The protestor - what does she want

When the anger of the protestor is totally justified, some of the demands are extremist and maybe not practical. This is an attempt to see what is the middle path, which is where the truth and practicality always lie .

One just wonders what is the need for so many people to flow on the streets of the capital and demand justice. This is not the first time, maybe many forgot the same happened the day after the 26/11 attacks on Mumbai demanding action. Has anything been done?

What were the demands of the protestors then? Our then Home Minister PC had said in a debate "please try to understand, we cannot have one policeman for every citizen"

What are the demands now of the protestor?
1. Speedy Justice - This is a very valid point for in India justice is always served cold after the victim goes runs from pillar to post for 10 to 20 years and sometimes the culprit even dies. However does it solve all problems?

2. Death penalty - Well this is a joke as our beloved ex-president had pardoned 5 such cases and in one such case the guy had died 5 years ago of AIDS and he was pardoned posthumously. So the law is already there, so what is the demand?

3. Safety - Yes this is a valid point and someone has to ensure that this point is taken note of and steps taken but who is going to do it. What was lacking on the fatal night? I guess there were already enough laws against tinted glasses and policeman available. What stopped them? laziness? Who is accountable? Long term decisions are the need of the hour.

4. Convene parliamentary session - Now here comes the ego of the politician. If the session is convened it means they have bowed down to the protestor and is never going to happen

Questions to the protestor
1. Mumbai had the same out pour after terrorist attacks. What did happen? Are you safe from another terror attack?
2. How long will this last. The government has all the time in the world to wait out. It is a matter of who blinks first. The aam aadmi is going to provide food for his family soon and sit on his TV for welcoming the new year. Who is going to change his mindset?
A bigger and long lasting platform is needed and is the need of the hour too.


My view: Extreme views are always welcome and must exist but the truth lies somewhere in-between, the sooner this point is achieved the better

Generation Gap - What Lacks Indian Politics

The Media houses are blazing and shouting where is my India, what are the politicians doing, call for an urgent parliament session,  each news channel is suggesting many ideas to the government on what needs to be done and calls for discussion with 8 panelists who suggests 80 things to be done.

There is one thing that lacks here - ACTION

One can clearly see the face of the protestor is a  young woman and sometimes is accompanied by a young or older brother, rarely the parents do accompany. The age of an average protestor is between 20 and 25.

In stark contrast when one does a caricature of a typical politician, his hair is either grey or he is bald, he has a large tummy and saggy eyes.

There is a stark contrast staring naked at us - There is atleast one generation gap between them if not more than one. The aam Indian politician is not in touch with this aam Indian citizen whom he boasts of representing.

No wonder insensitive comments like 'painted and dented' and 'no skirts', 'wear pardhas' come from a typical politician who later realizes that he is suffering from foot in mouth disease. In fact he suffers from what is called generation gap.

The laws which his forefathers wrote were even older and have developed cob-webs much like his principles on which he stood.

The youth Icon of congress is 42 years old, the youth wing leader of DMK is 60+ and has grand kids. No wonder both the politician and the protestor talk but neither listens.

Its time the youth step up to the plate and hit a home run, bridge the gap and change the face of Indian politics.

Human Life and India

It is quite surprising that my post on lack of importance to human life in India (human-life-cheapest-thing-in-india) brings most of my search engine traffic. I initially thought that all traffic maybe from Pakistan, as it is natural for them to search what they want to read about :)

However it seems many people want to know about this. Especially with recent brutal rape in the capital, one can confirm that human life is not much valued in India. There has been lots of examples in the past, be it the 1992 roits or the Godhra Carnage or Sikh riots of 1984, neighbor killing neighbor, grown men killing kids have occurred in the past and no Govt can guarentee it wont happen again.

For India is a land of diversity, every one can easily find other diverse from hi sown ideas be it language, caste, creed something or the other is different. So when one point is taken it is a matter of showing strength to the other. It is easily said and done, flaming of communal tension is an easy matter.

Having said all this, all hope is  not lost. The main reason one can see is because of increasing population and lack of resources. When TN asks for water, what does Karnatake do - deny it, why? because it is a resource they need for themselves, it is not for sharing, mind you is the reply.

Population, population, population, with the advances in medical field only God knows where this is going to end. With this huge population statistics does not lie but as Commentator Sidhu says it reveals more but hides the vital parts. The vital part is the percentage. Every country has its problems and issues, it may not be seen big because the population is less.

Assuming the same problem exist for 1% of population in Sweden and India. One can imagine the magnitude in India (1% of 2 billion!) is huge.  To cut the story short, all countries have issues be it the afro american development in US or the SC/ST development in India, it is the same level playing field. Even if our percentages are same, our numbers are high.

Population control is needed but I am not going Sanjay Gandhi way .. well that is for another day.

So folks looking for human rights violation in India - look in to your own backyard. We do wash our dirty linen in public but you do yours first.

Chennai 19B AC - 2 The art of seat grabbing

One reads in the news of politicians fighting for a seat in the assembly or parliament, getting a seat in 19B is no less effort. One has to devise a strategy, follow it , adapt it as the situation demands, ward of opposition and finally enjoy the spoils.

First of all it is a joke when someone does inquire when the next 19B bus is expected. For even the almighty might stutter to provide a clear answer .  On any city planned or unplanned, one can expect traffic, if not for the platform is reserved for two-wheelers type of Bangalore traffic, there is still some traffic on the roads, free-flowing mostly and jammed occasionally. Hence it is necessary that one has a good eye for catching the arrival of the bus, for there is always a deceiving AC bus (576) arriving to throw you off the plan.

There are other ways to spot that your bus is arriving, just watch the fellow software engineer he/she is bound to be like a deer spotting an attacking tiger, when the bus arrives. Not sure where to run when to run and more importantly when the door will open and which one will open.Once it opens one can see a huge rush from all directions pushing through the door.

The IT folks with their gym toned body, which they frequent once a month in their offices, or the huge tummy they built by sitting on their seats forever would be in full use. The poor ladies try to squeeze in between only to be pushed. Whether the front door alone opens or the back door also opens is a mystery even Sherlock Holmes would find difficult to tell.

All this applies if one stands outside the main bus stand and waits for the bus to drop currently traveling passengers. One wonders how this has become the norm of catching a seat for there is no clear rule on where a bus should stop to take its passengers.

The above rule applies to the active seat seekers. The passive seat seekers stand in the shade behind the bus stand, probably this is the original stipulated bus stop. These people probably do not mind standing inside the bus, some wait for the next empty bus which sometimes comes right behind.

Given the fact that it is sunny and hot even on a December Morning, one wonders the determination to grab a seat, one can only empathize the long travel time if someone travels to places like Siruseri, Navalur and beyond. They wait with their coloured umbrellas and red caps to brave the sun to grab a seat to start the long day at work as fresh as possible.

Chennai 19B AC - A Journey - 1

In Chennai most of the Software crowd go to one road that was called OMR (Old Mahabalipuram Road), now called as Rajiv Gandhi Salai. Many buses ply on this route but the software engineers prefer AC bus since it is more comfortable, it is a volvo bus. It plies from T.Nagar to Kelambakkam.
This is a series I am planning to write on my experiences the various people, rather characters I see, the talkative man (reminding me of Malgudi Days), the women with a burned hand, the ever sad girl , the girl that boards the bus only when there is a seat and so many more.

Getting the seat in the bus is itself an art . The bus I feel is very different from other normal buses is the fact that the crowd is very different here, when one takes other normal (non AC) buses one can feel the different quite easily.

All these for later posts, this is just an intro of things to come.
Now if you accidentally stumbled here to know the route timings I am not going to disappoint





The author takes absolutely no responsibility for delays in above timings as according to law of public transport in  Chennai "only when autos in Chennai run on meter, buses will run on time"

"Love Maya": My entry for the Get Published contest

It was quite unbelievable that he recognized me, it has been 10 years since we saw each other after college, I had added good amount of fat to my tummy and rest of the body; To him I might have looked like an inflated balloon that took 10 long years to inflate day by day, bit by bit, fat by fat, cell by cell.  

Eventhough I had totally forgotten him in the mundane life, the words immediately flashed on my mind

“Every atom in my blood

Says your name

Maya Maya”

It was not great poetry, whether it can be called poetry at all is debatable, but I remember it vividly as sun rays through a glass window in Chennai during May, was due to the fact that it was the first time that I saw something written in blood!  

Movies maybe have shown such nonsense but to see it in real life was a no nonsense experience.  The smell had climbed on to my nose and somewhere as the fat grew bit by bit it had rented a cell and rested comfortably on my brain like an old retired man sitting on his verandah in an easy chair bare chested, watching the traffic pass by having nothing to do but wonder about the son who is away in a foreign country.

Raghu looked the same, short and lean making anyone think of asking when was the last time he ate; the thick moustache looking like a black worm was there between his nose and lips. Lips were as dark as the stark reality of night, tarnished day by day by the smoking he did right from college days. As though smoke had settled, his hair had shades of grey. The only difference was the rim-less glass he was wearing now, this made him looked smarter than what he liked to pretend he was, rightfully so.

Neither I nor Raghu were the easy mingling types but seeing someone from college must have refreshed his memories and the smell inside me suddenly woke up clinging to his love story. The smell suddenly spread like milk spilled from the dropped open feeding bottle of a child, spreading as much as it can, as far as it can, raking the curiosity of the child with every move it made. Like the child splashing and playing the spilled milk, I began playing with it, the division of the class, sudden silence of Eashwar, the cries of people and irritatingly my lack of the full picture woke me up. 

I cared very little to know how he was doing and how he coped up with life after. The smell was only interested in knowing what really happened with him, Maya and Selvam. Sure this was a triangular story of love, betrayal, and hatred but was there more… death?  Why would Eashwar not talk about it? Now that I had the heart in front of me, it was time to dissect it and see what’s inside.  I sharpened my knives, blades, foreceps and clips, put on my mask.

Do you want to enter the operation theatre with me?

This is my entry for the HarperCollins–IndiBlogger Get Published contest, which is run with inputs from Yashodhara Lal and HarperCollins India.

Click here to vote if you want to read the rest
Love Maya