Reading a book

I have been reading(and watching) about Obama these days. This man has something in him. His story is intriguing and interesting. Young(activist-intellectual) Obama is more fascinating than the stoic man that he becomes when he is in the white house. We do get to see the flashes of his exuberant youth days when he is on the campaign trail with the sleeves of his shirt rolled up. His detractors love to dig deep into his past to find something with which to reinforce their claims that Obama is not a "Pure American" (don't ask red Indians what it means), that he is actually on a socialist mission(citation: see his mentors as well as healthcare and tax agenda) and has a soft corner for Muslims(citation: middle name 'Husein' ,Cairo speech, cold relationship with Netanyahu ) and he is there to preside over the demise of American 'exceptionalism' (citation: he reads the book "The post American world by Fareed Zakaria" ). The absurdity of such claims is axiomatic. Leaving such ridiculous claims aside and also a more reasonable critique of his policies at home and abroad which have been a disappointment for every naive observer who believed that somehow Obama would free himself from the imperatives of American establishment, I am more interested in reading and studying Obama's journey which led  him to be the unlikely president. His book "Dreams from my father" makes a good starting point. Hence, I am reading it....      

a point of view

Since the past few days, one story in the news has been intriguing my mind. It is everywhere; on the social media and news channels,dining table discussions and now in the supreme court. It is the case of the murder of a 20 yrs old Shahzeb in Karachi. Tragic as the murder of young Shahzeb is, the overwhelming attention paid to it in a country, and in a city, where daily loss of lives has now come to be dismissively described as a mere number, an arithmetic, is interesting as well as intriguing. How is the murder of Shahzeb different from the scores of others being committed daily in this ill-fated land of ours ? What makes this death worthy of so much attention of the institutions and airtime in the media when many other innocent faceless, nameless Pakistanis continue to die in the dark alleys of anonymity ? These questions are now beginning to be asked. To be sure, every death of an innocent person is tragic.Our heart goes out to the parents of Shahzeb and his loved ones. Hence, without detracting from the woefulness of Shahzeb's murder, it is important to analyse how and why it managed to garner limelight where others fail. 

The reason why this story continues to resonate so loud and clear is because of its simplistic narrative. It fits in well with the perception, real or imagined, of ruthless, arrogant and illiterate feudal lords on the one hand and the young, good looking, educated, civilized and urbane middle-class on the other. It was the binary reduction of the story to this simplistic generalization which helped it become a sort of cause celebre. However, it did not become so instantly. Media had to work overtime by creating a parallel between this ugly incident and another one unfolding across the border in which the Indian middle-class rallied around the death of a rape-victim. We have this predilection for measuring our progress against the benchmark of the progress made by our neighbour which we love to hate, something aptly reflected in the following sentiment of a cricket fan "Beat India in semis, whatever then happens in the final is inconsequential." Hence, how could our media and 'civil society' (whatever it means) lag behind their Indian counterparts which, of late, have had many reasons to take to streets (and to special TV programming and social media activism) , most notably in the case of Anna Hazare's 'crusade' against corruption (whatever happened to it).  

So, those of you who are wondering why the case of Shahzeb's murder is receiving the attention which even the en masse killing of Shias don't , well, Welcome to the unequal world where every life is not equally important. While we will have to put up with the way things work here, we hope and pray that the culprits in Shahzeb's case are brought to justice. Now that the murder of Shahzeb has received the kind of attention that the killing fields in karachi and Balochistan don't, the case should be taken to its logical conclusion. The parents of Shahzeb need solace, though nothing can make up for the loss of a young son. As for the parents of anonymous sons and daughters who get neither tombstones nor epitaphs let alone candlelight vigils and facebook pages, they might have to wait indefinitely.   

  

Of Calendars-Gregorian and Personal

Yet another New Year.  Isn't it already an oxymoron ?
Irrespective, the threshold marks nothing extraordinary on a personal level. Since our lives are not built around calendar, we will continue,as before, waiting for our own little milestones somewhere around the corner. In fact, we have our own personal calendars with different timelines marking many a beginning and end. However, since the world is celebrating "New Year", I hope the excitement around will rub off on me and help me renew my energies and spirits in order to keep moving on my own little calendar which is still not near any threshold.        

Malala is important

Malala is recuperating in Birmingham. Hope she gets well soon and blossoms back to life. Malala is important because she symbolises everything that the forces of darkness are afraid of.  A young girl ,who loves education and defies all odds to attain it, is the worst nightmare of obscurantists. Malala is also important because she has the clarity, simplicity and truthfulness of a child. It took 14 yrs old Malala to say what many grownups in Pakistan could not. It was the audacious Malala who told her countrymen living in self-delusional state of denial that "the emperor has no clothes."   

God has been kind

Fourth october, 2012

CSS result of written part has been announced and God has been really kind. Since then I have been trying to absorb the news and allowing it to sink down..It was my first attempt. It has been a long journey with many a up and down...
Although it is the result of only a written part and still a long way to go, it feels really good. For a few days, I intend to bask in its glory and then get down to the work that lies ahead.

My late uncle, you wanted to hear this good news but sadly you are not here anymore. However, I am sure you must be very happy wherever you are. You departed very early...I wish you were here with us. Miss you. (My youngest uncle passed away in nov. 2010)

I know it is not over yet and I have no illusion about the road ahead. But I am happy and relieved.



 

My favorite extract from fiction

God of small things- Arundhati roy

"Estha had always been a quiet child, so no one could pinpoint with any degree of accuracy exactly when (the year, if not the month or day) he had stopped talking. Stopped talking altogether, that is. The fact is that there wasn't an "exactly when." It had been a gradual winding down and closing shop. A barely noticeable quietening. As though he had simply run out of conversation and had nothing left to say. Yet Estha's silence was never awkward. Never intrusive. Never noisy. It wasn't an accusing, protesting silence as much as a sort of estivation, a dormancy, the psychological equivalent of what lungfish do to get themselves through the dry season, except that in Estha's case the dry season looked as though it would last forever.

Over time he had acquired the ability to blend into the background of wherever he was--into bookshelves, gardens, curtains, doorways, streets--to appear inanimate, almost invisible to the untrained eye. It usually took strangers awhile to notice him even when they were in the same room with him. It took them even longer to notice that he never spoke. Some never noticed at all.

Estha occupied very little space in the world"

The Lonely Jinnah

Inside the crowd-puller Quaid-e-Azam resided a very lonely person. Jinnah used to take long retreats, away from the noise of daily life, inside his quiet chambers, behind the walls of his home atop Malabar hill, in the detached environs of Simla and Kashmir or in the self-exile in London. This need for a measure of withdrawal was necessitated as much by his ever-weakening health as by the urge to reminisce Ruttie. The sudden departure of his lovely wife Ruttie stands out as one of the painful periods of his life. Jinnah, lovingly called ‘J.’ by Ruttie, was very secretive about his private life. Thus, one can only fantasize how he must have been seeking out those retreats to remember Ruttie, talk to her spirit, read Shakespeare to her and shed a few tears which the ‘Great Leader’ was not allowed to do in public by some unwritten rules. However, Jinnah did once break down in public. Kanji, Ruttie's closest friend, recalls, “...as Ruttie’s body was being lowered into the grave, Jinnah, as the nearest relative was the first to throw the earth on the grave and he broke down suddenly and sobbed and wept like a child for minutes together.” M.C. Chagla, Jinnah’s legal apprentice, adds, “That was the only time when I found Jinnah betraying some shadow of human weakness.”  There must have been many more such moments of love and longing in those lonely days and weeks of the Quaid-e-Azam. However, he aptly hid them from his millions of Muslim followers who, like many Pakistanis today, would take only a uni-dimensional view of this fascinatingly multifaceted personality.