Why the hell do you get angry?

So there are rape happening in the country! That too in the capital!! Oh God!!!

Police is sleeping… Government is doing nothing… Ask the Commissioner to resign… Where are our leaders?

Let’s go on streets and protest to ‘wake ‘em up’ and show our anger!

Government is prompt. Closes down Metro stations as if mocking, “What will you do now?” People are angrier and now start opposing the move by government to close down the metro stations!

Who are you kidding ladies and young men? Why can’t you see that media is manipulating you because it has nothing else to do. Though, I have no issues with highlighting the issue but c’mon, every single day ghastlier rapes take place in this very NCR and all around the country.

Why do you get angry when you see that on TV? Why the sudden revolutionary inside you comes out on horses with eight legs when you are shown something forcibly? I read newspaper and there is at least four stories related to rape every single day.

What is there to blame? Why do you think police should get inside each and every nook and corner of the society? What about the uncles, brothers and fathers raping the girls inside the houses? Do you want a police personnel inside each of the bedrooms?

The thing is no one can take guarantee that there won’t be crime in a society. Even if the proportion of police and people is one for each, it can never be prevented.

Coming to the main issue: your misguided and catalysed anger that you suddenly show on streets and, mostly, on free Internet space. See how it works: there is a rape (everyday there are many), the news editor is bored of the same political equations, IPL controversies, Digvijaya saying something idiotic… News editor is looking for that ‘breaking news’ which is not there.

Well, let’s create a breaking news. Pick a story from the inside pages of newspaper or the one which was filed by a junior reporter resting in trash can, use the negative adjectives, show incompetence of the authorities as if this was the most brutal thing to happen (which it is but their intention is wrong), run interrogatory voice over with text in red…

And voila, you have the attention of the nation. You have the young men and women running down the streets. You have status messages and pictures of protests on the whole social media. You have a whole angry nation.

That girl is nothing but a lottery. Her news has just beaten the odds of that hour when there was nothing to show.

Let me tell you (aah, you already know it but get excited each time) media is playing with you. There is nothing wrong in protesting but I have an issue with your ignorance of the larger picture. I pity your thinking abilities and rationale which wakes up when someone (other than you) negatively jolts it.

I do nothing. I don’t protest. I don’t abuse the state. I don’t ask the politicians to resign. I don’t want the head of the commissioner.

I want a grown up society which knows itself and doesn’t get moved away in euphoria created for TRPs. Maturity in thoughts, in exercising your vote (or no vote), sensitising your fellow being, asking yourself if it is you who is thinking or a media baron on your behalf… This is what is needed.

State is big. It can do anything. It just lacks will and your protests will be futile because it is not you going there but sheepish mass of which you are a part.

I know it is highly theoretical but it is more rational than pelting stones on the people you yourself have elected.

91% in BA is just obscene! (On the vulgar way of marking at GGSIPU)

Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University is one of the state universities in Delhi which offers a variety of normal and professional courses to students pursuing bachelors and masters. Several colleges have got affiliation from the university and scores of students pass out each year with their bachelors and masters degrees.

The issue is that their marks are, if translated into graphs, like sky-scrappers against the students from JNU or DU which appear as slum dwellers with no concept of roofs! I did my masters from the university and got more than 80% marks in journalism. Though I have no doubt over my academic abilities but still, 84% is way too much.

Today, the university published the results for the first semester students and some got as much as 90.8% and 90.5% in bachelors of journalism and mass communication. Some securing as much as 100 and 99 in practical papers. However, I have no doubts over the abilities of students getting these marks, I have issues with the way they are marked.

This wreaks vulgarity and obscenity in terms of marking scheme. The university might be able to project itself as having students with ‘exceptional’ students (who secure 90% regularly) with Einstenian abilities but it speaks badly for the credibility.

It has happened that people won’t believe that you got so much of marks in a paper from humanities stream where subjective questions are asked and there is a lot of scope however you express yourself.

There is, perhaps, a race of being the ‘best’ college with the most ‘talented’ students which has given birth to such ludicrous system of evaluating student. This harms the students in the long term and injects a false sense of belief that they have ‘exceptional’ abilities which they just don’t.

Almost all the universities including the best from India, JNU and DU, give marks in the range of 55-65% to the best of the students and there are only a few students in decades which score with distinction of 75%. But at GGSIPU, whosoever takes pains to just appear, perhaps, gets a distinction!

This scheme of marking inflates the ego of students, who somehow believe the marks in these exams are the only and the best way of their evaluation. They realise the futility and, mostly, this ridiculously high marks’ fetish when they step outside this university to seek admission at other university or apply for an academic job elsewhere.

I have seen my batchmates and seniors at GGSIPU, unable to speak for two minutes on any topic or write an essay in acceptable English, getting 80% in Masters regularly. All they do is to vomit whatever the teacher has said/projected/gave as notes. They have no knowledge of most of the things they vomit either when they write or even after they have written.

The sorry state of affairs is that they are unable to explain the why and how of whatever they have written. They remember their notes but seldom have the knowledge of it.

This ‘remembering without the knowledge of the subject’ is the problem which the country is set to face gravely in coming years. A country where Macaulay screwed up the whole education system is still not realising the importance of knowledge rather is still heavily dependent of the theoretical memorisation.

The quality of education is going down the drain and universities are happily helping the cause just to have a false feeling of having the ‘exceptional’ brains who score in eighties regularly.

This molestation of education system must be stopped and the students be made to realise the importance of knowledge rather than feeling happy about a certain percentage of marks which they, in no sane way, deserve.

The students have a right to know their actual abilities and they should know where they stand. This misguided ego boost is not going to help either the students or the cause of professional education.

Stand for yourselves, ladies!

I am sorry, I am not the one who has ever participated in any candle march or protest or anything of that kind to support the recent Delhi gang rape victim’s cause. Actually I am not sorry about it.

It is not that I am insensitive or wasn’t moved to hear the ghastly act. I talked, tweeted, blogged and abused our system thoroughly as any of us did. I am for a tougher law, better implication, amended acts and a safe world for women.

I also support who have been a part of these protests and are demanding justice. I am no one to discourage anyone from taking a stand or standing for someone.

While on a Facebook page, one of the boys commented what I was doing for the girls? He had, supposedly, gone to Jantar Mantar and India Gate. I replied I don’t go to these and didn’t explain why.

The problem lies with the mothers for not taking a stand against patriarchy. The problem is with our fake belief in the Hindi words “नारी तुम केवल श्रद्धा हो” (Oh women, you are just obeisance/adoration/respect). We have been using it to fool the females for generations and they have, eventually, accepted it and feel happy listening to it.

These words are just a garb from the male dominated society to let her breed, care and make his kids in to human beings and satisfy his desires and fancies. It is due to this belief that even the so-called ‘open and liberated’ woman believes in sayings like “husband is god”.

There is no problem in believing it when required but when he is a demon and playing on your subconscious, boasting you when he needs it, doesn’t justify it.

Unless the ladies and girls start to believe they are nowhere inferior to males in anything, the candle marches or protests will not solve any purpose. The mentality needs to be changed that ‘we are women and we should be treated the way we are’.

No. This needs to stop and will stop once the mothers stop saying, differentiating about how sons and daughters need separate treatment and should be raised differently.

They are just child. They don’t have genders until the age of puberty. It is we who make them boy and girl since they are born. We should rather make them realize the fact that they are same in regards to education, friendship, society and family.

That will allow them to be equals till they attain an age where they can use their own brains to figure out what they need to do in a certain situation. The injected feeling of being inferior or different or being a girl overall is what making all the trouble.

That’s the reason why I am not standing up for them. Not for my sister, not for mother, not for any of my friends. It is you who will have to realize that you have your own bone and flesh. It is you who will have to sensitize yourselves and future kids. It is you who will have to fight the males to treat your babies as just babies and not as a baby boy or baby girl.

Every single day many women are brutally raped, molested, murdered or forced in to situations where they don’t want to be. If you want a stronger law, don’t wait for the males to take a stand. The patriarchal mindset will just not help. Delhi has 80,00,000 women and don’t you think just 8 lakh could make the life hell for our politicians, police and bureaucrats and force them to act?

It will certainly do. But they won’t be allowed to come on roads for their own cause by their husbands, brothers and fathers. The best way is to prepare the future. A future where you are free to think for yourselves, stand for yourselves because you will be the mothers and you will know what’ll serve her good in these cases.

So, take a stand for yourselves. Feel your legs, feel the pain that might strike you, feel the torture that a male’s gaze gives you… stand erect and prepare a future breaking the shackles of this narrow patriarchal thinking that all of us have become a part of.

A rape is a rape

The story is: a girl was raped. Another day, another girl was raped. Another day, another girl was raped. As the Sun rose in the east and a girl was raped.

The victim dies after battling for her life. She wanted to survive. Another girl ended her life, as police would ask her to graphically show what happened with her. Another girl is fighting with the attitude of our society where an elected representative questioned her character.

Politicians, who we elect and allow to make laws for us for our better life, keep failing us with their ludicrous remarks and, mostly, silent approach and absence. Even the female politicians have given themselves to patriarchal mindset or may be to their party mindset.

How does it affect or why is it a pain to accept that the girls who went to protest go to discos at night? How does it make it correct if a rape victim is characterless (who are you to decide that?)? What has character or profession to do with being raped? Is the rape of a prostitute any less traumatic then of a doctor or teacher (if at all you see a hierarchy)?

No. The answer is: a rape is a rape. Dressing sense, having a night life neither gives someone a license to assault women not it gives anyone a right to question their credentials as sensitive human beings or judge them.

One politician questioned why media touches the issue when it is hot and doesn’t follow up? How ridiculous is that! Media has the job of bringing the issues to public attention and it is the job of government and agencies to follow up or take proper action.

Media by its very nature is an informative pillar. It need not drag the issues out. If a politician expects media do all the jobs then somewhere he/she trying to cover his/her sorry face.

Any rape is brutal. It doesn’t have degrees of ghastliness. There is no hierarchy of high-profile rape and low profile rape in a democratic or mature society.

At one hand we praise our women folk by saying they are goddess incarnate, “naari tum kewal shraddha ho”, they are our support system, they bring us in to the world, and on the other we kill female foetuses, deprive them of education, look them as inferiors…

Stop fooling around. Don’t glorify when you have no intention of treating them at par with yourselves. Let them just be human beings… human beings with same importance as yours.

It was not one victim that committed suicide. It was not one victim that died with multiple organ failure. It was not one victim who speaks with her face in the dark… We have failed our mothers, sisters, wives and friends.

If a victim has to talk in a dark studio in order to not to reveal her identity talks of her courage as well as insensitivity of a society that had made her do that. She is physically raped when some insane attackers overpower her; she is raped again when she has to narrate it to police officer recounting what happened; she is further raped when the trial takes place…

No one thinks about it. What is the solution? I don’t know the solution. I have voted my representative to work out a solution for me, for our society.

Instead of holding our hands and gently patting our backs with assurance and empathy, our leaders are at most showing sympathy. No one needs your sympathy when you don’t have the courage to kick out the MP who calls women as ‘dented and painted’, when one of you question about the character of the women, when one of you puts a ‘price’ on a female…

You will have to rise above party compulsions and your own definition of ‘politics’. Do away with the colonial laws that were drafted to suit the interest of the rulers. Make laws, enforce them and execute them properly.

Shutting down 10 metro stations is just a way to express your fear and helplessness which shouldn’t be a trait of a politician. We need to hear from you, we need you to come and show us a solution and not reading out condolence statement.

It is not just a victim that died, it is India as a state which collapsed as many of its organs swelled and stopped working.

मानवता का बलात्कार (Rape of humanity)

 

 

१६ दिसंबर को
मानवता का बलात्कार हुआ
और आज
मानवता की मौत हो गई
बताया जाता है
कई अंगो ने जवाब दे दिया था

Translation:

On December the 16th
Humanity was brutally raped
Today humanity died
It is said:
Many of her organs failed

(Dedicated to the Delhi gang rape victim and all of the women who are unsafe of our mentality.

It is not her death, we, collectively as a society, failed her and many others.)

Read related posts:

वो रंगे जा रहा था; When a girl is raped…

वो रंगे जा रहा था

मेट्रो ट्रेन के
भीड़ भरे डब्बे में
वो नवयुवक
अपने हाइलाइटर से
‘Constitution of India Part III’
किताब की कुछ पंक्तियों को
हाईलाइट कर रहा था
मेट्रो में वार्निंग
गूँज रही थी
“यात्री कृपया ध्यान दें,
सुरक्षा कारणों से
राजीव चौक, केंद्रीय सचिवालय, रेस कोर्स, उद्योग भवन,
बाराखम्भा रोड, मंडी हाउस और प्रगति मैदान स्टेशन
अगली सूचना आने तक बंद रहेंगे
असुविधा के लिए खेद है”
वो लेकिन रंगे जा रहा था
आर्टिकल 19(1)(a) के तमाम पॉइंट्स और सब पॉइंट्स को
वो बहुत शांत था
शायद शांत ही था

When a girl is raped…

The story is: a girl takes a bus, there are a bunch of ‘man’, they brutally rape her, unsatisfied, they put a rod inside and throw her out of the bus naked.

Now ‘civilised’ people walk past and doesn’t help, she lies unconscious for an hour and our overworked police van passes by picks her up, admits her in the hospital, the news breaks and nation becomes angry.

Now some become intellectual, some pseudo-intellectual, some questioners, some are deeply grieved, pained and stunned, some sit down and think what’s going on, some light candles, some pronounce death sentences, castrations, some gherao politician’s house, protests… A hell lot of rage!

Media is busy predicting the results of a certain high profile election for whole day, next day the election thing is over, realises its social responsibility and being the fourth pillar, takes the issue, asks questions, editors, anchors suddenly feel the pain as if their sister was the victim, next day is the result day of elections, anchors back to business of discussing democracy.

Girl slips in coma for sixth time, Modi is prime ministerial candidate, the protesting mob fires crackers as the champion of humanity takes a hat-trick term at the office, Facebook is very angry, profile images are turning in black dots, some say ‘comments won’t solve anything, let’s do something’, what to do no one knows, intellectual rage rages on…

CM ‘plans’ to take the critically unstable girl with damaged intestine to UK (God knows when), Congress celebrates its win in a state election, they realise politicians have more serious issues than a ‘mere brutal assault and rape’, for god’s sake we have 1.25 billion others to look at!

The girl will eventually die, politicians will express their deep pains and condolences to the family, RIP XXX will trend on twitter, common man will burn from inside on its inability, police will look for charges, case will go on, rapists will be charged, may be sentenced, may be come out as a nephew of someone! Life goes on…

Next day a similar headline in 72 points: Girl raped and thrown in busy market area

वो किसी के ख्वाब का एक हिस्सा थी

वो किसी के ख्वाब का एक हिस्सा थी
किसी को अपने आँचल में छुपाने वाली माँ
किसी के लिए राखी की डोर

ये दिल्ली है
ये सोती नहीं
ये रात भर उन खामोश चीखों को
घुट घुट कर सुनती रहती है
जो शायद हमारी माँ, बहन या दोस्त के
सीने से आती है
जिन पर हर आने वाले घंटे में
एक खरोंच लगती रहती है
जो काफी गहरी है
जो काफी लाल है
जो हर वक़्त ताज़ा होती रहती है

 

Translation:

“She was a slice of someone’s dream”

She was a slice of someone’s dream
The one who hides her love in the corner of her sari
The one who is the holy thread of Rakhi

This is Delhi
It never sleeps
It keeps up late helplessly
Listening to those silent screams
Which, perhaps, comes
From our mother, sister or a friend’s heart
Which bears fresh scratches with every passing hour
The scratches which are deep
The scratches which are blood red
The scratches which remain fresh all the time

#Dedicated to women in Delhi who are unsafe anytime, anywhere…

#Delhi moving bus gang rape

थके हुए लोग

जब थक जायेगा देश

और थक जाएगी

ये झंडे उठाकर चलने वाली जनता

विद्रोह कर कर

और बंद हो जायेगा

रैलियों और महारैलियों में

आम लोगों का आना

और ख़ास लोगो का बुलाना

रुक जायेगा फेसबुक पर

समस्या समाधान

और लग जायेगा ताला

बाबाओं, नेताओं और तथाकथित नेताओं के बडबोलेपन पर

नहीं आएगा कोई ‘हेमलिन का पाइड पाईपर’

लेकिन फिर भी क्या

झूठी मनौतियों, झूठे वादे सुन सुन कर

सह सह कर

थकी हुई, निराश और हतोत्साहित

ये भीड़

नहीं चल देगी उस चट्टान के छोड़ की ओर

जिसके एक तरफ है अनन्त जमीन

और दूसरी तरफ एक अंतहीन खाई

और शुरू कर देगी फेंकना

चुन चुन कर, खींच खींच कर

उन सबको

I am not Anna, nor I ever wanted to be…

   

Let’s have a look at the following news report from a news web site:

Blackout leaves 300 million without power; Team Anna sees conspiracy

“Govt is still arrogant and dictatorial… the grid has failed, Metro is down,” a Team Anna member said.

So, Mr Anna and his illustrious team of IITian, ex-IPS officer and several corporate lawyers, professors and a big crowd, think that whatever goes bad is all the fault of the government and the people should be awakened.

The other day I was in the Metro train and there were two gentleman talking about the movement. One was staunch supporter and was calling himself as a poet who claimed to have seen too much of corruption and turned a poet.

He said that he saw enough corruption, paid for it and then became a poet. Whatever, he was talking to nobody and everybody and trying to say that Anna is great and the people need to wake up.

Another old man who was sitting right beside him said that everyone was awake and they didn’t need any third party to make them realise that they are sleeping and need to open their eyes.

The poet got angry and started shouting: “Aap ko pata hai kitne mahan hain Anna? Aap is tarah se baat kar rahe hain, aap jaroor bhrasht honge…” (Do you even know how great is Anna? The way you are talking proves that you must be corrupt)

The old man just asked him to shut up. Poet then turned to his right and started telling his personal story to someone else.

The point of this incident is that these are the specimen of Anna campaign who, if you are not with them, are outrightly calling you a ‘bhrasht‘ or corrupt without feeling any need to know about you, your ideologies, your logic or even a sentence in your defence.

Another incidence comes to my mind when a friend of mine went to get his phone recharged and the question he was asked before he could say what he wanted was: “kyaa aap Anna ke saath hain?” (Are you with Anna?)

This was at the pinnacle of Anna’s movement last year. My friend was confused and couldn’t reply. He just said please give me the coupon and left.

I don’t doubt hundreds of people who are flocking to show their support to Anna but I can also see that there are a lot of them who are conveniently spreading a kind of false notion that either you are with Anna or you are simply corrupt!

Wearing Anna topi and t-shirt is becoming a convenient way of hiding your reality and it’s a convenient garb of honesty, irrespective of your reality, to show people that as you show support for Anna, you are not corrupt.

The frenzy ‘created’ by Anna and his team was based on the simplest of the trick in the book: The people are fed up with corruption; there is a public unrest because of several scams; a lot of media coverage; ensure the message goes to media; hold press conferences; give interviews; accuse the top most leaders (whether or not there is any proof, just accuse); and people will run wearing you ‘cap’, with the tricolour in hand with the energy supplied by your ‘coke’ and ‘samosa’ distributed at the protest venue.

That’s what happened last year. Students had lot of time after exams, the UPSC aspirants were done with their exams, public had the angst because of government failure to check inflation, Congress leaders were getting chargesheeted or accused for scams… this all made it apt moment and what followed was a large crowd.

A large crowd swelled on the roads, buses, Metro trains asking “Are you with Anna?”

To hell with you, I am not with Anna nor I want to be.

There were youth mounting big sound-boxes on trucks and holding traffic to ransom, dancing on the road and creating ruckus!

So this is it all about! This anticipated revolution was a big party to let you feel light!

Coming to the point, now Anna, after failed attempt to make his and ‘only his’ version of Lokapl bill being passed, has organised a ‘better looking’ campaign. The NGO India Against Corruption is on Facebook and all social media with cartoons and Anna wallpapers etc. They are trying to reach out to maximum people.

No problem with that. Anyone has a right to have a peaceful gathering and to express their views. After all we are a democratic country.

But the problem arises when you have the original “I am Anna” or “Mai Anna Hoon” cap and the fake ones; you have original badges from the NGO and you have fake one; you have original T-shirts and the fake ones….

Now I am confused. Should they not be focussed on the message that the cap carries? Or should they be more concerned that only the T-shirts made and sold by them be bought?

Is this about selling merchandise or to really garner support of people?

The whole approach from Team Anna has been negative since the beginning of the movement. The policy of not bending or showing any kind of flexibility was the reason that Lokpal talks failed.

Law has to be enacted in parliament and not from Jantar Mantar. Fasting is a kind of blackmail and not a non-violent struggle to get your voice heard.

People have realised that there is no strength in this movement and have kept away from being a part of the crowd. Anna doesn’t want to give any percentage of chance to government and want to force his words on to them which is not acceptable.

Neither he wants to enter politics and fight the system from within. Why then people will show faith in you?

They know that government is the authority to make laws and whenever it wants it can suppress your strike, you are not willing to die fighting, you look for excuses, you give weird statement accusing anyone personally…

That doesn’t work. If you think people are with you, if you thought they saw a genuine urge to fight against corruption then you should have performed as per their expectations.

A golden chance was there when 5 state elections took place in 2011. Had Anna showed some will to enter the system and clean it, who knows he should have made a difference!

But he chose the popular way of criticizing the ruling party and negatively campaigning against them.

This is not the Gandhian ideology. Gandhi never said to blackmail and use fast as a way to ride the public euphoria nor did he approve of negative tactics to call anybody and everybody corrupt.

It’s high time that he and his team realises the dangers that India faces and come with a solution better than sweeping everyone with same broom and singing the chorus of over-repeated chants.

And that’s precisely why I am not Anna, nor I ever wanted to be.