randomized

Watching PM Modi on TV boast about the historical feat he has achieved with demonisation had me feeling déjà vu yesterday. Of course the first reaction was a half smirk-laugh that maybe we have reserved only for the most repulsive moments; moments which disgust you to a certain level of discomfort when you wish you could wash and clean your mind somehow the way you do your body. But what followed that was déjà vu. If you watch late night American talk shows like me, or in this case, if you watch news at all, you would've seen a certain Trump conference where he boasts about the how good the Muslim Ban 1 has been implemented and how everything is going so smooth at the airports. And because I had seen that clip so many times on so many shows, you can guess how I felt watching that part of PM Modi's speech on TV. The more you see of these two lately, the more it looks like they are picking ideas and habits from each other. People outside of India even call PM Modi ...

Okay, here is the thing; I am not a hero. I never was, nor am I now. And I don't think I can be one in the future. My father once said how all your good deeds cease to mean anything once you do a terribly bad thing. 'What is the difference between a bad and a terrible thing, father?' I had asked. 'That depends,' he had said, 'on what you consider a bad thing and what you don't.' I never understood that remark of his. Surely, I thought, bad things are bad for everyone; that bad things were considered bad universally, that was the deal, correct? Turned out it wasn't. Not always were bad things considered bad. Not in every case were guilt a visible emotion in the guilty. But when I understood this, my father was not around; neither was my mother. Both had departed in their sleep on the same day some years ago. And I was left alone to comprehend the terribleness of my deed; a deed that had wiped all my good ones, if there were any before it. ...

There was a front page advertisement in the newspaper yesterday. It had 'Let's fight corruption' written in big bold letters alongside a picture of Narendra Modi, prime ministerial candidate of BJP for the General Elections 2014. It also had three other sentences which went like this, Let's minimise government and maximise governance. Let's use technology for greater public scrutiny. Let's be transparent and accountable. Modi's election campaign started last year with this headline phrase that was in the paper yesterday. Fighting corruption, boosting progress and reducing inflation were some of the apparent primary goals of BJP. The situation though, I must say, is a bit different now. We'll get to it (and the three points up there) in a bit.

Google "I don't give money at the traffic lights. In fact, I have stopped giving anything to anyone these days," said a friend a few days ago with an expression that showed that he no longer believes in any of such small acts of charity. I didn't know what to say to that, so I kept quiet. It might have been a momentary thing with him. Just an exaggeration maybe because he was a little off that day. But the thing is, there are people who don't give anything to any destitute just because they have some preconceived notions about the beggars.  Their argument is that 'these people', as they call them, have made it a business and that all beggars at traffic intersections are part of a syndicate and hence should be discouraged. Well, it's not entirely untrue, but colouring everyone with the same red is not the way to go. Anyway, we'll talk about that in a short time. First let me tell you an incident which led me to write this post in the ...