First and foremost - An Expectation

A new government has taken charge in Kerala. The expectations are running high in the minds of people who are tired of the shoddy governance, high-profile corruption scandals, and an insensitive ministry during the previous government. This led to a massive landslide victory of the Left democratic front in the state. People have voted them to power expecting rapid transformation to happen in the functioning of the government. There is no doubt that the present government is under immense pressure to revive the lost faith and build confidence in the minds of people and stand by each of the commitment given in the manifesto.

I hope the LDF government will take all steps possible in order to justify their victory. They also have a huge task at hand of proving to the whole country that a LDF government can bring about an inclusive development and equally preserve the secular status of the state which is under threat today. We are in an era where communal unrest is begining to gain momentum across the country.

But in between all these political drama taking place at the helm, people like me are curiosuly waiting to see the stance of the new government on the case in which a dalit girl - Jisha was raped and murdered recently in Perumbavoor. The carelessness with which such a henious crime was dealt with by the police has raised many questions in the minds of people. News papers and channels have been full of speculations about the motive of such lackadaisical enquiry by the police. There have been reports of evidences not being collected or protected properly, a hasty postmortem which was not even recorded and burning of the corpse which is not as per rule in such cases. The crime scene - single room house was not even sealed by the police after the enquiry which is the minimum standard to be followed in such cases. We see that in so many movies. But all these regulations were flouted in the air and today even after almost a month not even a single arrest has been made.

With all the dreams of a flourishing state in my mind, i can't but stop myself from wishing that a drastic step be taken by the government in this case. A girl was raped and murdered. She was a representative of lakhs of such girls who belong to the cornered groups in our society, With no means to proper living conditions these girls struggle all through their life in each step to establish a decent life. When one among them is raped and murdered and if our justice system is unable to deliver justice even after death, hopes and dreams of lakhs of such girls are being trampled. It is an insult to the struggle that many go through to bring about a positive change for their ilk in this society.

I only wish that strict action is taken against the officials who handles this case with so much of indifference and carelessness. If this is done immediately by the government, they will succeed in taking a positive step towards strenghtening the confidence of people like us in this government.

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Ode on the Old

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A smooth surface once,

is now rough and scratched.

Time has etched its lines, 

and the joints are now creaky. 

The hinges make screechy noise; 

when I try to swing its door open.

It has been in my family for so long; 

that I forget when we actually got it.

My father got it done with so much of attention, 

for it was the first in my family.

It was green in color with a glow, 

but now it has brown patches - signs of old age.

Unattended it has stood at a corner always, 

guarding untiringly all our secrets and valuables.

I want to throw it out just because it looks ugly, 

all though I know, to my mom, it is a memento of Dad.

She asks, why throw it when u can fix it to perfection? 

Why do old things irritate you so much when you just need to care for it?

A little bit of touch up is all it requires, 

to become the strong beauty it was long ago. 

Replacing it is easy but, 

nothing today is as durable as it is, even today 

It stands in the memory of so many things of our family; 

How easily you decide to throw it away. 

What will help you kindle your old memories, 

If you don't have anything that connects you to them. 

Throwing away is so convenient, but remember, 

that the replacement will not carry the memories so dear to you.

And what is a human without memories to talk about; 

They are all that we have, to prove our existence in the past.

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Lessons learnt and to be learnt

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There is so much of discussion going on about results of latest assembly elections in TamilNadu, Kerala, Assam, West Bengal and Pondicherry. Governments have been toppled, glorious victories have been claimed, a sustained assertion of power has also taken place and there has been an interesting development of making inroads into an impenetrable zone and even blooming at one place.

My new found interest in politics has come as a surprise to my family as till 2 years back my knowledge in politics was almost negligible and I was one among the crores of educated youth who considered it as a dirty game and took their names only to blame and complain. But what has changed in the past 2 years? When I started talking about politics at home my mom asked me this question. Is it because I had married a man who believed in a strong political ideology and also believed that every citizen should participate in politics? But no, I had woke up to active political discussions even before I met him. I had started to take note of politics in India during the 2014 Parliamentary election. The sudden rise of Mr.Narendra Modi is what kindled the curiosity in me.

I was stuck by the fact that a person who was spoken about across the country with terror, in a short span of few months had become the star crowd puller for his party. All of a sudden he became a model politician and his name could be heard in every nook and corner of the city. The city road sides adorned his huge life size banners screaming out a vision of a developed nation, promising a Gujarat model development plan. Prior to that, i had heard his name scarcely in news bulletins. People who supported him and even argued in his support - like my colleagues in office, I guess would never even have heard or read about him before, were his die hard fan and also were talking about the Gujarat model development about which they had no real statistical idea except for which was presented to them in a shining manifesto. So how come he could garner the attention of the whole nation? How did he mesmerize the youth of the country who had been indifferent to politics till then? This was a puzzle that actually got me to follow politics.

Frankly I have never been his supporter or admirer - but the aura with which he towered over all his friends and enemies in politics did make me notice his personality and also pushed me into following the political developments in the country. Once I started reading in detailed I understood that there was a huge PR strategy behind the whole campaign. The whole campaign was planned by the PR group intelligently targeting the tech savvy youth of the country. We are people who with access to the internet have details about the whole world at our disposal but do not have time to do any analysis or are basically lazy to get into statistical real data and so we will believe and gobble any story given to us in silver plate, cooked as we want it. We can never connect with the ground reality the way we connect with the social community on face book and twitter. So the whole campaign was aimed at bringing us into the magical world of developed India and building stories only around things that we understand or matter to us.

This is one part of the whole plan that I could grasp. I am sure there will be so many other parallel plans developed by the PR agency, which was implemented successfully and hence the unbelievable victory of the greatest show man.

This is one area where the other parties should learn a lesson from this charismatic man. It is imperative that the lessons are learnt by the right people at the right time so that our country gets a real leader who leads his people out of poverty by keeping them safe from the hands of crony capitalists who by the power of monopoly are influencing the policies of the government and pushing the people into poverty. Today the country is developing but its people are just poor and cannot afford the development.

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It is not Love

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She was crying uncontrollably. Sitting on the sofa her whole body was shivering in fear and pain. She was unable to talk in between her sobs. After crying for few minutes she started to calm down. Slowly her deep sobbing turned into a low hissing sound. Like a train coming to halt, she stopped and looked at me sitting across with red, swollen eyes. 

I could make out patches of dried blood in the corner of her swollen lips. There was big red patch showing signs of a blood clot at the corner of her right eye. Her hair was tied up in a ponytail, but her short strands of hair falling on her face with red wet eyes made her look much worse. While she was settling down to lay her head on the cushion of the sofa, I noticed her rubbing her left shoulder with a twitch in her already pathetic face. I could see that she was unable to lift her left hand without pain.

I got up from where I was sitting and moved towards her. Sitting beside her I took her hands off from her shoulder and pulled down the t-shirt she was wearing down her left shoulder to look at the source of her discomfort and pain. I was shocked to see that her shoulder was all swollen and it looked like she was assaulted with something heavy. I looked at her with a questioning look. She turned away from me and started to cry again. I put my hands around her shoulder and held her close to me. We sat there like that with her sob disturbing the silence around us. After some time, I helped her lift herself from the sofa. We walked towards the guest bedroom. While she waited sitting in a chair, I made the bed. She then sat on the bed when I went to get her some water. When I came back I saw that she was checking her phone. Seeing me, she put her phone down and looked at me pitifully. Without saying anything I gave her the bottle of water and walked out the room. 

As I walked towards my room where my husband was sleeping deeply, I could not stop the tears that rolled down my cheeks. I went into my room and laid beside my husband hugging him tightly. 

Hearing the alarm go off I woke up. On my way to the kitchen, I peeped into her room to see if she was sleeping but found her awake with her mobile in her hand. In a fit of rage, I dashed into her room and snatched the mobile from her hand. She was startled. I scrolled through reading the messages on the screen. 

Rajesh: I am sorry... Call me...

Rajesh: I am sorry dear... pls call me.

Rajesh: don't punish me like this... Pls attend my call...

Rajesh: I am tensed, pls attend my call.... u r killing me.

Rajesh: if u don't attend my call now u will never see me alive...

Sandhya: what do u want? why don't u just leave me alone?

Rajesh: I am sorry darling. I shud not have hurt u so much... u know how much I love u... u do stuff that anger me and u know I cannot control myself.... but it is because I love u that I come back to u asking sorry always.

Sandhya: It hurts... I could not sleep the whole night... I cried the whole night. I did not know what to do... U know I love u too. But u cannot hurt me like this.

Rajesh: I am really sorry dear. But I can't stay away from u... U know it is us always... I know where u r now... Coming to pick u up.. I will make it up to u today. Promise me whatever I do you will stay with me... that you will never leave me... I love u so much... u know I cannot live without u...

Sandhya: U shd promise me that you will never ever hurt me again... No matter what happens. Also promise me from the heart, because, every time you promise but never keep up your promise...

Rajesh: I promise from my heart that I will never hurt u again...

Sandhya: mmmm

I looked at her with disbelief. 

"Do you believe he will keep up his promise this time?" I asked her.

"I hope so. He sounds so earnest. And he has been pinging me for so long without sleeping. That should mean something right?" she wanted my reassurance for something which she knew was not right. But what could I say? 

"This is not the first time he is doing this. He said the same during the previous two instances. Why don't you just stay away from him for some time? He has some serious problem. No normal man can beat you up so badly. Let him at least realise his mistake. " I said trying to put some sense into her mind. But she would not listen. 

"I understand your concern, but let me try this one last time. Maybe he is really sorry. I don't want him to suffer because of me. He is so dependent on me. If I leave him he will be devastated", she said pleadingly. 

"What if he hurts you again?" I asked. 

"I will tell him clearly that if he hurts me again I will leave him. I will convey the message strongly. If he wants me, then he has to keep up his promise this time."  said she with a stubborn face. I knew there was no point in trying to argue with her. So, I decided to leave her to her wish. 

The door bell rang. I knew it was him. I opened the door. There he was standing with a tired smile. He looked charming even in his wrinkled dress. There was a single rose in his hand. He peeped across me searchingly. I looked at him furiously but he stood there like an innocent boy. I excused myself from the room so that they could talk. From the kitchen, I could hear his voice murmuring. It was not clear, but I knew he was doing his best to convince her. After few moments she called out to me. They were leaving. I said nothing, but silently let them leave my house. 

Another night, another call on my mobile and I knew this vicious cycle would repeat.

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To A Mother - For What She is Not

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Mother - Personification of Love, Sacrifice and Selflessness. Wow! how wonderful it is to see these words on a face book post that a mother is never going to see or on a twitter message that she will never even learn to open.  I fail to understand why people do this on face book or twitter.

I did not call my mother to wish her on this day neither did i post a message on social media to prove my love for her to the world. Even if i don't call out to her on this day she knows that i love her. I don't care if anyone knows about the kind of relationship i share with her.

I want to dedicate this post to her and to so many like her, for what she is not today, because she is a human being first, a woman next and lastly a mother. How can i forget that?

She is not a singer she wanted to be - because of my strict grandfather  and the orthodox culture of the family then.
She is not a dancer she wanted to be - because of again my strict grandfather and the orthodox culture of the family then.
She is not a degree holder that she wanted to be - because of she had to finish the kitchen cores even when she was 15 years old and educating women was the last priority in the family.
She is not a teacher she wanted to be - Because my father wanted her to stay at home after marriage.
She is not a professional tailor that she wanted to be - Because she got busy with being a good homemaker soon after marriage.
She is not a financially independent woman that she wanted to be - Because she always cared for our financial independence and never gave time for herself.
She is not someone who has gone beyond South India - Though my father was working abroad she chose to stay here with us in order to not disturb our education.
She is not someone who lived in the physical security of her husband - She decided to stay away from his security so that we would have a secure future.

She is not so many things she wanted to be. She could not do so many things she wanted to do. I respect her for all that she is not.

This is the case with crores of women in this country. They are not so many things they wanted to be. But who bothers about what she wanted to be when she is a mother - the ultimate achievement. We make motherhood her greatest achievement when she could have achieved so much more along with being a mother. This is a socially accepted justification that we impose on her to hide the injustice meted upon her gender.

Motherhood is great. But when that becomes the identity of a woman rather than it being a choice, it becomes a emotional burden. I think we should learn to look at her as a human being first and then a mother. Because, the moment she becomes a mother all her other achievements take a back seat and she is morally and emotionally forced to prove her motherliness through sacrifices and selflessness. 

Let's not make motherhood a burden rather let us make it a enjoyable experience for every woman. I wish every mother gets to celebrate her achievements without guilt.

Happy Mother's day.

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Selective Outrage - An irresponsible Trend

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In 2012 it was the most terrifying and heart-wrenching Nirbhaya incident and in 2016 it is a similar incident in Perumbavur, Kerala. It was Jyothi then and it is Jisha now. I shuddered when I read the details of Nirbhaya and I felt the same fear when I read about the Perumbavur case. It is not within the capability of any normal human being to even imagine the kind of cruelty that these two girls have suffered . The whole nation was on fire in 2012 and it is again on fire now in 2016. And it is right to be on fire.

When these incidents were brutal enough to shake the human within us, how many of us have thought or even heard about much much more such rape cases that have been reported in media between 2012 and 2016? I am very particular about the period between 2012 and now because 2012 was when the "common man" of the nation woke up from their self-induced peaceful sleep to the horrible reality of sexual assault and fatal cruelty meted upon a woman in this country. Do we know how many cases of rape are being reported every day? Just to give a fair idea, I am listing few cases that have garnered some media attention after the Nirbhaya case.

"In August 2013, a 22-year-old photojournalist, who was interning with an English-language magazine in Mumbai, was gang-raped by five persons, including a juvenile, when she had gone to the deserted Shakti Mills compound, near Mahalaxmi in South Mumbai, with a male colleague on an assignment.

In May 2014 two girls aged 14 and 16 were allegedly gang-raped in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh and girls were then hanged from a tree.

On 14 March 2015, a 71-year-old nun was allegedly gang-raped in Ranaghat, West Bengal by intruders at Convent of Jesus and Mary. "

- Source of information Wikipedia

In its annual report, the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) said that the number of rape cases in the country has risen by 9 percent to 33,707 in 2014 - Source of Information in.reuters.com
These records are available on the NCRB website and is open for all of the public to see.

Aren't these data enough proof to show that 'Rape' is not a rare issue but a recurring and continuing crime in our country. If for the sake of argument I say that I am ignorant about the statistics, aren't we supposed to react with the same fervor and emotions when any rape case is being reported in the media? Some cases do get media attentions either due to the rareness of the case itself or because of the courage showed by the victim to bring it to the media attention. So many cases go unreported in our country.

But why was no social media campaign for these cases? Why was there not so much of hue and cry over these cases? Why was there no public demonstration in support of these victims or any change.org campaign for these people? I guess these people should have had a horrible death so that they would have got so much of public support. So does that mean that the victim should die a horrible death for us to react with so much of fervor? Doesn't a rape victim who did not die deserve this kind of support? Had Nirbhaya not been so cruelly attacked and left to die, had not Jisha been torn to pieces, would we have given them this much of our time and emotions? Isn't rape a cruel enough act for us to react?

Does rape not kill a person emotionally? Does rape not put the victim through serious physical and emotional pain? The continuous scrutiny by the society, ostracism that the victim and the family members suffer is beyond many of our understanding. I feel that many times we look at Rape as a lesser crime than murder. But in reality in a society like ours where chastity is the base on which a woman is judged, where morality of a woman is considered more important than her real talents and her achievements, where a woman is pushed to commit suicide because of the shame of having been raped, where a rape accused roams around freely but a victim has to live in fear, rape should be considered a crime worse  than murder.

I am not trying to belittle the outpouring emotions of the public in any case but if only we could react with the same emotional outrage for each rape incident in this country, if only we could influence our judicial system to bring the accused of every rape case under the law and get the deserved punishment, if only our emotional outbursts in the social media could target each and every rape case in this country, If only we as a society could support each Rape survivor morally to fight back for justice and stop making them a victim, I feel we will be taking a step ahead towards building a much safer place for our women where they can really live without fear. Every woman deserves it.

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