir Khan. Well, may be Old Joe is the modern day Krishna, who too got the sobriquet of Ranchhod (one who runs away from a battlefield) after scooting from the battlefield.