A day in Paris

Paris! The fashion capital of the world and one of the best destinations in the world for a vacation. After a tiring day at Strasbourg, I took an overnight bus to Paris. It is quite surprising that my bus was late by an hour at Strasbourg and I reached Paris an hour early! Either the bus driver was an awesome one or I had the wrong time table ;) Strasbourg is a small and a beautiful city and I would like to go there again when I am back to Europe. 

I arrived in Paris at 6 am in the morning and had exactly 12 hours in hand to explore as much as I can. If you ask me, 12 hours is a lot less to learn "Paris". I took the subway train from Gallieni station towards Trocadéro - my first destination in this romantic french city. This is the first thing that comes to a person's mind when he thinks about Paris - The Eiffel Tower. It was useless to buy a day ticket for the metro as I traveled only twice and  the rest of the time, I explored a part of the city on foot. It is best to walk around rather than taking transportation if you are near Champ de Mars. The metro is not something anyone would be impressed with. The trains are quite small in dimensions. It was not easy to get a seat even at this morning hour. Paris wakes up early it seemed. People kept reading newspapers or sipping their morning coffee on their way to work. The sweet voice of a couple of women speaking in French was a good getaway from the German language I am used to hear in U-Bahn in Munich, which I believe is certainly not the sweetest language in the world. It looked like I was the only tourist at this time heading towards Champ de Mars.

So here I was, getting off at Trocadéro my first sight in Paris - The Eiffel Tower, an engineering marvel and I could not think of a better time to see this magnificent structure. It was almost sunrise and the first rays of light made a fantastic view of Champ de Mars. An Asian couple in their wedding dress were getting their photos clicked in Palais de Challiot overlooking the Eiffel Tower. The warm sun ray, the morning breeze and this magnificent view took off all the stress and my mind was completely blank for those few moments.

Eiffel Tower as seen from Palais de Challiot

Firstly, it was hard to believe I was there. A few years back, I would not have imagined myself to travel around in Europe alone as a backpacker. And here I was, having my breakfast right beside the Eiffel Tower in Paris. It was nearly a dream come true, but not quite there because I wanted to spend my whole day here which was not possible as I just had 11 more hours in hand with so much to see. So I could not go up the tower to see the restaurants in the first and the second floor and Gustave Eiffel's residence at the top of the structure, the engineer after which this tower is named. I am glad that the City of Paris did not bring this tower down in the early 1900s after Gustave Eiffel's ownership had expired as it proved to be valuable  for communication purposes etc. The tower is still used for TV broadcasting and radio communications and is the tallest standing structure in the city of Paris. The price to go up was nominal and people had already queued up for the tickets. I took a walk down the Champ de Mars towards École Militaire occasionally stopping in between to take pictures. The locals came here for morning walks and exercises. I sort of envied them for living in such a beautiful place and having the chance to come here everyday. Nevertheless, though it was not even an hour since I came here, I had decided to come back to Paris one day and spend a part of my life in this city. God knows if this comes true. 

With a map in one hand, camera in the other, a backpack, I strolled around to Musee des Plans-Reliefs, the museum of military models. Most of the cafes were closed at this moment but I can imagine the ambiance around this place in the evening. One gets the feeling of being in France, contrary to Strasbourg which still seemed quite similar to German cities probably because of its proximity to the country. The walk from the military museum to the Place de la Concorde is splendid. One passes numerous beautiful buildings, la Seane river and lush green gardens. Place de la Concorde, a major square in Paris was one of the busiest crossings I encountered. The distinguishing feature of this square was the central structure - an Egyptian Obelisk. 

Musee des Plans-Reliefs

The Obelisk at the center of Place de la Concorde

Originally located in the Luxor temple in Egypt، this structure was moved to the square in 1836. All around the sides of the Obelisk are symbols in ancient Egyptian language called heiroglyphs praising the reign of king Ramses II. The rest of the Obelisks are still at the Luxor temple. Making my way from the Square through Jardin des Tuileries، I had some crepes at the entrance of the garden -one of my favorite food in France. I sat on one of the benches kept at the center of the park beside a fountain، relaxing to the sound of sparrows and ducks preening in the warm summer afternoon.

The fountain at the center of  Jardin des Tuileries

After having lunch at one of the pizza places nearby، I went to see one of the largest and the best museum in the world - Musee du Louvre. 

Musee du Louvre

I have been crazy to see this place when I saw Da Vinci Code. And indeed, this place is enormous. I just had 3-4 hours to see it, but if you ask me, this museum itself will take about 2-3 days to see it completely. Losing your way in this place might be easy, so I had to end up walking a lot to find the exit gates, ending up at various new sections of the museum in the process. Of course, when I entered the museum, I had one main destination to find: Mona Lisa. You're not supposed to use flash cam anywhere in the museum but there were hell loads of tourists and it was impossible to stop anyone from using the flash. Mona Lisa has been kept in the center of Salle des États in a climate controlled enclosure behind a bullet proof glass and it was the most crowded place in the whole museum.

Mona Lisa

The museum was filled with what seemed like millions of art works by notable artists around the world, including the Egyptian antiquities, Roman and Islamic works and some of the sections even contained modern art work. I am certainly not gonna tell you about everything that I saw but the point is- the museum is huge and one gets tired after walking the entire thing.

I was glad to be out of the museum into the warm sun again. I took a short nap near the fountains outside the pyramid and was probably the best nap I have had in months. It wasn't awkward as it might seem because literally everyone was doing it, so even I did not mind. I gathered the strength to wake up and walk towards the Pont des arts bridge over La Seine river - a bridge where love gets locked forever.

Lovelock bridge over La Seine

One can see thousands of golden locks on this bridge with the name of a couple on each of them. Many tourist couples attach padlocks with their first names on it and throw away the key in the river as a gesture for their everlasting love. Locals sell souvenirs and arts works depicting various places in the city of Paris all along La Seine river and I was able to get a mini Eiffel Tower myself as a remembrance for this place. 

I have not mentioned yet but I was a vegetarian till then. So all I got in french shops was a cheese sandwich with nothing but cheese in it and pizza places were quite hard to find sometimes. Tired of having such small amounts of food every meal, I broke my vegetarianism and satisfied myself with a hot-dog. So Paris goes into my history as the place where I finally decided to be okay being a non-vegetarian. And this happened right beside Notre Dame de Paris, the famous Catholic Cathedral in the city. In Munich, I am used to see churches, but in France and Switzerland you see a lot of cathedrals with beautifully designed windows. And the best thing is, inside it is decorated with numerous candles which make a great ambiance around the hall.

Notre Dame de Paris

Cathedral window over the main entrance

Sitting in one of the benches, I closed my eyes to reflect on what all I saw for the past week. This has been one of the most eventful days of my life. Walking around continuously for the past 2 days in two of the beautiful cities in France، I was able to see a new culture which was apparent from the monuments I saw during this time. I was one of the few people who was alone and was having a great time just walking around and learn as much as I can about the place. My bus departed around 7 pm from Paris and my next destination was Berlin، the most historic place in Germany. But Berlin will be a subject of a different post. 12 hours was certainly not enough to live "Paris". But it is enough to make you fall in love with it :)

West Bengal: Murshidabad

West Bengal! A beautiful state in eastern India, a home to thousands of great scientists, philosophers, revolutionists, writers, musicians- you think of any sector and they are there- C.V. Raman, Satyendra Nath Bose (after whom the term Boson is coined, remember Higgs Boson?), Rabindra Nath Tagore, Bankim Chandra, Subhash Chandra Bose, even Mother Teresa lived a major part of her life here. Most of our national songs come from this part of the country, the anthem itself. Once a home to East India Company, this place played a key role in the British gaining control over India. A source of many varieties of mangoes which are distributed all over the country- Did you know they have a kind of mango which melts as soon as you open it? The only place in India where trams are still operational. Durga Pooja- I have never seen the kind of enthusiasm and zest towards any festival but being in this part of the world during this festival is something that should go in your list of things to see before you die. West Bengal- A land full of surprises and indeed makes up for a unique cultural hub in India.

Recently I had the chance to spend a week in Kolkata. I arrived at Howrah station in the afternoon. Moments before your train stops, one can see the magnificent Rabindra Setu or Howrah Bridge as it is popularly called, built over the Hugli River. It is a part of the great Ganges coming from the Himalayas, making its way through the historic city of Allahabad and Benaras to finally get consumed by the Bay of Bengal. Outside the train station, the road is filled with yellow taxis and it is easy to get caught in a traffic jam, a common thing in this congested city. The taxi took me through the packed Boro Bazaar, the famous cricket ground Eden Garden, Victoria memorial and Park Street.

After a day’s rest, I left for Murshidabad district the next morning early at 6 am with my mom and sister. As usual, the train journeys in India are one of a kind- this one was real crazy! My journey till the town of Krishna Nagar was smooth and I stood at the door to enjoy the fresh morning air. Local vendors barging in train compartments is a common thing and it is sometimes a delight to see them chanting chai-chai, something I have seen seeing since I was a child. But this train was full of vendors, beggars and artists (singers, musicians- not the ones you see on TV :P) after this town. You literary have a small market in one bogie with people selling towels, handkerchiefs, T-shirts, shorts, blankets, dhotis, toys, chai, jhal moodi, fruits and veggies. Every 5 minutes, a beggar came along asking for money and generally they were accompanied by kids or blind people. On-board entertainment is in the form of songs and flute music by the local daily wage earners. For the first time I have seen people using microphones and speaker systems in the train and having a karaoke in the middle of this crowded compartment. Earning money in trains just went high-tech. There were more vendors than people who were actually travelling. We reached Berhampore in Murshidabad district about an hour late at noon.

A 15 minute ride in a cycle rickshaw takes you to the village of Khagra, where my mom spent her childhood. She was excited to see her place after nearly 30 years. To her disappointment, her home and the nearby areas were ruined by the local people there. I was not impressed either to see the number of people living in slums here. The Ganges takes the name of Bhagirathi here and Hugli in Kolkata. The level of water has fallen drastically in the past 30 years. The government has made an attempt to beautify the banks by making parks and amendments to control floods. Unfortunately the locals and the tourists have used these parks as a dumping spot for the wastes. The forests have been replaced by shacks built of mud and dry grass. River gets contaminated by these people washing their clothes daily. But if you think about it, even they don’t have a choice- they have no livelihood, no jobs or proper homes or food- so they make the best of whatever is available to them. This part of Bengal is very poor, but beautiful geographically. This part feeds a major part of the population in the state as most of the agricultural product comes from the fields in Murshidabad. We took a ride in one of the local boats which people use to cross the river. You can bring anything- Motor bikes, bicycles, yourself of course, vegetable and fruit carts- anything! They were made of bamboo sticks and ran from early morning until night. We paid about ₹ 1.5 for the whole trip, that’s hardly 2 cents. It was good to travel in the cheapest boat ride ever in the midst of a beautiful landscape.

The market in Khagra is set up in a small street. Apart from the common goods like daily groceries, clothes and shoe shops, there were a considerable number of shops selling classical Indian musical instruments like Tabla, Sitar and Flute. In the middle of this one street market, there was a school where my mom used to study. It is one building about 2 storey high with no playground. It was 7 pm when we arrived so the school was closed and I was not able to see anything from inside. My mom recollected a fat old lady with a stick in her hand who used to sit on the front porch of the building waiting to punish the students who came late. Her eyes showed part nostalgia and part disappointment to see her locality. We stopped for food at one of the local restaurants to have traditional Bengali food which consisted of rice, pulses, veggies and potato fries.

Next day we left for a tour of the popular tourist destinations of Murshidabad district. We made our way along a road running parallel to Bhagirathi River to make our first stop at Motijhil- a horse shoe shaped lake enclosing Moti mahal, a palace built by Nawazish Muhammed Khan as a residence. The palace is now in ruins and only a mosque Khala Masjid stands with the tomb of Edward Keating, superintendent of Murshidabad district (1794), in front of it. The locals have taken shelter in the destroyed palace and the lake water is used to wash clothes. It is disheartening to see such a beautiful landscape being destroyed and nothing is being done about it.

The way to Jahan Kosha gun is full of lush green crop fields and we made a stop in between to change a punctured tyre. The natives were very generous to offer us Pomelo and raw lemon when asked for it. The intoxicating fragrances of these fruits were indeed rare to find in big cities like Kolkata or Delhi. Together with the pleasant air of a village, one often gets tempted to stay over for a week and enjoy these rare joys for city people like us. It is in this land that many wars were fought during and after Mughal rule in India. Bengali blacksmith-Janardan’s Jahan Kosha gun is one of the few heavy armory used by the military then. Made during reign of Shah Jahan (the same person who made the Taj Mahal!), this canon gun weighed about 7 tons. It is hard to believe that people really carried such a heavy load at a time when machines were alien to Indians.

Murshidabad is named after Nawab Murshid Quli Khan, who built the Katra Mosque in AD 1723. Built on a lofty platform, this mosque is the oldest and most imposing Islamic architecture at Murshidabad. Listed as a monument of archaeological importance, it is well maintained by the Archeological Survey of India. Nawab himself was buried under the front staircase of this mosque. His daughter, Begum Azimunnisa, was also buried under the staircase of her mosque, completely destroyed now, but bore many similarities with her father’s mosque.

Murshidabad is alive because of its monuments. Apparent from the way people live, this place is very poor and it seems like it is not getting enough government support for the welfare of the natives. The major source of income is through year round tourism, the seasonal mangoes and other veggies. The fields around Katra mosque are full of mango trees – about 250 different types. Between these trees, the lush green crops and beside the Bhagirathi river stands the magnificent Hazarduari Palace- a structure with an amalgam of Mughal and British Ideas. As the name suggests, Hazarduari (Hazar means a thousand and duar means doors) consists of a thousand doors. My mom and her siblings had actually counted those doors when they were kids! There’s a catch! Not all of them are "doors". Some of them are just made of concrete and blend with the walls to fool a predator from escaping the palace once he is inside. There are no knobs in any of the doors- real or fake. Only the keeper has the knobs and he only knows about the path to get out of the palace. Hazarduari looks like one of those Roman structures from the front, however with a Mughal touch inside. The palace is now a museum, home to thousands of war artillery, medieval ivory art, Mughal and British wagons and Roman style statues among others. This monument was indeed a wonder and a perfect place if you want to see India during the mid of Mughal and British rule.

After a heavy Bengali lunch, we took a horse cart to the nearest railway to make our way back to Kolkata. This trip was indeed one of a kind- I was travelling with my family after a long time. I am generally used to travel alone. To watch my mom come to her home village after a long time made me realize that someday even I will be in her place. Someday, even I will leave behind all the things I am living with. The question is, will everything be the same after all those years? How will our lives change? Destiny has its own way of taking us to unexpected places. Future is full of surprises. It is better to enjoy the gifts that nature offers us today!

A night outside Indian Railway station

Railways are considered to be the lifeline of India. Millions of people are dependent on it and it is the only cheap mode of transportation for long distances. With the rising fuel prices, airways and roadways are a secondary choice.

It is said that if someone spend a month in these trains, he can experience the best and the worst of India. It is true. You travel in a Rajdhani and Shatabdi express and no wonder you'll be impressed by the kind of treatment you get in these trains (there are a few exceptions though). On the other hand, you'd rather think about walking a 1000 km rather than traveling the same distance in a 2nd class unreserved coach. Such diverse is the system, one actually thinks if we are taking about the same organization.

I recently had the chance to spend a night at Pune railway station in India to book a tatkal ticket back to my place. A tatkal reservation normally begins at 10 am in the morning but the rush compels us to start queuing from midnight to avoid early morning rush. The 11 hour wait in that station changed the way I looked at that city. I forgot every good thing about that place and more generally about this country. If it wasn't for some experienced men who kept explaining things to me, I would have ran away in the middle of the night itself.

I found the tatkal line at about 10 pm and was delighted to be the 3rd one in the line, which means I was sure to get a ticket back home now. Two Rajasthani men were waiting ahead of me, both for ordinary reservations (not tatkal). It seemed like people have to fight like dogs for mere 3-4 seats even 4 months before the actual journey starts. It is more troublesome when you have a family to take. The first hour went all fine and I was having a good conversation about the situations in these trains and how they can be improved. A useless talk it was, but it was better than doing nothing. Till about 11 or 11:30 pm, the station is active and the last trains from Bombay drop off people who spent the weekend in nearby hills of Lonavala and Khandala (popular tourist destinations).

I had no idea what I was going to experience in the next 10 hours. It all started with a drunkard who sat beside me claiming that he was the 4th one in the queue time and again. For a first timer like me, such a person would freak you out. But I stayed there, assuming that one person would not be a problem for the rest of the night when I know cops and other people are around. Besides, the man was off to tea or more alcohol every now and then. He came back just to ensure we still think he is the fourth one in the queue. Me and the Rajasthani men started mocking him after sometime. After a short while, a teenage boy, probably 15 years old came to us and started begging and asked us to rescue him from the goons. Tears were rolling down his muddy face and his teeth-gaps were filled with bits of tobacco. His clothes smelled like desi-daru and where torn at various places, covering the essential parts. I almost felt like being in the middle of a Bollywood drama. Goons? People with guns and no emotions. That would be the last of all the people I would ever want to meet. A cold wave ran down my spine and I started panicking. I saw the Rajasthani men pretended to sleep during this event and I followed. After all that was happening, I decided to leave the place and head back to my room even though I risk not getting a reservation back home. The 'pretending-to-sleep' trick worked! The boy went away after some time and started sipping weeds with his fellow mates at the station. One of the Rajashthani men sighed- "The night has begun!". They told me that I'll see many boys like him in the station. The Railways is their home. He pointed to the drunkard who was watching the show all this time. It was that drunkard who sent the boy and told him to beg so he can get some money out of us. So if this is the beginning, I was not prepared to see the extreme.

My mind was in a dilemma now. I wanted to get out of there and be in a comfortable bed back in my room. But a large portion of my brain wanted to see how bad things can get. I was always afraid of such people in my life. I wondered what will I do if I come face to face with such circumstances. My voice trembled when I spoke now. Of all the people in my life, I wanted to see my family, my mom at this moment. The little child in me wanted the warmth of a mother. Mother's lap is the most beautiful place in the world when you are a child. One feels protected in her presence. But right now I was thousand miles away from her and I was not a child anymore. The only way to conquer a fear is to face the fear itself. I gathered all my strength and decided to stay and see what the real India looks like.

To my relief, one more person joined me and the Rajasthanis. He was a thirty-ish something man who worked in an IT company in Mumbai and was planning for a vacation with his wife in Jharkhand for a week. And he was another experienced man with this railway station and knew everything that was about to come. I was happy to see his built as he seemed to be the kind of guy who could fight 3-4 men at once. But I was glad more because he kept us busy with his talks- about his family, about politics (You keep 2 Indians in one room and it is impossible they wont talk about politics or the corrupted government). We got a company of about 5 other children after sometime who were also lining up for tatkal. I wondered why some 10-12 year old kids would stand in a queue at 1 in the morning. They wore decent clothes and did not seem to be from a poor family. As it turned out, this station was their home too. They have never seen their family and they work for the agents with whom I would be introduced in a few hours. They kept blabbering things in bihari language passing weed among themselves. Just like the drunkard, these boys went away for sometime asking us to save their positions. They came back after sometime with couple of blankets in their hands. It is not like these guys have a storage for their blankets. They steal from people who sleep on roadside pavements or the railway station. A demo for such a talent was presented right in front of us. One of the daily wage worker was sleeping sound beside a tree in front of the reservation center. The worker was drunk and was out cold. He didnt even come to his senses when the boys took the blanket away from him and even started kicking him just to let him know they are taking away his blanket. Though .

We all tried to get some sleep after the show. It was hard to sleep in concrete. The cold was getting worse and people started burning things to get themselves warm. People do not have heaters or coal here. They burn anything they find on the road unaware of the harmful effects of burning dangerous materials like cellophane which can cause suffocation among small children whom you can easily find wandering about the station area. But they do not have any choice, neither did I. I joined them for a moment just to relieve myself of the chills.

Making a queue was a hard task given that everyone was desperate for a ticket back home. But the trouble also came from a cop who came with a cane to shoo us away. It was annoying for we were sitting peacefully with an understanding among ourselves about our respective positions in the queue. At about 2:30 AM, we got to know the reason behind the cop's behavior, probably the 6th time when he came with the cane. Normally, this is the time of the night when people are in deep sleep and they wont even be aware if their wallet or any valuable good was stolen at this moment.

Soon it was dawn and the real situation and the flaw in the Indian railway officials became apparent. One does not notice the formation of a swarm of ants when you drop some sweet. The swarm of agents grew exactly like that. There was no use to complain to the police officers there as they were bribed by these agents. These agents were none other than the bullies and it seemed that can easily kill you if you did not follow their rules. It is for these people those teen boys worked. The honest people were left in vain. But that is the way it worked in the end. Money speaks in this country.

I ended up without any ticket that day. I did curse my country for facing hardships at every point. I wonder when this all will change and we get to see India as every common man wants it-- Corruption-free. I just wonder! The night at Pune station changed the way I see the trains in India. Indeed, getting to travel in this country for a common man is an achievement in itself.

India, an emerging economy?

India has been considered as one of the emerging economies in the world. The recent changes in reforms and the introduction of new schemes for the development of the rural areas have proved to be a boon for a large number of families in some parts of the country. More and more people have started joining IT companies and in Research and Development which has led to a better standard of living. A general view sees India as moving forward towards a better developed nation. However what the general public oversees is that in many of the areas, government is still not able to tackle even the basic problems of the people. In this  blog, I will give a few instances of the situations to make my point.

First, the Right To Education act which states that every child in India below the age of 14 years is entitled to receive education free of cost at any recognized  government school. A bold and a very noble move, it has been handled in the most dreadful manner by the officials in some places. For providing education, you need schools which have good sanitation facilities, notebooks and pencils, blackboards and above all, good qualified teachers. Some of the government schools in the national capital Delhi are notorious for the kind of teachers they have been provided with. I lived in the old part of the city in the north and I used to teach some students in a private coaching institution. Even the high school students are not provided with a Chemistry teacher for the whole academic year, which is one of the main  stream subjects for students in Science. The story is not limited to people in my area but it is common in many government schools in Delhi. I used to go to such schools for giving some national level exams and I was disappointed the way classrooms were kept. Damp walls with abusive language written all over the place, some fans not working and it seemed like they cleaned up the rooms for the sake of having the exams. I even fell off the desk in the middle of the exam because a screw was loose. I have been to some schools in remote villages as well and the situation there seems to be more desperate. They don't have any table or chair, so children have to sit on the floor and there is no electricity most of the time. In a place like that village (which was near the east coast of India in the southern part of the state of Andhra Pradesh), it becomes very hard to survive in 40 degrees heat without a fan and no lakes nearby. When the government cannot provide any basic necessities to the schools, then why do they pass such an act for which they are not prepared at all?

The village school in Southern Andhra Pradesh

Second, India is known for its diversity. It has such a rich culture and it could be considered as a continent in itself. When you move from one state to the other, you feel like you have entered a different country as the language and the geographical features become different from state to state. We also have the very debated Caste  system which is a form of social stratification where people are divided on the basis of their occupation, lifestyle, culture, religion among many others. During the medieval period, the caste system restricted each group to a particular duty and the highest rank was given to the Brahmins, the priests. Such a system still persists in some villages in every part of the country. Even the untouchables exist (yes! they are literally considered untouchable). Even the vedas, the ancient Indian  scriptures mentions the caste policy in some of the excerpts. However, the vedas never deferred anyone from being untouchable and neither restricted anyone to do any sort of job. Vedas do treat everyone alike. It is an irony that most of the Indians are proud of the vedic scriptures and proclaim that they follow its culture. Today, such a caste system has even entered in the process of admission to various Schools and Universities and even high profile government jobs. There are a fixed percent of seats reserved for schedule castes and schedule tribes and these people easily get admission to the best universities in the country leaving  some of the bright students of the "general" category lose the opportunity to be among the elite groups. The problem is not with the reservation system, but to whom the reservation is given. Some of the families in these reserved categories have a better quality of life than the ones in the general ones. They can even afford to spend a vacation abroad while some of the general ones can hardly afford to be a tourist for a day in his own city. Moreover, the reservation extends to the job sector and even in  places like hospitals where the selection of doctors should be made on the basis of their qualification and not the caste. In my view, the reservation should be change on the basis of the family income rather than the social status. And this reservation should be discontinued after some level when the individual has had adequate  benefits from the program that he is able to compete in the society with the skills he attained. An economy can grow only when we have a skilled labor and not a work force selected on the basis of a century old social divisions.

Third, the last example and probably the most important of all is the empowerment of women in the country. It is shame that even in such a globalized era, India has a disastrous record of female foeticide. About 500,000 abortions happen annually on the basis of the sex determination. The government has come up with schemes such as "ladli" among others to ensure reduction in such crime rates. However the government is not totally loyal to the general public when it comes to women empowerment  schemes. In the year 2012, a popular show by one of the best actors of the country revealed a horrifying truth about an incident in Rajasthan, a northwestern state.  Two journalists caught on camera a statement of a doctor who advised them to abort a girl child and that the hospital records would be cleaned and the fetus would be thrown in place where no one will ever know about. The news went viral on the television channels soon. The sad part is none of the people in India gave a damn about it and the incident was forgotten (it is still forgotten even after the show revealed the situation). Today the two journalists are fighting against cases which were registered against them by the Rajasthan government. As for the doctor, "she" is freely practicing the crime openly without any interventions. REASON? Corruption and bribery. People in this country easily get away by paying bribes to the government officials.
The Women Reservation Bill which reserves about 33% of the total seats in  the Lower house of Parliament of India, the Lok Sabha, and in all state legislative  assemblies for women, is still pending to be passed by the Lok Sabha for the past 17 years. How long does it take for a bunch of people to pass such a bill? Does it  really take 17 years to come to a definite conclusion? India has a dismal figure  when it comes to number of women in the lower house of the parliament. Only 11% seats are occupied by women and it stands at 109th rank around the world. Girls are married before the age of 21 or as soon as their graduation is over. This is not a rare situation, neither does this happen only in rural areas. It is happening in every urban city and even the education Indians indulge themselves in such activities. Even I have been a witness to many such incidents and as a young boy, one cannot do much to fight against the whole society. Even the girls are left helpless when the  whole society turns against them. This summer vacation itself I an encounter with three of my own friends in such situation and it depresses me to see such bright minds go waste all for the sake of marriage. The problem does not stop with the parents but even some of the young generation support this notion. This mostly happens because people think they would not get a better match for their girl in future or that she is "manglic" (which is another useless horoscope prediction) or because of the mentality of parents to think that if a young girl stays unmarried for a long time, then it is bad for their respect in the society.

If India wants to grow, it must first address these basic issues and then move on to the other developmental ideas. Even if the government is able to tackle the above  problems effectively, the country will automatically see a progress in its economy and development. Rather than spending money on useless division of states (I do not  understand why people celebrate the creation of Telangana? Millions of people in the state still die of hunger and you are happy about creating and line which  further divides your people). If we get such a government who thinks rationally and not for the selfish needs of the party, then we can definitely say India as an  emerging economy in the world!!

Delhi Gang Rape

The Delhi gang rape incident on 16th December has been a real shocker to every citizen of the country. The act of rape has been going on for decades in India, but only this time people came out on streets to express their anger and intolerance to such nasty events. No wonder, the government was not even able to handle the protests properly and had to end up punishing the protesters instead.

Lack of preparedness of the cops is also apparent from the 7-8 rape incidents that took place after 16 December. This is a matter of grave concern and immediate steps should follow to ensure the safety of women in India, especially in the national capital. But is anything being done after-all? I don't think so. One is amazed by the extent of insecurity among the Congress ministers in Delhi when the girl's condition worsened. All they had to do was silently transfer her to Singapore with better medical facilities as an excuse. At a time when a person has been operated thrice and is hardly able to speak, airlifting would not be a good option. There was a huge risk in doing so and it did result in a mid-air drama when her blood pressure dipped alarmingly.

Things were no different after her death. Her service was performed quietly amid tight security and ironically, the VIPs, who were actually responsible for this, were present during the service. Many areas were banned for protesters and to everyone's expectations, those areas were residential areas of MPs and MLAs. In my view, it the high security of these VIPs which gives rise to these rape incidents. The security which could have been distributed to the general public has recklessly been used in people who don't need them at all. Nevertheless, in order to make the mob happy, the idea of special "fast track" court came up in this case which has been present in India for a long time, but a few such cases actually end up in justice.

Today, the focus has shifted to the suspects who were produced before the court a second time today. The fast track plan was ruled out the fast track plan in the end as they court requires more scrutiny in the case. And so the drama continues! By scrutiny, it can only mean delay: a long long delay in justice. And I am pretty sure this case would end up like most others where the protesters ultimately have to give up and media would shift its focus to some other hot topics when this case has lost its charm to the ill-fated laws of India. The argument of the defendant lawyer  that the suspects have been tortured to a level that they are not even able to speak is rubbish as this is clearly an indication to make the case look complicated. It is obvious: who in the world would even torture such criminals to this extent when they know that the act can lead to more horrific instances of protests from the public. To make matters worse, it has also been argued that the evidences have been manipulated.

To the people of India, this all seems like a familiar story as this is the situation in almost all rape cases in North India. Court hardly provides any justice to the victim, and if any justice is given, it is too late as the matter does not make much difference to the society or the victim by that time. I am saddened by the  way the things are still going on. The big question thus remains: will India ever change (I should say Delhi particularly)? Or has the battle for a safe India already lost?