Himachal Diary

Nestled between Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir, is the state of Himachal Pradesh. It lies in the lap of the majestic Himalayas and is often called Dev Bhumi (land of the Gods). Characterized by pristine woods, majestic snow capped mountains, rapidly flowing mountain streams, and beautiful and hospitable people, Himachal has something for everyone. Blessed with some of the most spectacular and beautiful landscapes anywhere, it is a travelers' paradise. Lofty snow peaks, deep gorges, lush green valleys, fast flowing rivers, enchanting mountain lakes, flower bedecked meadows, beautiful temples and monasteries steeped in time, Himachal has it all.

I had been thirsting to visit Himachal for a long time, and when opportunity presented itself in the form of an invitation from a friend to spend one week with him in the pristine locales of Himachal, it was too good to resist. After applying for and getting a week of leave from my office, I set off on a voyage of discovery. As it turned out, the voyage of 8 days, across a 1500 km route, with mind blowing scenery and back breaking roads, changed my life in more ways than one. We started off on the 16th of June and returned back on the 24th.

16th June :

Caught an early morning flight from Pune to New Delhi. The flight landed at 11:30 am due to delays in landing, but we were left with sufficient time to have lunch and navigate to ISBT (Kashmiri Gate), in time to catch the 4 pm bus to Recong Peo, capital of Kinnaur district. The weather Gods were kind to us, and Delhi was much less hot than it usually is, around that time. In fact it had rained just the day before, and puddles of water were visible in certain parts of the town. The bus itself was an HPTDC one, which while not in the league of a Volvo, was comfortable enough.

17th June :

The crescent shaped capital city of Shimla had arrived sometime in the night, and when we woke up early morning, around 6 am, we were already in the laps of high mountains. The majestic Sutlej was to keep us company for several hours. Beautiful river, dramatic landscapes! We reached Karchham around 10 am in the morning, and wishing to start our itinerary with the enchanting Sangla Valley, we got down from the bus there. From Karchham to Sangla is an hours journey by bus or car, but since buses were infrequent, and we had missed the previous one by a few minutes, we decided to hire a Tata Sumo.

Sumos ply on a shared basis, between the two points regularly, but the drivers are loath to commence, until they get at least 10 passengers, the fare being a paltry Rs 30 per person. Not wanting to wait till the requisite 10 passengers arrived, we struck a deal with the driver. We would rent out the entire vehicle, and pick up what passengers could be found on the way and once we reach Sangla, we would compensate the driver for whatever shortfall he incurred. As it turned out we picked up 7 more passengers on the way, and we had to pay up only 90 bucks for the 2 of us.

A house in beautiful Sangla

It was nearly 12 noon by the time we reached our destination. We had booked a double bed room in Prakash hotel, with geyser, TV and a nice view for 800 per night (taxes not included). After a lunch of aloo paratha and mixed veg, we set out for exploring. Two kilometers downhill was the lovely Baspa river, surrounded by several mountain peaks, most of them heavily forested and some of them snow capped.

18th June :

We set off early (or as early as one can get up on a holiday), and started towards the market. Located a kilometer downhill from our hotel, we could see a lot of construction activities going on. Migrant labourers from far off places like Bihar and West Bengal frequently come here in search of work, and since heavy snowfall post October prevents outsiders from staying here, they finish off their work by September and leave.

The river Baspa in Sangla

We had a brunch of delicious steamed momos (a large plate of 10 for Rs 30) and veg noodles in Tibetan cafe and we were all set for a day's exploration. Apple orchards and lush green alpine orchards were enough to keep us enchanted, and further ahead was the beautiful Baspa river with crystal clear water. We tried climbing some mountain peaks and were rewarded for our efforts with some breathtakingly scenic views.

19th June :

We left for our next destination - Kalpa. Since no direct transport was available for Kalpa, we had to improvise. We took a cab to Karchham and at Karchham boarded a bus to Recong Peo. From Recong Peo, we boarded another bus that would take us to Kalpa. We had booked an HPTDC hotel room in Kalpa, which was so far from the Bus Stand that it took the better part of an hour to reach there, along with much effort, considering the heavy travel kits we were saddled with. But the climb was well worth it. At Rs 1200 for a night, the room was fabulous, with a king sized bed, carpeted room, TV and a captivating view.

A visual from breathtaking Kalpa

Kalpa is located at an altitude of 2759 m and also offers some fantastic early morning views of the Kinner Kailash. According to legends, Kalpa is the winter abode of Shiva and all the gods of Kinnaur assemble before him during this time for an annual conference. And when the supreme god himself seems to be so impressed by the beauty of Kalpa, how can human beings be far behind?

20th June :

Time to leave for Kaza. This journey necessitated getting up at 5:30 in the morning to catch the 7:00 am bus from Recong Peo. As the bus left Recong Peo we soon left the green, forested hills and got on a narrow, bumpy path that was to stay with us for the next 8 hours. The landscape was bleak, desolate and harsh and miles would pass by before we would see any human. On the way we saw several glaciers, many of which were progenitors of mountain streams, which would coalesce hundreds of miles away to form distributories of the river Indus.

The harsh and barren landscape of Kaza

At Kaza too we stayed in an HPTDC hotel (which was named rather unimaginatively, Hotel Kaza). Kaza being remote, and located at a very high altitude, had a topography similar to Ladakh – barren, arid and desolate. But it had a charm all of its own. On the flip side, power supply was in acute shortage, and on the second day of our stay, we encountered a power cut of 10 hours duration. Water too was scarce, and the hotel staff would supply us water in buckets.

21st June :

Spent most of the day exploring the unique topography of Kaza on foot. As neither of us had been to Ladakh, Kaza held a novelty for us. Trees were a rarity, and we learned from the locals that post October, the roads to Kaza are blocked due to heavy snowfall and landslide. To deal with the next 6 months of seclusion, the inhabitants of Kaza hoard supplies of essential commodities, including food items and medicines, and wait for the winter to get over.

22nd June:

Our next and final stop was Manali. After making enquiries we came to know that there were two Manali bound buses from Kaza, one at 4:30 in the morning, and the other at 7:30. Not wanting to waste our time sleeping, we decided to board the earlier bus. The bus was going to pass in front of our hotel at 4:45 which spared us the trouble of going to the bus stand so early in the morning.

The journey to Manali took us through some of the remotest places I have ever seen. The journey from Recong Peo to Kaza paled into insignificance compared to this one. We passed through roads that were so close to icebergs that we could extend our hands out of the windows and touch them. And midway through the journey was the famous Rohtang pass. Located 4120 metres above sea level, it was snow covered and choc-a-bloc with tourists of all hues – honeymooning couples, families, hikers and students. For honeymooning couples, writing their names on snow seemed to be a favorite activity.

Manali was only 51 kms from Rohtang and after a brief halt for lunch, we sped towards our final destination. We reached Manali at 5 in the evening. Our hotel - another HPTDC outlet, called Hotel Beas, because surprise, surprise it was located on the banks of the mighty river Beas - was very close to the Bus Stand and due to traffic congestion on the bridge we were able to get down just at the gates of the Hotel.

23rd June :

The sound of the river Beas was a constant companion to us during our stay at Manali. The constant gushing sound of the river, which is very different from the slam dang sound of an ocean, acted as a therapeutic on our senses. By now the realization had set in that our journey was about to end, and that realization made the remaining few hours even more precious.

We caught a paraglider on camera en route to Manali

The morning was spent visiting the Hidimba temple, which was 2 odd kms from our hotel. Despite a variety of transport facilities available, we preferred to walk down there. Majestic Deodar and pine trees shaded the entire journey, and the temple itself was breathtakingly beautiful, built in the Tibetan style. However, the temple being a favorite tourist spot, there was a long queue for darshan. Being short of time we could not afford to spend too long to get inside so we decided to skip going inside the shrine. Also close by, was Ghatotkach temple (the son of Hidimba and Bhim, for the uninitiated), which again we had to skip for the aforementioned reason.

Manali pleasantly surprised me as a hill station, because I was under the impression that popular tourist spots in India (particularly hill stations), quickly degenerate into crowded, unaesthetic places, with plastic bags and garbage strewn all around. Manali was surprisingly clean and very green. The roads were spotless and devoid of any garbage, the tourist spots were well maintained, and there was no rampant deforestation to cater to the obviously large no of tourists frequenting the place. This was thanks in no small measure to the initiatives taken by the local people and the government. Manali was a treat for the eyes. The only problem I saw was with traffic congestion, due to narrow roads, but I am sure this is something that can be worked out with dedicated effort.

The return journey

23rd evening and it was time to return. We took a DTC Volvo from Manali to Delhi (the tickets had to be booked in advance) and reached Delhi around 10 am the next morning after a relatively uneventful journey. Needless to say, the journey back was anticlimactic and not unmixed with sorrow. The weather Gods were kind to us on our return as well, and we did not get to suffer the famed scorching heat of Delhi.

I caught the return flight to Pune in the afternoon, and while landing I noticed that Pune had been visited by the rain Gods in my absence. There was a wet and green look pervading the city landscape, which helped lift up my gloomy mood by a bit.

In defence of anarchy

Let me tell you a story today - the story of a totally immoral, debauched, greedy and sectarian person. This is an opportunist, who breaks his promises at will, who changes the rules of the game unilaterally - to suit himself, and while he pretends to be a modern day Robin Hood, robbing from the rich to pay the poor, in actuality the poor never see the money that he collects on their behalf.

Before I proceed any further let me tell you some characteristics of this guy.

*He extorts money from people.
*He does this claiming that he's going to help the poor and then he goes and spends all the money for himself.
*He spreads rumours about people of one religion/race/ethnicity in front of other religions/ races/ ethnicities and creates infighting between them.
*He incites people against one another, to such an extent that they even get ready to kill each other.
*He claims his right to everything you own.
*He doesn't let you live your own life your way, instead keeps telling you what to do and what not to do. In the words of George Orwell he often functions as the "thought police" and uses his goons to preach his version of moral behavior and enforce his "morality" on everyone.
*He forces people to pay him for favours they don't want and which, in the end, he doesn't grant
anyway.
*Everyone hates him, but he's so powerful and his promise of doling out largesse, so potent that most people who hate him, invest in his evil company of thugs.
*He's such a swine, that he legally attacks unarmed victims and people who oppose him are incarcerated or handed out other similar punishment.
*His company, guarded by thugs and looters, doesn't allow respectable & hard-working people to operate in his area and forces people to buy essential commodities from him, since he's the sole supplier. He in effect creates a monopoly and artificially decreases supply and inflates prices solely for benefitting his thuggish supporters who run such enterprises.
*This guy and his friends have killed, looted, raped, burnt, molested, threatened, murdered, conspired and connived people for years and yet, no one dares to rise against him.

NO friends I am not alluding to Dawood Ibrahim and his gang. I am talking about what most of us know as, "The Government". The Government which in Lincoln's words is "by the people, for the people, of the people"; but which in today's terms does so much harm all the time, without fail that people are inured to it. If two or more alternatives are available, we can count on the Government to choose the most unsavory one, ostensibly in "the larger interests of the people" , but actually for the sole purpose of creating vote banks. And where such considerations do not apply, government action is characterised by ad hocism, meanness or plain indifference.

Governments are supposed to collect taxes from the citizenry (depending on certain criteria) and use those taxes for general welfare. A story comes to mind regarding the government's collection of taxes and its usage.

"Once a passer-by sees two people working in a field. One person digs a hole and the other fills it up. He is surprised at the strange nature of their enterprise, and unable to hide his astonishment, he approaches the workers and asks them about task. One of the workers' says " Three of us had been hired to plant trees on this land. To save time we divided our work in the following way. One person would dig the hole. The second person would place the sapling in the hole, and the third person would fill up the hole with dirt. Today the second person is absent. But we see no reason why we should stop working.""

Government's tax collection works in the same way. Their tax collection department is quite efficient, and the finance ministry burns the midnight oil nightly to come up with new and innovative taxes every year. However, not even a fraction of the thought or the effort goes into spending that tax amount for citizen welfare. Way back in 1986, the then Prime Minister had said in the Lok Sabha, to protests of righteous indignation, that only 15 paise of every rupee spent by the Government reaches its target audience. We can safely assume that that figure of 15 paise per rupee has further declined. Ad yet the Government steadfastly refuses to relax its stranglehold on public life which can reduce corruption and introduce some probity in public life.

Most people (mistakenly) think that an absence of government would lead to rampant lawlessness, social disorder and (horror of horrors) anarchy. Why is anarchy such a bad word? Will anarchy lead to more or less social disorder than is now present? Are the enormous amount of resources that are currently invested in the government, and which lead to an artificial order being imposed from the top, justified for the sole prupose of preventing the society from slipping into anarchy? Is the social cost of anarchy greater than the cost of maintaining a dysfunctional government, which in any case leads to oppression of the poor, and results in creation of a society based on flawed principles? Bankuin spoke of this when he attacked "official" authority, but defended "natural influence", and also when he said:

"Do you want to make it impossible for anyone to oppress his fellow-man? Then make sure that no one shall possess power." [The Political Philosophy of Bakunin, p. 271]

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon was famous for his quips (such as "property is theft") and took to himself the word anarchy. As if his purpose were to shock as much as possible, in 1840 he engaged in the following dialogue with the "Philistine".

"You are a republican."
"Republican, yes; but that means nothing. Res publica is 'the State.' Kings, too, are republicans."
"Ah well! You are a democrat?"
"No."
"What! Perhaps you are a monarchist?"
"No."
"Constitutionalist then?"
"God forbid."
"Then you are an aristocrat?"
"Not at all!"
"You want a mixed form of government?"
"Even less."
"Then what are you?"
"An Anarchist."

Considering the obvious failure of all forms of governance at all levels of human society, and the obviously human and flawed nature of those who govern us (elected or unelected), I think its time we did away with all forms of governance. Consider, that democracy is by another name "tyranny of the majority", and as Ayn Rand had said "The smallest on the Earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities".

Why this blog?

I had created this blog last year and since then off and on I have been writing to it. My posts are sporadic. In fact compared to several other more prolific bloggers who update their blogs at least once a day, my average so far, has been one post in 2 months. Now that I think of it, another difference is, my posts tend to be much longer. Today, that I discovered some free time, I thought I should note down some points which impelled me to create a blog, and in the process add another post to my (for long dormant) blog.

First and the most obvious reason was my narcissitic tendency, which delighted in seeing my name in print. The possibility that no one else may read my blog (which has been borne out by circumstances) seemed to bear little on my mind. After all I am the master of my own universe, and for all practical purposes I am a closed system, which cannot interact with any other being, without the aid of some commonly defined protocols which include language (both written and spoken) and gestures. And even with the aid of language there is so much that will lie undiscovered, and undetected because there is no adequate way to put it into words. And if a closed system is what I am, then how does it matter who interacts with me and who doesn't? My being the master of my own universe was enough to fuel and keep alive my narcissitic tendencies.

Then again, I belong to the category of people who believe that they have an opinion on everything. So I had an opinion on global warming, on deforestation, on extinction of species, on Pune's roads, on the state of Indian politics, on the relative merits of Leo Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky as writers (the latter was far superior I believe), on Hindi cinema, on Manmohan Singh and his sleazy cabinet, on US presidential elections and a lot many things. I would give vent to my thoughts by sending lengthy, rhetorical mails to all the people in my address book. The lack of responses led me to suspect that a lot of my mails were being diverted to the Trash folder, with or without seeing the boundaries of Inbox or Personal folders. Like the Bible says - and I paraphrase - "The truth shall set you free", and this realization set me free. The seed of doubt was always there, which crustallized when one of the long suffering targets of my numerous mails suggested that I start a blog. Not content with mere passive suggestions, he also sent me the link of blogger.com and followed up with me until I had actually created a blogger account. Then he pointed out smugly that now that I have a blog I can redirect all the trash I write over there. So that, in short was how I officially entered Blog-dom.

Now the question arises, as to why I did not write so prolifically on my blog as I used to in my mails. The reason is deceptively simple. One often comes across children who love eating chocolates, or adults who love eating rosogollas (I love both). Such people mistakenly believe that they can eat an unlimited no of chocolates or rosogollas and always complain that they don't have enough. They exaggerate their capabilities for eating chocolates or rosogollas. To such a child, gift a large packet of Lindt's or Hershey's and see how many they can finish off. In a similar vein, to expose the rosogolla-philic nature of an adult treat her to a large dabba of KC Das' and see how many she can bump off. In both the cases, the final outcome would be a disappointment both to the subject as well as to the conductor of such an experiment. The child will probably eat a dozen chocolates, the adult will eat half a dozen rosogollas and their appetite will seemingly be satiated. The point I am trying to illustrate here, is that there is often a disconnect between wanting and needing. So it was in my case. Once I got a platform to vent myself, I found that I had surprisingly little to say. But one benefit my blogging presence did accord to my hapless friends was, my frequency of mailing reduced.

I had started this blog mainly with the purpose of writing on topics of academic interest. My intention was to avoid commenting on issues that were even remotely controversial, which explains the lack of posts on OBC reservations, Iraq war, terrorism, Manmohan Singh's shenanigans (though I maintain that the university which granted him a PhD should consider withdrawing it, in the light of his extreme imbecility) and Himesh Reshammiya. Every now and then I would get a sudden bout of energy and find a topic interesting enough to write on, though finding one such topic would be a more daunting task that actually writing on it, considering the shackles that I had imposed on myself. Like on a half dozen similar occasions, I made a mental resolution today as well, that I will be more regular in maintaining my blog. But unlike most other times, I followed up on my newly made resolution by actually writing two posts.

This blog will not solve the problems of global warming, of poverty, of rampant corruption, of terrorism or of hundreds of such evils of similar or lesser magnitude that plague our planet. But if it makes the reader pause for a while and think, I will consider my endeavor to have succeeded. As I had noted in an earlier post, the single most important distinguishing factor of modern age, from the countless ones before, is, the proliferation of media and communication devices, which makes communication and collaboration so much easier, and which makes dissemination of ideas possible on a global scale. While it makes it easier for terrorists to plan their moves in relative ease and secrecy, it also makes it possible for us to catch them or to build public opinion against them. Professor Andrew S. Tanenbaum had once noted that transport and communication are having a race and whoever wins will make the other obsolete. Communication has won, but transport has still not become obsolete. And it is the victory of communication which makes our age unique.

All critique and comments are welcome. If you have accidentally located this blog, don't go away yet. Write some comments and share your views with me. So long and thanks for all the fish.

Tagged by Adya!!!

My dear friend Adya tagged me a few days ago, roughly around the time when I was holidaying in the green valleys of Himachal (ahh thats a different and more interesting story, but I will post it later, time and my boss permitting).

Two factors spurred me on to hastily create this post. The first and the most important factor being Adya's blatant threat of performing unspeakable acts of cruelty on my person, if I failed to write this post.

"I don’t believe in forcing people to do a thing.
Take your time to complete it.

I am not forcing you.
But do it , or I will kill you."

This threat sent me into paroxysms of fear, and led me to seriously contemplate the meaning of life and its blandishments for me including my unfulfilled dreams and ambitions; and for first time I could appreciate that old dictum "I think, therefore I am". The second factor which was 0.20798564321 times as important as the first one (its called the golden fraction because of some special mathematical properties that were first discovered by the ancient Incans, and they used this fraction to calculate the thickness of their dinner spoons) was my own love for books.

Books are wonderful creatures that come in several shapes and sizes, colours and textures, and some people prefer them to human company. At least books don't sulk when they are put aside in favor of newer, more glossy specimens. Besides, they were especially helpful to me in my childhood, when I being a podgy, unathletic kid, was subject to such jokes as "He will come second in a race even if he runs alone". I discerned some truth in the matter, though in the interest of self-pride I never tried out any such experiment. I did make some vain attempts to show off my athletic prowess early on, and ran in the company of other "also rans" (equally or even more podgy specimens of human race), and invariably ended up last in all such races. It was around this time, that books irretrievably claimed me.

Ahem .. ahem. Enough of clearing of throat. Lets begin to answer the eternal questions posed to humanity by Adya. Where shall we begin? As some wisecrack put it, "Lets begin at the beginning"!

Total No of books I own:

Eye witness accounts vary as to the exact no. The problem of putting an exact count to the collection is further compounded by the fact that several books at any given time are lent out to friends, and every weekly trip to Crossword or the friendly neighbourhood store, results in addition to the number. Census will commence in a few days. Watch this space for further updates.


Last book I bought :

Books are objects I don't buy in moderation. I don't think excess of books can harm anyone, unless they fall down on one's head in the dozens. I buy half a dozen or more (and sometimes less) books at a time and try and finish them at leisure. The last set I bought was

1. The Bhagavad Gita as explained by Swami Chinmayananda.
   
2. The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes Jamyang Norbu
   
3. It by Stephen King
4. The Art of Living: Vipassna Meditation as taught by SN Goenka
5. Essence of Yoga by Osho
6. The awakening of Kundalini by Pandit Gopi Krishna

None of the above need to be explained other than The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes. This was a book unfamiliar to me but being a Sherlock Holmes aficianado that I am, the moment I espied this book in a Crossword store, I immediately concluded that its proper place was on my book shelves, not on Crossword racks. The book tells the story of the missing two years in Holmes' life, from the moment he was supposed to have perished in the deadly duel with Professor Moriarty to the time he resurfaced in An Empty House. The book recounts how Holmes spent the period teaching a thing or two in deductive reasoning to the Tibetans.

Last book I read :

Osho Upanishad. Osho is one spiritual giant of the 20th century (in fact it would be a fallacy to say "of the 20th century", since Osho himself had said "Never born, never died, just visited the planet Earth from 1931 to 1990) who understood and was able to interpret almost every method from every major spiritual tradition that anybody ever used to gain enlightenment. However the technique he stressed above all else was the habit of watching the mind. This book comprises of his series of discourses starting from 1985 to 1987, when he had returned back to Pune from the United States and set up his marvellous ashram at Koregaon Park. I am still reading this book and I would recommend it to anyone for a marvellous insight into spirituality, the true path, the Guru shishya relationship and Osho-isms.

One book I couldn't finish :

Moby Dick by Herman Melville. One drab and dull account of the hunting of a great white whale (yes that is what it is for those who don't view every story as an allegory) by Captain Ahab, who is schizophrenic according to modern understanding of the term! Glorifying the hunting of whales, and writing pages upon agonising pages of commentary about the use of various body parts of the whale was cruel and sickening. Apart from that an actionless story, and archaic language lends this book the dubious honour of being one of the very few books I could never finish.

Five books which mean a lot to Me :

1. The Bhagavad Gita - No description necessary
2. My Diamond Days with Osho - Written in the true spirit of bhakti, this is an account of Osho's life written by one of his closest disciples (a Welsh lady) rechristened Ma Prem Shunyo by Osho. The book is amazing for its humor, love, devotion and insight into the unique teachings of Osho, one of the greatest teachers of the spiritual tradition that the world has ever seen.
3. Walking with a Himalayan Master - A book in similar vein as the one immediately above, this is an account of Swami Rama's life written by an Irish American disciple of the master called Justin 'O Brien. An amazing book, which will make you laugh, cry and wonder in amazement at the same time.
   
4. Jonathan Livingston Seagull - the first successful book of Richard Bach which set the trend in New Age spirituality. At 90 small sized pages (half of which are filled with illustrations of flying seagulls) this book takes an hour to complete even if one is reading at a slack pace. The content, however is something that keeps one occupied for several days. Bach claims that the book was channelled to him, so to speak. Printed in 1973 for the first time, it was hardly noticed by the critics. But it went on to become a bestseller and continues to inspire laymen and seekers alike.
   
5. Conversations with God - Neale Donald Walsch was at a low point in his life. He had lost his job, he had drinking problems, his relationship with his spouse and kids was not great and to top it all he was broke. He wrote an angry, venom filled letter to God, who he believed to be the root cause of all his troubles. He had expected this letter, like many others written and unwritten, to go unanswered. Surprisingly, God answers this time. And She answers in a clear to understand, unambiguous language. Walsch's God is caring, sensitive, intelligent and has a sense of humor. This is not the fire and brimstone God of Abrahamic religions, but an intensely practical God. A God all of us can find within ourselves.

I have scores of unread books lying on my shelves (not gathering dust, I take good care of my books, read or unread), many of which (25 odd) were purchased from the US on my last trip there. Next on my reading list are Hitler's Scientists (which was one of the books I bought from the US) and the final Harry Potter. There won't be any more Harry Potter books after this one. The possibility is too frightening to contemplate.

If you existed, but no one knew of your existence, would you still exist?

When words fail

Alone on a train aimless in wonder
An outdated map crumpled in my pocket
But I didn't care where I was going
'Cause they're all different names for the same place.
The coast disappeared when the sea drowned the sun
And I knew no words to share with anyone
The boundaries of language I quietly cursed
And all the different names for the same thing.

How do you feel when you walk down a lonely beach? A sandy beach, filled with white, firm sand, palms swaying in the distance, just a hint of a breeze, littered with large rocks just on the point where water meets land, and that noise of waves crashing against sand, shattering into a million shards of glass time after time and yet continuing their relentless persecution against land. The distant horizon, where the ocean meets the sky; the bluish gray of one, meeting with the deep blue of the other, creating an illusion (or is that reality) of all pervading oneness. Have you ever tried to put your experience into words and failed?

The amateurish attempt at describing a lonely walk alongside a sea beach was meant to drive home a more fundamental premise. Is there more truth in the expression “words fail me” than we allow ourselves to believe? How often do words fail us? How adequate or otherwise are words as a medium for expressing our feelings? Not much it would seem. It is an utterly futile attempt to try to capture nature’s beauty in words. One can never hope to share with another her feeling when she beheld a particularly beautiful sunset, or a majestic snow capped mountain peak, or a gargantuan wave crashing against the shore and shattering into a zillion droplets. If one cannot adequately describe nature in words, what hope does one have, of describing God or religion or enlightenment?

It is a well known story that the Buddha, following his enlightenment, initially hesitated whether he should bother to share his discovery with anyone at all, reflecting that:
"This Dhamma, won by me, is deep, difficult to see, difficult to understand . . . But this is a generation delighting in sensual pleasure . . . And if I were to teach Dhamma and others were not to understand me, this would be a weariness to me, this would be a vexation to me."

Whereupon Brahma Sahampati (a deva [demigod] from the Brahmaloka) intervened, pointing out to the Buddha that there were some beings with little dust in their eyes who would profit from him teaching them.

The experience that the Buddha had undergone was beyond description, and for most humans, as he pointed out, beyond comprehension; for the boundaries of our language are so often the boundaries of our world. We immediately discard that which cannot be expressed in words, deeming such experiences to be unreal. We fail to realize that it is not the experience which is unreal; rather it is our language, bounded by words, which is inadequate for describing our experiences! The primary purpose of language was not to make ourselves understand our experiences; it was to communicate our experiences to the other. Yet in a curious travesty of the need for language, we have started using language to convince ourselves of our experiences, to translate our experiences in a manner which can be palatable to the world. What a waste!

It is this realization, which has led me to wonder about the plight of the poets, for it is poetry, and poetry alone which can attempt to say what prose dare not. Are poets ever properly understood? Are they ever able to put their point across? Do their readers always understand what it was that the poet was trying to convey? And last but not the least; is the poet’s interpretation of her poetry always the only correct and sensible one?

What did Robert Frost mean, when he said :

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

I picked up this particular poem to illustrate my point, when I might as well have picked up some mystical stuff from Blake or Coleridge, because Frost will resonate more with modern readers, and his evocative imagery of nature, and winter (the harbinger of death) is so beautiful and yet so simple that it can connect with the reader at several levels. Like any other Frost poem, this one can be interpreted at many levels, and yet you might want to discard all such interpretations, and enjoy the poem just at the surface level which is still wonderfully evocative for its description of a snow filled journey.

There is a delicious ambiguity in the words "Whose woods are these I think I know?” Now what could have Frost meant by that? That there is a human owner of the forest where the poet stops, and his name is what comes to Frost’s mind when he thinks of the owner of the forest? But can a human ever own a forest - or the mountains - or the oceans - or rivers - or other fellow creatures? Can anyone possibly own something she has not created? If so, by what right? If she owns a land, how did she come to acquire it? If it was sold by another human, how did that human come to acquire it, because sure as heaven, God never sold any of Her creations to a human being! The forest, just as everything else in the Universe belongs to God, but She out of love for us has leased it to us, to take care of, to sustain ourselves with and to share with the ones we love. Can we always claim to have done that? Perhaps not!

When I read that line of Frost’s poem, I think of the divine ownership of everything, but was that what Frost had in mind when he composed the poem? If not, was his interpretation more correct than my interpretation? Does a piece of art belong forever to the artiste who has created it, or does it go into the public domain once the artiste has completed it, to be done with as the hoi polloi feel like? Does Shakespeare have sole right over his plays, or does humanity own it, to interpret as it thinks fit? Baz Luhrmann had set his Romeo and Juliet in modern day crime infested Miami, moving away from the original setting of medieval Rome for the play. Who knows Shakespeare might have chosen Rome due to the paucity of options available to him. He might have considered New York underworld and its warring mafia families to be a more apt setting for this epic love story had he been acquainted with NY when he wrote!

But we digress. To come back to the topic at hand, a very generous allowance can be given to the assumption that a description, if accurate, should somehow convey the thing itself; if I accurately describe 'water', the reader would then be wet. Similarly, it can be assumed that a person who has had an experience, should be able to describe the experience, in such a way as to convey the actual experience itself, to the reader. Failing that a verbal description is of no avail, for the listener has no means of independently verifying the accuracy of the description. What good will it do to describe snow to a Saharan dweller, when she in all possibility will never have seen and never will see snow in all her life? Even after snow has been described to her, and she perchance goes to a foreign land and encounters snow there, remote is the possibility that she can recognize it as the same object which had earlier been described to her as snow.

To extend the analogy further, is it possible that an experience can be shared by the narrator only with them who have undergone a similar experience, while those who have not, may have no inkling as to what is going on? To put it conversely, can it be possible to teach someone to think? Can someone be made to experience an experience by mere dint of describing that experience in words? And if not, aren’t all words futile, mere placeholders for reality, placeholders for what could have been?

Have I been able to convey anything in this essay apart from my inability to convey what I want to convey? And if not, why make the attempt to say anything at all? Why not learn from the mistake of the Buddha and keep quiet? Because silence speaks to the heart, when words fail.

The pitfalls of democracy, and the challenges facing modern governance

Democracies worldwide suffer from some endemic problems. Democracies thrive on majority support and as such only those issues get raised and stand a chance of being addressed, which affect the interests of a sizeable section of the population. What about those issues which cannot be traced to a sizeable constituency, but are important nonetheless – environmental issues for instance, or issues pertaining to wildlife conservation? Addressing such issues ostensibly has to be left to the mercies of the government which often shows up as remarkably ham handed in such situations. The recent bickering of governments over an issue as important for our survival as reducing carbon emissions is a case in point. Richard Bach had observed in a Bridge Across Forever that it was surprising how governments all over the world, even democratic ones, almost always managed to perpetrate so much evil and harm on their respective nation states. A quarter of a century later, nothing much has changed.

Even in issues such as education, or healthcare, or urban infrastructure which would be considered to be of general interest and where we can expect the government to provide useful solutions, an inexplicable ineptitude is on view, which can hardly be explained rationally, the only explanation being extreme cynicism on part of the government which leads its constituents to believe that good governance does not matter; what fetches votes is pandering to reactionary and obscurantist sections of society. Make no mistake about it, our democracy is in crisis and our democratic institutions are not equipped to deal with the crises that we face. These crises are becoming more familiar with each passing day, many of them having arisen because of decades of irresponsible and inept governance. And now these crises will not be wished away. They are looming large, staring us in the face, daring us to act decisively or get engulfed by them. Some such crises, when we think about them include, but are not limited to

• Widening gap between the haves and the have-nots
• Speedy environmental degradation and climate change which is evident to anyone who would care to look
• Technological dangers (including but not limited to increasingly available weapons of mass destruction)
• Terrorism, religious bigotry and extremism of all sorts
• The rising threat of global epidemics, the mobility of people making it easier for diseases to spread far and wide
• Unsustainable and destructive economic activities in the name of development
• And the corruption of democracy, itself

Many of these crises are interdependent, not isolated from each other. They feed on each other, like a hundred brooks and streams, until they are able to gather critical mass, whence they will swallow us and our children, nay the whole of humanity. It won’t be unfair to say that we are standing at the brink of disaster, brought about by inept governance.

In spite of this, our democratic institutions continue to promote:

(a) the relentless concentration of power,
(b) the materialistic culture orchestrated by that power and
(c) an ad-hocism in taking important decisions, and then forcing those decisions down the throat of the public using brute force and employing the full might of the repressive state machinery.

To hark back to an Indian example, the massacre of Singur, carried out by the government of the proletariat is only the latest in a series of examples stretching back to independence, which illustrate the truth of the last point above. Governments often behave as if they are the ultimate repository of all land, natural wealth, resources, minerals, oceans and the environment. It is this illusory thinking that leads to forced land grabbing attempts, which are then justified in the name of “common good”. Come to think of it, there is an increasing attempt by the governments even in democratic setups to equate themselves with the nation state at large, so that any dissent against the government is portrayed as anti national and unpatriotic and is liable to be suppressed with brute force.

It is apparent that governance is too important to be left to professional politicians. Douglas Adams says on the issue “Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. “ Talking about India in particular, something is very rotten about the state of politics in the country, which looks for a cure worse than the disease afflicting society. Perhaps the darkest irony is that democracy, itself, has been transformed from the crown jewel of empowerment of the ordinary citizen, into one of the most effective and insidious tools used by the ruling elite to manipulate us, the citizenry, the electorate, The People. Democracy is no longer government of the people, by the people, for the people. Rather it has evolved to become a system whence the citizenry becomes irrelevant after casting votes at the polls, and this state of affairs continues till the next round of polls. One cannot question the decisions made by the government, one cannot protest against blatant misuse of power, and one cannot make ones views heard without risking life and limb in the process.

Still, growing millions of us -- each in our own way – are coming to the realization that something is fundamentally wrong with the direction our society is taking. Most of us, though, cannot quite give it the attention it seems to deserve, to sort it out and take effective action. It is so complex, and our daily lives take up so much of our energy and attention, that we are left with only a haunting wish that something could be done about it. This testifies to the awesome power of our culture to distract so many of us from the ultimate essentials of life, even the survival of our own children and the natural world upon which the children of all species depend and force us to direct our energies towards the mundane activities of daily life. Apparently the question whether Naturals Ice Cream would make a better dessert than Baskin Robbins deserves more thought than the possible melting of Gangotri glacier and the prospect of the whole of Northern India turning into a desert by 2030!

We need to change the character of our democracy, and we need to do it soon. If we are to meet the challenges of the 21st century, we need to make democracy not only more functional, but truly wise. In another era, this would have been an almost impossible task (and I say “almost” because human will is stronger than the toughest of challenges, and sheer willpower has been known to triumph against the greatest of odds, but chances would have been against it). However, the single greatest invention of the past several decades - the Internet, gives us the opportunity to collaborate and come together in hitherto unimagined ways. No, revolutions of the French revolution and Russian Revolution variety will not occur in the foreseeable future! Rather, we will have a quiet dissemination of information, and sharing of knowledge, which will make it possible for everyone to participate in a bloodless coup. Internet has made distances and time zones irrelevant, the genie has been let out of the bag.

Now is the time -- while the worst of the coming catastrophes are still over the horizon (though visible to the far sighted) -- to create a system of governance that is wise enough to survive and thrive in the Era of Consequences we are entering. We have the resources right now to do it, if we choose to channel them into activities that will serve us in this historic effort. Now, more than at any other point of time in history we have a surfeit of volunteers who have the time and the wherewithal to channel their efforts into driving the country and the world towards a better future.

There may be political space to work in, as well. As existing systems become bloated and more unmanageable, those involved with them, including their leaders, are increasingly searching for alternatives. Wherever that happens, evolutionary opportunities open up. Breakthroughs can happen when such opportunities are taken before the clamor for oversimplified, strong leadership overwhelms our yearning to direct our collective fate with our own collective common sense.

Increase in population and the complex nature of the modern nation state makes it next to impossible for any central governing mechanism to hold sway over an entire population. The future of democracy has to be participatory governance, wherein informal but powerful roles would have to be given to communities of citizens and governments will be more inclusive than exclusive. It is here that the collaborative and interactive nature of Internet and online communities would revolutionize governance. All is not yet lost, not while there are still people around who can be inspired by Rang De Basanti to hold protest marches over the letting off, of the murderers of Jessica Lall. These are interesting times, interesting not only in the opportunities they afford us, but interesting also because our continued survival depends on the actions we take in this period.

Love in the time of strife…

It seems inapt to write a review of Hazaaron Khwahishein Aisi now, more than a year since it was released and went largely unnoticed by the viewing public. True, there were some rave reviews, by respected critics, but those could not save the movie from its inevitable fate. However, I am publishing this review now because – a) it was an unusual movie and it certainly qualified for the epithet of great cinema, b) this review was written a year back when the movie was released, and it went unpublished since I did not have a blog then.

The movie is similar in a way to Dil Chahta Hai (that cult movie about love, friendship and relationships), in that it also deals with three friends, who complete college, move out and experience things and participate in events which make them mature human beings. Like DCH, HKA is also a voyage of discovery for its three protagonists, and yes, thankfully we are spared romantic songs and sweet nothings.

The movie takes a dispassionate, non-judgmental and at times irreverent look at life from mid sixties to the mid seventies, for its three young protagonists. This was a turbulent period in world history, marked by rebellions against authority, a period when idealism and pragmatism jostled for supremacy and idealism won. This was the period of Bob Dylan, the Beatles, Germaine Greer, the Vietnam War and the feminist movement. In India, it was characterized by the Naxalite warfare against the state machinery and JP’s Jan Andolan. The movie looks at this era through the eyes of its three main characters : Siddharth (Kaykay Menon), Geeta (Chitrangada Singh) and Vikram (Shiny Ahuja) all of who study in a prestigious Delhi institute that looks suspiciously like JNU.

Siddharth is the son of a judge, born with the proverbial golden spoon in his mouth, who turns a rebel to set right society’s iniquities against the poor and the downtrodden. Geeta belongs to a middle class family, but her love for Siddharth draws her into the conflict. Vikram turns a wheeler-dealer, and of the trio, is the only one who could be said to have achieved worldly success.

Siddharth joins the Naxalite movement, and ventures into the interiors of Bihar, ridden by the worst kind of feudalism and caste based discrimination, where an invisible bond binds the oppressor and the oppressed. In a memorable sequence, when a horde of dalits rally outside the zamindar’s house to avenge themselves against the landlord’s son who has committed an atrocity against their women and the landlord has a heart attack caused from the exertion, the protesters forget their new found animosity against the land lord, and make arrangements to have a doctor called to the ailing patriarch’s side. It was, as if some primeval force, bound them to the landlord, whose forefathers had been served by their forefathers since generations past.

Geeta meanwhile marries an IAS officer and settles down for a comfortable, if boring existence as a socialite, where she meets Vikram in a party after several years. One thing leads to another and Geeta decides to leave her husband, and join Siddharth in his rebellion. Vikram has, by now become a prime mover and shaker in the corridors of power, and he frequently deals with a person who bears an uncanny resemblance to Sanjay Gandhi.

The story moves on, like life itself. The characters mature, they metamorphose and they learn from their mistakes. As in real life too, the movie amply demonstrates that a rebellion has to occur from the grassroots level, it cannot be imposed from the top. Besides, when it is a question of survival, idealism goes for a toss.

The director manages to extract brilliant performances from his entire cast. The music is different but apt. All in all, an excellent movie, that deserves several watches.