NavDharmyug

They say death is a great equalizer. The oppressor, the oppressed, the rich and the poor, the privileged and the deprived, the atheist and the fanatic, the prince and the pauper are all equal in death. They lie. They are wrong. All people are not equal in death. Death is as unequal as is life and as monstrously cruel. How we are treated in death is defined by the people we leave behind. We are quite helpless in our posthumous passivity. It is also defined by how we have lived. If we have mattered to people as name and person or only as number. What is our identity in death, numerical reality or philosophical rallying point? Many things define where we find ourselves when the cruel chariot of death has run over the fragrant floral lives and the dust settles down, giving way to the stench of dead body. From a very philosophical value, each life matters a universe in value, from a very cynical, realistic and analytic value, the quantum of loss out of any death will be defined ...

Nationalism is a fragile idea, which as the Roman Emperor, the philosopher-kind would allude to, in his dying day, when he asks his General Maximus, “ What is Rome? ” and then answers himself, explaining that, “ One can only whisper her name, anything more than a whisper, and it will fade away. ” Nation is a delicate thing, therein lies its strength. It joins the patches of varied lands, groups of varied people. Intellectuals have tried defining it in earnest. Some have succeeded. Some were really intellectuals, who searched for truth. Others were pretending to be intellectuals, their intent, to use it as a tool to propagate their idea. Their wish to propagate their own ideas was not driven as much by their conviction with truth being on their side, rather on their own interests. Truth is not the stagnant water of a muddy pond. Truth is the running river. A running river is certain of its existence but changes in its form. True intellect will always search for the truth. We...

Rating : If you are a writer, Must read. If you are not- Still, a must read. I have just finished reading Middlemarch . It is quite a heavy and voluminous book. The story slowly rises, very slowly, spread across so many deeply developed and intricately engaging characters- the people of a fictional rustic town of Middlemarch in the 18 th Century England. The narrative and the story is strong, well-built with huge shoulders to carry various causes which it alludes to. The beauty and charm of reading a classic of those times is that while these stories were written when Europe convalesced under the forces which were to set it on a path to glory; it is to the credit to wonderful writers like George Eliot (Real name, Mary Ann Evans (1819-1880)), that they never allow the narrative to surrender to their causes. While the story deals with love, marriage as prime theme, it is not a romance novel, as is evident by the male pen-name taken by the writer in those times. Ther...

Photo Courtesy Gettyimages There was a Supreme Court directive which banned traditional bull racing festival Jallikattu in Tamilnadu. Today, as I write this, women groups are storming into a small temple in obscure town in Maharashtra. Media is in overdrive. Times Now seeks the rationale behind why women aren’t allowed in Sanctum Santorum of the temple. Yesterday they covered a Member of Parliament, sworn to the same constitution we celebrate today, who urged people to vote for their party, else they will lose their right to eat beef, which he posited, is a way of life for Muslims and Dalits. The rationale of it? Well, nobody would ask that. The same tribe which fights for the well-being of the animal also fights for converting the same animal into their dinner. But no, we don’t have it in us even to question such inept political positioning. Left, always boastful of being atheist, jumps in gleefully. The people who have no faith in religion, step in to modernize the religio...

Courtesy: Getty Images I recently in The Paris Review came across an interesting quote by great poet, by Robert Graves (1895-985). He says, “ Never use the word “audience.” The very idea of a public, unless a poet is writing for money, seems wrong to me. Poets don't have an “audience”: They're talking to a single person all the time…... All the so-called great artists were trying to talk to too many people. In a way, they were talking to nobody. ” I posted it on Google+, seeking the views of people. I got responses, some usual +1, I’d take it that they liked and agreed with the statement. But a dear friend, and wonderful poet Sum James , wrote that the words which are written for audience and is not something of an ante-thesis of poetry, as is seemingly contended here. It runs along. I would however, agree that the term audience here could be misleading. Every poem, I would agree with Sum James, is intended to an audience. Therein lies the reason for disagreement. ...

The year has just past by. Another year, another life, another sigh, another teardrop for the giant eye of the time. Many things can happen in an year. Lives can change- a country's life, an individual's life. How does one day differ from another? Does the tide turn, the Earth revolves in another direction? It is a psychological peg we devise to measure our journey. To measure how far we have traversed from where we started. Did we travel farther than others that we measure against? It sounds such narrow-minded to measure ourselves against others around us, but what other way do we have? This competition make us going, while in our heart of heart we know it will all end into nothing- cipher, a zero and only solace we will have, will be an unproven promise of afterlife. But as spaces around us reduce, shoulders rub against one another, we barely breathe, we sigh, long sighs, as if they would some day grow so big to swallow our whole lives. We need friends, camarad...

Courtesy: Getty Images It was Christmas night. It was a day of exuberance, of joy, of resurrection of faith. Happy delightful lights filled up the darkest crevices of night. The sounds of kids playing, the melody of sweet laughter, the Christmas carols running in looped consistency swallowed the dark sadness of a cold, December night. The air was full of warmth of close embraces which floated away, melting the freezing air. Beautiful people, dressed in lovely clothes, kids overdressed, men impeccably dressed, and women scantily dressed, wandered around in the air-conditioned interiors of the mall, trying hard not to bump into one another. Rameshwar felt tired. His eyes waded through the crowd to the opposite corner of the Atrium where some good looking and rich-looking women had set up stalls selling cakes and other things to eat. He had been there during the afternoon and the upturned brows of the exquisite ladies setting up those stalls and the prices mentioned made him qui...