<SASIKALA OATH, SLAPPING AMMA’S GRAVE
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India is a vast land of such great diversity that we learn new things about the customs and practices in different parts of the country every day.
But for the social media and word wide web, many would not have known that slapping a Continue reading A Grave Situation
The ight of choice is the essence of democracy.
We are an independent, democratic, nation because we choose – between our caste and the rival caste, between fair and black faces, between the known devil and the unknown.
We choose between prostrating, grovelling and cringing before a fair lady and a black man who was doing the same along with us just a few weeks ago. All because she danced around trees with a ‘star’ whom we adored. Continue reading Slaves By ‘Democratic’ Choice
Chinnamma sheds tears with television cameras focussed on her. OPS stages a drama at the Amma Samadhi earlier. Hundreds tweet comments and jokes on the power struggle.
Public memory may be phenomenally short, but not short enough to forget a letter of apology by Sasikala declaring her family members who had become power centres and reportedly amassed wealth as ‘personal non grata’ and then see them all there, as soon as Amma died, to take over the house whose whose doors were closed for them.
So the promise in the letter to keep them away was a lie? The humble, grovelling, ‘mixture mama’ was good enough to be CM thrice, but suddenly becomes a ‘traitor’!
How could a people known to be highly intelligent and capable stand the sight of ministers and legislators prostrating before a ‘leader’, see a Chief Minister to be treated like a menial and stopped from seeing the dying leader after going to the hospital every day for weeks or fall for a politics of freebies and sops to voters at tax-payers’ cost?
The social media are flooded with jokes and comments about the political developments in Tamil Nadu, which seem to be driven by tears, melodrama, Twitter tweets, WhatsAppp posts and blatant power-struggle based not on ideology, policies or capability but personality and gimmicks..
Can politics get dirtier?
When I joined a newspaper in 1957 after a few contributions were published, it was under a notion that journalism, in a way, was meant for the betterment of society and therefore was social work, the field I was associa
ted from the age of 14.
It took me decades to realise that I was wrong. The Press of the freedom struggle days has become extinct. Print medium is overwhelmed by the TRP-driven electronic media with its sensationalism and hype. Both, therefore, have no time and space for anything not sensational or ‘hot’ news.
What should be the eyes and Continue reading Our Blind, Frivolous Media
Years ago, waiting at Chennai’s Meenambakkam airport for a flight, I was discussing the political situation with some locals. The DMK , in power, was f
acing a big challenge from AIADMK in the elections just around the corner.
The locals said corruption was the main issue as people were fed up with paying bribes for getting anything done.
A few months later I was there again and the locals I was talking to included one who was present earlier. I asked how the AIADMK rule was. “The DMK people took money for everything. The AIDMK people take money and do nothing,” was the reply. Both were same. Personalities alone counted.
The silly comedy now playing
out in Chennai made it a political tragedy. Continue reading A Comic Tamil Tragedy
India, many feel, is an oasis in the desert of failed democracies.
The 
world has too many dictatorships, starving nations where the ‘ruler’ spends millions on his birthday, ‘elected’ leaders who refuse to step down as their term ends, countries with fake elections controlled by army and religious hatred for neighbour or contestants who declare they would accept an electoral verdict only if they win!
Is it really an oasis or just a mirage where most parties are ruled by dynasties? A party whose members wag their tails at dynastic bosses calls others ‘dogs’ and thinks one family won the freedom for the country all others who died for it were fools. And that too just because it took on the name of the group of people who fought for Independence and Continue reading An Oasis Without Water
n the Western model of democracy which India chose to adopt, 51 is right and 49 is wrong.
This poses the danger of a demagogue appealing to chauvinistic nationalism or religious fanaticism, or promising populist measures to create a “wave” and get the support of 51 per cent who are wrong as against the 49 who are right. With dozens of parties and low voting, Continue reading Democracy And The Mob
This year, 2017, seems to be the year of 
walls. And the writing on the wall is clear for all to read.
The ideal of One World, global village and of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam (world as one family) envisaged by ancient Indian scriptures may be buried in the foundations of the wall the US President, Donald J. Trump, has ordered to be built.
As I write this, on Sunday, Germany celebrated the silver
Continue reading The Writing On The Wall
For the last some months I have been hearing several non-fiction books – yes, not reading but hearing audiobooks downloaded from a library abroad, though I still like the feel of printed books, going back to re-read passages, mark and saving quotes.
Perhaps hearing books is a preparation for possible blindness (though I wish not to live so long) from a neglected, incurable, glaucoma that causes total loss of vision.
Clicking on a ‘like’ on my post, I read (justanothersinglegirlinlondon.wordpress.com) Giulia’s fascinating account of her dining in total darkness at a London restaurant, Dans
le Noir. It made a good read. Continue reading Are We Blind Towards The Blind?
–Courtesy Prakash Hegde
WhatsApp has become so much a part of our lives that there is hardly an urban Indian who is not only on the app but also on one or several groups of the messaging service.
Some find WhatsApp a big nuisance with lengthy forwards and data-consuming videos Continue reading Growing Up In Information Age
