But, amusingly so, the only thing that helps me connect with this day over the past few years is my appreciation for Rajkumar Hirani directed film ‘Lage Raho Munnabhai’.

Gandhigiri, the bhai-tapori version for Gandhi ism charmed its way into my heart and also into Wikipedia! I just noticed that there is a even a website on Gandhigiri, not to mention the series of non-violent way of protests this film inspired people across the nation and the globe to emulate.

Google and Gandhi

In the age of Google, when not many may consider googling for Gandhi’s words of wisdom, except perhaps for preparing a speech on him on his birth or death anniversary at a function here or there, this movie reinforced the fact that one has to be creative with the mediums one choses to propagate the same messages (of Gandhi) with.

The movie entertains without being preachy, it makes you feel good, it gives me hope that no matter how evil, cunning and clever the world may be, I would survive in it and win it with my ways.

Today, 62 years after Gandhi’s death, his words of wisdom live on and continue to inspire generations, it is just that for many young Indians like me, the acronym has got changed, from Gandhiism to Gandhigiri!

Then and now ! = Gandhiism and Gandhigiri...

So, now bole to Gandhigiri Zindabaad!

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.

3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

4. Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

7. Cry with someone. It’s more healing than crying alone.

8. It’s OK to get angry with God. He can take it.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up the present.

12. It’s OK to let your children see you cry.

13. Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn’t be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don’t worry; God never blinks.

16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

17. Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.

18. Whatever doesn’t kill you really does make you stronger.

19. It’s never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don’t take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don’t save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.

23. Be eccentric now. Don’t wait for old age to wear purple..

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words ‘In five years, will this matter?’

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive everyone everything.

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30.. Time heals almost everything. Give time time

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn’t do.

35. Don’t audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

36. Growing old beats the alternative — dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood.

38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.

41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need

42. The best is yet to come.

43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

44. Yield.

45. Life isn’t tied with a bow, but it’s still a gift.

Nakusha: the protagonist in the TV serial 'Laagi tujhse lagan' on Colors

Nakusha is the protagonist on a Television Serial titled, ‘Laagi tujhse Lagan‘ that comes at 8.30 pm every weekday on ‘Colors’, an entertainment channel of the Viacom TV 18 group.

Nakusha is fair and beautiful, but born into a poor household. Her family comprising of a mother, a step father and a young brother half her age- live in deplorable conditions in a one room shanty somewhere in Mumbai.

But for her mother ‘Baabi’, Nakusha’s beauty is  a curse and she finds a strange way out to ensure that her daughter isn’t harmed by the evil elements in the society. She makes Nakusha look ‘ugly’ to prevent evil stares and ensure her physical safety, in this world in which men, many of them, still thrive on fulfilling their lust by prying on innocent, nice girls from simple homes. Baabi instructs Nakusha to dress up ugly, have unkempt curly oiled hair, pastes long artificial eye brows and to top it all cover herself up with a paste made of charcoal powder mixed with oil, so that she looks amazingly dark, tanned and oily in complexion (See photograph above). Not only does this ‘make up’ cover up her fair looking face, but it also ends up making her a butt of jokes and ridicule wherever she goes…because sadly in India, dark complexioned people are looked down upon! Call it the hangover of colonial rule that people are still differentiated upon on the basis of their colour, caste and creed in India. They dont even leave dogs, sample this recent piece of news and please don’t forget to read this comment trail on the subject.

Often I have noticed that people who are dark complexioned are automatically assumed by the elites too be ‘poor’ or ‘South Indian’.

What such ‘elitists’ fail to realised is that our skin colour is also determined by the type of environment and country we are born in- meaning- people born in tropical climatic conditions are generally born dark skinned because more melanin pigment in skin (the pigment that determines skin colour) helps in protecting the skin against harmful effects of sun’s UV rays.

Anyways, coming back to the story of Nakusha, I pondered on the reasons that made Baabi do this to Nakusha?

- As per the storyline of this tele-series, Nakusha’s elder sister was beautiful and fair as well, and thus she ran away from home to ‘capitalise’ on her beauty and get over her misery of living in deplorable conditions.

- She has a step father who is a drunkard- he can’t protect himself drinking day and night of his wife’s earnings, how will he provide his daughter Nakusha with any kind of safety net?

- She has a younger brother half his age, still in half pants and very young to understand the ways of this big bad world…thus effectively Nakusha has no one to count or call upon if ever she finds herself in any kind of physical trouble in.

- To make matters worse, Nakusha is poor and lives in an area often inhabited by men who have a ritual to drink every night and are cursed with a wicked eye for any woman,

Isn’t it ironic that  in India on one hand – a girl’s being fair, slim and beautiful are the selling points that are often typed and highlighted in bold in Matrimonial advertisements every weekend – be it from those looking for prospective brides or parents willing to get their ‘fair, slim and beautiful’ daughters married off…and on the other hand mothers of  girls like Nakusha living in abject poverty with good-for-nothing male members of the family and hapless mothers who live in fear for their daughters

I often catch snippets of this serial on Colors (which is normally and again ironically interrupted by advertisements for Fairness Creams!)  and have always wondered whether such a thing happens in real life in poor households across the country?

The more I think about this, the more I am beginning to believe that stories like that of Nakusha may not just be fictional stories, but rather may well be the reality for many girls born ‘fair and lovely’ in many poor households of the country.

The answer to it lies below, remember them and keep the faith!

Yesterday evening at around 7 pm, the water started to enter our ground floor homes, we tried to build dykes using jute boris, bricks and badarpur-filled kattas but nothing helped.

The sewers in the bathrooms and kitchens started to back-flow besides the water entering from our front doors. But the worst thing to happen was that water started to seep-out of our floors and then all of us decided to give up the wipers and the mops and concentrate on shifting all we could do ‘higher’ terrains and then laughed at our state. Well, what was the fun in crying over this? We knew we could do no better than what we had, it was time for watching some TV and entertaining ourselves while our slippers floated around in the water surrounding our bed.

The hard work began this morning as the water level on the streets went a bot down and we could clear our rooms of the water by using wipers and mops. Chottu and the daily wage labourer hired for the day were a great help!

The area MLA Mr. Bansal visited the locality, the ground floor residents- angry and furious dragged him in to take a round and see the sorry state of their houses.

The waterlogged streets resembled the streets of a flooded city but all of this was not due to a ravaging river but rather because of the faulty drainage system that has been damaged further thanks to the brainless work on the main drainage pipe carried out last year.

Don’t know what really materialised during that visit of the MLA, for us life went on smooth and fine, as we worked our way through the man-made floods and by the evening while the streets outside continue to remain waterlogged, normalcy had returned to our homes and lives.

That woman drugged the girl and she fell unconscious, she was taken to an undisclosed location and raped.

She was drugged again and left lying in a train.

She regained conscious and called her brother and her family went over to get her home.

Scared of the taunts and the shame that they and their daughter will be subjected to, if this news becomes public, the family has kept this incident under wraps.

Such instances are a reminder of the sorry state in which women live in our society, their safety (of women)hangs by a delicate thread and more or less rests in their own hand.

Just want to share  a word of caution, if you are a girl who travels alone in an auto rickshaw, make sure to take down the vehicle registration number of the auto-rickshaw and sms the same to your trusted family member or friend.

Stay safe!

It has been 22 years that we have been staying in this colony next to the Rithala Metro line in Delhi and the water-logging woes just get worse every time it rains and there seems to be no respite in sight either. This is the capital of India in the 21st Century and a part of Delhi far away from the flowing Yamuna river. It makes me wonder what the spate of other Indian cities would be like?

There is a meter box on the left as well!

Mom makes her way through the (waters..)

Water logged streets

Time for some good civil engineers to be inducted into the MCD and PWD (Public Works Departments), eh?

In the whole of this watery mayhem, it was only the neighbourhood male Dachshund named “Donut” who was having a good time swimming his way through the street. Caught him on the camera while he was on his sceond walk of the day!

That is 'Donut'

All along I have wondered, where has this compassion towards animals specifically canines- come from within me, because never in my family has anyone had an animal of any kinds at home or anywhere else…to this my mom perhaps gave an answer a few days back- that when I was 3 years old, I had happened to watch a bollywood movie titled, ‘Teri Meherbaaniyan‘ in which the pet dog Moti avenges the death of his honest owner Ram (Jackie Shroff) by the village goons.

"Dogs can't use Condoms: Spay and Neuter" (Image and Caption courtesy: PeTA)

Each bitch is capable of giving birth twice an year to a total of 8-10 pups or may be even more..

If you think, applying some common sense-Street Dogs can’t use Condoms or Oral Contraceptive Pills!

….therefore it is important that humans help them out over here.

Thus, for a safe and healthy street dog population, it is essential to adopt the humane method to control their population so that our companion on the street lives a healthy life.

For this the ‘WHO-approved, scientifically proven’ – ABC i.e. Animal Birth Control Programme is a tried and trusted way forward. The ‘ABC’ programme is being succesfully carried out in many cities and towns across India by various municipalities in conjunction with local NGOs [with support from the Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI)]

Simply speaking, ‘ABC’ i.e Animal Birth Control = Dog (Sterilization + Anti-Rabies Vaccination)

Elucidating further, ‘ABC’ involves surgical removal of a Dog’s reproductive Organs and giving them an Anti-rabies Vaccination prior to releasing them back in the territories where they were picked up from…reason being-with animals like street dogs, where they are born is where they belong!

United we stand...

Dear Friend,

If you are reading this, it is because I think you are an empathetic human being who is sensitive to the suffering of animals and wants a better, humane and kinder world for them and yourself to live in..

Please spare a couple of minutes to read through this mail, the animals will thank you for it.

Never before have India’s animals-street dogs, cows and others included yearned for or and needed our support more than this time around, never before have numbers mattered so much more at a rally!

So please circulate this note (and circular below) as far and wide as possible, to any one and everyone you know that cares for the well-being of animals, it is their chance to show to the world that the the citizens of India and the world stand united in their demand and quest for a better and kind world for animals.

The more the number that turns up at the rally, the more potent a message we will be able to give to the world, that ‘though animals may not know how to speak but there are hordes of individuals, willing to come together and speak up on their behalf”…and make this a powerfully ‘demonstrative show of support to animals’ on the 24th April, 2010

Your participation in this rally is akin to the saying, that ‘Prevention is better than cure’, we have to step up and demand NOW that we wouldn’t tolerate any cruelty to our animals lest stepping in when all is lost.

The 24th April, 2010 is a Saturday, I know it is a hot summer weekend, but please ignore your convenience momentarily and come in hordes to participate in this rally and sweat it around for animals, they need your support, truly!

——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————–

Invite:

Come and participate in

“United for Animals”

A Rally at Jantar Mantar on 24^th April, 2010 at 4.30 pm

Dear friend of the animals,

The world owes a lot to the observation of the German-born sociologist, philosopher and musicologist, Theodor Adorno, “Auschwitz begins wherever someone looks at a slaughterhouse and thinks: they’re only animals”. Charles Patterson, who quotes Adorno is his pathbreaking work, Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust, shows how cruelty to animals has provided the model for cruelty to humans. Yet, animals continue to be most horribly treated the world over, including India. The silver-lining lies in the emergence of animal rights movement as a global force to reckon with. In India, it is beginning to make its presence in some parts though it still has a long, long way to go.

Thus, to mark a celebration of the progress made by the animal rights movement in the country as well as a reminder that an enormous amount remains to be done, a rally, called

“United for Animals”

is being held at

Jantar Mantar, New Delhi,

at 4.30 p.m

on Saturday, April 24, 2010.

It will, besides, focus on four specific issues:

1. The need to give a massive, countrywide boost to the canine birth control programme–the only effective method of sharply reducing the presence of stray dogs in streets and public places, and the provision of enough funds for expanding infrastructure, training personnel and meeting all other expenses connected with the programme;.

1. The need for strong and effective action against illegal slaughter houses;

1. The need for strict implementation of Cattle/Livestock Transport Rules; and

1. The prevention of atrocities on street animals and the promotion of the emerging trend toward people taking to feeding and/or caring for them.

These are important issues and one hopes that the rally will be instrumental to launching a movement that would take rapid strides toward addressing theses.

Come forward to join us on the 24^th April, 2010 at Jantar Mantar at 4.30pm

It’s a Saturday!

So, please assemble there on time.

This is our chance to show and voice our support for the animals.

Please forward this far and wide to all like-minded friends, colleagues, family and bring or drag them along…the more the merrier.

Looking forward to seeing you there.

Regards,

Coordination Committee in Defence of Animals
–
Vasudha Mehta
Mobile: +91-98 18144 244
E-mail: vasudha1907@gmail.com
http://www.visfot.com/author/vasudha