India v/s China

The thing that got my goat more than the joint US-China statement saying China had a big role to play in South Asia, a region that India sees as its area of influence, was our response to the statement. Our government was literally foaming at the mouth, our media was in paroxysms about our “loss of prestige”, the journalists were apoplectic. Everywhere you heard the refrain about how India would not brook any interference in her affairs and so on. Within a few days, the US came out with a statement averring that their ties with China “were not at the cost of their ties with India” and we all patted ourselves on the back for a serious challenge averted and honour saved. Then last night China came out with a statement that they did not intend to intervene between India and Pakistan (which is what we thought the joint statement was a veiled reference to) and they preferred that we solve the problem bilaterally. What a nice gesture!
But what irritated me in the whole affair was that our knee-jerk reaction to that statement made us sound almost childish. And moreover, it gave China a tacit right to meddle in South Asia. Notice that they say that they would not prefer to interfere in the Indo-Pak affairs. They might, but they won’t. Let’s see if the two kids can solve this quarrel between themselves, they see to say. Have we looked more stupid in recent times? I don’t think there was any need to go public with our “righteous indignance” here. Ignoring the statement would have given it the amount of importance it deserved. No one has the right to interference in our affairs is an understood fact. By responding to the statement like we did, we brought that fact into question. By refusing to even acknowledge it we would have given the impression that we really didn’t care what China or the US said about this stuff, as long as they didn’t try to actually act on their stupid ideas. If ever China offered to mediate we could counter that offer by offering to mediate between China and the Dalai Lama. By ignoring the statement we would have said to the world, “We don’t recognize anyone’s right to meddle in our affairs”, by responding to it as we have, we say “We know China has the right to interfere but we won’t allow it to.” Which sounds better?

BJP- bad or a necessary evil?

Watched a debate on the future of the BJP yesterday. They were discussing if whether the RSS was interfering with the day-to-day working of the BJP and if it was right or appropriate. It got me thinking as to what the future held in store for the BJP. Never been a fan, never will either. But as I see it today I feel it is imploding and that’s not a good sight for Indian polity. I’ve always held Advani as a rank opportunist despite all his claims of integrity and principles, but his leaving the BJP and retiring sounds to me a death knell for the party at a national level. Once he’s gone who else is there with a pan-Indian presence and appeal? All the other ‘netas’ demand no popular following. They’re not even leaders in the proper sense of the word either. They’re the back-room wheelers and dealers. None of them is fit to become the face of the BJP like Advani is today. After he goes, the BJP will be left with second rung politicians with no charisma, hold, or personality.
Now the fall of a party that I love to hate should make me happy, but it unfortunately doesn’t. My choice in politics, in fact, every thinking man’s choice in Indian politics is not between right and wrong, but in what I, or any man, would perceive as the bigger or lesser evil. I have always felt that the INC with all its faults, and they are legion, is the less evil alternative to the sabre-rattling unltra-nationalist jingoism that characterizes the BJP. Hindutva, China and so on, they’ve made a lot of noise though when faced with an actual problem they pretty much bent over. But that’s besides the point. No matter what, at least the BJP was a national level party and a counterpoint to the INC. And that’s what I think will be sorely missed if the BJP does dissolve into petty squabbles and little fiefdoms.
Without a major party at the national level to present a serious challenge to the INC, a sense of complacency will set in and the Congress fall victim to an inertia which will most likely harm India in the long run. In such a scenario the only possible way for the INC to lose would be for them to cede majority in a large number of states, simultaneously, to various local political parties, such as the Akalis in Punjab, the SP or the BSP in UP, the AIADMK or the DMK in Tamil Nadu and so on. And what kind of national government could such a motley crew of diverse people give us? The result’s almost too sorry to imagine.

Disappointments

Sometimes I find myself unable to connect with anyone even on the most basic level. People I expect to be able to understand me and my moods suddenly seem so clueless, it’s as if they never had even the remotest idea in the first place. I don’t make it easy for anybody, I know that, but still not this level of disconnect! I swear there are times I want to leave it all and retreat even further into myself. Anything to avoid this disappointment and rage that rises in me. Nothing, no one is worth the aggravation. I’m not either I guess. However, that’s ok. The total absence of expectations should be better than this repetitive routine of dashed hopes and failed efforts at relationships that I expect too much of and get way too little from. This all too familiar taste of bile rising up my throat is one I cloy of. People I think were close to me have proven me wrong time and again and so I’ve reduced my expectations of them time after time till that level is near zero. I wish it was not how these things ended, but I honestly don’t see any other way.

In 40 hours I should be flying out of Madurai airspace, leaving behind a city that has given me few memories to cherish. Never has any place given me the feeling that I would be better the farther I was from it. Thrice have I come here in the last 4 years and each and every time I have been gladdest when I saw the back of it. Hopefully this would be the last instance.
They say that every city has its own character. Madurai is old, insular, inward looking and static. While the rest of the world around it steps up its pace everyday, Madurai stands still. It cannot, it will not open its eyes and see the profound, drastic changes happening around it. Almost medieval in many ways. Take an overnight journey by train to Chennai and you awake in a whole new world. Yes, Madurai still belongs to a previous century.
When the past weighs heavy on you, forward motion is well nigh impossible. I guess there a number of such cities across the length and breadth of India. We are a nation that is a celebration of a living past. Only, in place like Chandigarh and Delhi that past has become an item of pop culture, a snack to be had once in a while, like a Filet-o-fish at a Big Mac. But in places like Madurai, it is very much a solid presence; the past overhangs us like an atmosphere of its own an dpervades into every nook and cranny of this ancient city.
I an not built for such a way of life. Much as I revel in the days gone by, in the aeons elapsed, I still want to live in tomorrow. I want to be in a city that looks forward, an atmosphere full of the promise of the future.
Rohtak was mush the same when I went there in '94. But over the course of the following decade I saw it roused out of its slumber and forced to stir. It was jsut sich a sleepy old town as I find myself in now, and has begun to change perceptibly. Vague factors came together in Rohtak's case to determine its course; nearness to Delhi, an abundance of youth, a sudden inflow of wealth, a local boy as CM. With none of these factors seen here, I wonder what might make Madurai metamorphose?

On being nomadic again

Sitting at the airport, starting out on a trip I wish to God I didn’t have to make. One whole month cut off from all I love and care for. One whole month away from all things familiar and comfortable. One whole month in a strange city I fear will be unfriendly and distant. A city moreover, that unfortunately holds very bad associations for me. The site of the 3 most depressing days I’ve ever spent. If there was anyway in the world that I could avoid going I would’ve rushed back home in a hurry.
Is this what age and time does to us? The longer I stay at home, settled and fixed, the harder it is for me to accept the idea of being a peripatetic, again. Half my life I wasn’t a settled creature. Rohtak, Delhi, Chandigarh, back to Rohtak. A small circle for sure, but still it kept me from being too attached to one place. Of course Chd. was an exception but that was more out of nostalgia than anything else. Now after having spent 4 married years in Chd., setting up a house, a home, building a place for my own in this world in a sense, to have to uproot myself and go all the way across the country is hard. My Sunday mornings sprawled on the carpet sipping coffee soaking in the papers, my Saturday evenings with Scotch and serials, the incessant chatter and warm laugh of Seema, the hugs, the kisses, the smiles……. What a whole lot I’m leaving behind! Of course not for ever, but standing at the start of the journey, it certainly seems so.
I guess I’ve always been a homebody. Always felt better coming back home than going away. Travel has always meant a short break to unwind, but I wouldn’t feel bad if I had to do the same without setting foot outside my door either. I always surrounded myself with enough to occupy my mind and that was all that mattered.
I realize that this is a necessary trip I’m making and this one month will go a long way to improve my professional skills. A big sacrifice, but an unavoidable one too. And now that I look at it another way, maybe it isn’t bad to get out a bit too. Maybe I am getting too lazy and this might stir me up a bit. If it have been some other place, any other city…..

Finished watching “The Reader” the other day. Had to watch it, what with the reviews Kate had got for it. Came back with mixed feelings. It starts with an older Kate, in her 30s, having a secret affair with a teenage boy almost half her age in post-War Germany. Passionate and intense, it almost consumes the young boy. Kate enjoys the boy reading to her before they make love. He reads her a number of stories, ranging from Iliad to Huckleberry Finn. But hot and demanding as it is, the affair ends when Kate suddenly disappears without an explanation. Maybe she feels that the boy is developing affections for someone else, maybe she feels that it is getting too intense and can destroy him or maybe just that her secrets and her past will ultimately come out and destroy her, maybe by her affair or her promotion.
The kid grows up and becomes a law student. One day when taken to court by their teacher to observe a trial of some Nazi prison guards, he is shocked to see Kate as one of the defendants. She is accused of being a prison guard at a concentration camp and with 4 other female guards, of letting over 300 Jewish females and children burn to death. While the other females deny the charges, Kate accepts them in an almost stoic fashion. She admits to choosing prisoners to be sent to Auschwitz and even standing by while so many people burned to death when, during the Death Marches, they were locked in a church while they were being bombed by the Allies. Her admission of guilt shows her simplicity, and, to me, maybe an inability to understand the enormity of her actions in their entirety. The other females then gang up and accuse Kate of being their leader and of putting the whole incident on report. This is the first time that Kate is flustered and denies the charge. But on being pressed and asked for a handwriting sample, she changes her statement and admits to being the leader too. The boy realizes suddenly why Kate is admitting to guilt that was not hers. She is illiterate. Now he realizes why she wanted him to read to her and why she let him order food at the restaurant. He is caught in a dilemma about whether to come out with this knowledge and inform the court of this so as to reduce her sentence or let it remain secret because she wants to keep it so.
He finds himself unable to deal with this and remains quiet. Kate is sentenced to life. During this period the boy, now grown up, starts sending Kate audio tapes he records himself of various stories and books. Regularly, he sends her tapes of one book after another, and in her desire to communicate with him, Kate picks out the same books from the prison library and slowly and painstakingly, learns to write. Small notes she begins with, a request for more romances or a comment on a character…but Fiennes (the grown up kid) doesn’t answer to any. Even when she pleads him to write a line. Finally in her old age, Kate is about to get released. The prison contacts Fiennes as he is the only contact they have for her. He reluctantly agrees to it. On meeting her, his old feelings about Nazis come out and he asks her if she’s learnt anything after staying in prison all this while. She replies that all she’s learnt is how to write. But seeing the expression on Fiennes face, she grows quiet. She goes into her cell and hangs herself. Fiennes is shocked and heartbroken. Kate leaves behind all her money to the daughter of the only survivor from the church fire, who had recognized all of them at the trial. Fiennes meets her in the US and give her the money that Kate had kept in an old tea tin. While unable and unwilling to forget Kate for her actions, the woman keeps the tea tin as a memento of a similar one that she had had as a kid. They decide to open an education trust with the money. In the end they both, German and Jew come away from it with a little bit of solace, a little balm on wounds that refuse to heal…
Kate’s done an incredible job as always. Found it a little hard to understand Kate’s motivation for becoming a Nazi or for her actions as one. The secret she tries to hide all her life and the shame it engenders in her I can understand. Her interest in books and what they hold is also understandable. A simple person in a situation much too big and complex for her is what seems plausible to me. She was no hero, just an ordinary person suddenly caught up in events that were too much for her to comprehend. The higher ideals that castigate Nazi ideas were alien to her. Sometimes I wonder if she even understood what was happening. When asked why she didn’t let the hapless women and children out of the church, she simply responds that she couldn’t let the prisoners out like that. Hard to understand but that’s how most people respond to such situations. Inflicting pain and torture is easier if you’re able to perhaps, convince yourself that you are not directly responsible for it. Maybe something like that happened with her. I don’t know. Like that student who asks why the older generation said nothing when the Final Solution was happening or why they didn’t hang themselves in shame when they found out later. Bold words indeed, but how do we as common people react when we hear of such incidents in our own countries, or perpetrated by our own police/armies? Much the same way, I’m afraid to say. Like those Indian soldiers who shot at innocent people at Jalianwala Bagh. I’ve tried hard to understand her motivation, you see! I guess, looking back at this reasoning, one that I’ve come up with as I was typing this out, I don’t think mixed feelings was an accurate description of what I feel about the movie. She was a simple person, dealing with situations way out of her league, and in her death finding some expiation, maybe?