In the land of the blind-folded

In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king. But in the land of idiots, the biggest fool of them all is king. For the clever ones know that it’s all a question of pulling the right reins, at the right junctures.

Welcome to the world. By no means new, this world has been in existence since time immemorial. You have just been closing your eyes and pretending it’s all a dream. OPEN YOUR EYES, MISTER!!! Do you blame me for asking the world what it can do for me? Don’t answer that. For I really don’t care…and neither does the world.

First we all had this overwhelming desire for the right to call this land our own. For what purpose??? Of course, the desire for ‘Independence’. So what is independence to us? It is a very valuable aspect of human life (which is the only kind of life which we, incidentally, are bothered about) which actually helped us jump from the frying pan, right into the fire. Oh yes, the modern world concept of democracy. The right to submit, to a new power. And little did the ‘half naked fakir’ realize that what he was doing was just to hand over this fledging to the hands of a barbaric few who were clever enough to realize the potential of the new buzzword that rocked a nation.

The poor man can heave a sigh of relief looking up at the shambles here from down there, for this was one hell he was lucky to escape, though he wasn’t so lucky with the second one. And as for the ones who gave him the keys to the next level, they went down in history; and free India carried out her first death sentence. Hey Ram! Makes you wonder who Quit India should really have been aimed at.

So what became of the lush green lush patch of land, which emerged from the shadow of the Empire where the sun never sets? Or maybe green is not the colour to be used here. A large part of green, though not on the better side, was torn away by people who were born here, and grew up here (well, grew up physically at least…for we know their mental levels are a joke). So we filled up the remaining with saffron and white, and declared ourselves to be a democracy. And that was our first big mistake.

For the uninitiated, Democracy is a very popular form of hooliganism where the hapless public is given an extraordinary opportunity to choose which of the two leading packs of jokers gets to make a mess of our country and its economy for the next five years. We really got to hand it to them, though. While the severed hand is now in the forefront with the saffron lotus trailing far behind, we can always depend on the red sickle to show us that the worst is yet to come. For I’d prefer the two lesser evils any day, to the red sickle, for the rusted iron curtain is one form of government I’d definitely like to avoid. Now that the state’s all red, down south and in the Far East, let’s look to the centre and put the blame on the please-all brand of politics, which has all but painted the helpless hand a pathetic shade of red. Coalition politics, you say? Just one question…. Who’s the fool??? I reserve my comments.

Speaking of reservation, I’m reminded of a quip doing the rounds on the internet, allegedly by an ageing yet fearless tycoon from Bangalore(Whose “vegetable products” are far surpassed in fame by consumer goods) in which he demanded that the rules of cricket be modified so that the so called oppressed classes are given a “fair deal”, so fair that sixers need to cross the boundary only after a bounce or two and that too with the boundary moved in a few meters more than usual, just so that he can come up to the standards of the privileged class. In jest, true, but I salute his guts.

So while one half of the country put down their stethoscopes and pick placards to convince the nation that Reservation should stick to trains, there is, as always, the other half who find this a great opportunity to add yet another point to their already endless list of demands. And the man who sparked off this needless controversy finds the time just right to take a vacation in Singapore, far away from the entire melee. A last minute jibe from the grave by the thespian who just realized that his dream of a stint in 10 Janpath would forever be a dream. This name sake of a mythological warrior prince is now in the midst of a whole new controversy over a totally different issue which really makes us wonder if the song remixed by A.R Rehman on the 50^th anniversary of our submission to the new breed of barbarians (the local ones, from amongst ourselves) was indeed so malicious as the fundamentalist few seek to believe. No wonder though, for these are the very people who wanted a 19 year old sensation to wear a burkha on court (the sporting kind, not the legal one)

And speaking of sports, that’s one area where the action is really getting fascinating. Since the game began to be played more in board rooms and minds than on fields and stadiums, it’s getting fun to watch. A leg spinner who prefers bowling maidens over to bowling maiden overs; a prince in the east who argues that he deserves a place in the team although few of the people who really matter thinks so; a footballer who is ejected in the finals of his last world cup for head-butting a man who initially claimed to be innocent but later tried to pull a fast one by taking up all the blame now that the cup is safely locked away in the Azury cupboards; and as if those were not enough to complete the mockery, the final act has a hockey player who gets shot at, supposedly by accident while traveling. I can understand injuries sustained while in training, but in trains???...puhleese!

Speaking of trains and sports, the man who heads the Indian railways also heads the Bihar Cricket Association! The same man who made news, first for being, and then for controlling, the Chief Minister of the state which consistently bagged the bottom spot in surveys regarding development of Indian states. The same man whose daughter’s wedding became a nightmare for the automobile and furniture dealers in the state where his wife ruled as CM, for countless pieces of furniture and cars were liberally “borrowed” from their showrooms for the function and caused a loss of what is estimated to be about a few crores to them. That may not be much considering the amount he made in what we now know as the Fodder Scam. Well, all said and done, that “gentleman” Union Minister is now a subject of study in a leading B-school for his innovative style, which supposedly sky rocketed the annual revenue and profit of the Indian Railways.

Speaking of revenues and profit, until a few months back, two of the most successful profit making ventures, and bitter rivals in the country were a couple of soft drink makers. I used to enjoy watching the good natured brand rivalry in the ads. While one claimed that it was the official drink of a popular sporting event, the other gave a friendly jibe saying its product had “Nothing official about it”. Then when the first one told us to Eat Cricket, Sleep Cricket, but drink only their brand, the other shot back saying Eating Cricket and Sleeping Cricket was just fine, but when it came to drinking, “Yeh dil maange more”!!! Those were the days of classic ads!! Oye bubbly! Thanda matlab…he he!

But now those days are over, for their ads are now all about assuring us that their products are safe for consumption and even inviting us to their factories to see for ourselves. It seems strange that the people who claim that these products have pesticides in them conveniently forget that the levels of pesticides in them are indeed lower than those in essentials like milk and drinking water. And come to think of it, the source of these pesticides is the very same underground water table that people around the area use for drinking. So it doesn’t matter to them that pesticides are hazardous to health, they just want to establish that pesticides when in soft drinks are hazardous to health.

As a popular SMS forward states, alcohol may soon be the only safe option around, so drink and be merry…coz the worst is probably here anyway

Disclaimer: The above piece is not to be seen as an expression of my ideals or ideologies. I make no guarantee about the accuracy of the facts mentioned in the blog, and no offence is meant to any community or group.