My Father

Kids love their parents. Why? Because they are understanding. They are friendly and they can share anything they want to with them. I love my parents too. But my father? I'm scared of him to death. Sharing things? Oh no. I don't even tell him jokes. He'll ask me ye kahan padha. And then I'm gone. 

So why am I writing this? Because I know that the only person who'll read this will be you, papa. The day you'll read this, if you'll read this, you'll either lose it, call me mentally unstable and mannerless and compare me to Yashu Dadda Or you'll understand and maybe, things will get better for me. Who knows though. I don't know. 

Pseudo-modernist. Can I use this word? Because that is what you are in my opinion. Why? You see, this is the 21st century. 2021. You talk of technology and how important it is nowadays. You talk of youth and how smart it is. You know that 80% of the youth has a phone, right? Those fantastic children whom you give me example of, they have it? You know that? You took the old one I had away. And neither can I use mumma's. I am not that big of an idiot or a loser or a "doesn't know what's good for her" girl as you think I am. Just because I have an Instagram account doesn't mean I am a failure or a slut as you indirectly called me that day. Same goes for my friends on it. They are not fools. Or "berozgaar" "bekaar" as you call them. I talked to like 4 people. We talked of universities and colleges and future jobs and opportunities. Not everyone talks trash and flirts and starts affairs on the social media. I have this one person. Just one. I happen to be loyal. He's a school topper. Preparing for JEE. We hardly texted. Once in the morning. Once at night. But you think he's a cheater. If you think that way, I don't know then. You see, "you crave for the thing that is taken away from you". Now give me Soni Mausi ki betiyon ka example. I said " Taken away" not "never given". Those girls were raised that way. Soni mausi said, she never goes out, dost nahi hai, akeli rehti hai. Those must be good life skills, right? 

Also, can we talk about the way you speak, papa? Mujhse to rehne do, how do you talk to and about your wife? Then you say you're not like dadaji. I mean there's a manner of speaking. Leave it. I can't teach you papa. It's me who learns from you. But believe me, I'll never ever be the way you are. You told me dadaji used to say, "tere liye sabzi ka thela laga doonga". You say, " Tumhari shadi kara doonga". It's worse only if you think of it. Shadi mujhe karni hogi to kar loongi. But I want to become something. I want to earn. Alot. I have a lot of dreams and wants and I'll get them. Also, I can not live with you taunting me for not doing anything in life and god forbid my husband turns out to be like you. So don't worry, I'll be on my own and I'll do well. 

You remember papa when my 10th boards result came in and you said, "Congratulations. You have passed. " Pass hote hain 32% wale. I had scored 93%. I could've done better but believe me, I'll remember this till the day I'll die because I saw some kids whose parents' celebrated their 70-80%.

You don't let me go out. I cried on my birthday to go out. Remember you used to be out with your friends all the time when you were my age? Remember? Scooter rides, adventures? Now say ki tumhari hi bhalai ke liye hai. Really? 1-2 mahine mein ek baar bahar jane se insaan bekaar ho jata hai? You don't trust me at all. But still, I'll say it. I've never had alcohol, I've never tried drugs, never smoked. Nothing. Par nahi. I'm a loser. I know nothing. Wo jo mall pe ghumte hain? You call them berozgaar launde? Dhoka dena wali ladkiyan? Those are college/school students. They will be berozgaar. You aren't allowing me to do a part time job, wo kya hi karenge. And not all girls and boys are dhokebaz. It's just that some parents are very understanding. Just because he's a boy doesn't mean I am having an affair with him. 

This brings me to the topic of part time jobs. Why do I want to do it? Because papa asking you for money is like "apne paer pe kulhadi maarna". Why? Remember you said, " Maine kabhi apne baap se paise nahi maange". Good for you. But I need money. You know why, you were out with friends, having the time of your life. You were happy. I can't do that. So I look for happiness in materialistic things. This shirt, those shoes, that shampoo. This is why I want to do a part time job. Aur nahi hota mujhse ye sunne wala kaam. I'll do something. Anything. 5-6 hazaar milenge. My needs are like of 2-3 thousand. Baaki mumma ko bhej doongi because she's going through this for even longer. 

You ask me to study? Yes that's for my good. I know it. Par ye subah aake aise zor se curtains kholna, complaining about everything in my room, udhar nahi idhar baithke padho. What does this has to do with my studies. Bed pe baithu ya sofe pe ya table pe. What's the difference? I study, I study well. You don't have to doubt that. 

Call this a complaint list but it's just things I've had in my mind since forever. What did I ever do papa? Anything that is making you do all this? Why do you think I'm the worst kid in the world, ever? 

Why would I ever lie if you understood and appreciated my truth? 

I've said to myself, " Bas ek saal aur". Save all the money you want, talk as badly to me as you want to, behave this way. Trust me, once I'm out of here, I'm never coming back. Never. Atleast treat mumma nicely. 

If you'll want to scold me after reading this, then just ignore this. Think that I never wrote it. Because I failed. 

I'm sorry. I hope you'll read it. 

*he's not a bad person. He's my father and I love him. But sometimes things pile up in my head and hence, I decided to vent it out here. 

News vis-à-vis Views; Indian Media.

 

So the Indian media might lag behind in keeping us informed but it’s always there to keep us entertained.

“गौर से देखिये इस इंसान को!” (Look at this person carefully!) And honestly, I am intrigued to look at the man then. I mean that’s good, right? Well good or not, it’s definitely entertaining. Also, the way anchors and reporters read out the news is so dramatic. It’s full of emotions, feelings. It’s like looking at a drama and well, getting a little informed along with it.  They narrate the incidence in a way that the viewer has no choice but to listen to them. “यार ऐसे बोल रहा है तो कुछ हुआ ही होगा” (If he is speaking this way then something must’ve happened, man). And I have no problem with this, its good because people really do watch news because of this.

And well the English Indian channels are the same too (except some of course). The dramatic and aggressive narrative, the long ads (well I really don’t like the fact that ads are shown in between news. We are here for information not products. I mean a Zandu balm ad between a discussion on the Galwan valley is just pathetic) and weird titles (Example-हाफिज का ख़ास, कश्मीर में बना लाश) are common to both Hindi and English channels.

Also, these channels show very news-irrelevant shows too. Like they show Entertainment news in the afternoon. Entertainment…news. Well aren’t these literally juxtaposed? But my real problem is with the name of them (I mean सास, बहू और साजिश। Come on!) and they also show the horoscope programmes in the morning which isn’t news but well some people do seriously watch and follow it so let’s let them do it peacefully.

Another thing that I don’t like is the pointless debates. Everyone on the panel is screaming and shouting utter gibberish and there is no conclusion to these debates. People very often use very bad language and the mediator or the anchor appears to be biased towards some people or views. There were so many debates during the CAA-NRC times but they were all pointless. There was no para-to-para debate on it which is kind of disappointing.

It is disheartening to see that our media is TRP-oriented. They don’t show actual news or news which is important. Today, they have sidelined issues like Corona and poverty and unemployment and are focusing on Sushant Singh Rajput case instead. Now that is very important too but other pressing and significant matters cannot be neglected for it. And even if they do show TRP-oriented news, they should atleast do a proper follow-up. They take up a sensational news and then just leave it. The channels focus more on views than on news.

The news channels are hiring a lot of female anchors and reporters nowadays which is amazing. It shows that women are now just as good and well-informed as men to spread news. The leading reporters and anchors of majority of the news channels are women which is symbolic of the growth of the female gender in the country. These women are so confident and they are such good orators that we feel overwhelmed. (Now another reason for this might be to intrigue the male population but I would rather take this positively.)

“You do your act, turning it into a scam is our guarantee.” This must be changed. Our media should change its system almost completely. There is no denying the fact that these channels provide us with loads of information from all over the country which is a big deal as we are a population of 135 crores, spread over an area of 3.24 million sq.km. But the media system indeed requires a reformation as they are the ones who keep us aware and informed and the correct and proper information is very very essential.

Ram is back home.

 

   

‘Hindustan’. The land of ‘Hindus’ (now I am not saying that this stands for the religion Hinduism but this word has been used for the area which is east of the river Indus and the religion of the majority of people living here IS Hinduism or idolatry). And still, it took us 500 years to build a temple of Lord Ram, in a place that we believe is his birth land.

So it is believed in the Hindu religion, that Lord Ram was born in Ayodhya and that there was a huge temple, which had been made and developed by old kings and locals, on the disputed land. Later, Babar came to India and obviously in order to spread his kingdom and his religion, he severely damaged the mandir or rather destroyed that centuries old temple complex which not only had a religious place in the hearts of the Hindus but also, represented our old art, culture and traditions, and built a mosque over it. Hence that mosque came to be known as ‘Babri Masjid’.

Now this is the story of about 500 years back. Since then, the Hindus have been relentlessly trying to rebuild a ‘Ram Mandir’ on the disputed land. Being a population of 120 million, Hindus have been generous and kind-hearted enough to try to solve the issue by meetings, discussions, negotiations, legal methods and other non-violent ways. 1 man, Mr. Ansari, was living in Ayodhya itself, surrounded by Hindus, and was fighting against them. Do I think that something like this could’ve happened in any Islamic or Muhammedan state? Definitely not. We are a very flexible, loving, accepting and humane religion. We think of the Muslim population as a part of us. For us, the Muslims are Hindustani too. So instead of using the hook or crook method, we chose the civilised way (unlike Babur, from Uzbekistan, 500 years ago).

The ‘Ram Mandir’ or the Ayodhya dispute had been going on for years. The British courts have also looked into this matter. But that “looking into” was of no use, of course. It was after our Independence that the real struggle started. In 1947, an idol of Lord Ram was found inside the mosque. From then on, the hearts of the Hindus started swelling with faith. Since then, the dispute had been in the local courts. The previous Governments had always sidelined the issue, being not very keen to resolve it. After the failure of the ‘Karseva’ yatra in 1990, where protesters were fired upon by the Mulayam Singh Yadav Government, in 1992, under the leadership of Mr. Lal Krishna Advani, a ‘Rath yatra’ was started from Somnath in Gujrat to Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh. This was when the dispute was taken up properly, politically. A lot of ‘Karsevaks’ came to Ayodhya and protested in front of the disputed structure, asking the Government and the Judiciary to build a mandir in its place. After protesting for a few days, the ‘Karsevaks’ lost their temper and destroyed the disputed structure on 6^th December 1992.  So many people died in the struggles and riots that took place for the construction of mandir or which happened as a result of the destruction of the disputed structure.

Finally in 2002, the case went to the Allahabad High Court. The Court ordered the Archaeological Department to survey the disputed land and dig to find any evidences of a Mandir. The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) gave its report to the High Court in a “sealed envelope”, without making it public and in 2010, the High Court gave its verdict and divided the disputed land into 3 parts. But the Muslim side wasn’t happy with that so they took the case to the Supreme Court of India. Since 2010, the case had been pending in the Supreme Court. The Muslim side appeared not to be very eager to resolve the issue and continuously delayed it. They also called in political assets and were shrewd enough to ask the Supreme Court to delay the decision until the end of the General Elections 2019. And this was said by their lawyer who happens to belong to one of India’s biggest and the oldest political party. But since 2014, the case had been progressing at a comparatively faster pace. 120 million Hindus gave the decision of their faith, into the hands of 5 people. Daily hearings were held between August and October 2019 and finally on 9^th November 2019, the Supreme Court gave its verdict according to which, a temple was to be built on the disputed land. The verdict of the Supreme Court was very amicable though as 5 acres of land was offered to the Muslim community in Ayodhya itself. Finally, Lord Ram was served justice.

Within the battles of religion, it was ultimately the Constitution and the Judiciary who were the real winners. The huge temple will be built by the next 3 years and Ayodhya will officially become the Ram Janmbhumi. I wish that in the future, Lord Ram’s temple, who is considered to be “Maryada Purushotam” (man of men), becomes a symbol of unity, grace, peace, courage, equality, sacrifice, upliftment of poor and justice.

 

Suicide: An Option for No Option!

    

"Suicide is not the option." Everyone says this. And I agree. It is not the option. Things do get tough in life and it feels as if it is impossible to deal with them. But we just have to think that this is not how it will be in the future and then just let it go.

Sushant Singh Rajput committed "suicide" on 14th June 2020. Well it was indeed shocking. Why would someone that rich,that famous, commit suicide? A lot of people called him a coward,they said that he couldn't even deal with his problems. Well suicide is a big deal,isn't it? If he did it,he must've had a reason. Maybe that was too big, maybe too small. But it was definitely out of our understanding and hence, we have no right to call him a coward for this.

I remember that I thought that if he did have problems regarding his Bollywood career, he should've just left it all. He was pretty rich after all, he could've bought a house in some mountains or something and should've lived there peacefully. But I guess somethings really do eat you up on the inside,huh?

And well, Sushant's girlfriend is now being held responsible for his "suicide". Not a rival, frenemy or a stranger, but the girl he fell in love with. It's ironic how people closest to you could do so much damage to you. Having people you love is a true blessing but these people do hurt us sometimes . Maybe they don't even realise it  but they do. But giving up on life because of these people isn't right either. Future will be better. It has to be. Go away from people who hurt you as soon as you can because life is too precious to give up on because of some inconsiderate and mean people.

Sushant was a self-made man. He started from the bottom and indeed, he reached the top. He had money, fame, talent and perseverance. Then what led him to this? Maybe lack of self-respect? Maybe too many restrictions? Maybe too many ambitions? Maybe not having anyone who understood him? Maybe something else.

Whatever it was, we are no ones to judge him for it. As I have mentioned this before a lot of times, he had everything, at least everything materialistic. So if a person gave up on life after reaching the top, there has to be a reason.

Though I do stand by what I said in the beginning, suicide is not the option but if someone did commit suicide, for them it must've been the only option. Not having anything to look forward to, not being able to express yourself or getting called out for expressing yourself, having no one who listens to you, these are all problems and so are not being able to achieve your goals, having too many expectations, feeling like you are never enough and feeling like a disappointment.

There are many possible reasons why Sushant committed "suicide". And if he didn't, then I do stand by the people who are asking for justice. Nepotism is indeed a huge problem in India. There should be a fight against it. So many people like Sushant would benefit from it. Real talent should always prevail over money and reputation.

In the end, I would like to give my heartfelt condolences to Sushant and every other person who ever committed suicide and to their families. You all tried, but things must've been very tough. I am so sorry for that. Rest in peace.

For people who think that it is the option:

Suicide prevention helpline-91-9820466726 (AASRA)

Edit: Since I am a beginner, I request all of you to kindly give me suggestions so that I can improve myself. And also, I've got a great suggestion already!

So I was told that now 'commit suicide' is not considered the appropriate usage. Psychologists and mental health literature now use 'died by suicide' instead. Reason being that 'commit suicide' is like committing a mistake. Hence, 'died by suicide'.