Overheard realities

                                                       Overheard realities

As they say all habits are bad n as they say again habits die hard newer die harder n old ones don’t die at all …whether good or bad I overheard ….actually overhear becomes a bit more than what I did .It came as a background noise and as a young medico we are to adapt to this sort of a  noise …hastily .But sometimes background noise becomes  an absorbing one to such a length that real talk becomes a nonsense non talk .These incidents happen conspicuously not so uncommonly . However most of them vanish from our memories ,few leave a trace others excavate and create a life long impression .                                                                                                           It was my daily dull dusky routine sight of seeing faces full of expressions of anxiety pain n despair ,hearing cries appreciating n accepting doom n agony and above all Man”s helplessness before that All knowing All encompassing All mighty .first walking through overburdened corridors and “hustling n bustling “wait rooms where there is no place for even air to run through forget about the healing angle .Thousands of people in a single day ,thousands of desires ,thousands of hopes n despairs moving in and out and around .Now in the same setting while treading on a relaid path what I saw …made me to slow down my hastingly hurried speedster gait n made me to get out of relieving the physical pain &suffering and ponder over relieving the Abstracts Man by nature has many things that consciously ,subconsciously,or even unconsciously lie coverted within him .Only a sudden incident , some sort of despair n I feel Pain the best ….is the most imp element that unveils them and they say in French COUP-DE-GRACE___ Shot of grace response comes and these coverted things are finally uttered ….similar sort of thing happened …                     … A highly graceful ,white haired n white bearded man accompanied by his acquaintances was under the hot blazing sun in a july afternoon sitting on a hot pavement actually a pedestrian pathway .All were facing the breathtakingly beautiful n heavenly park of our institute but a cruel iron grill separated them and the mini heaven .It looked as if they were in a barricade and the fulfilled eternal desire was in the park .Another thing that shook me was they were having lunch …without comfort and grace and peace even the “bestest “of lunches and food seem to be lump of pepper in typical kashmiri what we say in other words “marchhvangan paend ”and in addition the old man was the patient although I didn’t enquire but this thing we can pick from a mile ….that was height of my angry yet despotic despair .When some passerby asked which I couldn …he answered in a way he could that it is only to be seen not felt ……………..Reason I did my best to search …. Few years back there was no restriction on the entry of people in these parks n places .They were maintained nicely and handsomely at that time however it grew into a menace not only for authorities of soura but for the colonies n people in and around.Lots of young n old healthy n sick people used to throng it Infact it used to be full of outsiders more less of attendents n patients .However as we are still backward including the aspects of aesthetic taste and civic sense these very “angels ” used to eat n litter then every thing that was left . Plucking flowers ,even some people took velvety Australian green carpet by digging and making trenches and holes .It is not a fiction but a dead hard reality .The greatest pride of our already neglected land began to stink ,heaps of garbage ,cess pools were the rife of the day .Undoubtedly black money has made us to look miragicaly cultured .People do own longest cars and limousines but mental ,emotional & moral backwardness prevails .People defecate in open not to speak of urinating and spitting .Public bathrooms lie blocked either by stones or polyethenes if not blocked then bib cocks or washbasins stolen if not then broken .It is sad to say n hear that we belong to a developing state but problem is that it is over estimated over statement it is an undeveloped rather non developing state in the real sense . One more problem that grew bcoz of our moral backwardness was that soura parks became a hub for vaga to bonds & dander heads to stay steal n smoke …a sort of “HIPPIE “ culture came to being .It became more problematic than the much cherished Iqbal park …Because of these things the park was closed for all even doctors were and are not allowed to go in but only to have a glimpse and for attendents n patients they do suffer … but is it really soura”s responsibility or of all …..God knows .Until we progress aesthetically morally emotionally physically &educationally .patients are bound to suffer and even largest public canteens are not going to cater to thousands ….My god let my people progress as goes Tagore…..                                                                     WHERE words come out from the depths of truth                                                                                            where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection                                                                                     where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way in dreary desert sand of dead habit                                      where the mind is lead forward by thee ever widening thought and action                                                                    into the heaven of freedom my father let Amy country AWAKE

A BURDENED SOUL

                               A BURDENED SOUL                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   Man as he claims is the cream and crown of God's immense and limitless creation . Undoubtedly he has been bestowed with magnanimous brain power that allows him to reason and assert. He can learn and reciprocate things and can look for relationship between them that contributes to his intelligence. His quest for experimentation leads him to understand and frame conclusions. Among other things that make him to stand tall above others is his immaculate power of communication ,which leads to sharing of thoughts and experiences .He can develop new skill and can hone it to perfection .His unquenching thirst for this perfection and relentless efforts make him to reach his goal ,and after reaching there he sets higher ,tougher and better targets for himself which satisfy his inherent zeal to conquer the unconquerable and tread  the ways not scampered  .                                                                                                                              A question arises is Man purely Mechanical? Does the big "M" in his name point to that? Is Man just an amalgam of much hyped special senses of smelling, tasting, seeing, hearing and touching? Is it all about the quantity, all about how much and too much? Has everything turned so organic? Cutting through the fog one feels in the present times man is a human phenotypically and the attires and attributes, of compassion, honesty, diligence and conscientiousness have become a heavenly affair, a Godly one. Uncommon is the word for these like the hyped yet unavailable common sense .                                                        It could have been just an ordinary day for him but his look turned my day not so ordinary. Not much he was having with him just a ferrying boat ,besides the helm to pave the way in not so exotic waters of Dal .I would not have been there but for my friends who took me to shrug of the sloth and boredom of a few weeks full of undeclared curfews and declared hartals .After walking some distance we had decided to have a ride ,a shikara ride to let free our caged bird of desires .But it had not come to the wildest of my dreams not waters but i am going to be rippled .An ever inquisitive nature made me ask my helmsman ,a boy hardly aged a decade & half how long  he has been carrying people around. A simple protrusion of his lower lip plus a negative movement of his head and the utterance that, I don't remember summed it all for me .His head didn’t match his shoulders, a mature head on tender and not so old ones .                                                                                                                                    As oftenly he struck his helm to propel his mini ship ,it wasn't the water only that was rippled but my heart too .As we began to talk it unfolded many a miseries .It was those that had turned his growth to be "precocious ".He had grown his age by years and before him i looked not more than a toddler that moves here and there after everything bright ,leaving less bright aside .He had lost his father from the times he didn't remember ,from the times immemorial for him though he had some memory traces left of how his father used to amicably make his only son a nature literate by letting him see with his own eyes the virgin beauty of dal .He did remember though little how his father in the very shikara would make his son move in its vastness .Those times the ride was for fun and frolic ,now both things have gone out of it .It had turned only into an occupation to fill the ever hungry bellies of himself and the dependents ...which included his grand mother ,mother and a little sister. Wasn’t he one among the lot who was begotten after tying votive rings over many a shrine? A son of life’s longing for itself. Vivifying had been his fate, cruel rather  and the hell hole for him was the veil that had been deliberately put around the demise of his father .He had heard multiple versions ranging from natural death to an accident ,from forced disappearance to being a victim of cross firing but the version that he held dear and true was different from those all .On one sultry afternoon his father was picked up by some veiled persons ,from his house who had an orgy of killing that came to lime light when few days later his family members  found his body on some brazen and uninhabited piece of  land .My  helm man couldn’t recollect the happenings properly because of the purposeful play on part of his family to conceal the truth from this young soul .It might had been an effort on part of them to save his mind and soul from the tectonic impact of a loss of a loved one to an unforeseen enemy .But for me they hadn’t had the last victory because what lies in ones destiny nobody knows for sure .He was one among the many that held their helm high and participated in the Shikara march against the land transfer .Few of his friends had put the green flags on electric poles and mobile towers .Well what drove him to such acts I hadn’t the courage to ask but surely the loss was a reason for him .Similarly for others they might had been having their own varied reasons .                                                                     

Out of sheer force of habit people tend to frame conclusions which being premature need to be redrawn later .What led to the spectacle of thousands of people thronging the streets against the land transfer that widened enough to encompass the freedom sentiment as well was not only the land as such ,it was result of deprivation on economic ,political ,psychological and emotional fronts .This was smoldering inside the mettle of every conscious inhabitant and land proved to be a vent that left the lava out .In part of the rescue measures like declared and undeclared curfews the Govt. tried to set things right that seemed to work for them partly but in reality they widen the deprivation sentiment and fuel the fire .Another eruption is in making and the electioneering cant be a sure vent as the lava is too hot for the ballot boxes to hold .

I hope my helmsman knew it too.

 

 

ARIF HUSSAIN SARMAST

Email;arifhsarmast@gmail.com 

 

PORTRAYING MUSLIMS

,                                                       Portraying Muslims

The train of blasts in a span of few months in multiple Indian cities latest being in Mumbai spilt fear, pain & agony besides blood. There were scenes of chaos and confusion multiple lying dead, scores injured and countless were those who saw these horrendous & horrifying moments turn into an unending ever lasting memory trace. People were barricaded by grief and shock that seemed to wring out the last few ml of residual air. People bore witness to the naked dance of death, destruction and fury. The worse thing is that there has not been any stoppage or a lull to the least in these nerve wrecking and deafening explosions rather the curve has steepened.

 It is not for the first time such tragedy has happened and an ordinary person doesn’t need to be a great genius to predict the sequence of events that followed and are following .Thanks to the media of this part of world which gives less of unbiased news and instead thrusts propaganda and pseudo secular, pseudo nationalist agenda on the poor viewers. Its because of this media  every body has turned into Einstein at his home, without turning grey. It is not difficult to understand the reasons as to why media does have such a captivating influence because the reach and the accessibility is too much and its rise has been phenomenal . The TV and internet have been of prime importance in this regard ,even surpassing the print media .They have the advantage of being more personal and more closer to direct communication thus more influential in framing ,rather molding general public opinion whether right or wrong .

Ask a small kid who has never has never seen a Muslim before..How they look like and what they do? No marks for guessing …he will frame out a picture of a man with long beard , fiery red eyes , a tight white cap ,holding some sophisticated weapon ,talking about rape ,ransom ,extortion &death .Literacy and education has not touched him ,he seems to be far from being cultured and honest .He is honest only in killing … a blood thirsty beast .Of a woman… she is one  wearing a long black dress,,,a hijab.. Which seems to cover not her body alone but her hopes, desires and expectations, plus nurturing her multiple kids.

 As we ponder on the issue the more we try to solve it the tougher the maze gets. Were the seeds of dissent sown exactly when India & Pakistan gained independence and partitioned?       .The Britain had declared to free India in 1948 but because of its internal weakness did so a year earlier. It is said Gandhi was in favour of prolonging the British rule by few more years .  Was the independence rather premature or was it really independence at all? No doubt it was joy And bloom everywhere but it was clubbed with pain and agony of partition .It was best described by Faiz Ahmad Faiz as”  yeh daagh daagh ujala ,yeh shabguzida sehar

                                 Who intezar tha jiska ,yeh wo sehar to nai

Partition was a calamity if not for the muslims of the other side of border but surely for those  here on this side .Just after partition muslims here were afraid to carry and keep Urdu books ..lest they were labeled Pak sympathizers .History is repeating itself … now muslims are being labeled as bomb sympathizers .Suicide bombing is considered a Muslim owned device paying little heed to the fact that Tamil Tigers were the first to show it to the whole world its power and dimensions .Rajiv Gandhi fell to their plot of suicide bombing as well .Still the irresponsible tagging continues.                              

                           Justice is justice only when delivered on time and it maintains the sanctity of impartiality and equality.Babri Masjid demolition started a new chapter of hate politics, conviction rate was 0.8 percent while in post 1993 Mumbai blasts it was 80 percent .The communal frenzy in Gujarat was a step higher..it was openly owned and backed by a head of the state and the plight of justice is known to every body. The height of paradox was when killing of 2 agitators in Jammu was shown and flown out of bounds .compensations were given and enquiry was conducted but here in Kashmir hundreds have died in these months not even a word of condemnation has come from the govt … if one exists .

There is no denial of the fact that Muslims in India are the worst than lowest of the classes in terms of education ,jobs ,money manpower etc .Justice Sachar committee was a land mark in making most of the muslims conscious of the facts which they new subconsciously .They got proof of the denial and exploitation they have met .Just a mention about the education scenario …national literacy rate being at 65.1%against Muslim literacy rate of 59’1%in 2001 .one of the senior Indian journalist summed it all when he said ,”scheduled  castes and tribes get reservations …muslims get commissions “                                                                                                                                              

 Six decades down the line ,,,, is an ordinary Indian Muslim safer , better and happier living in a free India   than  his predecessors were  when they lived  under the British subjugation or is it that only the subjugators are home grown now, subjugation reigns supreme .It was a bold revelation by Shabana Azmi that she couldn’t buy an apartment in one of the posh colonies simply because she was a Muslim .This shows denial at the highest place , for a woman who did everything ranging from shaving her head for a film or fighting the Shahi imam on live television show just to get” hinduanised’..but for her name all fell down to nothing .Undoubtedly the liberal space has decreased ,a Muslim ,president is acceptable only when he has read Gita as well  and has shun meat .

Muslims ruled India for a thousand years or so and integrated it ,united it .There weren’t any communal tensions .It has been only 61 years of democracy .condition is so bad comparison cant be made .How can this hatred go ,only the almighty knows

           

 

         ARIF HUSSAIN SARMAST

        E MAIL;arifhsarmast@gmail.com

THE LEATHER MISSILES

,                                       THE LEATHER MISSILES,

Recently American people showed to the whole world that they really uphold the values which they cherish .Democracy if it really does exist for surely dwells there .It  could not have been imagined that the people there would elect  a person  who had migrated and become a citizen only few years back to become the president of the world’s only real superpower .Remember how Mrs. Sonia Gandhi had to pave way for Mr. Manmohan Singh when the issueless yet despotic BJP tried the play the foreigner card . India only makes the claims of being the largest democracy while the America undoubtedly showed their own claims materialize .It proved that for being the best it doesn’t require being the largest. Its voters rose above the archaic caste, creed and particularly the “colour “ politics and voted for Mr.Obama  to become the country’s 44^th president .undoubtedly the issue that he being Barrack “Hussain” Obama was blown out of proportion .But still the people voted for him . It can’t be said that the memory traces of tragic 9/11 had been erased from their brains, especially in the wake that these things are miraculously uncommon there and undeniable remains the fact that the “culprits” truly or untruly carried Muslim names.

America is undeniably the country that heads the seat of power and calls its shots as and when required. It can boast of its material progress, its economy, the quality of life its citizens have. It respects talent more than anything else keeping aside issues of ethnicity and race  at the backburner .This can be guessed from the whopping immigrations that take place to this part of globe ,although it hasn’t been the promenade as it used to be especially after September 11 incident .For a comparison the Arab states never allow any immigrations even to Muslims not to think of people of different religious identity Reasons are best known to them ,although it wont be out of place to mention that in order not to dissolve their pseudo nationalistic identity ,these rules are in place .The world that has turned into a global village seems to be unappealing to them ,rather they remain confined within their narrow domestic walls.  If this would not have been the case then a Unified Arab State would have been the reality much before the euro unified Europe.

The picture definitely has other side as well. If it one time it is the immigrates’ paradise at the same time, it ranks as the|” world’s most hated nation” as well. As one tries to delve through the reasons, the Bush family has a major role to play if one considers in context of recent times only. In the era of senior Bush Iraq was prompted to attack Kuwait and that resulted in the fierce gulf war .Immediately the” golden” boy Saddam Hussain was branded as the dangerous villain by the same people who had pampered him earlier .  Mr.Rumsfield’s visit to Iraq before the gulf war and meeting with Saddam is not any longer a hidden entity. The junior Bush surpassed his father in not only eliminating Saddam but opening another front in Afghanistan. One sovereign country was attacked and turned to stone age on the pretext of finding weapons of mass destruction, which haven’t been” confiscated “still. And another country already war torn was turned into a testing laboratory for the latest war weaponry including the Daisy cutters and cave busters only on pretext of nabbing a single “fugitive” ..Osama bin laden .Both battles  turned  into  Napoleon’s  waterloo for America because the enemy being “invisible “proved invincible as well ,be it in the form of dollars pushed into the wars or the ever rising American causalities or the economic meltdown .It could be also understood in the form popular unrest at the heart of American people itself against the war .The “farewell’ boot that Mr. Bush  received  courtesy of an earlier less known but today’s  famous  TV reporter Mr.Muntazer al-Zaidi summed the sentiment of majority of people of world in general and Muslim ,Arab and Iraqi sentiment in particular.Zaidi shouted “this is the goodbye kiss from the Iraqi people,dog”.In the Arab world this is the worst form of insult that can be inflicted on any person .Mr.zaidi held him responsible for all the  destruction and devastation that could be seen in Iraq today. He held him responsible for thousands of dead and for millions rendered homeless as a result of 2003 US led invasion .Well president Bush ducked beautifully and showed his athletic ability and his reaction wasn’t one that was livid but as was made to believe by the media coverage of one that was robust and unmoved by the frenzy around . We don’t know what Muntazer’s fate would be ,if charged of an attempted murder which in the most probability, “the leathery missiles “would not have achieved, could leave him in detention for 15 years or the least he could be charged for insulting a visiting head of a state leading to a jail of 2 to 7 years, the worst could be a kangaroo court sentencing him for life . The thing that can stop it is the massive support his action is amassing, both inside and outside Iraq. It could not be love for this man but the deep seated hatred against Bush and his policies .The support base is progressively increasing shifting across the continents, the latest admirer being the Venezuelan president Hugo Rafael Chavez who described his action as “courageous”.

 Mr.Obama’s election has brought a new ray of hope to the world at large .He can choose to follow the footsteps of Clinton whose efforts bore fruit in the Bosnia and Kosovo not to forget the referendum and liberation of East Timor. In his regime American economy reached new heights, or he can follow his predecessor to virtual doom .Till then we can only hope his plans to widen the operations in Afghanistan take a back seat .Otherwise its not far when we all may need to reach for our Shoes.

 

 

 

ARIF HUSSAIN SARMAST

EMAIL;arifhsarmast@gmail.com