The TATA ridley!

They are perhaps the cutest things that keep coming to India year after year, and we do all we can to harm them... destroy their nests, steal their eggs, kill them for meat and shell... steal the young ones for exotic pet sales.

Read about some issues here.

And now there is a new port that is being planned at the locations these turtle keep coming to lay their eggs! Gahirmatha's seas are one of the world's largest breeding areas for the Olive Ridley Turtle. The Dhamra port could signal the end of this habitat forever.

Greenpeace has been pursuing the TATAs to change the location of the port since a while, and has taken out quite a few campaigns for this. This seems to be going on the right way as finally the TATAs seem to have taken notice and are hiring PR agents to look into the harm these campaigns are doing to their public image, and what can be done to save it! Wouldn't it be easier just to change the location of the port? Or is it that the souls have been sold already?

These turtles are going to need all the help and support from us that they can get. Read about the GreenPeace efforts here.I have been supporting this since a while. I would hope you would be concerned and sign it as well and spread the word.

PS: I realize I have started sounding like one of those guys who are ready to march out for anything and everything....but I think I am concerned about the environment. After all, we have but one earth, and in the end of the day, it is left to us to decide what we want to make of it....we could turn it to a land of wonders, or a valley of shame. Let's make the right choice.

It's hard to get by just upon a smile...

Once in a while, things happen and they touch you in a way you never thought they could. Currently there has been this controversy about abortion laws in India, and the decision was out yesterday, and nothing has been changed.

I am confused as to what I really think of the decision. On one hand, it is indeed true that the kid, in all probability, would be born with a congenital heart disease, and that is never a good thing. And while it's cruel and not right to say so, that kid will never really have a chance to lead a normal life. Its parents, their life will be messed up as well! Treating congenital heart diseases are expensive, and add to that the hopelessness of the situation, and the frustration of the whole system working against it. I feel for the parents. I really do.

Then again, this whole episode is simply another controversy over mercy killing, stated, or otherwise. Who are we to decide if or not that kid would develop the disease? Miracles happen! And in the end of the day, how can we decide for someone else, if or not he deserves a chance at life; however difficult it might be?

Personally, my opinion tilts towards aborting the foetus; it tilts very slightly, but very definitely. Here is a case of a couple, who are trying to save their unborn child from a life of innumerable discomfort and disadvantages, and trying to save themselves from pain. They had the boldness to question the system, and thank heavens for that!

Now that the decision is made, this will fade form the headlines to the second pages, and from there to invisibility. I wonder the legislature would take note, and maybe think what might be done. Life is not just being able to breathe in and out. It's also about the experience you have in this world. I would hope this kid has a decent life at the least. I would hope its parents have the courage to face life as it comes. I would hope that in between the pain, they at least have moments of sublime happiness to aid them forward.

I guess we Indians are an emotional lot. But we tend to forget that a man and a woman, together or independent, have a life beyond kids. They are people, and not just moms and dads. Maybe they should have a better chance at it!

In any case, this is just another headline, till the next cricket match. Media focus moves on.

Of dilemmas and dialectics

Coincidence. Or not. But while Abhi here (take a bow Abhi... make yourself decorative) has been turning steadily extrospective (it is a word now, so shut up), I've been doing quite the reverse... in the worst way possible... I've been thinking about writing lately. I always did - off and on. It's just more consistent now... maybe it's all the nothing-to-do I have in my life lately. It's a little like the a-rhythmic whipping of the fan, the staccato barks of the clock, the delirious rippling of the curtains... sounds invisible till 3 in the night, when acting with pre-determined concert, they stage Le Danse Macabre. Offkey.

What gets to me though is this: what do I write about? They say everyone has at least one story to tell. Either they are all CIA field operatives or I lead a singularly dull life (refrain from comments please... you just might hit a nerve... and my nerves hit back... hard). So what is it to be then: two guys, a girl and a dog? A girl, a dream and a recorder? Or an old man, a piece of tatting and the Louvre?

Then again: slapstick or poignant? It isn't easier to make people laugh than cry these days anyway... most don't care either ways... I mean the last time I cried was when I read Catina. And the last time I laughed was a minute back when my ex-roommate jigged energetically to a ballad of tragedies in a towel. I figure it's easiest to confuse people - there has to be a reason Hitchhiker's and Famished Road made it to the bestsellers' rosters and took all those awards home for breakfast.

The thing with mood-writing is holding the mood for a prolonged stretch temporally. Alternatively, finishing the novel/work/magnum opus/general trash while the mood lasts... in my case then half-an-hour... at best. Nothing is impossible... but this does creep mighty close. But really. Did Maurier surround herself with goth lava lamps, wind chimes and Irish hollyhocks while in the throes of literary composition? Did she look up from her manuscript and pronounce in a death-knelled, mystical voice resonant with the sands of yesterday "chicken soup" when her housekeeper asked her what she'd have for lunch? Did Wodehouse hide rubber lizards in his aunts' slippers? Or were they not-rubber? Was there no firewood when Bronte wrote Wuthering Heights?

Woolf committed suicide. I think I would too in all probability. Seeing as how I'm already profoundly schizophrenic, deciding which part of me kills the other would be tantamount to playing favourites.

In the interests of fair play therefore, I hereby take up the ukulele. Neighbours be damned.

Reading habits

Of late I have started reading books again. Not that I had really stopped, but the pace had become so slow, that well....you could call it a dormant state. However, since my online interests have suddenly gone down significantly, I have picked up my pace, and done myself proud.

I completed 5 books in the past 4 days, and that is something. Now on to my latest...its called Magic City, by a black woman writer called Jewell Parker Rhodes and so far, it's been enchanting, to say the least. Somehow, reading books about white men and women, and watching movies that deal with only white men and women alienates us from having a real perspective of things. This book sort of shook me back to reality. Just the difference in style was all it took.

And suddenly the world is a bigger place than it had seemed a few days back.

Reading is sexy!

Of sleepy nations and stupid notions!

We live in a strange country.

We live in a country that has decided to neglect its majority in favour of the minority. We live in a country where we actually support people who come to power with our votes and then steal our rights to give it to those who do not deserve them. We live in a country that has decided to neglect merit and favour the accidents of birth.

What is ironic is that the majority of the people inhabiting this country even support this. Could any other country match the spirit of sacrifice shown by the majority of the population of India? I cannot find any indeed. And I am glad so. Glad for if it were so, I’ll have to modify my first statement and say that I live in a strange world.

We are a 50 year old country behaving like a mentally retarded kid. What else can I say about a country that has people who favour mediocrity over ability in the name of homogeneity of society? India is overpopulated and over-educated. I find it strange to understand that there are graduates working at levels where a class X education shall more than suffice. And we have a society that respects teachers and does nothing much else further. Have any of us ever deigned to ponder over the amount of money a teacher in a public school earns? I doubt. And of course the teacher is lucky if he gets the salary in time and does not have to fight the state govt. or go for hunger strikes and various other conundrums for his arrears. Of course a teacher should be a teacher in the true sense of the word….he should be interested in the nobleness of his work—and he should feel good about his good luck that he’s got a chance to serve the society.

Bat shit!

I recently read in the newspapers that the state seats in different NITs have been discarded. So any NIT henceforth, shall have 50% of its seat filled by students from that state, and the rest, from students from the rest of the country…whoever can get the requisite marks of course. I have rather mixed feelings about this. On one hand, it is a step in the right direction, if that right direction be only equality in opportunities.

However, the issue is not just skin deep, or even merit deep for that matter. The issue is, well, being a student of one of the NITs myself, I’ve come to think of my alma mater not just as one of the best educational institutes in the country, but also a place where young men from all over the country meet, and learn to respect other cultures, learn to face difficulties of unknown language and customs. It’s a place where I grew up from being a sheltered kid to a man, ready to face the world.

Things should not change by this decision of the government. Only that, they would. The education system in India lacks uniformity. There are way too many educational boards, and way too many different systems. While this decision could have been a step towards bringing in a semblance of equality, it would not help as equality, in this case, should start from a more granular level. What I find surprising, and a tad disturbing, is that the government does not seem to be bothered about the pathetic situation of primary education and the lack of public interest towards this disparity.

I am not a political person. I steer clear of any political discussion simply because mostly I don’t care enough, and more often than not, I’d not really know what’s going on. But this is different. This is scary, and disappointing.

Everybody cribs and carps about how the brilliant minds of India are being lured away to different countries. Well, the way things are going, I don’t really see why any talented guy should stay here to face the political harassment and bureaucratic red tape, stupid socio-political measures, and social apathy. We have become a race that adores the mediocre, simply because we are scared of the exceptional.

It’s time to wake up.