Midnyt Yellow Moon

Feeling the cold breeze when I move out of my hide,

To feel the eternal bliss one could ever experience,

It comes as a whim,

To see it every single night,

The urge is so strong,

That I don’t pay attention to anything else,

It holds me so firmly

Never lets me go away,

Not for a moment it allows me to shut my eyes,

Its mesmerizing beauty

Flows in the whole night sky,

Slowly coming out of the dark clouds

And illuminating the clouds,

With its never diminishing shine,

All night long,

There atop I see the Midnyt Yellow Moon.

It comforts me as a pillow,

Completes me in the lonely nights,

Seeing it endlessly,

I get lost in the emptiness of the night,

I feel alive in the dead hours,

It bestows happiness upon me,

Like the happiness a mother gets in hugging her child,

Every night I feel the same,

Talking to the Midnyt Yellow Moon,
Trying to reach you, feel you.

The Reluctant Believer

Parents imbibe certain values in their children which they think would help their tiny tots in becoming respectable figures in the society of hypocrites, well there do exist a faction of people whom you can call considerably upstanding. The parents would teach their children to be truthful, honest, kind, merciful, polite, and the list of “good looking” words goes on until infinitum. The biggies are hopeful (I don’t know why) that their little ones will suck up all their teachings and will turn up to be good citizens. Well, it’s their duty, I know, but isn’t it forceful feeding to the kid about your own ideology and asking them to absorb your peremptory norms.

Rewind time and let’s go back to my childhood, where my parents would keep my after playtime evening time booked for reciting some bhajans or kirtans with my siblings. Irony is that I liked doing it back then, with my cousins, it was actually fun to do, walking and singing the bhajans and grinning after looking into each other’s eyes. And if you ask me to do that now, I will surely hang myself upside down. Back then I used to do it not because I was spiritual but because of the fun involved in it and lately I have realised that am not at all the same.

God, another word which is slowly evanescing from my assorted psyche, the powerful word for most mortals in which I used to believe (I still do a little). God, soulful immortal, my parents told me to believe in, and I did for a long period of time before my lost and wandering (don’t know for what) mind ceased to think that god exists. Hit the rewind button again, I used to fold my hands in front of some idols and pictures, which my parents described as GOD, I believed. God to me is not more than fiction and talking in Indian context, the Geeta, Mahabharat and Veds are simply splendid jobs done by fictitious fiction authors. I maybe wrong here but that is what I BELIEVE now.

Caste, in India pertains to stigma and the society is pigeonholed into it since ages. Being born in a middle class Brahmin family, the prejudiced caste system should have been caricatured in my mind but my family was miles away from it except for one thing which I will tell later on.
Hit the rewind button (okay, it’s the last time), I received from my parents to consider everyone equal regardless of caste or race and yes I still believe in it unlike a few other things. There were people from lower strata of the society who would visit my grandfather for help or guidance and he would treat them as one of his own, not maintaining a gap called casteism. He/she would be given tea/water in the same cup/glass and no difference was being kept with those people. So growing up seeing what my family believed in, I believed. 

Who will hit the forward button to know the other one thing? I don’t really have to go back to my childhood to tell you this. I often tell my father (jokingly) that I’ll marry a girl who I like whatever her caste may be; my father will frown upon this and will say that you will have to marry a Gaur Brahmin girl only. My mother and I would laugh endlessly just to see that frowned look of my father and his same old words.




PS: My parents would be vexed if they see this :P
    : Avoid typos.

The Oblivious Truth of Irom Sharmila and Her Hunger Strike of 11 years.

 “If Sharmila dies, Parliament is directly responsible,” she thundered at a gathering of journalists. “If she dies, courts and judiciary are responsible, the military is responsible… If she dies, the executive, the PM and President are responsible for doing nothing… If she dies, each one of you journalists is responsible because you did not do your duty…” these are the statements made by the Iranian nobel peace prize winner Shirin Ebadi on a trip to India in 2006 in support of Irom Sharmila Chanu.

Irom Sharmila, a poet, a social activist and a native of the ‘neglected’ state of Manipur and she is on hunger strike for almost 11 years now. Yes, eleven years, that is nothing in front of Anna Hazare’s fast of four days and still majority of Indians do not know about her and the cause she is fighting for. Irony, it is, that one person is getting so much media coverage and another person who is fighting for a similar cause is neglected by the government and most importantly by the media. She is fighting for the people of North East India and wants the repeal of AFSPA(Armed Forces Special Powers Act). The growing insurgency in Kashmir and North East India resulted in the inception of AFSPA. Citizens of these regions thought that now they would be safe from the militants but they did not know that atrocities by the men in uniform would follow soon. More than 20,000 people have been killed so far in Manipur alone, estimate the numbers of whole North East.

Gandhi inspires her, and in this country of Gandhi, she is being jailed as she expresses her solidarity towards the Draconian law of AFSPA. She is not doing this for fame, but for the people of North East who are helpless and weak in front of the ruthless army. She has been fasting because this is the only weapon left with her and then she is being charged under ATTEMPT TO SUICIDE and is being jailed for a year and then police arrest her again after 2-3 days. Isn’t this what Anna Hazare is doing, and the police is not arresting him under the same charge. Double Standards.

The big Indian media houses boast about their ethics, where are those ethics when it comes to the coverage of Irom’s struggle? Do these media houses only want sky high TRPs and not highlight the news and development regarding to Irom’s hunger strike? Strong questions are left unanswered about ETHICAL media.

Leaving aside the double standards of the police and the media, let me talk about the government now. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh formed a committee in 2004 to look into the matter of AFSPA, the committee was headed by Justice Jeevan Reddy. The report by the committee has been submitted to the government but it has not made it public yet but the report is there with The Hindu and it clearly recommends the repeal of AFSPA as "the Act, for whatever reason, has become a symbol of oppression, an object of hate and an instrument of discrimination and highhandedness". 

The report was submitted to the government years back but nothing has been done till now, the people of North East are still frightened by the Army.

The struggle of Irom has inspired many Indians and they are fighting for her cause in order to get justice. There was a gathering and candle light march at Delhi in August in support of Irom and soon there will be a march from Kashmir to Imphal. This march will create awareness about Irom and her fight for the people of Manipur and the North East. In October, a nationwide signature campaign is going to take place to express concern for the cause of Irom Sharmila. A campaign “Save Sharmila” is taking baby steps and with the help of students across the colleges of India, it is going to be a massive campaign. Student bodies have been formed to create awareness about Irom Sharmila at college level which will help in the mobilisation of the campaign. The members of the campaign are coming up with the screening of documentaries of Irom Sharmila, plays on her, articles on various websites and immense participation on social media platforms.

Soon the government will bow to the just demands of Irom Sharmila Chanu and will repeal the merciless AFSPA and justice would be done. Though this time time of eleven long years has resulted in massive health related problems for Irom, was reduced to 35 kilograms and her bones have become frail according to doctors. She has not met her mother for years, she says she will meet her only after the act is removed.  

Charas, Gaanja and The SMOKY Side of A STUDENT

“Roll another joint”, this is one of my friend saying to another friend of his, apparently this sentence or these words are very common in the life of a college student.

When we talk about the life of a college student then we also talk about weed, marijuana and other fantasy drugs that a student consumes daily.  A student does not have to look around for it for long, the availability of these dried leaves or grass as known popularly is facile.

“STUFF” is the usual slang term for gaanja/weed and is smoked in a cigarette, rolling paper, bong, pipe and nowadays in hookah. The consumption of stuff has increased exponentially in the past few years because of easy availability in college campuses and the surrounding areas of the campuses. The main carriers of stuff are auto drivers, rickshaw pullers and servant staff of the colleges. Moreover the price of gaanja is very less, one can buy 10 joints for just 50 bucks. These two factors (carriers and price) and the third factor which is one of the most important, the FRIEND CIRLCE, help a student to indulge in the consumption of stuff.

What propels a student to consume stuff? Yes, this is a question which has a lot of answers to it but let me tell you a few.

The major reason for this is ‘let’s try out something new attitude’ as now we are in college and ‘freedom’ also connects with it if a student lives in hostel or away from home. These two reasons when combine, it results in inception of yet another stuff smoker who believes that doing this would be another achievement in his life and he can brag about it in front of his friends.

Another reason for consumption of charas/gaanja/drugs is ‘show off attitude’ of a particular class of students who believe that consuming stuff would make them COOL, but that’s definitely not the case. This ‘show off attitude’ makes them vulnerable to more and more consumption to save their so called pride.

Friend Circle, as mentioned in above plays a prime role in a student’s life. Be it academics, sports or some unacceptable activities which includes consumption of those dried leaves and grass. In my college life I have seen some students who did not consume stuff when they were in 1^st year but started consuming it afterwards and the only reason I hear from them is, “For how long you will stop yourself when your roommate and all your friends smoke it”.

One more drug/stuff known as hash, is also consumed by students. The students consume it by the method of eating, they put it in their sandwich, cookies or bread and consume it. The effect usually starts late and it lasts for long. Cocaine, heroin and brown sugar are also gaining popularity in this stuff market and I think it won’t take much time that students will start using these costly drugs and make their lives hell.

The youth of the country is gripped into this fever of stuff smoking and it is really becoming hard to stop them from doing so. Mostly students do drugs when they are under pressure of studies and they think that doing it once won’t harm them but in reality, drugs catches an individual and it doesn’t let him go. Marijuana is known as gateway drug, it leads to the use of other drugs and the short time love for the fantasy becomes addiction. It has been observed in some studies that students doing drugs and consuming alcohol are more prone to unprotected sex which leads to AIDS. Around 25% of teens/students who are sexually active report having unprotected sex as they were drinking or using illicit drugs. The youth who have drug problem do not realize it because they always treated drugs as their friends who would help them in relaxation of mind and body.

The drug use is surely a problem for the youth, they will be reluctant in doing daily tasks like bathing, studying and even eating. They tend to distance themselves from social eves and can even behave in an unpredicted manner at social gatherings out of anger and frustration. The most common problem is that they will stop attending classes and as a result of that their academic performance will be hit hard and it will degrade in the coming time.

As we all know that smoking leaves an irreparable damage in an individual and it definitely kills. Smoking marijuana/consuming drugs increase the heartbeat and reduce the blood pressure. It also causes extreme amount of hallucinations, loss of coordination, chest infection, lung infection and increased coughing.

Strong will and self control can only save you from indulging in smoking Charas, Gaanja and other stuff. Stay controlled, Stay healthy.