Teacher who became a watchman

susheel pundit suddenly felt an urge to migrate and change his profession. similar to the spiderman story, susheel pundit was smitten by luvbug while on his daily morning ablutionary visit to the field on the outskirts of his village in the cowdung land. since he was carrying just one lota of water, he could not 'purify' the spot where the bug had bitten him.

the poison of the bug spread slowly upward in his body - from sri lanka to the foothill of himalaya. he felt a tingling effect in his head.

in keeping with the tradition ordained in the manu smriti, susheel had taken up teaching in his village school set up specially for the children of cowherds and shepherds.

the children all liked him so much that they made it their sport to tie up his pony tail to the rickety chair on which he sat cross-legged, making them learn by rote the basic principles of earth-shastra.

learning by rote was the only pedagogy he knew. making the students repeat one-liners like 'king is dead, long live the king', 'boss is always right', 'never question your teacher', 'report to the teacher of any suspicious activities', was his singular method of teaching. however ever since that bug bit him where it hurt the most, susheel pundit was not able to enjoy children's harmless pranks and had become extremely irritable.

even an innocuous 'good morning, punditji' on the blackboard scribbled by the back-bencher natthu dubey, was enough to make susheel pundit jump at the very first student who happened to be near him at that particular inauspicious moment.

the change in susheel pundit's behaviour had not gone unnoticed by the head masterni. susheel pundit had not given up his habitual ritualistic practice of paying obeisance to the masterni. and, yet, she noticed the change in him. the change was very subtle, which only she could notice as it was she who had given him his first and only job in the school, favouring him over the rest of the candidates.

susheel pundit was very fond of playing gulli dunda earlier. he would play this game, considered the most happening thing to do by the village damsels, on the sprawling mango orchard, every day after the school. he had stopped doing so last two weeks and switched over to playing ikkad dukkad with the highschool girls. since, no boy was around at this particular time the change in susheel pundit's habit did not become talk of the village.

however, the news was promptly conveyed to the masterni by kankuben punjabhai who, like the hariram nai of the film sholay fame, had become the official informer ever since she had failed in the eighth standard for the first time four years ago. the reason why the matter was promptly reported to masterni was that kanku punju had a glad eye on susheel pundit and didnt like the idea of his playing ikkad dukkad with the bright and smart school girls.

the masterni, though aware of kanku punju's motive, took serious note of susheel pundit's behaviorial change and called him in her chamber for a one-to-one discussion.

"SP are you aware what you have been doing of late?"

"what, your excellency?"

"you have stopped playing gulli danda and have switched over to ikkad dukkad. don't you pretend that i am cooking up a story," the masterni said fixing her gaze on susheel pundit. the masterni had mastered the art and craft of interrogation. her moon-shaped 'third eye' achieved what a spiral did for a hypnotist.

susheel pundit soon started singing like a canary.

"madam, please pardon me. i cant reveal where, how, and who bit me while i was offering my morning prayers. but ever since, i find it painful to teach the children. can you not make me the school watchman, please madam."

"alright. but, make sure you give me an intelligence report every morning and evening on the law and order situation in the campus," the masterni thundered.

"goes without saying, madam. you will get a report from me even on a holiday," said susheel pundit, his smile spread from ear to ear.

susheel gladly accepted the demotion and the accompanying salary cut to merrily blow the whistle on anyone he suspected of flouting the school rules.

epilogue: the children are missing their punditji whose pony tail they used to tie up with the rickety chair.

Jigetty Jig

All the boys and girls were tired of moving their legs and shaking their hind part in this mundane world.

"Why do we work so hard and to what end?" asked lady Videbottom.

"To earn our living, madam," squeaked Timothy Tomatowala.

"Shut up you imbecile" snubbed the lady, "Is that why your dumb parents have paid a fortune to send you to this unrecognized Ivy League B-school?"

"No madam. Then, I guess they sent us here to ensure that we learn how to jig. Shake, shake, move, move. Rock, rock, jump, jump," butted in Bigbelly Bajpaii.

"Smart boii," said the lady with a smile of a tom cat, smacking her lips only to hurriedly paint her lips with a crimson red lipstick.

"Come on boys and girls, let's all do something exciting. Let's form a community, a community of jiggers and jumpers," the lady proclaimed, pulling her turtle shell spectacles over her head, a practice she had copied from her school headmistress she looked upon during her fifth standard while sitting on the back bench.

"Brilliant madam, really super idea. No wonder, the director is so fond of you," chimed Spoony Sharma.

The lady's eyes lit up like the headlights of a 10-ton truck on the Agra-Jullundar highway.

She ordered the boys and girls to form a circle on the campus lawn and made them count their number. "Now all the odd numbers step forward and the even numbers stay with me," commanded the lady.

The odd numbered boys and girls were told to run to the canteen and fetch a cup of coffee each, while the even numbered ones were asked to fetch tea.

Drill and discipline were her mantra to sensitize and sanitize the students and prepare them for the rat race they were supposed to join after the graduation.

the drill done, the madam asked the august gathering to wait for her while she went to her workstation to catch up with the latest gossip doing the rounds in the cyberspace.

The madam having left, the boy's surreptiously took out the pint of beer they had hidden in the hip pockets, while the girls busied themselves applying mascara and lipstick.

"Wish the madam takes such breaks every 15 minutes to allow us to replenish our stock of beer from the canteen boy," muttered Moni Motwani. The canteen boy ran a spiritual business under the banner of 'Baba Bholenath' to earn some extra bucks.

"There comes the madam," warned Champak Chowky and the boys hurriedly disposed off the empty cans behind the hedge that lined the campus. The girls assumed their position looking all glum faced, seriousness writ large on their face.

"Good boiis and gals. here we go. Remember what I had told you in the class today? Practice your jigs and jumps to perfection. Only a good jig and a good jump will make you beat the world in the rat race," said the lady in a sombre voice, marking her speech with a baritone cough she had acquired with much practice.

These were parting words before she got into her Toyota Corolla car. She was in a hurry to to reach on time for her jiggy party at the Gymkhana Club.

Back to Music

Homage and Heritage -3

Overwhelmed and humiliated, the anguished Father, bent under the infirmities of age, runs once more to their succour, even like the hen covering her brood under her wings against death. He takes his abode among the sorrowing. He faces the Fiery Ordeal again and again and works miracles. He repeats to them his lasting message: "Not through hatred and ill-will ye shall seek to avenge yourselves. 'Vengeance is mine' sayeth the Lord. Grieve not; forsake your fear; work and strive for goodwill and unity. For know ye who are afflicted, that Love exalteth, Love alone triumphs."

And he gathered them around him evening after evening as was his wont, and prayed with them for the purification of their hearts, beseeching them and admonishing them and instructing them with his words of wisdom and cheer. They gathered in the ancient city under whose precincts mighty empires lay in dust and in whose neighbourhood his Great Predecessor taught Eternal Wisdom to Man from His Chariot on the battlefield.

But so that the Scriptures may be fulfilled, and that the world's Martyrdom may attain its perfection, behold! there comes on the scene, once more, the infamous Ashvathama - the perverse Assassin of Ages, the vile Brahmarakshasa with the eternal wound on his mangled head and condemned to everlasting life of a roving ghost, - the embodiment of the accumulated evil of his race. He comes unrepentant and unrelenting, aye, even with a gusto within, for his unholy design, and accomplishes his foul deed of calculated cold murder before the eyes of a staggered multitude, to the everlasting shame and humiliation of his nation.

To Thee, Father of our Nation! we pay our grateful reverent homage. We salute Thee. We rejoice in the midst of our tears and our shame. We rejoice rather than sorrow and are grateful that the mericful Providence spared Thee to us to accomplish our deliverance, however shameful and agonizing the aftermath. We glory in Thy having walked our earth. For Thou hast given to mankind new values and compelled obeisance from a recalcitrant world by challenging it once again to measure its own stature against them. Thou art indeed in the line of Thy recurring Predecessors - the Great Saviours of mankind. Thou didst come to fulfil the Scriptures and to fulfil the pledge made in the Song Celestial:

"For the protection of the Good, for the descruction of the Wicked, and for the firm establishment of righteousness on Earth, I am born again and again."

Even so through ages hast Thou lived and laboured again and again. All Thy life didst Thou wear Thy Crown of Thorns and dist bear Thy Cross, finding life's final fulfilment in surrendering it as a ransom for our own sins and shortcomings. Greater love, indeed, hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for goodwill among his fellowmen.

We salute Thee, Father of our Nation! None that hath received Thy Light shall walk in darkness.

(End)

Swami Anand

Homage and Heritage - 2

They came from distant lands and from across the seven seas. They came from all parts of the earth. And he taught them all and made them good men and women. Even like one of his great predecessors, - The Guru Gobind - he would make the sparrow hunt down the hawk, but with a different weapon. With patient labours of a lifetime extending over half a century and spread over the entire land, he worked on his people to forge his weapon and to temper it.

Out of dross he made precious metal; out of earth-clods he made material to challenge and defy the might of an insolent empire; to whose people he bore the greatest friendship, and yet whose end he ordained, even as Krishna had ordained the end of the arrogant Jadavas. He called upon the foreigner to quit the land which he had bled white and in which he had worked much inequity.

And behold! For the first time in human history the world witnessed an epic struggle of a whole nation locked for three decades in non-violent combat with the alien rulers so that her chains should break. A saga of peaceful peasantries challenging the might of established authority, armed to the teeth, by refusing to submit to its unjust levies, inviting upon themselves untold sufferings and living under conditions of a siege till the privations turn them and their cattle white; of millions throughout the length and breadth of the country defying salt laws in the face of lathis, tear-gas, horse-hoofs; women refusing to part with their pinch of salt till their bones dislodge; men tying their own hands with iron wires to prevent slackening of their grip on raided salt; of gallant men who would be counted among the very peak of any army, offering to be beaten or pounded to death, by official myrmidons, without so much as raising their eyelids in protest; of statesmen, savants, tribunes of their own people - objects of world adoration, leaders of men and of an age, who would adorn the halls of any international assembly -- accepting cheerfully to surrender long indefinite years of their great lives to be wasted in cold, dark, solitary dungeons on a par with felons; of the nation's Bards pouring forth the agony of an age before sobbing magistrates in crowded court-rooms; of apostles who walked the land bare-foot, broadcasting the New Gospel carrying neither purse nor shoes nor yet staves, pleading guilty against their accusers and urging the courts to inflict on them maximum penalties; of wandering monks offering to starve themselves to death in protest against outraged whomanhood through long agonizing fasts without a trace of ill-will towards the guilty; of frail little men offering to lay down their lives denying themselves in their prison cells all food and water till death do deliver them, and in the meanwhile coasxing their captors to administer 'without blame' 'some suitable poison' when their sufferings did annoy them; of street urchins proudly mounting the gallows after being court-martialled for bold pranks; of village peasants naively facing military reprisals, with no better armour than plywood planks hung in front of their chests; of whole masses of unarmed, undrilled men and women flinging themselves in blind abandon against bayonets, bullets, guns and bombs.

Righteousness the world over wailed in oblivion. Untruth was in excelsis. Naked Fascism masquerading in the garb of aggrieved innocence stalked the land. It maligned virtue with impunity. Truth was lynched. The stars in high heavens wept over the inequities and the vileness of man.

And against it all, in his indiganation, the Father of the Nation lay crouched and twisted on his Bed of Fire for the tenth time, challenging his accusers from behind the prison. And his protest rang through the world pentrating the Iron Curtain. His Great Disciple, who was to him more than his own son, and 'with whom my Father is well pleased', lay in a handful of ashes at the prison corner. And the gentle Mother of the Nation was to meet her millions no more. Outside the prison raged Revolution. The Empire shook, and his mighty accusers trembled. They fell flat. Their chagrin knew no bounds.

And behold! The Titan collapsed under the weight of his own inequities.

And he quitted; but not without upholding the disruptionist who clamoured for rending his own Mother's garments. Freedom came, but Her face was ghastly. Brother flew at the throat of brother, and women wept. Millions were uprooted and flung on the roadside. Men lost all their sense and shame, and they burned and killed and perpetrated unmentionable abominations. Cities swelled with fleeing men and wailing women. They cursed and called aloud for retribution.


(More to follow)

Homage and Heritage: Swami Anand

Two thousand years ago the Prince of Peace atoned for the sins of his fellow-men on earth by mounting the Cross with words of forgiveness and love for his persecutors. And though man felt ashamed and humiliated he did not mend his ways.

The primitive man hunted for food; in the middle ages he killed for glory. The supermen of our age stalked the globe with a technique of slaughter and enslavement in the wake of greed and exploitation. The earth was rent with weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. Humanity lay prostrate under the agony of unnamable outrages.

In the midst of all this clash and conflict came, once more, a Wise Man from the East. Like the Good Shepherd he shouldered the ailing sheep, the insulted indentured Indian, toiling far away from home, and comforted him and his tribe. With words soothing and life-giving, he sayeth unto them: "Come ye that grieve and are heavily laden. I bring to you good tidings, --the Gospel of Resistence."

And he shepherded his flock and ministered unto them in their afflictions with tenderness and affection. He taught the worm to turn. He taught little mothers to stand upright and resist racial arrogance and insult, marching with babes in their arms and courting prisons.

He sat among overbearing foreigners and pleaded his people's cause, disarming them with his courtesy and his integrity. He evoked their sympathy with his gentle sufferings and earned a great renown.

And behold, he returns homeward to his own people and concludes with them, once more, a new Covenant: "It has been said by those of old: 'Ye resist not evil', or 'resist evil with evil'. But I say unto you, resist evil within and without you, with the whole might of your soul; resist it with Non-violence, resist it with Truth, resist it without malice. Repent ye, and do penance for your sins, collective as well as individual. Eschew all violence, eschew all hatred, shed all fear and forge yourselves into finest weapnos of resistence. You are the salt of the earth. Ye are to establish once more, by testifying to it in and with your lives in this holy land of synthesis, the supremacy of soul over matter; of God over Mammon; of service over self-interest. And ye are to carry the Gospel of this non-violent resistance to the farthest ends of the earth. In this redeeming task, he who shall lose his life shall find it, and he who shall seek to save his life shall lose it."

And he sayeth unto them again:

"Despise no man; but believe in his innate goodness. Harbour no ill-will against him; only resist the evil that has seized him. Resist and suffer cheerfully with no thought of returning evil for evil. Shun all fear. Be brave and wield the weapon of Truth and non-violence, which is Love abounding. They are but the obverse and reverse of the same coin. To me there is no God other than this. It is my sole weapon and my refuge. And know ye, that it is not the weapon of the weak. It is for the bravest. Learn ye, therefore, to wield it against all your ills. It shall sustain you against the mightiest. For it is forged on the anvil of Love that exalteth and that abideth in God."

And behold! Great multitudes followed him.

And he covered the entire land with his journeys, plying his wheel, and with its thread linked men with men, - whole masses of them.

The toilers came from their fields and spinners from their hovels; fishermen left their nets, tradesmen their counters. Rich men, encumbered with large possessions, came too, in search of solace, and he lightened their burdens. Women came resurrected and awakened to the true dignity of their state. The untouchables came with their limbs withered and their souls crushed under the weight of age-old inequities. And he ministered unto them with all the passion of his soul and made them whole. He made them God's Chosen. Came also the publicans, the hated ones -- servants of Government -- who served the alien rulers and worked against their own country for a mess of pottage. And he called upon them to repent and turned many into humble servants of the dumb millions. Lepers came and he built them shelters and himself washed their wounds. Came also the pharisees, the learned ones, negotiators and peace-mongers. And he suffered them all and treated them with unfailing patience and tenderness.

(This is the first part of an unpublished manuscript of the writings of Swami Anand, a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi)

Ram and Rahim

When in 1906, young barrister Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi launched his satyagraha in South Africa against the discriminatory treatment being meted out to people of Indian origin, his chief lieutenants included Hindus, Muslims, Parsis, Dalits and Christians. Among his colleagues were also Chines, British and Germans. Indeed Gandhi was a Vishwamanav (global citizen) whose quest for truth could not be constricted by the consideration of caste, creed or colour.

When he set up the Satyagraha Ashram on the bank of the Sarbarmati river in Ahmedabad a decade later, Gandhiji nominated Imam Abdul Kadir Bawazeer, a Muslim priest who had courted jail in 1910 as a Satyagrahi in South Africa, as the vice-chairman of the ashram's managing committee. Bawazeer succeeded Gandhiji's secretary Mahadev Desai as the chairman of the ashram after the latter was arrested during the Salt Satyagraha in 1930. And, when Gandhiji was arrested, he nominated 76-year-old Justice Abbas Tayyabji to lead the Salt Satyagraha.

Gandhiji's Satyagraha ashram was a global village. Its inmates included Hindus, Jains, Muslims, Parsis and Christians. Even Miraben, the youngest daughter of an admiral of the British Royal Navy, was an ashram inmate, such broad was Gandhiji's concept of universal brotherhood.

When in 2002, a group of concerned citizens gathered at the satyagraha ashram to discuss ways to promote communal harmony, it was attacked by a mob crying 'Jai Shri Ram'. A few days back, the mob that had destroyed the mausoleum of Vali Deccani, a.k.a Vali Gujarati, the great poet credited with founding the composition of shaayari, was also shouting the same very war cry of 'Jai Shri Ram'.

Gandhiji had popularized the singing of the hymn:
"Raghupati Raghav Raja Ram, Pateet Paavan Sita Ram
Eeshwar, Allah Tere Naam, Sabko Sanmati De Bhagwan"

The Muslim, Christian and Parsi inmates of the satyagraha ashram sang the hymn with equal devotion as it was a prayer to one God who was known by different names and whose blessings the hymn sought so that good sense prevailed among all human beings.

But since December 6, 1992, when fanatic Hindu mobs demolished the Babri mosque at Ayodhya as an act of revenge against the 15th Century Moghul emperor, Babar, the chant of 'Jai Shri Ram' has assumed violent connotation, striking terror among the non-Hindus, specially Muslims whom the Hindu fanatics chided as 'Babar ki Aulad' (Descendants of the Moghul emperor).

Communal Trap

A cornered cat pounces at the throat of the one who has cornered it. Should the Muslims act likewise? Some of them did. The serial bomb blast in Mumbai was in retaliation to the demolition of the Babri mosque. So were several other acts of terrorism. But an act6 of terrorism triggers off state terrorism of greater maginitude. Besides, terrorism alienates the common people from a terrorist outfit.

An act of terrorism by members of the minority community helps reinforce the propaganda by Fascist forces that Muslims are anti-social elements who need to be dealt with an iron hand. It was because of the attack on the Akshardham temple complex in Gandhinagar and the assassinatioin of former home and revenue minister Haren Pandya that the police could terrorize the Muslims by subjecting a large number of youths to torture and then putting them behind bars under the provisions of the draconian POTA.

Violence breeds greater violence. Similarly, communalism of the majority community thrives on communalism of the minority community. Some religious and political leaders seek to encourage and strengthen orthodoxy among the Muslims on the plea that preserving a distinct identity is the only way to survive the onslaught by forces that seek to wipe out Islam. But by doing so, they add fuel to the fire of communalism on which Fascist forces thrive.

Another tendency seen among a few Muslim leaders is to accept the supremacy of the majority community and be rewarded with a share in power. Such Muslim leaders, who accept positions in the government or in the ruling party, play a second fiddle to the top leadership and come in handy for the Fascist regimes to tom-tom their 'secular' credentials. As happens with any fifth columnist, they become a subject of abject contempt among their own community even as their loyalty remains suspect in the eyes of the majority community.

A vast majority of Muslims are poor and illiterate, making them vulnerable to the machinations of politicians and the clergy. Politicians, irrespective of their party affiliations, view Muslims as a conglomerate of various monolithic, closely-knit clans each controlled by clerics and/or community leaders. In times of elections, politicians seek the support of these clerics and community leaders, who act as power-brokers.

Politicians, clerics and community leaders have shown little interest in the welfare and uplift of the common Muslims. On the contrary, they seem to have a vested-interest in keeping the masses illiterate and their attention diverted from such burning issues as education, poverty, unemployment, social and economic justice. The same holds true for the Hindutva forces too.

Karl Marx had described religion as the opiate of masses. The followers of Savarkar, Godse and Modi are proving Marx right in Gandhi's Gujarat.

Hate Campaign

Though there appears to be a surface calm in Gujarat, the Modi government and the Sangh Parivar continue to target the Muslims. The state government is out to subverting the process of justice to ensure that no one involved in the 2002 carnage is punished. The Best Bakery case in a glaring example of this. In the Best Bakery case, the session's court has acquitted all the 21 accused of killing 14 hapless people, including women and children, after the key witnesses were coerced by the local BJP MLA and his municipal councilor brother into retracting their statement. Similar has been the fate of most of the cases of heinous crimes in which BJP, VHP and RSS activists are the accused.

While those who had committed murder, rape, loot and arson are roaming fearlessly, the police is hunting down Muslim youths, foisting trumped up charges against them and arresting them under the draconian Prevention of Terrorist Activities Act (POTA). In most of the POTA cases, the charge leveled against the detained person is the same that he had been recruited by Pakistan's intelligence agency, ISI, after the Godhra carnage, taken to Pakistan, trained there in terror tactics and brought back to Gujarat to attack Hindu places of worship and kill leaders of the BJP and VHP.

In times of communial violence in Gujarat, the language press sheds its yellow and dons deep saffron. The Gujarati press has proved time and again that pen is mightier than a trishul (trident). With scant regard for journalistic ethics, the Gujarati press has been adding fuel to the fire by whipping up communal passions.

The Muslims in Gujarat are a hounded lot, condemned by the ruling party politicians (BJP and its VHP-RSS allies), a partisan police force and civil administration and a belligerent press. If this is not Fascism, what is it?

Saffron Surge

But it was chiefly because of some retrogressive action of the Congress government like the decision to nullify the Supreme Court's judgment on the Shah Bano case through an ordinance and Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi's move to throw open the Babri mosque for the devotees of Lord Ram, that gave a shot in the arm to communal elements among both the Hindus and Muslims.

It was Prime Minister V P Singh's decision to implement the recommendation of the Mandal commission on socially and economically backward classes that hastened the BJP to take up the issue of Ramjanmabhoomi temple in Ayodhya, lest the coming together of all the depressed classes - harijans, advisasis, other backward classes (OBCs) becomes a formidable obstacle to the Sangh Parivar's dream of turning India into a Hindurashtra.

The Sangh Parivar systematically went about recruiting and mobilizing harijans, adivasis and members of other backward classes for the Ramajanmabhoomi campaign. Through the campaign, the Sangh Parivar managed to 'sanskritize' and bring under the fold of Hindutva members of those communities who had been suffering the humiliation of untouchability for centuries. When the bricks meant for the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya were consecrated in a Dalit colony or a slum, those who participated in the ceremony felt equal to the caste Hindus.

Simultaneously, the Ramjanmabhoomi campaign portrayed the Muslims as 'enemies' of the country who had no place in the Hindurashtra. The Indian Constitution had rejected the two-nation theory by adopting secularism. Hence, what could not be achieved through constitutional means, the Sangh Parivar sought to achieve through unconstitutional and extra-parliamentary means by driving a communal wedge in the Indian society.

Polarization of society on communal lines has vastly benefited the BJP as is evident from the increasing strength of its members in both the Parliament and the various state assemblies. The communal carnage, which triggered off the ghastly memories of Nazi concentration camps, that shattered Gujarat between February and April 2002, was translated into a mandate for chief minister Narendra Modi to rule the state for yet another five years.

The Gujarat assembly election results porten a serious threat to the secular India because the BJP and its extra-parliamentary allies, the VHP, the Bajrang Dal and the RSS, have made it amply clear that they will be trying out the 'Gujarat Experiment' in the elections to the assemblies of six states later this year as also in the parliamentary general elections the next year.