The Rebelle blog

"And beauty will return again to common things, And firmness to the heart's resolvings. No fear will haunt the drift of fancyings." And here I pay a tribute to the man who died this day today, 25 years ago in 1991, Graham Greene. I have not read his novels but I have read his poetry and his poems have made a great impact on me as a sensitive person. I am not into reading fiction and this is why I never read Greene's works. The local library I frequent has shelves stocked with Greene's novels and yet I have managed to go past them without ever casting a glance over the titles. Some of my friends are huge fans of Sidney Sheldon, Stephen King, John Grisham but I have never heard any of them speaking of Greene. It's strange but perhaps Greene demands the kind of serious attention that these other mentioned authors don't. Let's not be judgemental but Greene wrote on a serious Catholic perspective in his novels. The moral and immoral fight agains...

केवळ काहीतरी रोज लिहायचं म्हणून लिहिणारे असे कितीक असतील आणि मनातलं कागदावर ओथंबून देण्यासाठी लिहिणारे किती असतील? नुसती उगाच आकडेमोड नकोच. हल्ली लोकांना फार लवकर राग येतो आणि तो लवकर व्यक्त सुद्धा होतो. तर्कावरून सुरु झालेला प्रवास तर्कशुद्ध विवेचनावरच थांबतो असं तर अजिबातच होत नाही. काल एका मराठी वृत्त वाहिनीवर हैदराबाद मध्ये कन्हैया कुमार वर चप्पल फेकली गेली त्यावर चर्चासत्र बघितलं. इतके खुजे लोक राजकारणात आहेत आणि असं विषारी राजकारण करतात हे बघून वाईट तर वाटलच पण आपल्या देशाच्या गौरवशाली परंपरेबद्दल ह्या लोकांच्या मनात किती भ्रामक समजुती आहेत, याचादेखील प्रत्यय आला.  मुळातच विद्यार्थी चळवळ हि काही आज किंवा काल सुरु झालेली चळवळ नाही. तिला देखील काही इतिहास आहेच. आजच्या राजकारणात मुरलेली मंडळी जेव्हा इतका विखारी विद्यार्थी द्वेष व्यक्त करतात तेव्हा आश्चर्यापेक्षा त्यांची मला कीवच जास्त येते. एका विद्यार्थ्याने तुम्हाला एवढं जेरीस आणलं आहे कि त्याच्यावर तुम्ही आता चप्पल देखील फेकतात, त्याला जीवे मारायची धमकी देतात, हात पाय तोडणे यासारख्या फुटकळ घोषणा करतात आणि त्याला तु...

Conformity may give you a quiet life; it may even bring you to a University Chair. But all change in history, all advance, comes from the nonconformists. If there had been no trouble-makers, no dissenters, we should still be living in caves.  -A.J.P. Taylor, historian (25 Mar 1906-1990) I have never been this frustrated with people or events or my country. Sure enough I always remember what John F. Kennedy said about "ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." Yes, I keep this quote in mind but the current political monkeyism is getting on my nerves. How on earth did we come to this point of having to threaten, thrash, jail, molestate students who are protesting for their rights and exercising their fundamental constitutional right to speech and expression? I am baffled to see the top guns in the government especially the HRD minister who about a week ago cried in Parliament and passionately explained her love and conc...

With barely two hours of sleep last night since I spent it watching Kanhaiya Kumar's brilliant address at JNU campus, I woke up today morning to realise I had a host of deadlines to meet. Kanhaiya's call for freedom (Azaadi) kept lingering in my ears and the utter brevity to see so many people share their thoughts on social networking sites about his stance on socialism, secularism, equality and freedom from politics. With that fire in my belly, I wrote a first draft for a friend's branding consultancy website. I have no previous experience on writing corporate profiles but as they say, if you read well, then you can write well. (I would like to whole-heartedly believe this statement.) I realised how scattered student movements are in India. When I was in college, we didn't have any association, no affiliations with political parties of course, but no inkling towards social realities as well. All the students did was attend classes, sit at campus hot spots sipping...

Not sure if this is an under-statement but so many struggles through human life seem too irrelevant when seen through different tinted shades. In my country right now, there is a huge debate, newspapers filling their columns and eminent writers, public personalities moaning over political judgements and chaos ensuing in society over nationalism and anti-nationalism, sedition and loyalty to the religion major. It's sickening but true how students, writers, common people feel the brunt of black jacks but the bureaucracy fails to see the many-hued superficialities it lays on its billion citizens. Do we have to really wade through such deep, murky waters to reach to the bottom of what seemingly is utter trash? How do we fare in the eyes of the world? Perhaps, that we cannot be bothered to worry about since our nation in itself is a great entity that has survived for aeons and shall do so, with all the ancient rooted philosophies deemed oh-so-relevant in 21st century. Correct me i...