Political Disorder Of The Psychological Kind!

Wife: You think you are the most righteous person of the world! Always wise, considerate and honest!... I think you are just dumb!

Husband: What do you mean ‘dumb’?

Wife: ‘Dumb’ means dumb. You can never spell it out loudly and clearly in times of need. People go on doing the wrong things on you and you think God will set it right.

Husband: I beg your pardon! You never heard me talking bold or shouting?

Wife: Oh…right! You can indeed shout like hell…but only at me! To the outside world you are just dumb.

Husband: You mean to say I got my degrees, got my job and have been doing my office assignments efficiently enough…by just being dumb!

Wife: That is why you’ve progressed only this far. If you were not dumb maybe you could have been the CEO! You know what Mr. X told about you…?

Husband: Oh…shut it up! Any outside fellow saying something about me is bible for you!

Husband happened to have a high-decibel brawl just down in the campus with a few residents and the watchman on some vexing housing society issues a few days later. He enters home afterwards exuding pride and victory.

Wife: Are you crazy? Why were you howling like a madman? You just didn’t listen to anyone! …

Husband: Goddamn it! Confound it! Bullshit it! What's wrong with you? You will pick only on me when I don’t do it and you will pick on me more even when I do it!

The Government and the opposition behave similarly, if we may say so! The opposition would go on castigating the Government for not initiating the essential reforms in light of the global economic crisis for example. And, when the Government proposes hard measures or an economic reform the opposition starts castigating again citing harm to local, regional and national interests. The disorder concerning ‘doing’ and ‘not doing’ goes on…!

If an esteemed foreign source maybe the Time magazine passes a political judgment the cascading confusing madness loses all methods…!

But like in the Biggest Tennis Fight the puzzle remains as to who is acting the wife and who the husband! No gender bias please!

India Must Redefine SHAME!

Apart from rising levels of population, intolerance, violence, crimes against women and corruption the largest democracy of the world called India has been dictatorially making life most inhuman for its children—supposed to be its future. Had there been a choice many souls from the ether would have straightaway rejected the offer of getting born in India!

Endless herds of street urchins engaged or forced into begging, rag-picking, illegal trafficking and plain abuse. A whole vista of little innocent faces falling prey to the curse of child labor. NOT ENOUGH!

Lives nipped in the bud through widely practiced female foeticide and at a later stage through infanticide.  The male dominated dowry-based society bashing up and killing girl children brutally and at will. Newborn babies getting killed thanks to hospital negligence and callousness. NOT ENOUGH!

Those who are lucky to be able to get a little older despite the most hostile environment are falling into open holes that abound all around them-enticing them and trapping them in. Sufferings and deaths continuing in a vicious circle. NOT ENOUGH!

Those who are lucky to grow up in well-to-do city families are falling prey to kidnappings and physical abuse that lurk in unpredictable corners all the time. NOT ENOUGH!

A 5^th standard school girl of a cultured city of Kolkata and in a university that was founded by the Nobel prize winning poet-composer-writer Rabindra Nath Tagore. Her crime was she could not get out of her habit of bed-wetting. The hostel warden, incidentally a lady too like the Chief Minister of the state, was mercilessly decisive in punishment. The warden forced the girl student to drink her own urine to teach her a lesson for bed-wetting. NOT ENOUGH!

India must redefine SHAME and try FEELING it!

The Mingy Grandmother!

Stingy, mingy, parsimonious, frugal, prudent, thrifty—there are so many words for ‘miser’! We must be prudent in using a suitable word for our lovely grandmother who just had the habit. We decided upon ‘mingy’, but definitely ruling out the possible interpretation of ‘mean’. Hard core misers are hardly enjoyable! Those who are rather habitual ones with lots of confusion and contradiction are really amusing.

In a particular neighborhood there had been a grandmother who got the reputation of being a little miserly, but most of the times she was not taken seriously and was only laughed at. Further, she was never mingy to family and close relatives. Only when ‘others’ were concerned she behaved differently.

For all the ceremonial functions including a few weddings held in her household our grandmother always insisted on visiting the neighbors to invite. She used to meet the head of the family saying, ‘Please do come!’ and then adding in a low tone, ‘Only you…alone…okay?’ Afterwards when she found somebody attending whom she did not expect she used to accost him/her too warmly, ‘Hey dear! I am so happy you came!’ and then adding in an undertone not quite audible, ‘Would’ve been happier if you didn’t!’  

That afternoon grandmother was alone in the house with all members going out on different errands. Her youngest grandson rushed in home from school with a pal a little earlier than usual. Grandmother looked askance at the other boy!

‘Oh grandma, I am ravenously hungry! Give me something hot and tasty, quickly!’ Her grandson demanded.

‘Sure, my little darling! I’ll make you a steaming plate of noodles, two minutes…okay?’ the doting grandmother then turned to the other boy asking, ‘Dear me! You must be very hungry too, no?’

‘Yes…grand mom…!’ the boy said hesitantly.

‘Right! Then do me favor, honey! Run home quickly, have a good fill and join back here nice and cozy! Okay?’