AN EXECUTION SCAM

A N   E X E C U T I O N    S C A M

How can we be so inhuman and breach our age old principles of 'Atithi Devo Bhava'? 'He came, he saw and he conquered' Mumbai on November 26, 2008. While performing his duties in the land of 'Karma, Dharma and Marma (compassion)' he committed some excesses, for which execution was too harsh a punishment.
It is quite evident that Dharma was not followed by a government which believes in it so stoutly that it allowed 2G scam to happen for the sake of 'Coalition Dharma'. For Dharma it facilitated Warren Anderson, a convict in the Bhopal disaster case, to flee India.
What surprises me the most is when many people are in the death row, how come the queue was breached and the privilege of going to gallows was bestowed only on Ajmal Kasab.
I have a belief that Ajmal Kasab has not been hanged. (Some people say people like Ajmal Kasab do not die. They only change their status- from single to the company of 72 virgins). It more seems like an attempt of a scam-tainted government to divert public attention from its misdeeds and put to rest public ire against it. There are many loose ends in the execution story. Reports suggest that there was no noose man to hang, so the capital punishment was given by a senior jailer. There is no information where the body was buried later. To raise more doubt, there are no photographs or videographs of the body.
In 65 years of our history we have attained so much of expertise in executing strangest of the strange scams that you should not be surprised to know that an 'EXECUTION SCAM' has taken place.

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A Banana Parade

          --By G Manjusainath

Things seem to be going awry these days. While the market is on fire due to inflation, banana prices have simply sky-rocketed.

“Rs seven a banana,” the local fruit vendor gave a curt reply to my query on banana price.

I know this vendor chap for the last five years. I still believe that he is very familiar to us. Earlier our conversation used to start with the exchange of greetings paving my way to bargain. But for the last one year his behaviour has changed dramatically. These days he gives very terse replies as if he is a very busy man. Probably he has sensed that friendliness with everyone hampers business prospects.

When I poked the vendor to know the reason behind steep rise in banana prices, he started opening up.

“Sir, God only knows what has happened to the Congressmen nowadays. They are on a banana buying spree leading to a huge gap between the demand and supply. As a result, the banana prices have spiralled like never before. One thing is for sure, their new-found love for banana has got nothing to do with the festival season.” Almost after a year I heard him uttering so many words in one go.

My quest to dig more on the acute shortage of banana led me to Kelamal Aamchandani, a wholesale fruit merchant, who is said to be a distant relative of Balkrishna Sadvani (name changed for obvious reasons).

“Kelamal Ji, why are people buying banana in bulk these days?”

The wholesale dealer corrected me, “It's not the Aam Admi  - the so-called common man -, but the Congressmen who are on a buying spree. I prefer calling it panic-buying.”

“But why?” I asked.

“To prove the first Jeeja G of the country right. You may be aware that he has come under fire for his Facebook status message, 'Mango People in Banana Republic',” said Kelamal.

“So?” My astonishment increased.

“The Congressmen are consuming banana in bulk, feeding the fruit to the poor and needy people, hanging it at the entrance of their houses and offering it to the Gods and Goddesses. These exercises are meant to prove India a real Banana Republic,” Kelamal explained.

He declared that the banana prices will shoot up further in January.

I was baffled. “What's the January connection?”

Kelamal elaborated, “January 26 will be celebrated as Banana Republic Day, this year.”

My anxiety increased. I asked, “What will happen that day?”

“It will be a very special day for India, way beyond eating, feeding and hanging bananas. The annual parade will see 'Men in No Uniform',” Kelamal chuckled only to increase my curiosity.

“But what's the need? We will be a laughing stock across the globe!” I screamed.

“Cool down my dear. There is more to the story, which, I think, you will be keen to know,” said Kelamal adding, “The historic parade this year is to strengthen our belief that we are a Banana Republic as declared by our First Jeeja G. For a change, the theme of all the tableaux that will pass through the Raaj-Path this year will revolve around the banana instead of our military prowess where we used to display missiles and tankers. Also, the parade leaders will not hold sword or baton this year but bananas only.”
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Corporate Spirituality: A mirage in the cruel desert

-- G Manjusainath

The Swami, in his mid-fifties, ambled along amidst his devotees sitting in the rows at an open amphitheatre in his sprawling Ashram in Bangalore. After displaying all his soft skills, he then sat on the throne.

In this management era post liberalisation, the buzzword of soft skills has come quite handy for this Corporate Swami to hide his feminine behaviour.

From the dais, the Swami roared in his mellowed voice, “Today is a historic day as people from across the globe converged here to eradicate poverty. We formed several kilometre-long human chain to send out a message to all the governments across the globe that poverty shall no longer be tolerated. It needs to be eradicated.”

But still there was a section in the crowd which was not convinced. It wanted to know how the poverty can be eradicated from the village in the backyard of the Ashram, let alone the world, by forming a human chain. Actually, the scepticism should be blamed for the absence of a vision to look at things in the right perspective. The atheists ignored the fact that these means had helped eradicate poverty of the self-declared seer. The grand magnificent and palatial ‘hermitage’ of the Swami, which is spread over hundreds of acres of land, is big enough to give complex to emperors and business tycoons of the world.

The event instinctively reminded people of former Prime Minister Ms Indira Gandhi’s call for ‘Gareebi Hatao’ (remove poverty) in the late ’70s, which had helped her return to power. Those, who still question the prevalence of miseries in the society many decades after the popular slogan was raised, actually turn a blind eye to the riches of those who were among the Granny Gandhi’s confidants.

You need not have to bang your head too much to know why poverty and spirituality sell like a hot cake in India and the Swamis mushroom here. Visit any government hospital and you will realise that God along can save people here. Take the case of Vani Vilas Hospital in Bangalore. In literal terms, the name of the hospital means ‘Rich in Speech’, which sounds very apt for the century-old government hospital in view of the acute shortage of doctors, paramedics, medicines, equipment and also sanitation workers. This scene is prevalent in almost all the government hospitals in India.

A hospital, which itself is ailing, cannot offer anything but lip services (Vani Vilas) to its patients somewhat on the lines of Adi Guru Shankaracharya’s famous work ‘Bhaj Govindam Moodh Matay’. The devotional song in Sanskrit underlines the insignificance of memorising the principles of grammar in the twilight of life and emphasises upon invoking the name of God all the time.

A general observation is that when government fails, God, Godmen and their missionaries come into play. Another Swami in Bangalore only strengthens this notion. He is known for offering quality treatment at his five-star kind of super speciality hospital at a hefty price. It will not be out of context to say that spirituality is a family business of this Swami as all his near and dear ones are some or the other Swamis serving in his luxurious hermitage and enjoying their share in the hospital and education institutions.

Not many people can afford the Medical Swami’s blessings, which come for a hefty price. For such lot, a new seer has emerged in India, Nirmal Baba. Too many things have been written against him but his quackery at a relatively cheap price has shot up his popularity graph leaving his competitors far behind. Among his hundreds of ways of offering ‘relief’ to the ailing humanity, one has become a grand hit.

“Eat Samosa with green Chatni and ‘Kripa Aane Lagegi’ (You will start getting the grace),” the Baba had said at a seminar.

You would wonder that there is a price tag attached with the Samosa Chatni remedies too. You need to deposit at least Rs 2,000 in Baba’s bank account to attend his seminars. People say the Baba has been exposed because of media’s sustained campaign but those who cannot afford Medical Swami’s blessings and are afraid of going to sick government hospitals, Nirmal Baba and other godmen like him continue to be their guides and mentors. The distressed masses knowingly overlook the fact that these Babas and Swamis are only a mirage of oasis in the cruel desert.

Poorna- The story of zero by a cipher

Poorna- The story of zero by a cipher

By G. MANJUSAINATH

ॐ पूर्णमदः पूर्णमिदं, पूर्णात पूर्णमुदच्यते.

पूर्णस्य पूर्णमादाय, पूर्णमेवावशिष्यते.

-- इशावास्योपनिषद

Om poornamadah poornamidam

Poornaat poornamudachyate

Poornasya poornamaadaya

Poornamevaavashishyate

-- Ishaavasyopanishad

“That is infinite. This is infinite. What has come out of the infinite is also infinite.
When the infinite is taken out of the infinite, the infinite still remains infinite.”

Other than ghosts and demons if something would scare me during my childhood days it was mathematics. So much aversion I had for this subject that the very mention of it would cause me a kind of nausea but my maths-loving dad was hell-bent to churn a Ramanujan, a CV Raman, an Einstein and finally a James Watt out of his frail little child overnight.

But, as fate had it, the son turned out to be a paper-tiger. Before making my way into the journalism, I had some six years of meandering after my father finally stopped hoping against the hopes and allowed me to go stray just like a bull with trident mark, grabbing green groceries in the market. It was during that course of time when I developed a fascination for astrology and a subsequent realisation that I missed many things by ignoring mathematics. I must confess that I have seen merely a few droplets of the vast oceanic maths. While studying astrology I stumbled upon the above-mentioned verse from Ishavasyopanishad and simply fell for it. I have no hesitation to say that next lines are cipher’s shallow claims of deciphering zero.

To my mind, the first verse from Ishavasyopanishad is revolutionary in a sense that it is responsible for the development of modern mathematics and science. The verse which speaks about the nature of omnipresent God, said to have had inspired the seventh century mathematician, Bhaskaracharya-I, to translate it into mathematics. He devised a new number called Poorna or zero with no face value but great place value to make the mathematical numbers infinite.

Bhaskaracharya chose a circle to denote the nature of God because it is neither a line with a head and tail, nor a triangle with conjunctions of lines. An unending loop, the circle represents the immortal nature of God.

The number zero completely fits in the definition of infinite God as described in the above-mentioned verse. "If you add zero to zero, the result remains zero and if you subtract zero from zero, the result again remains zero." However, zero also signifies ego and desires, which have no value as such except for creating vacuum in life and keeping a person busy to run after something which does not exist! For example, the variety of numbers is only between zero and nine but after nine, ‘one’ comes once again to run behind the vacuum called zero and gets the name Ten to head for infinite.

Did you ever wonder why ten comes after nine and not after five, six, seven or eight? You may find it interesting that the objective behind devising a scientific numerical system was to study astronomy and astrology. In fact, in olden days cosmos and celestial bodies inspired people to calculate their movements and the distance between them in view of the prevalent belief system that these heavenly bodies have a bearing on everything on the earth. It is believed in Astrology and numerology that the nine digits represent the nine planets of astrology namely Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, Rahu (dragon's head) and Ketu (dragon's tail).

The claim that Bhaskaracharya was born somewhere in the border regions of Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, seems to have some basis. The local Telugu populace of Andhra Pradesh, particularly in the regions of Andhra, prefer calling zero as 'Poorna' unlike other parts of the country where it is called Shoonya, may be to immortalise the scientific legacy left behind by the great mathematician.

So the next time if somebody muddies a pristine forum in a rabid and archaic manner only to tell you that your top floor has got nothing then stay cool, chant the above Mantra and say: "Nothing is everything, for I know, Shoonya is Poorna'.

Missing a caressing hand

Just two days before Holi my wife forwarded me a greeting message. Though sent as a gesture of goodwill, the SMS reopened my healing wounds and a spontaneous four-line poem flowed instantaneously in reply –

Jisne Bhara Rang Jeevan me,

Raha Nahi jab vahi sang me,

Holi ne kho diye rang sab,

Bemani tyohar lage ab.

(Now that the one who filled colours in our lives is no more, Holi has lost all its colours and festivities have lost their sheen).

I was coming to terms with the departure of my ailing father in August last year when the message pricked my old wounds.

The party was over and a killing gloominess had descended upon me and my family. I wished I could have clinched the sand of time tightly and escaped with my dear ones to a place faraway from the glares of death. I would argue with the unseen why he did not mend his rule at least for once for the sake of his devotees like me, and spared a life from slipping into the jaws of death.

I could clearly realise that the 24 hours forming a day are not relatively the same every time- Happy hours run away so rapidly that even before you could try to take them into your grip, doom pounces upon you to knock you down.

As emotions ran high, memories played before me a bioscopic view of some festive occasions I had spent with my parents, especially with my father. I could reminisce a typical Deepawali night which taught me to enjoy silence and solitude in the middle of noisy crowd and turbulence.

I was about 13-year-old on that Deepawali night when people were out to defeat the new moon night with festoons, chandeliers and dazzling crackers. I too had great plans to celebrate the moment with a moderate stock of crackers but I could not realise that within an hour they would be exhausted. Celebrations were over and a gloomy sadness dawned upon me.

It was at that moment when I heard some Bengali songs being played somewhere quite a distance away. Though I could not hear the lyrics clearly I could make out that it was Rabindra Sangeet sung by Kishore Kumar. Distance hindered the audibility and acoustic too was a problem but the tune was surely soothing in those silent and depressing moments. The effect of the songs was such that I began to sink deep in silence and for the first time I realised the beauty of quietness and solitude in the dark new moon night from the roof of our house in Raipur. Just then someone suddenly held me by my shoulder from behind. Taken aback, I turned quickly only to find my father standing behind me.

“Baba, why are you standing alone at this dark place? Isn’t your Diwali over?” father asked me affectionately. It took little time to overcome the charm of Rabindra Sangeet. After a brief silence I said, “Appa, can you hear the song? It’s Rabindra Sangeet. It’s sweet, isn’t it?” My father too nodded.

The stroll along the memory by-lane showed me the way to solace. Thanks to internet, today I have a prized possession of a good collection of Rabindra Sangeet like, ‘Amaar Raat Pohalo’, ‘Ami Tomaay Jato Suniye chhilem Gaan’, ‘Jadi Taare Naai Cheeni Go She Kee’, ‘Amar Andhoprodeep’, ‘Purano Sei Diner Kotha’, ‘Amar Bela Je Jaaye’ and, not to miss, 'Jadi Tor Daak Sune keu Naa Aashe...’. These songs helped me wipe my tears and silenced my inner turbulence but disappeared is the person who had caressed me affectionately during some opaque and trying moments in my life and instilled a sense of security.