Glorious India - My India (Mera Bharat Mahaan)

I have nothing against exposure of our Indian flag nor the commercialization of the Independence Day. I don’t find myself overtly patriotic and neither do I consider myself to be totally devoid of any feeling for the country I reside in. It is also the country that saw my birth and the birth and demise of my ancestors. To take pride in your country of birth or country of residence, you do have to feel connected to it. My connection is somewhat limited to the cribbing that I do at the diverse yet identical queues that I stand in, intersections that I cross, crossings that I crawl through in my car, and call centers that I call to register complaints for the electricity outages, for the faulty ceiling fan that produces more noise than relief, leaking bathroom fittings, dried taps, inflated credit card bills, train delays and rescheduling and a lot more. I cringe at the sight of beggars at the crossings and the streets. I revel at the thought of venturing out on foot during rains, fearing the muck to absorb me as I walk or rather wade through. I wait for that long beep of the last dying effort of my inverter as I continue punching keys on my imported laptop. I honestly dread the moments when I’d be forced to offer a bribe to the policeman at the crossing, as I almost deliberately jump the signal. I can grease palms with the excellence of a Gangul-ian cover drive. Easy does it.

I have recently got entrapped in a self realization mode. The remote seems to be working on dead or at best dying, flickering batteries. My life is just not switching to another channel. I see people working around me performing different roles and varied duties. Some are engineers, some laborers. Some are soft, others hard. Some are teaching, some mugging up. Some are cleaning while others messing around. What am I doing? Sitting and waiting for my moment to arrive. I believe that everyone is born for some single purpose in life. Some find it, others don’t. I deliberately stopped doing anything else but look for the answer for myself. I am yet to find it.

But this article was not supposed to be about me. It is supposed to be about the kite that I saw. Torn and in tatters. The only concern I felt for the shredded piece of paper was towards its uncanny resemblance to the national flag. Something stirred in me. Holding my German Shepard in one hand and balancing the milk packets in the same, I took out my latest mobile and snapped a couple of quick pics. My dog did not share my concern. He had come for his walk and was sure to get one. He pulled me over to the other side of the street. He relieved himself of the overnight burden and then settled down to be taken around at my will at last. I returned to the same site and painstakingly took down the shattered flier. Now with the remnants in hand I pondered on what to do with them. That’s when I realized. This was simply paper and sticks. I was the one who saw it as a torn replica of the national flag. It was not. It could not be. The lie was true in my eyes. I folded the pieces into a bundle and promptly deposited them into the nearby dustbin. Thereby having relieved myself of the pain and turmoil that I felt.

But still the high quality digital photographs that I’d taken with my Nokia didn’t let me rest easy. The moment I transferred the photographs onto my laptop via Bluetooth, I was shocked and again reminded of its uncanny resemblance to my national flag. Was it just a chanced situation or was it destined to happen? Maybe I should avail of my rights as a law abiding, honest, caring and aware citizen and exercise my RTI to question the President, the Prime Minister and the concerned senior authorities as to why had I been so unjustly exposed to this ever lasting mental trauma and anguish. My country lay shattered and torn as I simply looked on and clicked photographs and all around me the people were unaware of the significance of the moment. They just carried on with their duties and went on with their lives. Why should I be so troubled?

Om - My first artwork

This was an attempt that I made for my friend Tobias Kudla as a parting gift. It happened on 27th of September, 2007. I had not got it framed so that it would have been convenient for him to carry. He was a true friend and remains one even now. He got the painting framed and it adorns his wall in Germany.

The following is an effort to decipher the painting:

Life in unison. The communication between the souls of the opposites. The shape of each soul is not incidental, rather intentional. The female form has a slender, and slightly more flexible, curvy shape, which lends feminity to it. It is accentuated even more by the choice of colour. The subtle nature of the orange and yellow combines to give a calm yet distinct feminine essence to the shape, that coils and curls around the more rigid and bold masculine form. The bluish tone to the male counterpart provides depth and at the same time, a colour in contrast and also in complement to the orange companion. The togetherness of the two forms is elevated by the presence of ‘OM’ symbols floating around and gaining footage and alliance to the resonating figures in the centre of the painting. The red background symbolises blood, - something which is at the source of all existence and is the substance within all forms of nature and beyond its realms to provide the environment for successful coupling of the two poles that signify life. ‘OM’ is simply a darker shade of the background, since its presence is non-refutable and does not need the figures to exist. Its relevance is in its unity with the environment, which it is a part of and probably the core of it too. ‘OM’ becomes recognisable in its spirit and form, once the resonance of the feeling and communication of the figures in proximity, increases intensity. The communion does not necessarily mean physical interaction. It is the exchange between the souls of two beings, coming together, and uniting in one, but still maintaining their individual characteristics. Individuality of the beings survives all unions, and if and when, separations. ‘OM’ figures are larger in size and bolder in presence when they come nearer to the united forms. This could also signify the realisation of the resonating (‘OM’) shapes, which magnifies their relative sizes. The existence of resonance in the surroundings is not justified by the resonance created by the joining of the two forms, rather it is omnipresent and it is only perceived better when the unison of thoughts of the two shapes allows it to be in line with the presence around it, by virtue of enhanced self-realisation.

It is also noteworthy that although all the shapes – male, female, and ‘OM’, seem to encircle and overlap each other, they do not reduce the individual’s identity, and the sanctity of ‘one’ endures and persists beyond the union.

Such a harmonious companionship is probably the sacred most state for all concerned.

My world - Frog's view

'The world is mine and mine alone', so thought 'Frog', the frog.

The light at the end of the rising walls around Frog kept him in tune with the occurrence of days and nights. The sun shone at times stronger than he could bear, for it would be directly targeted on his world. On other occasions, the evidence of a shining sun beyond the horizon, his world's horizon, was a certain warmth and glow that he could feel all around him, illuminating his world and keeping the temperatures bearable. Then there were instances when the dark clouds, which formed above his world, would unleash a sudden flow of the sweetest water that he encountered in his world. Actually, his water world was kind of too salty for his comfort. But then who had the perfect world, although he was sure that his world came extremely close to the definition of one. His world had been exposed to many intruders, but fortunately, he had been able enough, to ward off any unfriendly invasion, and to entertain guests that came and brought him fables and tall tales from an imaginary world beyond his world. The beetles and mosquitoes that came to meet their end for his benefit were never short on such stories to entertain him before becoming his meal. The world around him was well explored and there wasn't any part of it that had missed the round eyes of Frog. Frog's world was the only thing that existed in the world and with the sun, the moon and the rain, all trying to find a way in to his world, he knew he was the king, the saviour, and the sole leader of the world. That there could exist anything beyond the shallow well that constituted Frog's world was a fiction that didn't strike him in the least - a possibility.

One day, a slimy, vine-like creature with, a two-pronged slithery tongue, slid down the walls of his world. Frog was ready to devour this new food, when calamity struck and he found himself stuck inside the invader. Soon the confinement proved too suffocating for the hunter, now hunted. Frog didn't notice the rain that followed the thunderclap. He was lost and his kingdom won over in unfair, and disbalanced duel. The victor was now the sole leader, for the slippery walls didn't provide enough foothold for him to scale out of the well. Frog never made it out of his world - alive, that is. Even in death he was relieved of the pain of discovering a world beyond his own, hostile and unknown.

Do our lives represent a frog in the well approach? Can we see beyond our own world? Most don't, and most don't even want to. Do I?

Nature's dilemma

All the things around Adam and Eve were beautiful and soothing. The trees, the green grass, the multi-colored flowers in full bloom, the frolicking animals, the chirpy birds, the clear blue sky dotted with some silver-lined clouds, the cool and inviting ponds, and even the fruits weighing the branches to move serenely with the soothing breeze that made the branches sway, as it did to Eve's hair gently and enticed Adam to look towards her. He felt complete within the restricted expanse of the garden that he was confined in. The garden felt like home and not a prison.

The sin committed later was one that forced 'God' to banish the human couple from the 'Garden of Eden'. The garden was for the use of the couple and the couple only. What they achieved by indulging in an act out of pure love of each other was to experience an earth-shattering mutually-satisfying orgasm. But since the technical know-how was limited and 'God' had forgotten that as was the case with all of his creations, he had given the human pair an option to procreate and expand their number. No contraceptive devices meant that Eve was gonna be missing her next period.

Although they were banished from 'paradise', the couple didn't learn anything substantial. Their presence on 'Earth' without any limiters on the horizon meant that the pleasurable exercise of having sex for the sheer fun of it was to be repeated enumerable times, over and over again. Maybe it was that 'God' knew something that he decided not to share or that 'he' realized the folly of his own creation. He provided the humans with the will and the power to do so, without providing them with the requisite intelligence to be reasonable in their approach to ensuring a balance with nature. Since the first step of humans on 'Earth' were felt, the planet has reeled under the pressures forced on it by its new tormentor. 'Earth' provided all the living and non-living creations with an environment to exist and cohabit with each other. What it didn't know was the futility of the whole exercise?

Humans were simply dumb-witted and near-sighted. They felt confident in numbers of their own progeny. Thus they grew and grew in numbers. As their numbers multiplied, the burden on nature to provide them with food and shelter increased. This in itself was an ever-increasing burden but nature hadn't made provisions for the playful behavior of the bipeds. Humans were really keen on gamesmanship and they found ample game around them. Plants and trees were treated as mute victims, who's sole reason for existence was to provide humans with whatever they desired. The animal kingdom provided them with food to eat (and waste), skins to cover their body for warmth (and style), and most importantly with a sport to boast of, to satiate its own ego and boost its esteem among its species. Humans have always been hunting and killing, putting the flora and fauna of the 'Earth' under serious threat of extinction. That they have achieved to rule out the existence of numerous animals and plants species is of great importance to them. Humans rule. What an achievement! We have not only played destroyer to the animals and plants we needed for our immediate needs but we have also succeeded in creating an imbalance in the ecosystem, providing an option for the surrounding environment to slowly degenerate and disappear without any further intervention by us.

We have managed to triple our population in the last 50 years, nearing a small total of 7 billion. What an achievement? What's the prize? Our extinction! Once we do away with all the other species of life on 'Earth', what will be the next step? Cannibalism and complete annihilation- come to mind. Why, but why can't we realize the foolishness of our action? We are a part of the nature as long as we respect its importance and allow it to coexist it with us. It allows us to coexist as long as we allow ourselves to limit our burden on the ever depleting resources. Death is always a pain, birth always happiness. But if we restrict the number of births we can make sure that the immediate burden on 'Earth' can be limited and with the mortality rate in play, the odds might even out and the ecosystem might self-replenish. Lesser number of humans means lesser consumption of the natural resources. This does not mean that we decide to do away with a part of the population, rather that we don't increase our numbers for some time. Let nature bring a balance on its own.

We can also surely help it by not adding to the pollution levels of the world any further. Thus, providing for an opportunity for the ecosystems to rebuild and reconstruct. It is in our hands and we are the ones who need to do something.

Let's do it. Let's make love not babies.