The Brave Pedestrian

[I wrote this in June 2011, when Arvind Kejriwal, Anna Hazare, Kiran Bedi, Prashant Bhushan and Baba Ramdev were together in India-Against-Corruption or the Lokpal Movement. I think it still holds today.]  Dear All, I have asked this question before, a couple of years ago, to the activist  junta . And I am asking this question afresh in the context of Anna Hazare’s campaign Jan Lokpal Bill, as well as Baba Ramdev’s campaign for bringing back money stashed abroad, because I smell the stench of self-righteous pride in our midst. Baba Ramdev and Anna Hazare may be well meaning citizens, but their speech and actions — and the actions of their followers — are increasingly marred by an arrogance that is self-defeating and ridiculous. They are deluding themselves and the people of India into taking an untenable stand. In recent years, I have visited several municipal offices, government offices, police stations, State Information Commissions etc. to collect replies to RTI...

Dear friends, The passing of Right to Information Act 2005 was like the unfurling of a flag, heralding the coming-of-age of ‘We the People’. It was not just another mundane event in the life of our nation; it showed a shift in the national psyche. By winning Independence Struggle I, we sent the British ruler home, but we inherited the baggage they left behind:   A bureaucratic structure that was, as Wajahat Habibullah noted, suited more for colonial slave India than free democratic India A legal structure biased towards maintaining the inequality between the rulers and the ruled. Upon the foundation of Official Secrets Act 1923 and other archaic and dysfunctional laws (such as Bombay Municipal Corporation Act 1888), we unthinkingly based our more recent laws. Our Constitution – painstakingly debated and written between 1947 and 1950 — is forward-looking and seeks to empower citizens Our judiciary, with its archaic privileges and untrammeled powers. And now it is like a sch...

Dear friends, The Delhi bus-rape event clearly aroused our nation’s collective conscience, and “Nirbhaya” or “Patient-X” or “Jagruti”, who died yesterday in Singapore, became an icon representing all the victims of violence in India. But, going into 2013, let us ask whether our conscience has really awakened, or whether this is just a year-end orgy of self-righteousness. Let us take a look at another woman who is fighting for her life in a Mumbai hospital. Let us see if our collective conscience even blinks, let alone shed a tear. Meet Rekha Nerade of Nizamabad, Andhra Pradesh. She is 27 years old, attractive and single. Her eyes are asking you, “Am I any less of a victim than Nirbhaya, for whom you have shed copious tears, and continue to light candles all over the country? Doctors are worried that Rekha may not even survive to salute the flag on Republic Day 2013. But, unaware of the full gravity of her situation, Rekha and her elder brother Krishna are worried about how...

Ratnakar Gaikwad’s selection as Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) of Maharashtra on 6 June 2012 violates a key principle of Natural Justice,  “Nemo iudex in causa sua”  i.e. “No man is permitted to be judge in his own cause”. The circumstances of the selection point to Ratnakar Gaikwad having been “judge in his own cause” in the matter of his selection. Prima facie , it appears that he exercised his powers during his previous tenure as Chief Secretary (i.e. overall chief of Maharashtra’s administration, including General Administration Department (GAD), and reporting directly to Chief Minister who heads the selection committee) to select himself in advance, and to keep the CIC’s seat vacant for 10 months until his own retirement from IAS. He was among the top 2-3 authorities in Govt of Maharashtra responsible for filling the CIC’s post in a timely way. He shirked that responsibility in a way that he gained from it. For its proper functioning, the Information Commission ...

…was pressing the blunt heavy chopper to his throat unnecessarily hard, grinding it into adam’s apple. “Die, you filthy monk! You lying dirty bastard! You betrayed the trust with which I sent my wife to prostrate before you… swine! Now you die!” he was screaming into his ear. Guru Vaastava wished his disciples would learn to express even anger in a gentle whisper. A trickle of blood soaked the saffron cloth on his chest. His mind was numb from the sudden attack of this obedient disciple, Ramana, in the dead of night. Oh yes, he remembered Ramana’s wife… how could he not remember those perfectly-formed white thighs? How could he forget the look of surprised pleasure in her eyes? He remembered how he had bid her to lie on her back in the prayer room, in front of the black stone linga that she had so lovingly rubbed with sandalwood. Under the stony gaze of the hooded serpent, he had gently caressed her toes and feet as she lay whimpering in passion… caressed her calf-muscles with a c...

Love, they say, conquers all… Does it? Does it, my friend? Does it? Then let love find a way! The world stares me in the eye and laughs, and mocks. Love is a wisp of grass, it says. It dries in the sun, It rots in the rain, It withstands nothing, It withers in pain. What love do you speak of? The world asks with a laugh. My brave arguments die in my throat. I lay down my arms.

Forgive me, Lord, this broken drum speaks In a unworthy voice — now true, now untrue. Sift truth from the lies if truth there is, Else spill me in the dust. My quest is the quest of a one-eyed man Whose vision oft deceives him; He depends on his poor eye not because he trusts it, But because people who offered to lead and show him the way Did not earn his trust. Dimly-remembered voices from a past So distant that it is doubtful Whether it existed at all Echo in my skull Half-voices, half-noises… Disturbances in a cave of unknown depth. With the tips of my mind I seek out the cracks Between wakefulness and sleep Where I hear these voices loudest, And glimpse faces that I recognize – Faces not of those living Nor of the dead I know. Fleetingly with forceful gestures they speak. Seeking to grasp their words, I awaken Only to find my awakening empty Bereft of the meaning of what I saw and heard. Something I knew and trusted was lost And so I grope a...