My Grandfather

When I was 9 years old, my grandfather died. I remember his funeral when his body was covered in Indian Flag and Commissioner of Police and a police team had come to pay their last visit to him. I was afraid to touch his body and feeling that he was dead, had not sunk in. The first memory that I have of my Grandfather is of him, teaching me Gita in Sanskrit. He was a Freedom Fighter and I used to understand that there was something special about him different from others but the true significance of him being a Freedom Fighter was never understood by me then. I remember, he was very punctual and used to get up very early in the morning, used to do a lot of Yoga. He used to Knit Yarn daily and then he used to bathe with Mud (black mud of my home town, he never bathed with a Soap). He did not believe in worship of statues and rather he would read Vedas for sometime daily in the morning. In the evening he used to do a Evening Prayer called SANDHYA by him and then he would take him night meals. He would sometime create some beautiful stories for us and we used to enjoy them a lot. As when he died, I was very young, I could never see him as a Great man rather I always saw him as my beloved grand father. But today when I think about him, I feel proud of him and proud of myself to be grand child of such a great man.
It is now only that I realize that how hard must it have been for him to leave my grand mother alone at home in a very poor condition and to go for the cause of freedom of India. How much resolve must he have had for doing this. Now I understand why he used to be so excited when I used to recite my Independence Day speech to him in Sanskrit and why he and his many friends used to give me sweets for the same. Now I understand why he used to be so delighted on Independence Day. Now I understand why he was not in favor of worshiping statues of Gods. Now I understand why he wanted to open a naturopathy Centre and give free treatment to poor. Now I understand why he used to give so much importance to healthy living and healthy thinking. Today I am able to understand that he had a lot of courage, he was very honest and truthful, he never cheated anybody and all these things were not that he followed but they were values that he used to live his life with. He wanted his country to be the best in world and preferred simplicity to the pomp. Pain of other persons was his own pain and nature was a balm for him.
If I look at myself, I feel that while he may be happy in many ways to see me as what I am, he must also be very sorry about many things. while teaching me Gita or other things he wanted me to internalize many values which I have not and if I talk of resolve, I think I am very fickle. But I think I have a goodness in me that is a quality that I bestowed from him and that’s why I feel pain for others, and am pround of my country and sometimes feel sorry for many things for which he would have had same feeling as that of mine. I have a wish in my life that I should improve myself in to somebody so that he is truly proud of me when he sees me from Great Heavens. And I continue to strive for that. And I am sure I will succeed some day. Amen.

Epic Ramayana in Few Lines

When I was a small kid, my grandfather had told me a verse of Sanskrit, which summarises Ramayana in few words, today I read an Article discussing if Ramayana is just a fictional epic or it is based on some real events. This reminded me of these beautiful lines of Sanskrit, and there those lines are:

In Sanskrit:

"Aadau Raam tapovanadi gamanam, hatwa mrig kaanchanam, Vaidehi haranam, Jataayu maranam, Sugreev sambhaashanam, Baalee nirdanam, samudra tarnam, Lankaapuri daahnam, pashchaat Ravana Kumbhkarna hananam, etad Ramayanam."

In English (Translation):

In the ancient age, Rama(Raam) went to sacred forest, tried to kill a golden deer. In between Sita(Vaidehi) was kidnapped and Jatayu was killed. A meeting with Sugreeva happened and Baalee was killed. Then travell across the great See happened. and Lankapuri was burnt. Thereafter Ravana and khumbhkarna was killed. And this is Ramayana.

She my trueself

" Thought she was there no more
but she still jolts me.
thought I was not defined by her any more
but she still explains a lot of me.

Thought I breath air of my own,
but still its not my true identity.
thought I don't owe any thing to her,
but I have no such feeling any more.

There she is again more than she was before,
And I do know she is the one, I truly adore."

Susceptible I

I have never found myself more susceptible to new ideologies, ways of thinking and ways of doing things than I am finding these days. Some days ago I was reading a book about "Special theory of relativity" and there I read this chapter about time dilation. I was so moved by this. I was reading this in my office bus and as soon as I understood that our concept of time is not absolute, I was awestruck. I was not able to speak any sentence, I just wanted to think more and more about it. I started thinking about that basic "mosquito in a train example" ( general theory of relativity) and then tried to relate it to slowing of clock ( can be explained on the basis of special theory of relativity). Oh man, I don't remember when I got down from bus and when did I reached my flat. I was so much in to it. I had read this theory before but never was so overwhelmed.
Some days ago I completed book "Discovery of India" and as soon as it was finished,I felt a strange void. The conception of man's thought, his purpose on earth made me feel uneasy. What I am doing? What should be done? Should man seek balance in his life or should he become an individualist and an extremist. All these things had never struck me like this ever before.
Yesterday, I watched 2 movies- " Secret Window" and "In to the Wild", I was so amazed to see movie:"In to the wild". Is man a force of universe? How small are capabilities in comparison to the might that of a river? Why at all we sometime try to go against nature? Why this society? why don't we live as animals in pure coherence with nature?
I have noticed that I have too many questions these days and have very few answers. And somehow, I try to get answers for these complex questions by some rudimentary thinking. I sometimes reach somewhere and most of times I am lost in my thoughts.I know I get a lot of pleasure thinking and which drives me to keep doing so. But this sometimes disturbs me a lot, I get a little absent minded. For instance on Friday after reading after reading this theory of relativity I was nowhere. I was lost somewhere.

I believe I may not get answers for these questions of mine, but somehow this thought process helps me develop me as an Individual. I think this has something to do with my age that I am so susceptible to thinking. And more because of the fact that earlier probably my IQ was not so much that I could appreciate real beauty of all these thoughts. And that is one thing I can be happy about. Ultimately the fact is that I am too susceptible these days and don't know how many new questions will come to me? And eventually how many more dimensions will be added to my perspective further?

Uddvelan

"It hits hard. And leaves no chance to do so. Demon is always there.
sometimes it pushes hard and sometimes just a gentle wipe. The sun rises.and there is always a night after..I think why? Snakes come to me,hiss and try to scare me but never bite. Anyway eventually I have no place to run" Professor is suddenly awakened from his dreams. He has been dreaming a demon since last some days and is aware of doing so. The girl on the next seat is very cautiously watching this old man.She starts crying. The professor feels helpless.What is happening to him? Sometimes he dreams a war, some times he dreams a young man bare chested with blood all around. Sometimes there is light and patterns formed as in Young's double slit experiment. "Oh..Young Double slit experiment..Oh class..Oh what is time: its 9:30..Oh Shit,Late again.Professor sees the crying girl.she is again watching him carefully but this time smiling". Professor checks his notes.They are with him. Fine!! Professor sings to himself: "stayin alive..stayin alive..ah ah ah..." the girl is relaxed now.and so is prof.
Professor is a Physics Teacher in 'Boys High School'. He is again late for class as usual.

Note: I feel as if some burden is off me. I don't know how it happened.

Mile Sur Mera Tumhara: India, Unity in Diversity

Yesterday I happened to see Doordarshan's Old song " Mile Sur Mera Tumhara" on DD Bharti. For those who don't know about this song, Here is introduction that it used to be telecasted on DD National earlier almost 3-4 times in a day and has first lines as " Mile sur mera tumhara to sur bane humaaara". Then in the song many people and prominent personalities from different part of contry are shown singing these lines and then all of them are shown to assemble at a place so as to form a symbolic Indian map. Little kids with Candles are shown, with Candles in their Hands and they Create an India. Song is just one click away at YouTube.
I remember when I was a kid, I kind of not liked it because I had to wait for my favourite serial Mahabharata for some more time because of this song. But at that age also it used to generate a sense of Indianness among me. It was my first introduction to a South Indian Language or a Marathi people singing this song in marathi language. It was the song that subconsciously made me aware of India being a diverse country and all of us being a thread to its diversity and yet being united to make this beautiful collage. I consider myself lucky to have been later in a MNNIT Allahabad, where I came in contact with people from all parts of India ( In all NITs in India we have quotas for persons from all states of India) and felt the richness of India because of this diversity. I always have seen this diversity as our unique strength.
But now that I have grown up, I have other feeling also, for this "Unity in Diversity" Tag. Sometimes I think that we(Indians) have spent only 61 years as country India. Earlier there were provinces and there was no concept of India as a nation. So if you consider this, you would realise that out of say 5000+ years we have been India only for 61 years. And precisely grew united because of urgency during freesom movement of India, which provided us a common cause. And as we all know that even for Freedom we had to become divided in India and Pakistan ( though it was because of many reasons yet the baseline was our diversity,religious in this case. And Besides we had Leadership of some great figures of Indian History like Mahatma Ghandhi, or some others, and they were the ones who helped in development of concept of nation India.
But now after 61 years, does it not look like we are falling apart? Consider these recent separatist movements for separate Kashmir,earlier for separate Khalistan, North East and in Tamilnadu. I read this Statement from Arundhati Roy some days earlier that Kashmir should be given Freedom from India. I understand, that the statement is emotional to a large extent but it has an intellectual basis also. Does it not strike you since we have no common cause like freedom struggle today, we are moving towards separation which is our natural tendency because of so much diversity? I mean we always say that India in unique because of "Unity in Diversity", but to me it looks like that this diversity alone does not let us to become united naturally.
Well, This is just a thought that I do not subscribe very well for even myself. But somehow it makes some sense. and if you think more on this point, it makes greater sense. It seems natural that we have Naxalism,Bodo terrorism or many such other problems.
But On thinking more I find out that No, we have a common Thread, a sense of being Indian, which I am ignoring if I say that separation is our natural tendency. If Abhinav wins a Gold Medal, a Tamil is as happy as a punjabi. And Its been like this since ages that people at one part of India have mourned in sufferings of people elsewhere in India. This common thread is precisely the same feeling that I used to get watching "Mile Sur Mera Tumhara". This is our common Pulse that beats loud and keeps doing so. I felt this Pulse when I was at MNNIT Allahabad,I felt this pulse when I was at IPL match at Delhi,when India won T20 World cup,when we won 3 medals at olympic, when I ate Khicdi in Pongal at Allahabad, or even when I felt pain after bombblasts at Ahmedabad. But I feel we should strive to keep this pulse beating. For Instance I am surprised to see why Doordarshan does not Telecast "Mile Sur Mera Tumhara" any more. Why can't I&B ministry push other TV channels to do so. Some give economic agrument against this, but Money in one hand in counrty in other! Choice is simple. It is very imporatant that we become aware of this pulse and then try and not block it in anyways. Because Propagandas are created repeatedly which can effect our subconscious thinking, like the statement that of Arundhatui Roy. Well, at last I would say that we should enjoy this richness of Indian Diversity as this is very unique strength or ours and makes us True nation in many ways.

"Mile Sur Mera Tumhara to sur bane hamaraa"

India, My Country

Sometimes I think why at all freedom was required for India. In other words I would say I try to think about a scenario in which India does not become free in 1947. After a lot of thought I most of the times reach to a conclusion that, in order to become a world leader or a world power one elementary condition is to become free. And more so for India because arguably we were once world leader in ancient times and we were the ones who made significant inroads in field of mathematics, art, law, philosophy, Religion and other fields and it was us from whom most of these things flowed to other parts of primitive human civilization. But that again, that was only in ancient times. I also find out one more reason that is that we Indians are capable of becoming world leaders again, we are a country which deserve to be second to none.
For Instance a Ramanujam was a clerk in Madras, did not have proper food and other basic amenities of life. But when he was sent to a British university, He grew to be considered as one of the greatest mathematician of his decade. I just quote this example here because I think that Indian mind is some how capable of taking human civilizaion to steps further in many directions. And it was therefore a necessity for country India to become free to become creative and original in its ideologies and Ideas. And It was also necessary to ensure that every Indian gets proper food, clothing and basic amenities of life so that he can move ahead and innovate.
Some days earlier I saw bribery scandal being divulged in the Parliament and I was shocked. I was more ashamed because the MP's who brought money to Parliament considered it to be some kind of victory with out being even slightly thoughtful about the fact that whole world was watching at this mockery of Indian democracy. Some of them must be joking at us and some of them may even have contempt in their minds for us. That day there was a mention of Bomb Blast in Jammu Kashmir in news paper, and I was surprised to see that it was so taken for granted that no body paid attention to this. It looked as if Life of people at Jammu Kashmir holds no significance for us. No statement from Home minister, no consolations for people those died. The only news that was in lime light was this Bribery scandal.
If I summarise my feeling to some words at that moment it was not any kind of disappointment or sorrow, rather this was an acute pain. I just felt- 'oh shit'. I was feeling as if I just wanted to go somewhere where I just can't think about this.
Then came next day, Bomb blasts at Banglore, I was again deeply shocked. Next to that day I was going to watch a movie and some of my friend mentioned that its not safe. I just had an argument with him that its ridiculous to think like that. I mean, we should/have right to feel safe at least in our country. But then the same day, there were blasts at Ahmedabad, next day live bombs found at Surat. Should we really feel safe? Lets not discuss about right of feeling safe.
And then came statement from one of members of a major national party that these bomb plantings and blasts were done to divert attention from Bribery scandal. My God! what an opportunism. What has happened to us, where is that cohesive view of India where we call her our motherland and think that we can do anything for her. What about Indians being people who will give world new directions ? I thought that there would be some statement from our Prime Minister or President with an assurance. but that was not !!! It looked as if feeling of being Indian was being hit , the pride behind it is being hit from all sides. The pain became more acute.
It was only the next day when I woke up and came in balcony and saw temple bell ringing and a flag over it, I felt no, its not all bad. I was coming to office and saw people talking to each other happily, some hugging each other, I felt relaxed. I felt no, spirit of my motherland is alive and we are moving ahead. I also thought probably it is this spirit that has kept us bounded and very much alive since ages. And this thought improved my feeling of relaxation to a certain optimism and certain happiness. I felt as if my blood pressure is decreasing and took a deep breath and a sigh of relief.