Stories Of Death

Stories Of Death

"A well lived Life....looks forward to Death. A painless, sudden death. No suffering. When people around you don't feel you are a burden, financially or otherwise."  Ajji kept reiterating every time she got a chance. Her ever growing snow-white hair that she massaged with hot coconut oil filled in a coconut shell, dentures she had started using after making more than full use of her permanent teeth and her now cataract free eyes that she used to read news on television - betrayed anything but her age.  For us, listening to her talk about Death was almost a ritual every year when we went to the village. It evoked mystique, a sense of awe as she narrated how people from the family met their maker, and Ajji's timelessness. She remained constant across births and deaths - transcending generations - and perhaps would continue to.

                                                             ***********************

" I always sensed Death closing in on your Father" Ajji told my Mother, for the umpteenth time. It had happened thirty five years ago and the emotion had been sucked out of the incident long ago. For someone like me, who had never seen my Mother's Appa, Ajji's narration seemed to paint a picture of my Grand-Dad's death, just like other incidents painted a picture of his life.

"There was something ailing him mentally for quite a few months. He had lived a happy life. Sons and daughters were doing well. That premature death of your brother....may be" Ajji said, looking at my Mother. The mention of that premature death still tugged at our heartstrings - though we hadn't seen our uncle. 

"He probably had a premonition of his Death the previous evening. And it was all over...next morning"  Ajji said, her tone respectfully sombre. We had heard the story multiple times from her and also from my Mother. But we fell prey to the mystique, as always. "What happened Ajji...?" I asked, as the rest of the audience waited in silence.

"I suppose he had a minor heart attack that evening...almost as if Lord Yama was preparing the noose and was trying to find out how tight or loose it needs to be. He complained of severe chest pain. But by the time we reached him, he had recovered. 'I almost thought I'd die alone' he said, sobbing. I think he knew he'd die. But he didn't want to die without anyone by his side..." Ajji paused for effect, we thought. But we could see that there was a drop of tears at the corner of her eyes. It was unusual, but it didn't stop her flow.

"He was reluctant to go to town and visit the Doctor. But driver Ahmed wouldn't agree. He insisted on a check up. He drove your Grand-Pa to the town. Doctor Basappa never minced words. There were no machines or sophisticated equipment at that time in Mandya. He was still the best Doctor around. Basappa calmed your Grand-Pa down and re-assured him. But he took Ahmed to the side and told him there wasn't much time left for Grand-Pa. Ahmed at that time didn't realise "not much time" was a few hours. He didn't mention the conversation to us till way later. "

My Mother took over, invariably, at this point.  "Anna came back. He looked weak. The light was already gone from his eyes. We never realised that at the time. I'm glad he had a good meal that evening. And then, he insisted on all of us sleeping in the hall, with our beds next to each other. I'm sure he knew it. Or may be, he was just scared. Who isn't scared of Death?. We felt that night was crucial. Nothing was told to us - but we had a hunch. An eerie hunch, if you ask me. And slowly we drifted to an uneasy sleep."

"I'm glad I saw him pass." Ajji said, breaking the silence after my Mother's words. "I'm not sure why. But I'm glad. And I'm sure he felt at peace that his Mother was watching him pass. I didn't want to wake up the next morning and just discover that my son is dead. It was five thirty in the morning when I woke up. I peered through the mosquito net and found his breath becoming shallow. He looked at me. I could sense the helplessness. He didn't want to go. I  looked at him. And then he relaxed. Or so I thought. The helplessness was replaced by a blank face. I'd want to imagine it was peace. I was the one to bring him to his world....I bid him Goodbye"

                                                           ***********************

" Your Chikkamma was lucky to survive her first bout with Death" Ajji said, looking at my Father now. My father was especially attached to his Chikkamma (Mother's younger sister). He always felt pained talking about her death. But Ajji would never leave him alone. "You should talk about it, for you to forget the pain. She was living on borrowed time, at any rate" she said, in a matter-of-fact tone.

"I remember that car ride from Mandya to Bengaluru, vividly. Chikkamma unconscious. You and I on either side. I took a handful of tablets and thrust it in her mouth. Poured a bottle of water so she swallowed them." My Father started. I almost knew the next sentence. "I was the reason why she lived twenty more years."

"It's all fate. Chikkamma had some unfinished business here. She wanted to see you married and happy. Her own sons married and happy. And may be watch some soaps on the new age colour television" This last statement was an addition to last year's narration. Clearly, Ajji was improvising too.

"But she was a fighter. Every time Yama dragged her to the hospital, she found the will to give him the slip and return home. I never saw her spirit fade. Except the final time she made her way to the hospital. The look she had on her face when her sons carried her on her chair to the car - I was sure she had given up the fight. Her final journey had begun that day. What happened a month later was more a formality."

Ajji certainly seemed more emotional this year than she had been in a while. Her voice was quivering as she narrated these incidents. But then, she took a weird pride in being in that unenviable position of having seen more deaths up close than any one else in the family. 

"She couldn't have been more helpless towards the end. She forgot names and people. Quiet, sedated and sleepy in the mornings. Manic and vengeful all of  a sudden in the night. Buried feelings and suppressed emotions burst forth unhindered.  She didn't want to take all the burden with her, perhaps."

"Talk about the last day and close it Ajji" Father insisted.

Ajji smiled and stared silently into oblivion. Her cataract free eyes couldn't hide the tears. 

                                                         ***********************

It had been a month since Ajji fell in the bathroom and broke her back. Doctors gave up hope on her being able to get up and walk again. The back injury did to her what Life could never do. 

She was shifted to a cot in the hall at our ancestral home in Mandya. Her spirit held fort the first couple of weeks. She was cheerful - hoping for -and making us hope for - a miracle. "It's just a broken back. I have rich grandsons who can get a golden rod fixed in my spine." But as more and more Doctors visited her and went back with grim expressions, she started fading. 

Tears streamed silently down her face, when no one was watching. The helplessness apparent in her face and voice. She felt ashamed when anyone tried to clean her up and help with a change of clothes or adult diapers.

"So... a couple of days before Chikkamma passed" she started, one evening. We didn't want Ajji to exert herself. But then we couldn't stop her from speaking. It was all she could do these days. 

"Chikkamma saw her dead husband beckoning to her, from outside the room. I was staying with Chikkamma for the night when this happened. I'm not sure where she found the energy, but Chikkamma got out of her bed and walked to the door. Talked to him for almost ten minutes. Then she walked back and slept. The most peaceful I had seen her sleep, after she was admitted to the hospital"

All of us were stunned. Ajji had never mentioned this in all these years. My father burst into tears and left the place. It took a while for us to calm down. And as we absorbed this incident, Ajji made an other revelation. "The other day when I stopped Chikkamma's story midway, I could see her beckoning to me from the other side of the room. "

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Ajji never spoke coherently after that. It seems her mind was made up. She refused to eat from the next day. Whether it was out of conscious decision or did her body start giving up  - we would never know. Weakness overpowered her quickly and she slipped to a semi-conscious state in a matter of days. And after that she consumed only teaspoons of water.

 About a week-ten days later, all of us got used to the new normal with her. We knew it was a matter of time. But we were not ready to give up easily on her. Doctors inserted glucose drips and we found improvements in her energy levels. "You have some unfinished business Ajji" we kept teasing her. She would give us a silent weak smile. She still wouldn't talk or eat. 

Our Sunday afternoon conversations took place around her cot ever since she was bedridden. That Sunday, after a long while, we could hear Ajji's voice. "Ice Cream. I want some Ice Cream". she said. We were thrilled. A couple of us ran to get her some ice cream from a nearby store. Ajji was smiling. Did miracles really happen? We wondered.  We took turns to feed her the ice cream that evening. She relished each spoon. She even managed to say "Thank You" in English. Clearly, there was some unfinished business holding her back.

                                              **********************************

Ajji passed a couple of days later. It wasn't the sudden death she had aspired. We sat around her as her breath became shallow. Now from the stomach, now from the lungs, now from the throat and the last couple of breaths from the mouth. She had closed her eyes long ago. So we couldn't understand what she had always meant, by "light disappearing from the eyes."

Over the next fifteen days, some of us took turns to read the Garuda Purana. The paperback version was stowed away in her trunk. She had to be the one reading it when someone passed in the family. 

Did she actually see Chikkamma beckoning to her that night? We wondered. Did she know her time was nearing? Ajji always held us in awe when she was alive.......she would hold us in awe in Death too!

                                                                                       

                                                                                  -     25th September 2019

                                              

The Last Ten Minutes.....

The Last Ten Minutes…

The blue notification light had not glowed in the last 10 minutes or so. The ten minutes felt like eternity. It was as though the world was standing still. I was juggling between answering a mail, drafting a proposal and running a (mandatory) training video in the background. My brain constantly switched between these tasks. Yet in the milliseconds between these tasks, I glanced anxiously at my phone through the corner of my eyes. There was a tinge of guilt, that I was sucked in to waiting for a notification – yet there were almost an addict’s withdrawal symptoms that craved for it.

Was there nothing happening in the world that was interesting – in the last ten minutes? Surely, someone in my friend circle would have posted on Instagram? He would be vacationing in the middle of the year – while the rest of us slogged full days at office and waited for the weekend, to recoup and get ready for next week’s battles. Or a friend would surely have posted a #throwback picture to a vacation he had months ago – in a wave of endless nostalgia. Either way, that would mean a notification and that chance to hold the tender back cover of the phone that I had not felt in the last 10 minutes.

What about Facebook? No book in print got us hooked as disarmingly as Facebook. And were people silent there too in the last ten minutes? Creating content was passé, we were now into liking and sharing content. Surely, a war must be brewing somewhere? Between conservatives and communists? A social media war between neighbours? Or atleast a hilarious and supposedly harmless dig about Prime Ministers who served tea and played cricket earlier. One stranger from my friend list would surely have liked and shared the video. I could spend a couple of minutes figuring out who he is and then scroll through the content he would have liked and shared in the last couple of months. But no, that stranger friend too seemed to be silent in the last 10 minutes.

Almost anxious about the world’s stunning silence now, I turned to LinkedIn. Well, it was office time. Surely, people would have logged into their professional network?? I have this habit of keeping LinkedIn open for most part of the day. What if that ever elusive job gets posted and I’m not in the top 10% applying for it? My carefully crafted profile with exaggerated glories of past achievements and relentless jargon would go unnoticed. And I’d have to catch the attention of the potential recruiter all over again – for a role I coveted without knowing what exactly it entails. If I knew what it actually meant – why would I apply for it anyways? Well, there were no jobs in the last ten minutes-else I’d have been notified. No recruiter had viewed my profile. There would be no dearth for feed though. With people posting their latest insights and thought leadership. From posting about Toasters in the Cafeteria that taught lessons in “Keeping the Lead Warm” to waiting for the traffic lights to turn green that signalled “Process Orientation” as a key character trait. None of this, however, would warrant the blue notification light that would trigger me to reach out to my phone and check the notifications.

I looked at my colleague sitting next to me. He was busy scrolling away on the phone screen. His laptop had gone on standby. Which meant he was on his phone for atleast five minutes now. And he would have consumed so much information and knowledge in that time. Enough to beat me to a promotion? He would know how the economic slowdown would impact our industry and result in decreased demand from our clients. He might just be coming up with a Plan B to cover up the losses. He would surely present it to the management? Or he would have identified the next latest trend in technology and started applying to those companies before I did? Or he might just be chatting up with that girl in the Marketing department with whom neither of us had managed a direct conversation yet. In which case I had to worry the most.

My self-imposed penance of not touching the phone till the blue notification light flashed was causing me a lot of harm – mentally and materially. And it had taken less than ten minutes for this to happen. Nevertheless, I decided to stick to it. Not by focussing on my work. But by waiting with bated breath for the notification so that I could break the penance and know what’s going on in the World – my World.

The 24-7 news apps seemed to have gone silent too. It was as though the world was taking a holiday from mischief and misbehaviour. What kept the news apps going, what kept the world going and what kept you and me going, was that steady dose of addictive anxiety news sites and apps were injecting us, notification by notification. Creatively crafted click bait articles that ended with an ubiquitous question mark were enough and more to get us hooked. “Recession imminent??” “Countries are going to War…?” “This could happen if your city in nuked….” And these articles, gave us despair and hope every ten minutes, spicing up our lives and giving us a larger vision and a global event to be part of. We were not passive bystanders now. We were actively involved, desperately trying to click, like,  comment and pass the “buck” of opinion to the next equally desperate “Consumer”. The absence of a notification denied me from having the next drop from that eternal trickle of information.

I was slowly discovering how Content had become the “Elixir” for my brain and mind to stay calm and sane. The Content didn’t have to be meaningful. It just had to be there. It just had to be new – slightly new. The same landscape photographed from a new angle, the same news delivered once in a conservative channel and then from a radical tabloid. I would never remember most of the content – let alone use it in my professional discussions or personal banter.

Holding the phone had become muscle memory. And in the moments my hands were not holding the phone, I was almost feeling insecure. The Insecurities of the brain were a different dimension altogether. Holding the Phone - I realised – gave me a sense of control. I was on top of my professional world, my personal world and the World at large. I was in sync with every mail from office, I knew what every stranger in my social World was up to and I would know if my city would be nuked in the next few minutes – though I could hardly do anything about it.

Ten minutes. My phone had engaged me in a who-would-blink-first in the last ten minutes. The  notification light was still elusive. My resolve was weak and anxiety was at its peak. It was easy to end that battle against a non-living object, grab the phone and experience relief wash over me. A saner instinct prevailed and I held myself back. My colleague was still scrolling through his phone for what seemed like an eternity now. I looked at my watch. It had been 10 minutes. Only.

                                                                      

                                                                                                - 7th September 2019

Corporate Musings: Of Goodbyes, Exits and Disappearances..

Corporate Musings: Of Goodbyes, Exits and Disappearances

Most of us were still trying to digest the mail that was the talking point of the entire organisation since morning. Messiah had decided to move on, after an illustrious career of 20 years in various roles in the organisation.

"He has set his sights on something more adventurous, most probably" Mr. Sales was saying. He was the perennial fan of the Messiah.

"He would have made enough money already. He could have chosen to hang up his boots. I would do it, if I were in his place" Mr. Forever mused, tacitly voicing his wishes.

"Or did the Transformation devour him too?" chipped in Mr. White Beard, with his characteristic chin scratching.

I had different things on my mind. Vinay had chosen to move on. We were colleagues, yes. But then, we had developed an excellent friendship too. We'd joined the organisation through the same program and had similar journeys in the last couple of years. The fact that he was moving on meant losing a friend on the one hand, but also sparked doubts of my reading of the situation at the organisation. 

"Don't get complacent, Alok. You may think you've got everything going for you here...the reality is different" was the message he rubbed in every time he got a chance. I smiled an unsure smile every time he said this. I wasn't sure of what I had - or what I didn't have.

Ravi had chosen to quit too. He was a member of the Housekeeping team. The team that helped us function smoothly without worrying about electricity, air conditioning, printing and scanning, cookies, lunch plates and many other little things whose business impact- most of us believed - was not exactly quantifiable. 

Moreover, Ravi was a person who went about his daily work diligently, without a fuss. Everything seemed to be in its place as if it was the natural order in office. The only time he was conspicuous was when he served tea and coffee to all of us during meetings. And to Mr. Sales and a couple of other senior colleagues everyday at three thirty sharp in the afternoons. 

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"We should send Messiah off in style" Mr. Sales was saying during lunch one afternoon. I was a fan of his conviction and class whenever he wanted to pitch an idea - whether internally or in front of the client. "Let's treat him to a five star dinner and gift him an exquisite oil painting. He has a refined taste for Art" The downside of his class was he at times came across as slightly snobbish to some of us. Contributing money for an oil painting and a five star dinner was sure to burn a hole in the pocket. 

Then the obvious question of connect came about. There were lots of veterans in the organisation who knew the Messiah personally. He had been a father figure for them in the organisation and supported them through thick and thin. And then there were the rest of us, to whom Messiah was a leader, an orator, an icon - but hardly anything else. I remembered him from my interview, a couple of coffee machine conversations and a jig at the sales conference where everybody danced with everybody else. I treasured those fan moments - but was still at a loss to develop any kind of emotional connect with him. The stylish goodbye seemed a luxury and a diplomatic obligation.

I was more concerned about how we planned Vinay's send off. He believed in a quiet exit - and I could rationalise with that. He wanted a last day where he could just go through the motions like every other day. Handover his laptop, ID and bid a final goodbye to the organisation. He had moved on emotionally from the organisation a long time ago.  

However, Ms.There-For-Everyone and Mr. Portfolio felt there should be a send-off lunch for a colleague who had been there with us for a length of time.  I, being his closest colleague, was tasked with co-ordinating the lunch and fixing a date. I was thankful for that.

True to her nature, Ms.There-For-Everyone soon initiated a mail trail for Ravi as well. We were asked to contribute generously in cash, so that Ravi could use the money during his transition from this job to the next. The entire office was unequivocally eager to pitch in and make a difference. 

                                                      *******************************        

Messiah arrived at his send off a lot more relaxed than people had seen him in years. The charm, the poise and his razor sharp tongue still evoked the same intensity of laughter (partly natural and partly forced, as always). People stood around him, escorted him and took pictures with him like there was no tomorrow. A few over-enthusiastic colleagues recited couplets that they had meticulously composed in his honour. One of them went on to say that the organisation's journey would have two phases: Before Messiah and After Messiah. There was thunderous applause at this juncture. The colleague was so overwhelmed that tears started streaming down his eyes -  sprucing up the emotion of the occasion.

Messiah himself was composed and real in his speech. He thanked the team he had built. He cherished the successes and reflected on the failures. "I'm climbing a new mountain" he announced, as the audience cheered him on, Mr. Sales and Mr. Whitebeard at the forefront. Mr. Hardware was busy taking a video of the entire speech, that he planned to upload on LinkedIn later that evening. As Messiah walked to his Chauffeur driven BMW that evening, all of us walked to the basement to bid him adieu. Amidst the jostling that happened, I wasn't sure if the Messiah noticed that I was there in the crowd too.

Vinay and I drove to the restaurant together for his send-off lunch. We were still not discussing the fact that it was his last day. He might have felt pompous. I would have felt insecure. We discussed his plans in his new organisation. I told him my vision for the next few months. We continued to debate about what was right and what was wrong in our present state.

Most of the office was present for the lunch. Ms. There For Everyone commanded the respect of colleagues. And everyone knew Vinay in person - all of them wanted a chance to wish him luck. The initial spotlight was on Vinay, where he thanked everyone for their support and encouragement. Everyone smiled and nodded. The focus soon shifted to the Andhra lunch that was on offer. Vinay's exit was made more memorable by the lunch for sure. Once lunch ended, there was a group picture which Ms There For Everyone shared on the office WhatsApp group. That night, Vinay wrote a final Thank You message, before leaving the group forever.

There were eight of us in office, when Ravi was leaving. Not many knew his actual relieving date - as it had been moved around a couple of times. All of us in office gathered in a conference room just before Ravi was to leave. Ms. There-For-Everyone had placed the cash neatly in a company envelope. Mr. Forever spoke about Ravi. His humility, tenacity, courtesy and hardwork - all of it found mention. I felt a sense of pride for the organisation at that moment - which I had not felt at Messiah's Farewell or Vinay's exit. Ravi didn't speak. He kept smiling throughout the five minutes that this ceremony lasted. May be he felt thankful, embarrassed, relieved and optimistic at the same time.

I pulled him aside for a moment after his send off and asked him what his plans were. "I'm starting off on my own Sir. I'm planning to learn photography and do wedding shoots. My friend is helping me with that"
"Isn't that a big risk? You have a fixed salary here" I asked.
" I can only grow to be a supervisor here Sir. And I don't want to do housekeeping forever. I'll start off...God will help me along the way" he said, with confidence in his destiny.

I realised Ravi's parting words would haunt me more than Vinay's or Messiah's ever would.

                                                  ***********************************
  

Out of sheer habit, I looked up Vinay on the company directory the next day.  "Presence Unknown" it said. My thoughts lingered on him for a couple of minutes. At that moment, I received a call from one of my customers. My attention completely shifted to the task on hand. I would WhatsApp Vinay later on in the evening.

Though I fully knew what the result would be, I looked up Messiah on the company directory:"Presence Unknown". I looked around. Business was as usual. Those directly reporting to him might have felt an ephemeral vacuum that their responsibilities would have filled the next moment. Mr Sales would still sing paeans when he found the opportunity. But I was at the bottom of the food chain. Messiah or no Messiah - organisational realities would never change for me.

Ravi had disappeared. He had no mail ID. So it wasn't possible to look him up on the company directory. At half past two, our morning tea cups were still at our desks. The previous day's sticky notes and tissues were still at our workstations. At three thirty, Mr. Sales and Mr. Forever walked to the pantry to make their own tea,

As I watched them brew their own tea, I wondered what mattered most - the Goodbye, the Exit or the Disappearance.....

                                                                                                                - 8th May 2019

DISCLAIMER: Incidents dramatised for fictional and narrative purposes

The Poll Predicament

The Poll Predicament

The largest democracy in the World goes to vote in the next few weeks. Some call it the stage; Some call it the battlefield. For some it's a right. For some more, it's an exercise. For the politically naive 

(I come close to being one), the election fever is akin to the World Cup fever that breaks out a couple of months prior to the event and disappears without a trace later on - much like the majority of politicians who surface in flesh and blood just before polls and later remain confined to television and social media.
                                          -----------------------------------------------------

Arjuna, a first time voter, sat in the darkness of his room - visibly agitated. The room had become a research center in the last few weeks. The fervor of exercising your franchise for the first time (FFF, as he called it) can do these things to you. Spread across his table were statistics of development and progress. Hanging on the walls were comparisons between previous governments and the incumbent. His bed was littered with manifestos of different candidates. His phone and laptop were streaming social media activity from multiple political leaders and organisations. The cacophony in his mind was a hundred times worse than the clutter in his room. His first vote was a few hours away - and Arjuna was none the wiser about who he had to cast it in favor of. Closing his eyes, he sent a silent prayer to his Maker, urging him for divine guidance.

And as though answering his appeal, there was a soft knock on his door. The latch turned. As the door opened and He entered, there was a surreal stream of light that illuminated the room. Arjuna held his hands in front of his face, to protect his eyes from being blinded by the Light. As his eyes slowly accustomed themselves to the Light, Arjuna was able to recognize the person. It was Krishna, his grandfather. A grand old man of more than seventy years. Arjuna had always viewed him only as his grandfather. Yet today, Krishna seemed to embody the enlightenment of electoral politics. 

Arjuna went down on his knees and clasped his hands "Oh Ajja Krishna, thanks for stepping in like a beacon of Hope in the eleventh hour.  My first vote is a few hours away. Everybody seems to be a friend and everyone seems to be an enemy. All of them claim development. Yet none of them has completely delivered it. I want to cast my vote - yet the NOTA seems to be an option as well. I want to make a difference to this country...yet I'm scared if I'll do it in the right way!"

Ajja Krishna smiled the all knowing smile of a voter who had exercised his franchise every time since he had attained majority - which was roughly fifty years ago. He had seen governments form and collapse; Leaders rise and fall (and defect); With equanimity, he placed his hands on Arjuna's head:
"Dear Arjuna, "You have the Right to Vote, But not to the fruits of your Vote".Your vote might put your candidate and your party in power. Or it might not. What is important to for you is to cast your vote. That way, you are doing your duty as the citizen of this country. Leave the rest to Me." 

Arjuna looked at Krishna. There was a divine aura around him that evening. An aura that seemed to contain answers to all his raging doubts and fears. He pressed on.

" I see a lot of statistics on development and progress. Some say we achieved a lot in 60 years. The rest say, we achieved a lot more in five years. Who is right? Who is wrong? I can't even trust the data anymore!"

"Arjuna, Progress and Development are the order of the Universe. The Universe forgets the old and moves on to the new. As some wise man said, 'No force on earth can stop an idea whose time has come'. Could people stop the Renaissance? Or the Industrial Revolution? Or in today's times, could anyone halt the march of Internet and Social media? Some politicians can give Progress a push. The rest stop at a mere nudge. With or without them, the march will continue. The human mind and will is relentless."

This put things in new light for Arjuna. Schemes and policies seemed to be old wine in new bottles. Change was dramatic in some decades. Less dramatic in other decades. What seemed to have changed was how informed the masses were. That again, was the power of technology.

"What about caste, and religion? Do I have to vote based on that? It seems the easiest thing to do!" Arjuna continued.

Krishna smiled. "I don't know what religion you are talking about. The only religion that should matter is the one that guides you to serve the community and the country. And these are the twin religions of Jnana and Karma - Knowledge and Action. Acquire as much Knowledge as you can. And once you do, pass it to the community through Action. Choose a Leader who believes in these twin Religions. Jnana and Karma, my boy. Your generation has plenty of sources to evaluate who is the better Leader in these aspects"

"That seems to be the biggest problem, Krishna. There seems to be so much information from so many sources. Print, visual and social media. Debates and opinion polls. Mainstream media that is no longer neutral. Social media that has always been biased. Statistics that can give different perspectives depending on whether you want to look at the glass as half full or half empty. I'm scared. My opinion, may not be mine anymore."

" The Truth is all pervasive. In whatever garb people choose to hide it, Truth is going to reveal itself at the right moment to its true seeker. It takes a lot of commitment to discern Truth from falsehood. And once you do, it takes a lot of courage and conviction to defend it from the constant attack of lies - and these days Post Truth. I agree emotional appeal these days has more mileage than fact and it is difficult to pierce this darkness to find Truth. Well, that responsibility lies with Youth like you. Make sure the bugle of Truth rises above the cacophony of  Post Truth. But ultimately, Truth is but found on the ground. What you see around you, in real, in flesh and blood, is the reality you need to go by." 

The two of them sat in deep silence. Arjuna, true to his generation, was evaluating each of Krishna's statements with a pinch of salt. Ultimately, Krishna was from a different generation. A generation that thought differently about Country, Religion, Technology and even Life. Krishna could feel the confusion in Arjuna's mind. With a tinge of nostalgia, he remembered the first time he voted. Yes, the responsibility had weighed on him that day too. Yet, he could appreciate that the challenges of making the right choice, the pressures for conformity and acceptance and the risk of being branded naive and ignorant, were too high for Arjuna's generation. Krishna let Arjuna make peace with his own thoughts.

Finally, Arjuna looked at him and asked him a final question: 

"Ajja Krishna...I've listened to you all this while. How do I decide who is the right candidate? I'm lost in the the mounds of information and unable to decipher the deluge of data that is available today. Who is good for this country, Krishna?"

Krishna sat in momentary silence that seemed to encompass an eternity. He then got up. And the next moment he transformed. Arjuna watched in disbelief, as Krishna transformed from his grandfather to a politician clad in a kurta, then to a soldier in his uniform, then to a doctor in his coat. Next appeared a farmer carrying his produce and a policeman with his lathi. A Teacher with his books and an author with his Pen. An Engineer with a laptop and a businessman with his briefcase. He then transformed to Arjuna himself. Arjuna had never seen this side of Krishna. He was in shock. Yet he was overcome by devotion. A devotion that was calming and intimidating at the same time. Arjuna folded his hands and said "Krishna, I see you embody every citizen of this proud country. Across professions. Across backgrounds. I'm in shock and awe at your knowledge and wisdom. Please take your normal form and bless me". He proceeded to prostrate before Ajja Krishna. Krishna slowly returned to his normal self.

 "Arjuna, you asked me who is good for this country. It is You. You alone are good for this country. Nobody can script Your future - if You are not ready to perform Your duties. In whatever profession, in whatever capacity, to whatever extent. Serve Your country. Let Honesty, Integrity and Humility be Your guiding Lights. Let Knowledge and Action be Your Weapons. Let an economically and spiritually developed country be Your Goal"

The words echoed in Arjuna's mind long after Krishna left the room. He looked at the charts on the walls and the literature on his bed. Their presence did not intimidate him anymore. He knew what he would be doing next morning.......

                                                                                                         - 2nd April 2019

The write-up clearly is inspired by the Gita and ofcourse the Elections. The attempt here is to provide food for thought as we approach a phenomenon that only gets bigger each time. This is an article purely for entertainment purposes - yet if there is a message that is driven home, nothing like it!

                           

Illusion

     Illusion                      

    From the womb of a craving mind

    Feb by Hope, nurtured by Fear

    Is born the enigma of Illusion

     

    With time and Times, and the World around

    You realize, the Illusion isn't just one

    They grow with You, They grow on You

    Four colored walls and a glass ceiling

    And a mirage for a floor to plod on

    Control, Success, Love, Fame
    Mine, Yours and the Forever delusion      
    Holding on with Fear, to a World outside
    The emptiness we eventually leave behind

    Destiny, Plans, Luck, Meant-to-be
    Attempts at belief, while there is none
   Holding on to Hope, the convenience of letting go
   The Life that is.....and the one that goes by

    The content of Acceptance, devoured by the hunger of Aspiration
    Past and Future, Dictators in a commanding Collusion
    The Present wanders alone, in search of Redemption,
    The guiding Light of Truth, that lurks in the shadow of Illusion  
  
                                                                          - 27th March 2019


Bringing up 75 posts in this blog with this one. The last 25 posts have taken roughly four and a half years. But then, a lot of them have also received heart-warming responses from you. It feels great when you reach out saying you connected with the post. The post has then fulfilled its purpose! Writing is a life long project. I only hope I'm able to write more, write better and write to connect with you!     

- Alok Simha