When I was young I believed that Coimbatore was the largest city I will ever see on my own in my life. The ‘on my own’ condition is because I have already seen Chennai and Kuala Lumpur as a kid thanks to my father. Life looked bleak. Unemployment ruled. A trip to Coimbatore across the Walayar border, one hour by road was a major event. We would watch English movies, which come to Coimbatore a bit earlier than they reached sleepy Palghat, eat Dosas in Annapoorna restaurant and take the night train back travelling ticketless. The Tamilians on the other hand would come to Palghat, loud and boisterous, booze to their heart’s content (those were days of prohibition in Tamil Nadu) see Malayalam movies which had some pretty hot stuff those days and go back. How uncomplicated life was! For someone with such modest aims in life, I haven’t done too badly. I have visited many countries, eaten in great restaurants (Wolfing down caviar and foie gras pretending they taste as good as pazham pori lest the hosts consider me impolite). That’s me- a small time country boy who did pretty well without deserving any of it.
But I haven’t seen snow. Twice when I alighted at Charles De Gaulle airport in France, the temperature was minus two degrees but I had missed snowfalls by one day. As I boarded the plane on Thanksgiving Day in Washington DC, my last question to my hosts was when it snows here. When I see fluffy clouds from the window of an aircraft, I imagine it is white snow covering me in its cool blanket. To someone who lived in years of dark monsoon rains and hot humid summers, snow was only in English movies. Or Hindi movies where Shammi Kapoor is rolling down the slope in Gulmarg hills, crazy gyrations and all, wooing a perky Mumtaz, who I am sure, must be hoping deep inside that he would just vanish into cold Himalayan air. But snow was always there in books- intertwined with great love stories, silent and deep. A very romantic thing- snow that is. There are birches, tall silver Oaks and poplars covered in the white substance. There is a humming in the ears as you walk with hands inside pockets, breath forming vapours in the air. You walk into a nice heated house where a log fire burns. You sit by the fireside and drink the golden liquid which warms your insides and fall asleep reading in the couch.
Back to reality… Last month I read a marvelous book by Iain Banks called Raw Spirit. Iain Banks is a Scottish writer of science fiction. But Raw spirit is a dream commission from a publisher to take a tour of the distilleries of Scotland, tasting various Scotch Whiskies and write about them. The book is about the quest for a perfect dram of whisky- the warm liquid that keeps the insides warm on a cold snowy evening. It was a trip to the distilleries in his huge car, tasting single malts of Islay like Laphroig to highland whiskies like Glenmorangie- all through the cold, damp, windy and snowy places in Scotland. You can imagine Banks, getting calls from old friends ‘are you sure you can do this task all by yourself? Do you need some help? How do you taste whisky and drive? Are you sure you don’t need an ole friend like me on the wheels?’ I envy him although my choice of poison these days is not whisky but Absolut Vodka once a week under the spotlight of harsh glares…So after having read all books by Ian Rankin, the other great Scotsman of crime fiction, I decide to read other books by Iain Banks. I pick up Wasp Factory, his first book. It is dark, horrible and I couldn’t guess that the same good natured, fun loving guy has written it. All about a hormonal experiment gone bad, carefully planned killing of little kids by other small kids etc. I can’t take it any more. I have sworn off Banks. He might be the brightest guy on earth with a great sense of humour. But no gory murders of little kids- I don’t have the stomach for it.
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I have been reading a lot about financial crises, recessions, meltdowns, run on banks etc. It is all part of an assignment I have to submit next week. The assignment turns out to be mediocre. But I came out with a better perspective. I know something about complex derivatives, the Scholes- Black model for valuing options, the Tulip mania of 1600s which was the mother of all financial crashes, the Great Depression years, how the IMF gave pretty crappy advice to countries reeling under Asian financial crisis etc. I have been reading Charles Morris, George Soros, Niall Ferguson and a lot of other writers on global finance. I might scrape through the course but it has revived an interest in things I have forgotten long ago.
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Talking about political entertainment, I had been watching the proceedings of Australian Parliament live. It was so disappointing. The grandeur of Indian Parliament is missing. In a small hall, the PM sits by a long table placed in front of the speaker, turning sideways to the benches and making his pitch. There is really no space for the Honourable Members to rush to the well, throw shoes & microphone stands and indulge in other antics. Australians get very little entertainment from their politics. All the politicians are rather neatly turned out, the men in boring suits and the women in nice dresses. They don’t have Swamis in loincloths, mullahs in skullcaps, guitarists in jeans (did you know we have one of them too?) and journalists in Rajasthani headgear. So at the visual level itself we score several points over Aussies- not to mention our total dominance in the variety of languages and the action we offer in conduct of Parliamentary business. If you watch the proceedings of Aussie Parliament live, you would nod off to sleep in no time. I found this brilliant piece by Manas Chakravarty in Mint. It is about entertainment deficit in Indian Politics. Try it…
http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/StoryPage.aspx?sectionName=HomePage&id=b9da5964-fafb-402d-b037-34c853b65ee0&Headline=Entertainment+deficit
Tuesday 26 May 2009
Thursday 21 May 2009
Haircuts
A haircut for the young venture capitalist might mean cutting losses by taking a hit on returns on investments. For me it is a trip to ‘Lucky haircutting salon’ in Sadiq Nagar near HUDCO place in Delhi where I used to live. I cross the huge garbage den outside the relatively clean government colony. Stray dogs abound in the route. In the market half the road space is occupied by flower and fruit sellers, chat stalls etc. Loud Hindi film music blares from several shops. Sweet shops, dry cleaners, pharmacies, stationery stores have all encroached into the road and there is very little space to maneuver. Cars and bikes zig zag to avoid collision with humans and cattle that throng the road. A walk to this market means persuading Chathu over several days to agree to come with me for the ritual trip to the barber every month. It is more important to him than it is to me. With my bald pate, I can go for a few months without a haircut. Hardly anyone would notice the difference.
In the salon, there is loud music from the FM radio interspersed with the DJ speaking in that affected tone of Delhi's youth alternately in Hinglish or Hindi. Or there is Salman Khan’s movie with soppy emotional dialogues and loud threats at the unjust, fuedal Thakur emanating from the small portable TV in the corner. I would often fear for our safety when the knife or the scissors brush one’s head when the movie is poised at cliffhanger moments. But no, these guys are professionals. They have seen these movies a hundred times before. There are newspapers in Hindi and Urdu lying on the bench. In summers, the desert cooler offers little comfort. There would also be deep, involved discussions among the barbers on the politics of the state of Bihar where they hail from. And I suspect their strong sympathies lie with a none-too polished but charismatic leader from there. Haircutting charges are Rs 15 per head. I pay them Rs 50 for two haircuts, which includes a Rs 20 tip. So the guys at Lucky are mighty pleased when father and son walk in. A comb is run vigorously through wet hair and the scissors go snip snip, and it takes about seven minutes to complete the cutting, shaping and to throw in a vigorous head massage. (I always refuse that offer. They are earnestly happy to do it for with generous tippers) Chathu is embarrassed by these visits because his friends frequent swankier joints in upmarket localities, where the hair is coloured, blow dried and funky cuts on the scalps are made. Before we set out I make promises to Chathu that I shall instruct the Barber to keep his hair long. But a silent code passes between me and the Barbers. A wink and I tell them to keep his hair long while I make a small gesture with my finger to instruct them keep it short. Chathu had caught on to this mischief very recently and watches me carefully as I pass instructions.
I still recollect Chathu’s first haircut. He was all of four years old. We took him to a shop in Nungambakkam High Road in Chennai called “Three coins”. He was cajoled to sit on a wooden platform on the chair and the haircut began. There followed a loud twenty minute session of shrieking and bawling by Chathu. I suspect that drove a lot of customers of the day away. The second haircut wasn’t as bad and slowly he became friendly with all the Barbers. But a trip for haircut would cost me an additional customary visit to the shop next door for two chocolates, two pastries and some small toy which are all part of the haircutting experience package. As he grew older he stopped linking a trip for haircut to blackmailing me into buying him stuff.
We went for a haircut to nearby Evatt market in Canberra last month. Chathu had started resembling a vampire since he has not had a haircut for three months since landing in Australia. A girl at the hairdressers’ asked us whether we have an appointment. I said no. Can we wait? I asked. She went in, checked and said it might take another 45 minutes. Well can I get an appointment for tomorrow? I asked. OK, She said. We took an appointment for the next day morning and left.
We went next day. We were expected. The girl who started with Chathu’s hair looked much younger to him. But she had this rather funny way of lifting a few hairs at a time with her fingers and cutting. It was taking a hell of a long time. I had this vague feeling that the girl might be a student of 5th standard studying in Chathu’s school. I decided to forego my haircut. There is very little to cut anyway. The bill was 20 dollars- a concessionary rate for children. I suppose it is double for adults. Translated it into Indian currency (multiply by 34), it sounded an obscene amount for something as simple as a haircut- especially for a regular Lucky customer back home in Delhi.
So I went and bought a clipper. It is something like an instrument to shear wool off sheep or to cut pet hair. Shearing, as you know is big business in a wool producing country like Australia. The clipper maintains a standard length of 2 to 4mm of hair throughout one’s pate. It cost me little and I run it through my hair once in twenty days. Chathu refuses to subject himself to this home remedy. I have been receiving broad hints regarding my unmistakable resemblance to villains of Hindi movies who made a career out of raping women and getting beaten up by chocolate heroes- Or a cross between an Euro footballer and an ex-convict. ….No problems: No way I am paying 40$ for a haircut.
I did a little back-of-the-envelope calculations on a haircutting career in Canberra based on number of customers per day, average revenue per customer, rent, power etc. My findings are interesting. Ambittans (Slang for barber in Malayalam) in Australia have it better than Babus in India. So all ye career aspirants who are slogging to join the Civil Services in India…. Drop those huge tomes of academic stuff and stop worrying about rubbing shoulders with politicians and over the ground criminals. Ye shall take the knife and scissors, polish your skills and head to this beautiful land where you can live a life of quality. This is one skill that is in short supply here and your permanent resident status might come faster than expected.
In the salon, there is loud music from the FM radio interspersed with the DJ speaking in that affected tone of Delhi's youth alternately in Hinglish or Hindi. Or there is Salman Khan’s movie with soppy emotional dialogues and loud threats at the unjust, fuedal Thakur emanating from the small portable TV in the corner. I would often fear for our safety when the knife or the scissors brush one’s head when the movie is poised at cliffhanger moments. But no, these guys are professionals. They have seen these movies a hundred times before. There are newspapers in Hindi and Urdu lying on the bench. In summers, the desert cooler offers little comfort. There would also be deep, involved discussions among the barbers on the politics of the state of Bihar where they hail from. And I suspect their strong sympathies lie with a none-too polished but charismatic leader from there. Haircutting charges are Rs 15 per head. I pay them Rs 50 for two haircuts, which includes a Rs 20 tip. So the guys at Lucky are mighty pleased when father and son walk in. A comb is run vigorously through wet hair and the scissors go snip snip, and it takes about seven minutes to complete the cutting, shaping and to throw in a vigorous head massage. (I always refuse that offer. They are earnestly happy to do it for with generous tippers) Chathu is embarrassed by these visits because his friends frequent swankier joints in upmarket localities, where the hair is coloured, blow dried and funky cuts on the scalps are made. Before we set out I make promises to Chathu that I shall instruct the Barber to keep his hair long. But a silent code passes between me and the Barbers. A wink and I tell them to keep his hair long while I make a small gesture with my finger to instruct them keep it short. Chathu had caught on to this mischief very recently and watches me carefully as I pass instructions.
I still recollect Chathu’s first haircut. He was all of four years old. We took him to a shop in Nungambakkam High Road in Chennai called “Three coins”. He was cajoled to sit on a wooden platform on the chair and the haircut began. There followed a loud twenty minute session of shrieking and bawling by Chathu. I suspect that drove a lot of customers of the day away. The second haircut wasn’t as bad and slowly he became friendly with all the Barbers. But a trip for haircut would cost me an additional customary visit to the shop next door for two chocolates, two pastries and some small toy which are all part of the haircutting experience package. As he grew older he stopped linking a trip for haircut to blackmailing me into buying him stuff.
We went for a haircut to nearby Evatt market in Canberra last month. Chathu had started resembling a vampire since he has not had a haircut for three months since landing in Australia. A girl at the hairdressers’ asked us whether we have an appointment. I said no. Can we wait? I asked. She went in, checked and said it might take another 45 minutes. Well can I get an appointment for tomorrow? I asked. OK, She said. We took an appointment for the next day morning and left.
We went next day. We were expected. The girl who started with Chathu’s hair looked much younger to him. But she had this rather funny way of lifting a few hairs at a time with her fingers and cutting. It was taking a hell of a long time. I had this vague feeling that the girl might be a student of 5th standard studying in Chathu’s school. I decided to forego my haircut. There is very little to cut anyway. The bill was 20 dollars- a concessionary rate for children. I suppose it is double for adults. Translated it into Indian currency (multiply by 34), it sounded an obscene amount for something as simple as a haircut- especially for a regular Lucky customer back home in Delhi.
So I went and bought a clipper. It is something like an instrument to shear wool off sheep or to cut pet hair. Shearing, as you know is big business in a wool producing country like Australia. The clipper maintains a standard length of 2 to 4mm of hair throughout one’s pate. It cost me little and I run it through my hair once in twenty days. Chathu refuses to subject himself to this home remedy. I have been receiving broad hints regarding my unmistakable resemblance to villains of Hindi movies who made a career out of raping women and getting beaten up by chocolate heroes- Or a cross between an Euro footballer and an ex-convict. ….No problems: No way I am paying 40$ for a haircut.
I did a little back-of-the-envelope calculations on a haircutting career in Canberra based on number of customers per day, average revenue per customer, rent, power etc. My findings are interesting. Ambittans (Slang for barber in Malayalam) in Australia have it better than Babus in India. So all ye career aspirants who are slogging to join the Civil Services in India…. Drop those huge tomes of academic stuff and stop worrying about rubbing shoulders with politicians and over the ground criminals. Ye shall take the knife and scissors, polish your skills and head to this beautiful land where you can live a life of quality. This is one skill that is in short supply here and your permanent resident status might come faster than expected.
Saturday 16 May 2009
EVMs and Democracy
I have refrained from indulging in pissing contests on whether Indian democracy is better than other time tested ones in the Western world. To me it is much like five year olds comparing whether my willie is longer than yours. I lived long enough in our flawed democracy to be modest about it and realize that these are early years yet. Fifty years in a nation’s history is like a year in human life and we need to evolve further as a nation. There is a chain mail going around giving a breakup of the criminals among our elected parliamentarians. I always maintained that there is nothing much to feel proud about our democracy and constantly take potshots at it. But scratch the surface and you will find every Indian proud of our democracy. Sitting in Canberra, I miss all the gossip in South Block. How the political and bureaucratic winds are blowing, who is close to whom and what is going on, etc. I speak to my ex-colleagues once in a while. They are all dreading the possibility that the winners in this elections might bring in a new generation of political mercenaries to power.
Talk to any successful 30 something Indian investment banker rolling in money- he will tell you that India ought to have Chinese style one party rule, military rule or benevolent dictatorship. Conveniently forgetting that if absence of democracy was the best way to growth, may be Nigeria, Pakistan, N.Korea & Burma ought to have been up there in the comity of developed countries by now.
But it sent goose pimples all over me yesterday to hear a white man say that even the US ought to learn from Indians how to conduct elections. An Australian Election Official shared the table with me at the lunch at press club for a talk on Indian Elections organized by the Indian High Commission. Between flutes of wine and grilled fish, he was comparing Indian elections with various systems and said that the Indian system is a wonder. He seemed to know everything about the indelible ink, the electronic voting machine and all the other features that make Indian elections a unique exercise.
In a country of India’s diversity and magnitude, to have a democracy and to conduct elections periodically itself might be called an act of heroism, said Robin Jeffrey, the resident Indophile and the main speaker. He gave examples and data to prove his point. The entire electorates of Australia, East & South East Asia are not as large as the Indian electorate of 714 million voters, he said. Then he went on and on about the diversity of the country which is even more than what one can hope to see as one travels from Spain through Finland. Then he went on to describe the Electronic Voting Machine as one of the main heroes of the elections.
A thrill ran through me as I heard it. The Defence Public sector company (Bharat Electronics Ltd) that I have been intimately associated with, in the Ministry of Defence in Delhi designed the machine a quarter century ago. It was first used in a constituency in Kerala. I recall politicians holding press conferences in those days to show how the machine is susceptible to manipulation and can be misused by the ruling party. Whenever I speak to the technocrats in BEL about it, they talk of it as the past. Yeah…that is an order we fulfilled with ECIL, another public sector company. There is very little future requirement and hence we have to move on to other things. They were a bunch of faceless Engineers who did a great job and moved on - without a sense of history for this marvelous achievement. One of the EVM team designers of those days, I have heard, was a Tamil writer, an IIT educated Engineer who goes by the pen name Sujata in Tamil periodicals.
Twenty years on we conducted an election entirely on the EVM (2004 elections). The entire world has started to sit up and take notice. The elections in 2000 when the US could not throw up a clear winner due to omissions in counting made the US system look bumbling compared to the Indian one. Even criminal-candidates in India accept EVMs as reality and are constantly looking for ways to beat the system- instead of stuffing ballots in the old fashioned way, they keep the queues engaged, which makes it a very labour intensive and impractical way to distort the system, says Jeffrey. So, practically it offers very little scope for old fashioned rigging. The technology is not too high fangled and networked to enable a geek to hack into the system. Nor is it too sophisticated and delicate that it cannot withstand the dust and heat of the Indian countryside. It is just enough technology and a lot of capability built into it.
India had universal adult franchise before the Americans had it. The EVM is one such thing which merits a mention along with the architects of the first Indian General elections- They visualized the need for universal adult franchise to empower every Indian, election symbols, to enable recognition of candidates by a poor illiterate population and indelible ink, to prevent multiple voting. The people behind the EVM, I hope, shall be remembered when histories of elections are wrote.
Talk to any successful 30 something Indian investment banker rolling in money- he will tell you that India ought to have Chinese style one party rule, military rule or benevolent dictatorship. Conveniently forgetting that if absence of democracy was the best way to growth, may be Nigeria, Pakistan, N.Korea & Burma ought to have been up there in the comity of developed countries by now.
But it sent goose pimples all over me yesterday to hear a white man say that even the US ought to learn from Indians how to conduct elections. An Australian Election Official shared the table with me at the lunch at press club for a talk on Indian Elections organized by the Indian High Commission. Between flutes of wine and grilled fish, he was comparing Indian elections with various systems and said that the Indian system is a wonder. He seemed to know everything about the indelible ink, the electronic voting machine and all the other features that make Indian elections a unique exercise.
In a country of India’s diversity and magnitude, to have a democracy and to conduct elections periodically itself might be called an act of heroism, said Robin Jeffrey, the resident Indophile and the main speaker. He gave examples and data to prove his point. The entire electorates of Australia, East & South East Asia are not as large as the Indian electorate of 714 million voters, he said. Then he went on and on about the diversity of the country which is even more than what one can hope to see as one travels from Spain through Finland. Then he went on to describe the Electronic Voting Machine as one of the main heroes of the elections.
A thrill ran through me as I heard it. The Defence Public sector company (Bharat Electronics Ltd) that I have been intimately associated with, in the Ministry of Defence in Delhi designed the machine a quarter century ago. It was first used in a constituency in Kerala. I recall politicians holding press conferences in those days to show how the machine is susceptible to manipulation and can be misused by the ruling party. Whenever I speak to the technocrats in BEL about it, they talk of it as the past. Yeah…that is an order we fulfilled with ECIL, another public sector company. There is very little future requirement and hence we have to move on to other things. They were a bunch of faceless Engineers who did a great job and moved on - without a sense of history for this marvelous achievement. One of the EVM team designers of those days, I have heard, was a Tamil writer, an IIT educated Engineer who goes by the pen name Sujata in Tamil periodicals.
Twenty years on we conducted an election entirely on the EVM (2004 elections). The entire world has started to sit up and take notice. The elections in 2000 when the US could not throw up a clear winner due to omissions in counting made the US system look bumbling compared to the Indian one. Even criminal-candidates in India accept EVMs as reality and are constantly looking for ways to beat the system- instead of stuffing ballots in the old fashioned way, they keep the queues engaged, which makes it a very labour intensive and impractical way to distort the system, says Jeffrey. So, practically it offers very little scope for old fashioned rigging. The technology is not too high fangled and networked to enable a geek to hack into the system. Nor is it too sophisticated and delicate that it cannot withstand the dust and heat of the Indian countryside. It is just enough technology and a lot of capability built into it.
India had universal adult franchise before the Americans had it. The EVM is one such thing which merits a mention along with the architects of the first Indian General elections- They visualized the need for universal adult franchise to empower every Indian, election symbols, to enable recognition of candidates by a poor illiterate population and indelible ink, to prevent multiple voting. The people behind the EVM, I hope, shall be remembered when histories of elections are wrote.
Saturday 2 May 2009
Fruits of Heaven
I have been out of action with a terrible sprain in my back; almost immobilized me for 3-4 days. To add to my woes I had a big assignment to submit. I had spent the last several days in Melbourne sipping exquisite liquor (one of the best unintended consequences of having a diplomat sis in law with a well stocked bar of high-end duty-free liquor- else you’d catch me sipping Thunderbolt beer and Old Monk rum in a seedy Haryana highway bar on a night out with friends from college days), eating prawns and occasionally smoking a cigarette. I had recently stopped all vices due to lack of a sense of occasion. With the Missus always around, darting harsh glares just about kills every sense of occasion. I made up for all that in Melbourne. I almost started feeling normal and human again.
Lest readers of this blog suspect that senseless trivia is my forte, I confess to a habit of contemplating on matters beyond the pale of the material world. I enjoy hearing the raves, rants and deep sonorous chants of godmen, priests, moulvis and other agents of the Supreme One on earth. There is a frenzy in their voice, a tremor in their tones which suggest that not all is hunky dory with their brain fluids, or with the world around them. I gaze in absolute wonder at their ability to rouse and influence their audiences.
It was a time I was living alone in Kolkata. The Missus and son had gone to Delhi and I was left behind, waiting for a chance to join them. Really, the first few days of freedom are great. No harsh glares… peace and quiet as you sip an evening vodka. I started watching ‘Q’ channel, a Pakistani religious channel. Yours truly had long outgrown the tendency to watch fleshpots swinging to film music in the multitudinous Hindi channels. And the prime attraction of ‘Q’ channel was a preacher called Zakir Naik, an Indian Medical Doctor from Konkan region who took to preaching Quran full time. His memory of scriptures is photographic and he can cite with ease from Bible, Gita and Puranas with equal felicity.
Whether country comes first of the Ummah, asked an eager believer. This is like asking whether mother comes first or father, replied the good preacher. Is Islam a violent religion?, asked another. He recites verse after verse to show there is no other religion closer to Islam in its’ advocacy of peace. Then the penny dropped. It came in the form of an innocent question from a girl. The channel being a big time religious one, the girl’s face is not shown; only voice is heard. Will a Hindu receive the Almighty’s blessings if he utters the Salah? The answer is no, since his utterance of the holy prayer has no value unless he has converted to Islam by swearing submission to the only God. For every uncomfortable question about the Holy Book, he gives an answer which says it has to be seen within a certain context. He does that brilliantly. Then comes a load of stuff, which I found difficult to digest. If kafirs don’t like to be called that they can always convert, says he, smugly. People say Taliban is bad. Wouldn’t you like your sister to be paid salary in her house without going out to work? That is what Taliban does, says he. I sure didn’t hear it before.
The preacher I have been hearing for the last few days is a guy called Rahmatullah Qasimi Muthedam. He is a preacher who is at the centre of an unsavoury power struggle among the learned Muslims of Kerala; an antithesis of the Muslims elsewhere in India, for they have made remarkable strides in educating their community. You can watch Rahmatullah at http://www.tubeq.com/view/579522 (sorry, non-Malayali readers, this may sound incomprehensible to you; but you can still watch the body language; it is amusing) He has a sharp, shrill voice and a predictable habit of wiping his balding pate occasionally as he recites verse after verse of the Holy Book. ”Can a Muslim be a Communist ?” asked a young boy with a scarf tied around his forehead. In a state like Kerala it is a major existential dilemma. No says the good preacher vehemently. Capital or wealth is at the soul of Capitalism and Communism. Islam accepts the importance of wealth but it is a distant one in the hierarchy of importance. Submission to the Lord is at the core of Islam. So a Muslim cannot be a Communist. I am impressed by the response. No gobbledygook. Simple Logic. Some of his responses are quite convincing that one would really start believing that Islam was the first religion that wreaked a revolution; a revolution for the under class; a revolution for the down trodden. It is almost as imaginative as Communism as it were in the early years of the previous century.
Then he goes on to say a lot of other stuff. All world literature is bumkum. Muslims ought not to play football (really ??) , or listen to music or watch TV serials or movies. The list is long. Looks like the great music of AR Rahman, the fascinating bowling of Zaheer Khan and the mysticism of Sufis could be enjoyed only by a bunch of heathens, not by true Muslims. He is also candid. Hell is infested with women, says he and recites the scriptures and hadith in suppport. He says it is alright if women choose not to come for his Quran study classes for saying unpopular things. He nearly says that women do not have much of a chance to get to heaven. And getting to heaven as you know, he says, is the true calling of the Muslim.
From visions of heaven of all religions, it sounds like a boring place. Well, saying prayers five times and sleeping with beautiful multiple houris could get on your nerves after a while, don’t you agree? Or walking on clouds, amidst soft laughter and mild banter with Bhajans or choirs flowing from the Tampura or the Church Organ in the background; won’t it drive you nuts after ten days? Can’t we have some action? Like love, jealousy, anger, heartbreak, affection, passion and the Guns and Roses? These are only in earth; it appears. I have been impressed by the power of religions to influence minds. I write about Islam, because it has occupied a lot of mind space in recent times. And there is that feeling that the whole world is closing in on them. It is a powerful idea, and these are powerful preachers. They have a lot of good things to say. And there is also a load of crap which is out of sync with the world we live in. And these ideas cannot be countered with battle tanks, daisy cutter bombs and stinger missiles. And these cannot be conquered by the CIA, Israel or by writing abusive comments about Pakistan and Islam in rediff.com. These ideas have to be countered in the minds- by those within the Ummah.
Lest readers of this blog suspect that senseless trivia is my forte, I confess to a habit of contemplating on matters beyond the pale of the material world. I enjoy hearing the raves, rants and deep sonorous chants of godmen, priests, moulvis and other agents of the Supreme One on earth. There is a frenzy in their voice, a tremor in their tones which suggest that not all is hunky dory with their brain fluids, or with the world around them. I gaze in absolute wonder at their ability to rouse and influence their audiences.
It was a time I was living alone in Kolkata. The Missus and son had gone to Delhi and I was left behind, waiting for a chance to join them. Really, the first few days of freedom are great. No harsh glares… peace and quiet as you sip an evening vodka. I started watching ‘Q’ channel, a Pakistani religious channel. Yours truly had long outgrown the tendency to watch fleshpots swinging to film music in the multitudinous Hindi channels. And the prime attraction of ‘Q’ channel was a preacher called Zakir Naik, an Indian Medical Doctor from Konkan region who took to preaching Quran full time. His memory of scriptures is photographic and he can cite with ease from Bible, Gita and Puranas with equal felicity.
Whether country comes first of the Ummah, asked an eager believer. This is like asking whether mother comes first or father, replied the good preacher. Is Islam a violent religion?, asked another. He recites verse after verse to show there is no other religion closer to Islam in its’ advocacy of peace. Then the penny dropped. It came in the form of an innocent question from a girl. The channel being a big time religious one, the girl’s face is not shown; only voice is heard. Will a Hindu receive the Almighty’s blessings if he utters the Salah? The answer is no, since his utterance of the holy prayer has no value unless he has converted to Islam by swearing submission to the only God. For every uncomfortable question about the Holy Book, he gives an answer which says it has to be seen within a certain context. He does that brilliantly. Then comes a load of stuff, which I found difficult to digest. If kafirs don’t like to be called that they can always convert, says he, smugly. People say Taliban is bad. Wouldn’t you like your sister to be paid salary in her house without going out to work? That is what Taliban does, says he. I sure didn’t hear it before.
The preacher I have been hearing for the last few days is a guy called Rahmatullah Qasimi Muthedam. He is a preacher who is at the centre of an unsavoury power struggle among the learned Muslims of Kerala; an antithesis of the Muslims elsewhere in India, for they have made remarkable strides in educating their community. You can watch Rahmatullah at http://www.tubeq.com/view/579522 (sorry, non-Malayali readers, this may sound incomprehensible to you; but you can still watch the body language; it is amusing) He has a sharp, shrill voice and a predictable habit of wiping his balding pate occasionally as he recites verse after verse of the Holy Book. ”Can a Muslim be a Communist ?” asked a young boy with a scarf tied around his forehead. In a state like Kerala it is a major existential dilemma. No says the good preacher vehemently. Capital or wealth is at the soul of Capitalism and Communism. Islam accepts the importance of wealth but it is a distant one in the hierarchy of importance. Submission to the Lord is at the core of Islam. So a Muslim cannot be a Communist. I am impressed by the response. No gobbledygook. Simple Logic. Some of his responses are quite convincing that one would really start believing that Islam was the first religion that wreaked a revolution; a revolution for the under class; a revolution for the down trodden. It is almost as imaginative as Communism as it were in the early years of the previous century.
Then he goes on to say a lot of other stuff. All world literature is bumkum. Muslims ought not to play football (really ??) , or listen to music or watch TV serials or movies. The list is long. Looks like the great music of AR Rahman, the fascinating bowling of Zaheer Khan and the mysticism of Sufis could be enjoyed only by a bunch of heathens, not by true Muslims. He is also candid. Hell is infested with women, says he and recites the scriptures and hadith in suppport. He says it is alright if women choose not to come for his Quran study classes for saying unpopular things. He nearly says that women do not have much of a chance to get to heaven. And getting to heaven as you know, he says, is the true calling of the Muslim.
From visions of heaven of all religions, it sounds like a boring place. Well, saying prayers five times and sleeping with beautiful multiple houris could get on your nerves after a while, don’t you agree? Or walking on clouds, amidst soft laughter and mild banter with Bhajans or choirs flowing from the Tampura or the Church Organ in the background; won’t it drive you nuts after ten days? Can’t we have some action? Like love, jealousy, anger, heartbreak, affection, passion and the Guns and Roses? These are only in earth; it appears. I have been impressed by the power of religions to influence minds. I write about Islam, because it has occupied a lot of mind space in recent times. And there is that feeling that the whole world is closing in on them. It is a powerful idea, and these are powerful preachers. They have a lot of good things to say. And there is also a load of crap which is out of sync with the world we live in. And these ideas cannot be countered with battle tanks, daisy cutter bombs and stinger missiles. And these cannot be conquered by the CIA, Israel or by writing abusive comments about Pakistan and Islam in rediff.com. These ideas have to be countered in the minds- by those within the Ummah.
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