The Inner Storm.........

  After being asked the above   question fourth time in my office lift, I have finally sat down to pen my thoughts. Firstly, to all dedicated citizens of India, I will recommend that one should neither try to understand Kashmir conundrum nor try to speculate over it. Because no good has come to any one with their association with Kashmir. The roots of this problem are too deep for anyone to spend time and understand it properly and the other issue is “Kashmiris”. Kashmir and Kashmiris have a different culture, a different language and a very different outlook, which you may point out is the case with every-other state. But what you forget is there are other facets of Kashmiryat too. One, the closeness to Pakistan and another Islam. This makes a seemingly simple linear equation into a full-fledged lagrange theorem that too in Urdu, so good luck to you. In the meanwhile, if you have other important things to do, such as buying the correct liquid detergent for yo...

Hi, I stopped writing about 2.5 years ago. Why?  I guess I didn't like the smell of my own shit. Weird huh!! Well, that happens right!! Self-doubts, low self-belief and mostly poor sentence construction and grammar issues.  Have I overcome those? Naaa, still work-in-progress. So, why am I writing again? I think I have a sane explanation for that at least. Writing when taken as a job or as a serious vocation becomes impossible for me. It simply ceases to be fun for me.  One more reason for not having written much from last 2.5 years is that I became better at managing my emotions, hence I stopped using my blog as my refuge. So, guys bring out your reading glasses and your coffee mugs because it is going to be a long read. My fingers are working on an auto-mode. The process is so fast I am unable to keep up with it. I am barely able to breathe. God! Have I missed it?  It is like touching yourself again after a month-long "celibacy"...

One word which kept ringing in my head during my trip to Bihar was "unapologetic". Everything I saw or heard was in its raw form. There was no tact or attempted sweetness. The Auto rickshaws did not wait for you to move off the road, but somehow without scratching you, they will pass right through. Driver will turn his eyes towards you for a brief second and then spit the pan on the other side. "Chawtiya" was his assessment of me followed by peels of laughter from the other c ramped passenger whose one butt cheek was hanging like an overgrown pumpkin. I did not mind. Neither did I revert. I just smiled and walked. It was around 9 am. The market was already bustling. We stopped at a dingy sweet shop. The owner was sitting on a tall stool as if he was judging a tennis match between Rafa and Federer. We asked him the rates of the plates. He just showed us in and indicated V with his finger as his entire mouth was overloaded with Pan induced Saliva. The walls wer...

I don't know the name of the founder or the owner of the Kickass-Torrents site, and frankly, I never bothered about it. There was no Wikipedia entry on where he went to school. Did his ancestors come to America on a ship or an Alien craft? Nobody knows or cares. All I wanted is to just find the damn torrent, hook it to the Bit torrent and just wait till the download was complete. Nobody batted an eyelid and everything was hunky dory. I even thought it was all in good faith and purely legal. There were a couple of banners on the site saying get a VPN to avoid getting tracked. But, we the people of India are very well aware of the tech savviness of our  Police. Plus, who gets arrested for downloading a movie. No one. The site had so many amazing features, you could search the movie by the genre and even by the actor's name. I remember once searching for Collin Farell movies and stumbling upon a gem of a movie called   In Bruges . What a movie it was. It wa...

Another body was lowered in the ground in Kashmir. This time the direction of the violence was from the other end of the Jawahar tunnel, an area which is known as the safest place in Jammu and Kashmir. It is almost a garrison town, surrounded by Army cantonments and ranges. The summers are less harsh in this area. I am talking about Udhampur, the place where the two kashmiri truckers were attacked. I don't know whether their actions warranted this kind of vicious attack, or the other technicalities of the case. But, what I am worried about is the cycle of violence that will get unleashed aftermath. More coffins, more graveyards, more protests, more violence. Again and Again. This time it is the cow-meat debate, next it would be Quran desecration, cartoon from Denmark. In short, any thing which is out of normal will lead to a complete breakdown of the normal life in the Valley. When are we going to look up, take out our head from this sand. Has any one single journalist ever ...

Finally, the mavericks at Phantom have started to churn out movies which can both stir the social curry as well as money counters. 38.8 Cr in the opening weekend must have been a big deal for the producers. It's been a long time since the money came in crashing for them. Udta Punjab is a treat to watch, for a lot of reasons. Is it an unconventional movie?Yes. Is it entertaining?Yes. Does it have a message for the society? Yes. Does Alia have an item Song? No. Sorry. She was not paid that much or even Kareena for that reason.  The latent stench of a documentary has been well camouflaged behind the long flowing locks of Shahid Kapoor. Within ten minutes of the movie, you get a feel that the director means business. There is no excess social drama that usually forms the part of movies which are on Drug menace-A poor family with a little source of income and the main earning member hooked to the syringe-No, Sir. This one started right at the barbed Indo-Pak border...

Sun had already begun his descent. Maybe, he could no longer bear to look at the mayhem humans had created on the battlefield. Dead bodies of soldiers lying on the ground for miles. Hordes of Hyena’s and Vultures were fighting over the carcasses. The main architect of this carnage was not stopping even to take a breath as if some devil had taken hold of him. It was just difficult to digest the fact that a week ago same warrior refused to take up arms. Even the lord of three worlds who had reins of the horses in his hands looked perturbed. There was no stopping him. It seemed that Kauravas had already surrendered to his might. Arjun’s quiver was fast emptying as the sunset was close. Kaurava foot soldiers were praying for the day to end. His deadly arrows have rained on them, piercing men and animals, earth and sky alike. It would take them all night to clear bodies which Arjun had left in his wake. It was the bloodiest day yet in the Mahabharata. On the other side of th...

Mr. Rama Reddy is a man of habits and punctuality. He is the village head or commonly referred as the Sarpanch of his village named Pulluru. His village is one of the hundred villages surrounding the town, YS Gate, which is again 15 KM away from Chittoor. Mr. Rama Reddy is about 6 feet in height, stout, and no extra flab.  Years of working in field helps later in the age. His sun brunt dark skin is the testimony for that. He has very prominent wrinkles on his forehead. May be, he thinks too much. Like all mornings, Mr. Reddy again woke up today at sharp 6 AM. With his years of discipline and will power, he no longer needs an alarm to wake him up. His eyes would open exactly at 6 AM. This morning was no different. He unlocked his gate first, took a round of his small garden in the courtyard. Filled the water buckets and kept them in front of cattle. This took exactly 15 minutes. At 6.15 AM sharp, he was in his bathroom. Singing religious hymns, he poured two...

1. Nothing can be more frightful than a demonic scorn of a pissed off girlfriend. In olden days, it could have burnt you to the ground. 2. Colleagues, who side stepped you to promotion. You are no longer a big hug bunny to them. 3. Profs, whose courses you flunked. You may be a big shot manager by now, but you will always try not bump into him/her, during the alum meets. 4. Neighborhood Uncle and Aunt, who know your academic record like the Sachin’s centuries. 5. Relatives and family friends whose wards have foreign degrees and their parents can’t shut up about that; nor can yours. 6. That one cousin in your family, who shared the same crush as you. 7. Few school and college friends, you no longer feel connected to. Just share few old jokes and pass on mate. 8. Your weed dealer, if he is under arrest. 9. Landlord, when you bring a girl over for a ‘Night Cap’. 10. Former classmate, whose ‘Diaper-Delivering’ start-up just got a funding of 1 millio...

“Misterr Ishaaaan  fucking Kauuuuuul” Ankita screamed. ” Another mention of that bitch Nikita and I am going to kill you, she dumped you for some hot shot banker six years ago, you know what dumped means, I guess two years of teaching first standard  kids must have taught you the meaning of dump, she must be having a great family now, couple of kids and here you are half bottle down, pissing on our vacation.” His Girlfriend of six months was half drunk but that didn’t stop her from giving him an earful. “Yaaa… but …that night was magical …..” Ishaan didn't finish. Ishaan Kaul is actually a software engineer who quit his high paying job to teach primary kids English at a convent  school. “Welcome back Mr. Kaul, while you were away on vacation, we have inducted a new boy in your class, he is an absolute delight” Miss Mendoza the head mistress said. “Where is he?” Ishaan replied, still in vacation hangover. “Oh, here he comes.” A thin boy of five wa...

I have to write ...yes, I have to. Everyone tells me,it's an addiction. It will never pay you, but consume you. It will engulf and make a fool of you. How can I explain, I am bound by my nature.  I did a small experiment with myself. I wanted to see how long can I keep myself away from penning down my thoughts or reading something. Well, on the reading front,apart from the usual dose of 2 national newspapers,magazines and Quora feed.I have managed to keep myself away from the the "heavy readings". I could have stayed away from writing also. It is no big thing. Writing seems like work to me.  Today the image that is dancing at the back of my mind is that of an small office in Paris. This office was unlike the normal ones. Here the people didn't just run through the motion. They were creators. Creative people are not bound by spaces, it's all in the brain. It's just that their antennas are still functioning compared to the other people, who bury ...

It's chilling tonight in Hyderabad, the traffic outside my room is thinning slowly. An Ernest Hemingway book is staring at me. It is my salary day gift to myself. Every end of the month, my company dutifully deposits my salary in my numbered account in Geneva. On that day, after finishing from office or some workshop,depending upon the orders of the day,I go to the Crossword.  I like to be surrounded by books. I still remember the first time I had visited a library. It was my school library. My favorite book back then was a giant Picture book about the various planets and heavenly bodies. But, what I loved in those books was the pictures of Greek gods and godessess and  a small background  story on how these bodies came to be named as they are today. I hardly recall any word from that book, except that its smell still lingers somewhere; I used to run as soon as the bell rang, leaving my lunch untouched. I wanted to be the first kid to get that book issue...

A fter few requests from  very close friends ( current and a pissed off ex). I will at least try finish the thought.  Most of you are probably not aware about the pain of the half finished story. I guess, in order to explain it, I may have to use some similes.  Imagine, you are alone in a cottage in Goa,  which you have booked months in advance just to get away from everything. You just have a 7 inch spring mattress in the room. It is close to  the beach, the waves are making a nice hum noise. It's  all very pleasant. You are sipping pulpy orange and reading Sidney Sheldon. Suddenly(I am just kidding) you get a hard on (yes this is sexist). Now why would anyone get a hard on reading Sidney Sheldon? Well, before I move on let me clarify that, though the name Sidney sounds like a well endowed, hot, blonde chick in a tank top and shorts with sexy,shining, and  waxed  legs, bending down to adjust her slippers(OK,I need to stop). He was a "tha...

I am a Facebook addict. Let’s face it. Whenever, I get time in between the barrage of the phone calls and outlook. I log onto Facebook and check out what others have posted. What new jokes and memes are trending. All my acquaintances have green light in front of their names along with their mugshots. If Facebook was invented for connecting humans, then I am wondering why I am not connecting with them.  As I am inching towards the wrong side of 20s, the list of people who have known me is just expanding, but the list of people I like to be with, is shrinking fast. There is a procession of people outside. A huge caravan of vehicles carrying  men with green flags marked with half moon and the customary star, has spilled on the street. Today apart from being Sabbath is the birthday of Prophet Muhammed (PBuH). FYI, this PBuH means Peace be upon him. I first read it in a history book of NCERT.  It took me a long time to figure out what this Pbuh means. I was afraid th...

It was a dark cave which served as their board room.  20 Old dusty Taliban warlords had assembled there. A group mail was sent to all of them from SHQ for their monthly review. Target Vs Achievement excel sheets were being prepared and filed. Their one –eyed boss was busy getting his beard dyed n th time by his wife no. 14 who was just 25 years younger to him. All 20 warlords were trained by CIA way back in early 80s when America wanted them to fight against the Russians.  It used to be a big class, but then the American invasion in the next century made sure that only few alumni survive to attend this monthly review. The meeting was scheduled for 11 am but it was not before 2 pm that everyone was seated cross-legged on the sand, getting bashed by their master. The one-eyed boss was angry to the point of bursting. None of the warlords had completed their monthly target of killings and bomb blasts. They were also behind their opium off take from the ...