Voice of Merituous

(Premise: The Voice of Meritorious must rise. I ask you, each one of you, to write a blog about it, voice your opinions, in your strongest words, let the voices together tower to a proportion where the politicians and the voters can hear it.

I am writing this piece SATURDAY, APRIL 22, 2006. I hope you guys will pitch in your voices through your own blogs starting MONDAY APRIL 24.)

In 1990, I saw thousands of people protest against the implementation of Mandal Commission recommendations. Hundreds in each state committed suicide, burnt themselves to death. The reservation quotas were increased. Protests died out. It was like a communist whim or a socialist myth triumphing over the intellectual common sense. In fifteen years since, we have seen people with shameful scores get through exams for their caste allows them special privilege. They get into the schools, where they don't deserve to be on pure intellectual merit, then they get all the scholarships too (mostly irrespective of how much money their family makes), and most of them manage to scrape through with just pass scores. But since the reservation regime is so biased in their favor, they get into jobs which they won't deserve if merit was the sole criterion, they are promoted faster than their "upper class counterparts" who by now are expected to understand that merit, good work is not the card to be played these days, and then these guys are in best position to have their own kids benifit from the reservation policy.

The politicians are shrewd enough to keep Parliament out of 33% Women Reservation Bill, and 50% OBC/SC/ST Reservation. They impose will wherever they can. The latest fear of raising the quota in IITs and IIMs is a simple example of how little some people comprehend the value of hard-working intellegesia. Social change cannot be brought out by killing the merit, by drowning the standards, by propping up mediocricity, by discrimination based on caste or tribe. I would have never known or figured for some people that they belonged to a certain caste, till I saw them get what they did not deserve based on just birth. The idea of reservation is a flawed idea, that allows the richest among those castes to benifit the most, and benefit generation after generation. It selects less than the best for psoitions where better people could really allow better cure as doctors, better product as engineers and better overall administration as bereaucrats. It leaves despair in the heart of deserving.

In our country, we are born unequals, for reservation allows certain castes, classes and tribes easier access to colleges and jobs.

In our country, we discriminate against our own people for discrimination carried out in previous centuries, we as kids are supposed to understand that our high birth means we need to strive harder than others to achieve something, because our forefathers were unwilling to allow some castes access to certain professions.

In our country, we think at by having 50% of people in a Medical College come from undeserving students, (based on intellect or merit), we will transform the society into a healthier one.

In our country, where we are striving towards a free market economy, where our GDP growth and industrial and social progress is going to depend on how well we attract foreign investors and compete on international scale, on international scale where they judge only the product, WE EXPECT to compete by using our convulated standards where half of the engineers and managers may be below par, but are there for they belong to classes that must be mollycoddled for mostly political reasons.

In our country, we don't get richer or poorer based on caste. The "UN-SCHEDULED" classes have their own share of economic and other disadvantages. Allow poorer students easier access to schooling, provide them free books or free lunches, but PRAY PLEASE DON"T GIVE SOMEONE GRACE POINTS FOR HE IS FROM A PARTICULAR CASTE. Give them opportunity to do well, training to do well, but please don't impose the undeserving on positions that they donot merit.

For kicks, if IITs and IIMs need to have more reservation quota just because it is ticket to high paying jobs, I strongly insist on a 50% quota in Indian Cricket Team, in Olympic Teams, in Parliament.

In our country, where we need to come through a killer competition at every stage of our life, where it is so easy to lose hope and disappear, where places like IITs and IIMs are places that keep the flame of toil and well-deserved returns alive, WE WISH TO CONDEMN ourselves to a lack of vision by allowing people graduate without their deserving to graduate, get the jobs they did not earn by meeting the scientific standards, take decisions about rest of us by sitting on chairs that are propped by a class contigency.

WE CANNOT JUST STAND AND STARE.
WE CANNOT BE QUIET AND SCARED.

The Voice of Meritorious must rise. I ask you, each one of you, to write a blog about it, voice your opinions, in your strongest words, let the voices together tower to a proportion where the politicians and the voters can hear it.

I am writing this piece SATURDAY, APRIL 22, 2006. I hope you guys will pitch in your voices through your own blogs starting MONDAY APRIL 24. I will keep posting more stuff myself; but we all must pitch in our strongest opinions and post them on every wall, till the wise blind men we have elected see that the MERITORIOUS HAVE A VOICE.

Review: We The living by Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand's We The Living is a novel set in Russia right after the revolution ended and explores the lifes and times of primarily three individuals: Kira, the female who wants to be an engineer and is passionately in love with Leo, the son of former Army General and the immistakable Andrei, who has risen from streets to become a formidable communist. To complete the cast is Victor, Kira's cousin, who does the needful to shed his bourgeois past and rise through the ranks, Pyerov and Sonia, who in their own way use communism to become richer and powerful, and other members of Kira's family. The novel dwells on how revolution alters not only their daily lifes, morals, ambitions but also reveals their base and basic human character. It is a tale of falsified hopes, broken dreams, corruption, love, and of the struggle of someone to survive a political system that is of utmost dislike to him/her.

Perhaps as the first book to come out of communist Russia, We The Living has gained more respect than it merits on basis of just literary qualities. Like all her heroes and heroines, Rand's prime suspects here are three idealists who seek to justify their different means for their selfish ends. The love triangle between Andrei, Leo and Kira is stifling reminder of how some people try to lead a dual life, hoping they can let two people be happily in love with them. Kira, who Rand wishes to potray as the martyr in her superhuman effort to be true to her individualistic ideals, and whose character is the reason for calling this novel as primarily as war of an individual against the state, fails to impress me. While the novel is a great treatize on how and why communist Russia squandered the dreams of early revolutionaries, Kira fails to impress. Her convictions are full of contradictions, as are her means and methods of achieving them. If I really want someone to read about communist Russia, I'd ask them to pick Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak. If Ayn Rand's Objectivism or Invidualism is your ideal, stop after reading Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged.

Kira's love is flawed for it lacks the honesty and fidelity that one must show towards one she cherishes. Her ideals are made ridiculous by the manner in which she sheds them for survival. Andrei is the unlikely hero, who is victim of his own idealogy, victim of treachery by both the women and the country that he tried to love and save. Leo is a failed ideal, and his character, throughout the novel does not tell me why Kira loved him so. There are other people in the novel, and Rand seeks to potray their state as the consequence of communism. Agreed, the state that supressed personal freedom and right for personal profit, must have broken the spirit of one and many. As a grim reminder of how social catastropes can alter family life, We The Living stands strong. As a ideological entity, I find it uninspiring. Fountainhead rules any day.

Review: Chronicles of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Nasar dies. Gabriel Garcia Marquez in this short, quick read novel, tells you that Nasar dies in the opening chapter. He is murdered, everyone knew he was going to be murdered, no one did enough to prevent it, and it was as if a death foretold was executed before their own eyes. The narrator tries to piece together the events and conversations that occured before and after the murder. Several stories are revealed, many incomplete ones, half-forgotten memoirs of those who saw it all happen. The novel is written with less of imagery and metaphor than Marquez usually incorporates in his writing, and so in comparison to the rich language and imagination on display in his other novels, this is more down to earth, matter of fact kind of piece.

Marquez indeed is one of the best novelists of our time. This story is harrowing in reminding us of how most of us fail to act and prevent tragedies that we could easily prevent. The bride who is returned on the night of her marriage, the brothers who must kill of save her honor and the description of merry making before the murder all add their share of spice to this tale.

Anth mein tera kaun hoga? with Translation

Anth mein tera kaun hoga,
Shubadh, prabudhh maun hoga.
Anth-arr mein aaghaat hongay
andheray, dukhadh prabhat hongay,
sur-viheen jeevan raag hoga
swapan swapan khaakh hoga
sirf tera kaun hoga
shubadh, prabudh maun hoga.

kavi vivek ki vidumbnaa yahee
kavita, kalpana ko samajay sahee
preet ka swapan tootayega
bhram ka aaina footayega
kunthit har ulaas hoga
aise mein tera kaun hoga
shubadh, prabudhh maun hoga.

praayaas ka prakram haarega
aasha ko adharm maarega
pawan mein agni uglegi
dhamniyon mein deh-shat sulgegi
aakaash aakrosh ka vistaar hoga
adhura, akela sansaar hoga
aanth mein tera kaun hoga
shubadh, prabudhh maun hoga.

spring 1998

An old poem. Two lines remain etched in my memory

anth mein tera kaun hoga
shubadh, prabudhh maun hoga


Attempting to translate it (its my own, so apologies to self for this sacrilege)

In the end who'll be yours
Anguished, immense silence yours
Injured will be self yours
Dreary, dark even dawn hours
Out of tune strung music of life
dream dream, shall be an ash pile
Only then who'll be yours
Anguished, immense silence yours.

Poet Vivek's conundrum is simply this
Poetry, imagination he as real percieves
The dream of love will disrupt
The volcano of delirium erupt
Each joy'll be stigmied, curtailed
Eternal, absolute sorrows unveiled
In all this, who'll be yours
Anguished, immense silence yours.

The valor of effort will die
Hope, through sacrileges, run dry
Even winds will bellow fire
Arteries smother like scary pyre
The sky'll be the extent of agony
Your world'll be incomplete, lonely
In the end, who'll be yours
Anguished, immense silence yours.

Translation Spring 2006
April 14, 2006


Its amazing that I am translating it after eight years. One of the long lost, nearly forgotten verses from the most prolific times in my poetic career.

Pad Thai Noodles

"Pad Thai Noodles," I decided.
"Thats what I'd like too."
I had offered to buy her lunch,
Why she accepted, I've no clue.

"I am Thai," she blurted
"But how can that be?"
Her blue eyes, blonde skin
She reckoned, "A tourist sired me."

I coughed. The Pad Thai stung.
I felt like a noodle. Senile.
She winked, "Its curious at first
But you'll love it after a while."

I tried to swallow the sudden spice
Her hands worked up her hair
She whispered, "Honey, twenty dollars,
And we both be swell out there."

I looked out of the window, a houseboat
Minutes later sounds choked her throat
The boat creaked and swayed and shouted
My tip was larger than the price touted.

As I scraped titbits off my plate
Her nudge brought me back to sense.
"What were you thinking, " she asked,
I smiled, "Oh! Just some work nonsense."

April 12, 2006
1:30 pm

A song, a conundrum.

Often its been seen
these limits-bounds on the mind
mind tries to break through
chasing unknown desires
chasing unknown hopes
mind tries to gallop through.

In these paths, in these passages
in these paths of life
of the blossomed flowers, smiling flowers
which flower must I steal
decorate in my heart.

I don't know, don't know
this conundrum, I don't know
how to resolve anything, can't figure out
who must I make my sweetheart
leave whose love and part.


Translation of the following song:

Movie Name: Rajnigandha (1974)
Singer: Mukesh
Music Director: Salil Chowdhury
Lyrics: Yogesh Year: 1974


KaIi Baar Yuu.N bhi dekhaa Hai
Ye Jo Man Kii Seemaa Rekhaa Hai
Man Tor-Dane Lagataa Hai
Anjaanii Pyaas Ke Peechhay
Anjaanii Aas Ke Peechhay
Man Daur-Dane Lagataa Hai

Raahon MeiN, RaahoN MeiN, Jeevan Ki RaahoN MeiN
Jo Khile HaiN Phool Phool Muskuraakey
Kaun Saa Phool Churaakey, Rakh LuN Man MeiN Sajaakay
Ka_Ii Baar Yuu.N Hii Dekhaa Hai ...

JaanuN Naa, JaanuN Naa, Ulajhan Ye JaanuN Na
SulajhaaunN Kaise Kuchh Samajh Na PaauN
Kisako Meet BanaauN, Kisakii Preet BhulaaN
KaIi Baar Yuu.N Hii Dekhaa Hai ...

Rosewater stain

I

My fingertips traced moonlit moments
around the dark areoles of your
fleshy imagination. Your closed
eyes enwrapped the sensation, and
the loo on my lips whispered of the
wonder you felt.

II

O dear! Why must
you color like a rosewater stain; its
only poetry, not a video recording.

III

Sparks only fly when you nails plug-in
the chasms they have created in my back.
Pain, I guess, is the switch we must
flip, before pleasure can be turned on.

IV

My ploughing of these sheets hasn't
produced a single crop. Sweat is so
salty that its useless for irrigation,
and trust me, seeds sprout only when
the season and soil are rightly chosen.

V

O dear! Why must
you color like a rosewater stain; its
only poetry, not really a memoir.

VI

Age has made your ribcage grow,
the bones seem too eager to escape-
the loosely hanging crumbling tissues
that once smelt like sandalwood
have color of dry, decaying grass.

VII

O dear! Your ash in my hand
scalds the grip that once longed to carry newborns.
As I disperse ash into Ganga, our years together
dissolve away in the eternal flow.
Soon, I'll be, in the river too.

April 06, 12:15 am & April 07, 11:00 am!


PS: I guess I post too much stuff that I cannot take pride in, but serves the purpose of experimentation and maybe teasing some people. Here is another experiment, but something I think resembles what I usually write as serious poet must:) and seldom post online!

Do tell me what you think of this one.