I always hear a scream when I see the word 'rape'

Some ugly words in the English language …..
snot, gruesome, accursed, abandon, slime, decaying, deceit, carnage, bloodsucking,
maim, backstab…
and one of the ugliest is rape. I always hear a scream when I see this word. Read about the MBA student and I couldn’t sleep again at night. It took merely an evening to destroy the hopes of a girl, to throttle young promise and laughter and joy! There is now a girl who will jump at shadows all her life. And nothing can even the score for her. Ever.

For the men who think of it as a crime, ranking below murder, I offer a visual image….most girls will drink a bowlful of snot, decayed eggs, liquid roadkill if they had to make a choice between this and being raped. We would choose to be killed than be gangraped….I would kill to protect a girl from such a fate, if I could, without blinking! It is something we are warned about from the time we are baby girls, when ‘the enticing stranger’ is someone who can eat us maybe. And when we are old enough, we realize that we can be harmed in such a manner that our soul can be maimed. It is an act which is worse than murder….a raped woman has been damaged beyond repair and she still has to carry on living.

Since most people cannot understand the psyche of a victim and feel the death penalty is too stringent, why don’t we let the victim decide the magnitude of the punishment meted out. If a victim feels that it is no big deal, she can settle for a financial settlement or let the accused off with ‘a stern warning’…she can have his arm or leg or some other appendage cut off…let us give the victim a chance to get even. Let us see what is asked for in exchange…I can promise you it will be an eye-opener for us all!

I am thunderstruck that here justice is pure hogwash…the victim is punished over and over while the perpetrator is let off! Remember Santosh Kumar who entered Priyadarshini’s home to rape and kill her…and the judge let him go while stating that “I know you have committed the crime…” it was only the relentless efforts of a father who had nothing more to lose and an indignant public who finally saw that the man was put behind bars. Would the judge be this merciful had his daughter been the one to lose her life? Why do we bay for justice only when we or ours are harmed? How can a rapist have anything to say in his defence? Do you remember Aruna Shanbaug, the 19 year old nurse, raped by a sweeper in the very hospital where she worked? Choked by a dog chain? Still in hospital after more than 3 decades, unable to talk, walk, braindead…while her rapist walks free and lives his life !

We are two sisters and my dad is 5 feet 7 inches…he’s always been slight in build. BUT he would transform when he felt his daughters threatened…I have NO doubt in my mind that my dad would have killed to protect me and my sister! And he would have no remorse…the essence of a father is protection. He would extend this protection to my friends who came over to our house as he was conditioned by then. Does one need to have a daughter to realize that rape is frightfully wrong? All have been born of women…does this universal truth hold no insight?

We need to change laws which deal with rape…and change them fast. When it is child victims, there should be no other punishment other than the death penalty. And when victims are women then they should be given the choice of an adequate ‘exchange’! Let us see what price a woman puts on her self respect! I think that in such cases, most rapists will be happy to be hung!
I remember one boiling summer afternoon in Delhi when I was a thin married girl of 25. Had to take my Doberman out as usual when I found a young girl, literally gibbering with fright. She was terrified of my dog, yet she was sticking to me. Her mama had left her near a bus stand to go finish her work and two men had tried to grab her while she was standing there. I was instantly afire…took her back to the stand where sure enough, two mangy men were hanging about. I sat down and made the girl sit next to me while Lady, my Dobe, stood in front of us both and I prayed for the men to come near! Three females united! I think I might have been growling too. Those days I needed my husband when I had to open a jam jar but that afternoon, for 15 minutes, I was Kali! I just remember heat….heat of that merciless May sun and an inner heat that had me inflamed. Those two took off after sometime…they recognized my unspoken wrath that had me vibrating visibly! And I was disappointed for I wanted some bloodletting that day…the girl was an eight year old! I felt no pride then or now…I had just wanted a reckoning…and I knew that I would not have backed down! Not that day!

Life gives no second chances

Is “understanding”an abusive word? I think it is when some of us urge the others to “understand” a terrorist’s point of view! Many of us feel that Kasab was brainwashed and that he actually is a victim as he is dirt poor. Okay, my brother was a toddler aged 2 and a half when he put his hand inside the mouth of a stray dog to rescue a half eaten squirrel. What made my brother feel this kind of compassion for an animal when so young and what made Kasab kill an unarmed unaware populace peacefully going about its business? Kasab supposedly studied till the forth standard…..my brother had not touched a book by then!

By the same lunatic reasoning, should we ‘understand’ vermin who rape babies? And ‘understand’ adult humans who beat strays to death, who poke out the eyes of puppies and leave them staggering around in unspeakable agony? Or should we ‘understand’ those who throw acid on young girls and make the rest of their lives a living hell? Maybe we should ‘understand’ Santosh Kumar who stalked a college going Priyadarshini Mattoo for two years and then entered her house where she was living under police protection, assaulting her so severely that he sustained fractures in his hands before finally strangling her! Would we be so ready to ‘understand’ if we were at the receiving end of such brutality? Should we get inside the mind of Manu Sharma who took a life over a simple refusal of a drink as the bar was closed? “Understand” him too? “Understand” human trafficking and pedeophilia! Child porn! Why not ‘understand’ the Austrian who fathered 7 children from his daughter he confined in a basement for over two decades? ‘Understand’ those who sprinkle petrol over a bear, panther, elephant which has strayed from its habitat and come into a village or a town, and then set it alight? So many things to ‘understand’ and so short a life!!

Or should we understand that these people concerned are not human….they cannot be reached by compassion or love and need to come back to earth again in a new and improved form! And to forgive them is an unforgivable act of weakness. They have proved beyond a doubt, that they are maneaters…predators. Do we leave them unleashed in a civilized society? Do you really think you can leave them in a world where your sons and daughters live?

There are some acts which are simply not acceptable. They make one’s gorge rise. To let them pass and go unpunished severely is a crime in itself! If we can find excuses for such behaviour and seek to understand it, we violate the concepts of fairness and justice.

We all have one life…we all are responsible for what we make of it. Life gives no second chances…a life gone is gone for all eternity. And one who kills with so much of malice and so little compassion had served his time here.

We need heroes to inspire and lend us clarity of mind and heart

Okay, I’ve been down and out lately…the men of inaction leaving me completely demoralized, quenching my inner fire, dousing the rage with the ice water of pseudo intellectual talk. I write with a pen weighing me down and I realize that I will not let my flame flicker and die out…I will talk of Sam Manekshaw…he who makes me smile as I write about him. We need heroes to inspire and lend us clarity of mind and heart. Why I write about him….

After 2300 years of unremitting defeats of Indian armies against every invading army, Sam Manekshaw made the country experience the glow of a stunning victory against the Pakistan army in what is now Bangladesh . That will remain Field Marshal Manekshaw's unique position in Indian military history.

Field Marshal Sam Hormusji Framji Jamshedji Manekshaw, known as Sam “Bahadur”, or Sam the Brave, an honorific given him by the Indian Army’s Gurkhas, the mustachioed, twinkle eyed dapper, gentleman with the admirable sense of humour and courage of steel….that outspoken master of detail, has the rare distinction of being honoured for his bravery on the battle front itself. During World War II, he was leading a counter-offensive against the invading Japanese Army in Burma. As he charged forward with his men, a Japanese soldier suddenly emerged from the bushes and fired at him, wounding him seriously in the stomach. He caught nine bullets! Major General D.T. Cowan spotted Manekshaw holding on to life and was aware of his valour in face of stiff resistance from the Japanese. He quickly pinned his own Military Cross ribbon on to Manekshaw saying, "A dead person cannot be awarded a Military Cross.”

On another occasion, a General accused of misusing funds was marched up to him. "Sir, do you know what you are saying?" asked the General. "You are accusing a General of being dishonest." Replied Manekshaw: "Your Chief is not only accusing you of being dishonest but also calling you a thief. If I were you I would go home and either shoot myself or resign. I am waiting to see what you will do." The General submitted his resignation that evening.

On one occasion, he found that the Defence Secretary had penned his own observations on a note he had written to the Prime Minister and Defence Minister. Infuriated, Manekshaw took the file and walked straight into Mrs Gandhi's office. He told her that if she found the Defence Secretary more competent than him to advise her on military matters she did not have a need for him. The Defence Secretary was found a new job.

How we paid our last respects to this stalwart who died in 2008 aged 90? A man who walked his talk and did his job with great dignity, honour, raw courage? Guess! The Prime Minister, along with the Army, Navy, and Air-Force Chief's, all missed his funeral—which was a modest one held in Tamil Nadu in the south, not a grand one in the capital.

If we had one Sam Bahadur in politics, we had nothing to fear! If we had a thousand Sam Bahadurs, India would be safe and well ahead of the rest.

What gives me hope is that Indians have shared their land with some mighty, mighty men….that there is a hidden message for all those who question being born in India. Do you think it is chance that made us Indians, a random occurence? Or do you see the potential? Why have we been born Indians is a question we have to answer ourselves….if you live the American dream, go ahead. If you despise your motherland, escape her! There is no right or wrong here. A man who is ashamed of his country is ashamed of himself...that is a cross he has to bear.

Famous quotations of Sam, the soldier

"Gentlemen, I have arrived and there will be no withdrawal without written orders and these orders shall never be issued" -During 1962 War, when he was sent to North East Frontier Agency (NEFA) to command retreating Indian forces against the Chinese force.

"I wonder whether those of our political masters who have been put in charge of the defence of the country can distinguish a mortar from a motor; a gun from a howitzer; a guerrilla from a gorilla.

"You received three at this age; when I was of your age, I received nine bullets and look- today, I am the Commander in Chief of the Indian Army."- During the 1971 Indo-Pakistan War when he met an injured soldier in Army Hospital with three bullet wounds.

"If anyone tells you he is never afraid, he is a liar or he is a Gurkha."- On the Gurkha Battalion of the Indian Army.

"I'm always ready, sweetie,"- 1971 war, on being asked by Indira Gandhi about the Indian Army's readiness.

"Don't you think I would be a worthy replacement for you, Madam Prime Minister? You have a long nose. So have I. But I don't poke my nose into other people's affairs."- To Indira Gandhi, on rumours of him planning a coup to replace her.

Fare thee well, old soldier! Your epitaph should read " Here lies A Man Of Action! Sleep well after a duty well done and God bless.

We are superb cowards and bullies par excellence....

Had started blogging because I was a raging, average Indian….normally quite placid and never looking for trouble; with a great capacity for endurance. Something snapped that Wednesday and I was so sure that we were on the verge of some breakthrough! After reading all the nonsensical write-ups that have begun surfacing…I am in despair. There are so many rationales for what happened. Someone has said that all the rich were attacked hence the hullabaloo…the poor die everyday and there is silence…Tarun Tejpal says that the elite are to blame and the Gujarat riots which went unpunished have resulted in this Wednesday in December. Really, am I banging my head against a wall here? Can nobody see what I see?

Kasab’s village in Pakistan is Faridkot, the villagers all seem to view the media as a threat and do not want to even acknowledge the fact that they knew this unholy creature…off camera, they cannot stop giving out information about this miserable man. Apparently, he had come to take his mother’s blessing before setting out for jihad.

Pakistan refuses…..just refuses every demand that we make….I may as well stand under a neem tree and demand from it mangoes! “Demanding” anything from Pakistan is like asking the sheikhs for free oil…not going to happen even if Hell freezes over. Yet everyday, we make fresh “demands”!

The politician is already on to other agendas! He was shown in a very poor light and he took a week, ten days off…and is back in his old avatar! The Shiv sainiks tore up a lawyer’s place who was supposed to defend Kasab. And while a mob of them raised merry Cain there, a couple of policemen with the ever ready danda made faint, feeble gestures of maintaining law and order. Where was this mob when 2 terrorists went up and down Bombay (yes, I say Bombay now and forever, Mumbai is an idiotic change), firing at will and brought life to a complete halt? Like I said, we are superb cowards and bullies par excellence….one unarmed lawyer doing his job we can handle! 10 terrorists left loose make our teeth chatter like castanets all week long.

Which means that we are doomed to have such scenarios repeated because we do not learn ANYTHING at all. There is a belief that we will face similar situations in life till the time we evolve and handle them…so if a man runs away from trouble, trouble will pursue him all the time, till one day he has his back to the wall and has run his limit….he will have to fight some day, some time. In some life.

Then there are some bleeding heart jackasses who hold that “war will take away food from starving babies”…why on earth did India free herself from the British Raj and pay the stiff price of partition and a million dead? And in our villages, when “starving babies” die in peace time, is it acceptable? Please do not hide cowardly hearts in intellectual debates! Name ONE COUNTRY that would not have waged war when such an incident happened….one country! Name one country which has such a God-awful approach towards terrorism! We just let terrorists bloom and blossom and fruit and seed….and hold raging debates when they spread death and destruction! We should perhaps talk the terrorists to death since we excel at this one thing!

Can we have marathon talks and kill off our enemies? There’s an idea! Overwhelm them with words till they shoot themselves with their own bullets to escape this constant, verbal barrage.

We appall the world with our moral, physical, ethical weaknesses!

A few years back I had caught an Oprah Winfrey show where an eye catching woman, flashing diamonds, took the audience on a tour of her house. I still shudder to recall those images. That lady had a small dog and one of her loos was chock-a-block with small, black pellets. You guessed it…it was dried dog poo! Probably years old! And the rest of the interior matched that filth encrusted bathroom….things had gone so much out of hand that that woman came on the show and faced the disgust and horror of strangers to ask for professional aid in cleaning up herself and her home. I thought she should have burned down her house and started afresh!

Reminds me of Indians and India…we have let things get so much out of hand that we too have years of excreta jamming up all our systems and now look at each other and debate about what is to be done! The frailer ones decide to jump ship and emigrate…others just continue to exist in this unwholesome set up.

Nothing works here….and even when we are torn apart and blown up into bloody chunks, the survivors and onlookers debate!

If debates could replace action then we would be the most efficient people on the planet…the TV each day covers people from various fields…debating! Endless repetitions of what happened and why and how! What should be done, and can be done and how to do it!

Our politicians breast beat in public and apologise and…debate! What their party has done, and how and why they are superior to the other parties. And the only time their vacant eyes show steely determination, it is when they are direct contenders to the “kursi”….the rest of the time, they are on auto pilot. You can blow up their public to kingdom come and they would go about their business as if all was peachy perfect!

Its been a fortnight since the Indian public was ambushed and attacked, as it went about its business, by trained militants now proven beyond doubt to have come in from Pakistan …and we debate! Pranab Mukerji says that India will not tolerate any of this any longer. So what are we doing now? Aren’t we tolerating? And enduring? And what a fine message we are delivering to a world wide audience….come and kill us when you please and as you please and in as many innovative ways as you can dream up…and we will debate!

We are a scared nation who make public displays of lamenting and have the memories of goldfish…lasting precisely 5 seconds!

We are in deep, deep trouble.

Pakistan is showing far more fire and mettle….it will not give us Dawood. It will not send the ISI chief here although it is so very very sad about what went on here… where is the proof? All know about its policy towards terrorism…Pakistan has never been its advocate and will wipe out terrorism from the face of the earth….excuse their tiny training camps in their backyards….national security matters, you see!! Overlook the fact that Kasab is singing like a canary and spilling all the beans, in between calling out to his mother. Pakistan wants proof! And Pakistan always gets what it wants! So we aam Indians can like it or lump it! Life is unfair, get used to it!

We are going to get strafed again and we will catch a glimpse of hell on earth…the unluckier ones will get a bellyful of the terrorist might and in that aftermath too…we will debate!

We will continue to have no stomach for fights, and we will discuss fair play and dissuade the hotheads amongst us that anger never achieved anything, we will debate and backpedal and discuss terrorism till it feels like an old friend…and wait to be blown up again…so that we can again congregate and light candles and march and abuse our leaders and give vent to all the emotions that have no outlet ordinarily and wait again for some more bombs! After all we are a billion strong…can’t we spare a thousand odd countrymen every few months to some terrorist activity? Ha, ha..where is your sense of humour!

Circular paths! Retracing our steps over and over again! The sheer futility of life itself!

Whom can we call and where can we air the disgusting cesspool of our lives to get some professional help? Where is Oprah? Let us take her on a guided tour and show her the mockery we have made of our lives....let the audience gasp with loathing….who lives in homes like ours?

I feel a deep connection with that poor doctor who made it his business to check security in cabs and is now in police custody! He is trying to make a difference….he is fighting back. He realized that nothing would shake off our immense lethargy and inertia and tried to do his bit. Let the man off, for Christ’s sake and go catch some terrorists!

Aren’t we stereotypical bullies? All bullies are cowards…so we let other countries wallop us around and cringe! And when we catch someone weaker, don’t we just come into our own? Publicly lynching cycle thieves, dragging young boys, who wrote love letters behind tractors, beating up pregnant women who we suspect of petty theft, throwing people with children off trains and buses because they had no ticket, gouging out eyes of stray dogs and painting them with burning coal tar…..ah, then we are unstoppable! And how do we treat men who come and make mincemeat of us and our families, who machine gun us to the ground, who send us for months to hospitals, who orphan our kids and leave us with missing limbs?

We do nothing!
We debate!
We wait!
We make each other laughing stocks!
We appall the world with our moral, physical, ethical weaknesses!

Rabindranath Tagore had written a powerful poem which we had to memorise in school…

“Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken in fragments by narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depths of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by Thee into ever widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my father, let my country awake!”

Where is that India ? Did it exist only in the minds of the patriots? Was it only a figment of their imagination?

I too have a prayer…

May the sleeping Indian awaken, Lord! And during his slumber, do not abandon him, O Lord!

The weak and the meek become extinct!

Just when I think my rage has abated, I hear or see an image which again brings me full circle. This time around it was a set of colour photographs. They show two grievously injured men, who later succumbed, lying after being shot down. I cannot get them out of my head, two men with wives, and small children, with mothers and sisters smote down for nothing! This is what gives birth to my savage anger…to die for nothing. A life which could have been so much more, hacked away merely because an animal in the garb of a man thought of destruction. We are all questioning that how could only 10 men wreak such havoc. One man can do so! Is it difficult to open fire on an unarmed multitude going about its business? To kill is so easy…I wonder at the mentality that can destroy and not build, that can kill this murderously but not debate, that considers all fair game….and it leaves me with just one thought.

We cannot forgive and move on, till we resolve this state of matters we just cannot proceed. It is WRONG to carry on…we owe the dead. There is a time when the most undecided of us will have to take a stand…a time when we will no longer question and just act. And I know the time is now. If this does not raise our hackles and make us congregate in the open with war cries, I can assure you, nothing ever will.

Tomorrow they will mow down school kids and we will go about our business because we would have been inoculated against horror and pain! They will kill grannies and we will reason that the old have to die! They will be driven to more and more outrageous acts because that is the sole principle of terrorism…to generate such mayhem that the living give up!

We cannot surrender, we cannot say that darkness will envelop us and we have no way out. History has shown that endurance brings no victory…we cannot build fortresses and hide away from so determined and ruthless a foe! Life is all about decisions….and however much we want to believe that the meek will rule, that is not going to happen! The weak and meek become extinct! THAT is the truth behind evolution too. All forms that cannot compete die out! We have all studied history and the life sciences…law too states that it is within our basic rights to retaliate with a proportionate force to the danger perceived…which means that if one is being mugged, one can stick a knife in the lawbreaker’s arm or leg and if a fellow comes after us with murder in his heart, we can pre-empt him and kill him first and we are not only blameless but protected by law! Religion too tells us to fight when running away is no longer an option. Why have all the avatars been born in warrior forms? Why does the samurai generate such reverence? Why has literature sung about the defenders, the fighters in such glorious prose? Why do poets deify the soldier? Because sometimes it is the greatest dharma to engage in battle! He who cannot protect himself and his home will never have poems composed in his honour…he will be forgotten even while he is alive. Sometimes pride is all we have and that unbending, unforgiving pride can sustain us when the going is tough!

Remember Rana Pratap….a king with such fierce pride that he did not give up when all the rest had and, lived to see his son eat chappatis made of grass, he never won but he lived free and died free and still is a symbol of glory and honour! A king who lived the hard life a soldier and became immortal. Even his steed gained a place in history…who has not heard of Chetak, the worthy horse of a worthy king! Maharashtra gave birth to Shivaji, the mighty Maratha who fought and hid, and fought and hid…played hide and seek with an enemy that out numbered him by far, and never gave up. These warriors with an iron will never won the war but they could never be tamed…and their feats have become legend! They were Indians…somewhere within us we must have the same fearless braveheart…we too have breathed the same air and shared the same earth. Time to bring him out…and to bring out an ancient pride! A centuries old sense of honour and do or die spirit! The fire of a soldier who battles for what he believes is right! The righteous wrath of the wronged!

Where have all the tears gone?

I have a part of me which is very naïve….it makes me believe that when one is hurt and cries out aloud, help arrives. I believe that good always triumphs, I believe in prayers being answered, I seriously believe that if I were involved in an accident and were lying helpless, a good Samatarian would stop to pick me up.

I have never disregarded what I believed to have been a distress call. I think it is a human impulse which all of us possess and listen to.

I have dogs at home…see, I do not say I keep dogs…I am lost without them, their presence completes me. Sometimes as I lie listening to music and my dogs lie near me, I roll over and let our foreheads touch and I know that He who has made me has made them, I can sense our connection.

I admit that I cry when I listen to Sufi songs…and I do not understand a word! I cry when I pray very hard and it is so very embarrassing.....I always have a tear in my eyes when I hear our national anthem. When the Sabri brothers sang on one chilly night in Delhi , I wailed away and was very glad of their robust voices which concealed my sobs very effectively. My crowning moment was when I first came to Bombay and had gone to drop my son to his bus stop and we saw a stray dog with one eye and suddenly there I was, weeping away unabashedly with Sangram patting my shoulder and looking around to see who else had caught sight of his mom making a spectacle of herself.

So as you can see crying comes easy and I seem to be getting better with age. One would have thought that all the horror of these past days would have wiped out the entire tissue supply of neighbouring shops…but I do not cry. I did not cry when I saw the emptied station with abandoned heaps of luggage mixed indiscriminately with congealed pools of blood and footwear strewn all along which captured the essence of what went on there, I did not cry when we saw the tally of the killed and wounded, I did not cry when I saw the proud Taj being strafed into submission, I did not shed a tear when I saw the dead Major’s mother talk to a son lying in his casket, I did not cry when I saw sons cremate their fathers and their mothers turned to stone, I did not cry when I saw a father raging at the world when they handed him his only son in a coffin ( he reminded me so much of my dad), I did not cry when I read about The Taj GM who lost a wife and children, yet kept on saving the others….my tears have hardened into a mixture of rage and anguish.

I know that tears have no place here…they are weak, weak, weak! They have turned to lava and they burn the back of my throat and keep me awake. I do not want to talk and when I see the political guys trying to wriggle out of the cesspit they have created with their filthy, filthy ideas, I wish I could change a bit of the scenario and include them too in this spectacle which exceeds all nightmares! The terrorist shooting at random and getting away to later realize he shot down his family, A Vilasrao bidding farewell to his only son (where are the grins now, eh, fatface??), a Patil finding his own charred home and shrugging nonchalantly “aise hadse to hote rahte hain”, A livid Rane cursing his party upon seeing the dead (not now when he has been rejected for the post of CM), An Achutanand…(by the way, very appropriate name, suits him, how did his mother know)….being attacked and savaged by hordes of dogs as soon as he opened his mouth to utter sacrilege, Naqvi condemned to live forever with a wife in all her “natural’ beauty complete with 6 inch moustache and 4 inch goatee, and body hair which can be plaited (now why do you wail for beauty parlours and cosmetics, you pathetic throwback!), A…what IS Benazir’s husband’s name, Bhutto?? (There’s some cashing in on the dead wife’s name, politicians are a breed apart) saying at a press conference that Pakistan is not involved and a grenade shatters a wall to show a terrorist training camp in his garden, the ISI chief stating firmly his innocence and Osama’s call coming in loud and clear on his answering machine, Mme Rice shaking hands with the Pak delegation and then looking down to realize that her wristwatch and rings are missing and 3 of her fingers too ….I wish I could be scriptwriter for a day! Tear down all these veils of hardcore lies, expose the deceit and get redressal!

And I take heart from the anger I see reflected in others…this anger is good, it will burn all apathy, it will get things done, it is infinitely better than the tears and wails that have been of no account till now, it will start something new. We might see a phoenix rise from the burning flames of our collective anger!