Wake Up Or Its Never Be Tomorrow...

Yesterday, I was standing outside my Stockist Office talking on my cell phone. It was very pleasant evening. Small dapples of clouds were scattered here and there in the sky waiting to rejoin to wash the world clean. While I was talking on phone, a guy came near to me and stands there as if he was waiting for me to finish my talk on phone.
As I finished my talk, he came nearer to me and asked in Chattisgadhi language that he didn’t have had tea since morning and if I could give him a five rupee coin? That guy was of quite strong build and not from any attribute was looking like incapacitate doing work. I inquired what he is doing. He said that he is not doing any work… Then why doesn’t he work. He said, see if you want to give money give me otherwise don’t give me gyan. I would ask some other person…
What… I was almost speechless hearing this. Why mendicancy is better option than working.
I remember an incident of Mumbai. This is some five year back incident when in a pleasant evening, I was sitting opposite to Hilton Tower at Marine Drive, which once was use to be one of the favorite place of mine to sit and pass time counting waves and observing colorful people running here and there in hurry. I was just observing people there and then I saw a father – son duo sitting on the wall and talking to each other. Lot of packmans was moving on footpath to sell their products. There a small kid of age of 9 – 10 years was also among those hawkers, who were selling popcorn. The son called that kid and asked for Popcorn. The cost of one packet of popcorn was five rupee. Son gave him a 10 rupee note, took one packet and said to keep remaining money. That kid felt astonished of the situation. He was in confusion whether to keep remaining 5 bucks or not. Suddenly he picks one more packet of popcorn from his bag, kept it in the young son’s hand and ran away shouting popcorn… popcorn…
My goodness, he was just a kid and was getting 5 bucks as tip. This amount would have been enough for him to freak out and have something to eat and enjoy. But he rather behaved like a businessman and had sold one more packet of popcorn…I was amused seeing that kids great sense of decision-making.

And here is this man… I am still speechless and just want to let my subconscious mind do the work.

Today read these lines of Jigar Muradabadi. I loved it...
मैं? और तेरे इश्क के क़ाबिल? नही! नही!
मुझको मुआफ़ कर की मैं तुझसा हसीं नहीं!

Politician & Manager

Today someone asked me about the distinguishing traits of a Manager.

I think, a Manager is one who creates more Manager. He / She should mould his / her subordinates in such a way that the organisation find them to be the asset for organisation.
If a Manager is very good enough to create lot of followers, then he / she definitely is not a Manager, but a good politician.
And an organisation is definitely not a bunch of "Good Politicians". :)

The Economics of Naxalism !!!

I was in Bastar 2 days back. It is one of the district know for monolithic Naxalites problem. As I am still reading some more stuff on the topic, this is still a matter of attention for me.

There in Bastar, I came across another face of Naxalism, the commercial face.

To my great surprise, I came to know that Naxalism is no more a philosophy; it has rather became a way of making money, easy money rather.

How…

Whenever the Naxalite group call for a strike or total closure of any city, road, tehsil or village, the local businessman get the information 3 – 4 days prior to the incidence. And during these early days, they stock daily usage things and sell it at double rate to the local citizen. Hard earned money of peasant go waste for funding the Naxalite movement in a very wrong way. The money earned by the businessmen during all this black marketing gets equally divided into the Police, and the Naxalite group.
A very easy way of making money. Earned at the cost of local people, for whose right they are fighting…

Why then this movement will not flourish here!

Naxalite groups are earning money by duping people. Otherwise what differences these people have bought in the life of peasant for whose right they are fighting? Did at any place, a social justice or equality have been brought because of any Naxalite movement? Did even a single person can stand and tell the Nation that, “Yes the Naxalite Movement in their village has made a difference in his life in an incontrovertible sense?”
I think, the early people will understand the early they would come out of the anguish of being oppressed and exploited. As no one but their own well-wishers are exploiting them and letting them be like that so as to run the shop of Naxalism.

Big Nirvana in Small Happiness

I remember those pluvious days, when we had won the football match playing in rain.
And the day when I cross the railway track without falling down from my bicycle.
Those class 3rd days when for the very first time I got the remark “Excellent” in my notebook.
The day when finally my kite started flying high in the sky.
And the day when very first time, I had taken Railway Reservation standing in a queue, without doing any errs.
Oh what were those days! Very small things were giving us Elysian happiness.
After doing anything which I never had done were really giving me a great sense of accomplishment.
I was cherishing those moments.
Appreciating myself.
Oh man, u did something which was not so easy.
Where all those days did went?
Plausibly those were the days of complete bliss and delight and peace. Actually the days of Nirvana.

Naxalites: - The Transgress Mortal

Naxalism, still a topic for me to learn and understand it better.
In this quest of understanding the subject, I was literally digging my library for the whole Sunday. I got another book, which if not was on Naxalism, was somehow related to it. It was Mahashweta Devi’s “Bhookh” (भूख). Mahashweta Devi is one of the treasured Indian Author who had written books in Bangla, Hindi and English. Her novel “Bhookh” was scripted around the tribal life of “Palamu” a district of now Jharkhand. This books deals with the Zamindari Pratha and Bandhua Majduri. Here in this novel, the tribal people of Kheda, Jhujharu, Laratu and several like villages were being exploited by the Zamindar of that place. Tribal people were made slave, their ladies were being property of Zamindar, and people were forced to work for the Landlord for a handful of corn.
When the victimization had crossed all the limits, the villagers joined their hand together and formed an extremist group to fight for their rights. And to ask for their rights, they became violent and started killing people of landlord. This movement had been supported by some of the communists of nearby big towns. This way the local police started suspecting as the dawn of Naxalite movement in Palamu.

I read this novel in a single sitting on Sunday night. This may not be the documented cognitive process of dawn of Naxalism, but would definitely have been started because of all these slavery, oppression and exploitation. Though this may be one surmise. Things are not that simple as it looks like.

I remember an incident of village Bara of Jahanabad (Bihar) where in the year 1996 a more than 56 people were being killed by the Naxalite group MCC in retaliation. As per one of the report of BBC, right from 1967 till 2008, as much as 8000 people were being killed because of Naxalism. I don’t understand, by killing people, entire village and humanity how someone could establish social justice! Isn’t it a way to dissemble ones own weakness. I cannot educate my people to understand their right so I taught them to take gun and hunt for their own right… an Eye for an Eye kind of act. Though I am still digging the topic, but still I think that “The Naxalism Philosophy is good but the mechanism adopted for Social Justice is not at all acceptable by society”. This is not in the benefit of the mankind.

Tomorrow, I am going to Bastar. Probably I would get some more insight on this subject.

Naxalite Movement - An Annihilation Line

Learning new things always enamors me. And here I got a job which allows me to get divulged to various situations and places to understand, learn and experience. I was planning to go to Bastar District this month and had planned my Itinerary for the month accordingly. As a wont, before going to any place, I generally try knowing the metier of the place. This I do by asking people, or searching on internet. Here in Chattisgadh, Bastar is known for its tralatitious Bastar Art on wood and wire and most importantly know for Naxalites.
Naxalites, what is this? Who are they? Is this a philosophy or a way of life or just a criminal group? Where does this thought aroused? Lot of questions hovering inside my subconscious mind. What to do, where to go to satisfy my inner soul by answering these questions!
Yes, I have some books on the same topic. And the Ethernet world is open for me, waiting for me to log on and let me shower with the knowledge on the topic.

Naxalite or Naxalism is an informal name given to communist groups that were born out of the Sino-Soviet split in the communist movement in India. Ideologically they belong to various trends of Maoism.

The term Naxalites comes from Naxalbari a small village in West Bengal. Here a section of Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)) led by Charu Majumdar and Kanu Sanyal led a violent uprising in 1967, trying to develop a "revolutionary opposition" in opposition to the CPI(M) leadership. The insurrection started on May 25, 1967 in Naxalbari village when a peasant was attacked by hired hands over a land dispute. Local peasants retaliated by attacking the local landlords and the violence escalated. Majumdar greatly admired Mao Zedong of China and advocated that Indian peasants and lower classes must follow in his footsteps and overthrow the government and upper classes whom he held responsible for their plight. He engendered the Naxalite movement through his writings, the most famous being the “Historic Eight Documents” which formed the basis of Naxalite ideology.
This movement started going beyond the poor and peasant. The philosophy has contaminated the youth also. The Naxalites gained a strong presence amongst the radical sections of the students’ movement in Calcutta. Large number of students left their education to join revolutionary activities. Majumdar adjusted the tactics of CPI(ML), and claimed that the revolutionary warfare was to take place not only in the rural areas but everywhere and spontaneously. Thus Majumdar's 'annihilation line', a dictum that Naxalites should assassinate individual "class enemies" as a part of the insurrection was put into practice not only against landlords, but also against university teachers, police officers, politicians and others.
Throughout Calcutta, schools were shut down. Naxalite students took over Jadavpur University and used the machine shop facilities to make pipe guns to fight the police. Their headquarters became Presidency College, Kolkata.
The Naxalites soon found ardent supporters among the educated elite, and Delhi's prestigious St. Stephen's College, alma mater of many contemporary Indian leaders and thinkers, became a hotbed of Naxalite activities.

This philosophy became hot topic for film fraternity too. The British musical group Asian Dub Foundation has a song called Naxalite. This song was part of the soundtrack to the 1999 film Brokedown Palace. In 2005 a movie called Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi directed by Sudhir Mishra was released with the backdrop of Naxalite movement. In August 2008, Kabeer Kaushik's Chamku starring Bobby Deol and Priyanka Chopra explored the story of a boy who takes arms against the state.
There is a reference to a character, in the novel, The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy, joining with the Naxalites.
The 1998 film Haazar chaurasi ki Maa starring Jaya Bachchan gives a very sympathetic portrayal of a Naxalbari militant killed by the state.
The Naxalites say they are fighting oppression and exploitation to create a classless society. But since last couple of year, the way their movement have changed shows that somewhere there philosophy has been shifted from class war to a terrorist movement. In fact a week back, some of the extremists had been caught by Chattisgadh Police with very automatic weapons which was claimed to be got by some terrorist group cross border.
Though this topic on Naxalite have come to my mind randomly, unintentionally. But as I started reading to understand the movement, at some part I started getting convinced with the philosophy. No, conviction doesn’t mean that I am going to join some Naxalite group. But it means to actually see the movement closely. But then, the way this movement has started shaping, I think, the basic soul of the movement is dropping off.

Next time will write on its spreading in India.

सत्ताईस सदियों का फासला

याद आती है
कुछ सदी पुरानी वो बात
वो दिन, वो रात
जब हम दोनों प्रकति की आगोश में
एक दुसरे से मिले थे
जब हवाएं भी बोझिल हो
टुकडो में बह रही थी

जब सूरज
अपनी परछाइयो से पार पाना चाह रहा था
तुमने मुझसे मेरी नजदीकी मांगी थी
इतनी नजदीकी की दूर जा पाना नामुमकिन हो

जब शाम अपने में ही शरमाई गुलाबी हुई जा रही थी
जब परिंदे आवारगी की हद तक
अपने नीड़ की तलाश में बिखरे - बिखरे उड़ रहे थे
तुमने कहा था
हमारा रिश्ता सात जन्मो का नहीं
सत्ताईस सदियों का है

तब हवाओ ने अपना रुख बदला
और सूरज अपनी परछाइयो के पार हो आया

मैं आज भी साल दर साल जी रहा हूँ
सत्ताईस सदियों तक
तुम्हारे साथ सत्ताईस सदी तक जीने की आस में। 
-अमितेश

हिस्से की ज़िन्दगी

कहते है मिलती है एक ज़िन्दगी हमें
पूरी ज़िन्दगी जीने के लिए
कहते है एक मौत मिलती है हमें
पूरी मौत की मियाद तक
पर क्या एक ज़िन्दगी काफी है
पूरी ज़िन्दगी जीने के लिए!
या एक मौत मुकम्मल है
मौत को मृत्यु तक महसूस करने के लिए...
मैं नहीं मानता,
एक ज़िन्दगी में हमें
कई जिंदगियों से जुड़ना पड़ता है
तो कोई कैसे,
हिस्सों में उन जिंदगियों से जुड़ सकता है।
फिर तो ज़िन्दगी बाँटते-बाँटते हिस्सों में,
ख़ुद के लिए शायद ही बचे कोई हिस्सा
अपनी पूरी ज़िन्दगी जीने के लिए।
पता नहीं मरने के बाद भी कोई
अपनी पूरी ज़िन्दगी जी पाता है या नहीं।
शायद मरने के बाद भी
मौत को हिस्सों में बांटना पड़ता होगा।
-अमितेश

Unlike Glimpse of Society

While passing my time watching Discovery Channel, I was just went down my memory lane. Lot of my past experiences has been changing like film in memory. And here it is. This was the uniqueness of India I experienced, rather lived some 1 year back when I was working in Madhya Pradesh.

While touring for my work, I went to a place named “Neemuch”. This place is known for world-class opium crop. The main source of economy here is Opium. I got excited to see the Opium farm. But then my contact there has told me that I could be able to see Opium flower only in January-February because this is the month when crop reap off and beautiful white flowers of Opium cover entire field. So I will have to wait till that time. Then I heard something very unusual about this small district of Madhya Pradesh situated at the border of Rajasthan. This was, it is a district that contributes substantially to the Eye Donation to the world of people who didn’t have been blessed with the visual sense from the kind nature. In fact, if we consider here’s people word as authentic one, this is the second biggest eye donor district in the world after some district of Sri Lanka. 50% out of total natural death here donates their eyes to someone who they don’t know. Because of this quality, this place is know as “Eye Donation City”. Strange, how many people in this highly advanced mechanized world understand this human feeling of giving light to the life to those who opened their eyes to see the darkness. And here is a place, which is not so literate but still is teaching the advanced world the importance of human touch in mechanized life… In fact the entire society is having a similar thought about the importance of Eye donation. This was a very rare phenomenon, which I came across.
I was almost mesmerized. In a world where people have started developing a philosophy of “Eye for Eye”, this place enjoins the world how wrong they are. This is actually a place where human being lives in a true sense.
With a lot of good experience of this place I proceed to my next destination. It was Mandsaur, another small semi urban district of Madhya Pradesh. This is about 60 Km away from Neemuch connected through comparatively better roads, although not as per the standard. While traveling through the highway, I saw a lot of small huts spread through out a 20 Km range of the highway. These huts were characteristically made by bricks, mud and straw and were situated near the highway, drawing attention of passerby. I saw a lot of young women sitting on the cots outside their hut. They were wearing a very rural kind of make up. A make up which easily can attract the oculuses of passerby. Even their garbing was in very fluorescent colors of yellow, pink and violet. When I asked my colleague about them, he blackguarded said that this is a village known for flash trading. But how come this they can do so openly like that, when I provoked.
He said, “they belong to a particular community called “Bachada” and they are professionally into the prostitution. Even government and police know that”.
“But aren’t they taking any action towards this”.
“Arrey saab even policewala come here, enjoy and move on. They have lot of other works to do apart from this”.
This community has aroused my interest to know more about them. My colleague told me that even their male family members are acting as pander for their women. Isn’t it a diversity, which you can see only in India. Just a few miles back, there is a place which is know as Eye Donation City, and here is other which attracts people’s eye to satisfy their sexual needs. But how come male member of family act as pimp for their lady? There would be some father, some brother, some husband who would be selling their daughter, sister or wife for a couple of thousands of rupee. Is it the only way to earn money? I don’t know, but this is true that they are doing this. And this tradition they are carrying from generations. Seeing this, we must have to understand how tradition originates? Is it that this so called tradition these people are inheriting since Vedic Era or that some of the useless bastard have started selling their own lady for earning a lifestyle, instead of working himself to earn bread and butter for their family? Whatever is the reason, but the truth is that flesh trading is happening in the world that to near to the so-called sophisticated citizens. Goss, seeing this, do we have any right to say we are social people or does any society exists here in these small villages? If yes, then we seriously have to do a retrospective session, not for our own soul but in a broader sense for the entire society…