Politicians: The Eternal, Immoral Status-quoists of the Public Woes

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              Politicians: The Eternal, Immoral Status-quoists

                                    of the Public Woes

It was early morning. Six or seven monks in red-ochre robes, hennaed beards and their hair plaited in numerous little braids were wandering in the streets shouting in full religious-rhyme, “Monks and the elephant have arrived! Elephantwale baba, mai give some clothes or money!”

The bulky female, her monk owners called her Champa, was slowly moving with subtle rhythm. Various coloured flowers had been painted on its huge body. Floral designs and patterns on her broad brow, ears and both hind-legs evinced the painting caliber of its monk riders. Palpebral sketches around its small eyes made it look like the cute queen of the tusker kingdom. But in contradiction to all this endearing appearance, huge stash on its back made it look cumbersomely crowned; as if it solely bore the worldly weight of its owner monks.

Two big brass bells, hanging down the belly on both sides, made fastidious temple chimes, as she moved slowly with her intoxicated tread, while the monk-cum-mahout riding atop the mendicant friars’ earthly possessions gave it soft commands. The monks swarmed the doors like a pack of locusts, forcing the women of the houses to donate clothes to Lord Ganesha. And if someone appeased their alms-asking-hearts they would forcibly take her to the blessing trunk of the female elephant. Much to the petrification of small human female, the mountainous sis swayed her trunk above the head seeing stars in the broad daylight.

However, one thing was missing in the whole spectacle as the monk-troupe blowing the conch-shell to grab attention, wended its way through the streets. Thrilling enthusiasm of the children following it was not up to the mark like on previous such occasions. In fact the rowdyism entailing the elephant had shrunk considerably this time-–both qualitatively and quantity wise. Because best elements of hooliganism beaming with  their scuffing clamour and prancing manoeuvres were gathered before the High school since the day break because it was the polling day, November first to be precise-–a public holiday both on account of the date of state formation as well as the elections. In this land of public holidays, the state election commission giving a rare example of ‘concernedly responsible body’ had fixed the polling date on this public holiday so as to save another working day draining down the wastage sewer. The state government had lodged a protest against this sane dictation from the election governing body, because it took away another holiday of boom and bust, when a maximum mass could’ve been jotted down in the name of campaigning on this politically utilisable day.

The morning had definitely mothered a winter infant. A cool south-western breeze sailed down playful wavelets across the pond water and when they crossed the shiny zig-zag diamond-–or did it seem like a little pearly continuum?-–formed by the slanting, rising sunrays from the southern quarter of the eastern horizon, the shining puddle seemed to crown the lake-like pond.

With the arrival of winters many more species of migrant birds had arrived in the pond. Time was there when the pond was fully open for them to feed, to breed, to quack, to flibber their wings. But that was only when the pond was used for only one purpose-–drinking and wallowing place for the buffaloes. But then it started to serve another purpose as well three years ago as the village panchayat gave it on lease for pisciculture. So, now the birds’ liberty had been considerably checked, because fishmongers like cormorants, swans, herons and egrets mingled with ducks, wagtails and waders and numerous other non-harming species registered the whole pack in the unwanted list of the watchman. The old man knew it very well who the real culprits were, but then one can’t segregate birds under such discriminations. So, the loud burst of the watchman’s thwacking tong shooed them away all jumbled-mumbled in a birdie mass in the sky. After having an airy escapade they downed again onto the water forgetting the desperate human-made noise. On some occasions even docile ducks became sticklers, particularly when the fish seeds or larvae were just put in the water. These soft, tiny, insecty things were easily preyed upon by the ducks.

So, gone were the days when bird-swarms flapped with unhindered pleasure in the pond’s calm waters throughout the winters. When under the dispassionately euphoric rays of a January sun they thronged the big water spread in gloriously teeming thousands, so happily away from their summer Himalayan and Central Asian abodes; when in the foggy mornings one could hear the riotous symphony of their quacks, chirps, hooting, howling and flapperings; when they bred unchecked in the dense water grass along the pond margins.

Now the unsparing fish-work completely unaware of the ducks’ role in a wetland ecosystem was trying its best to calm down the birdie disturbance in the commercial waters, because to us majority of our perceptions about a duck are bestowed by a few tiny facts like ‘a duck stays and floats in water,’ or ‘it quacks’ etc.

With our greater rationale born of a bigger brain, why do we care about the feathery world of poor birds? After all they are just belittled cogs in some vaguely genial-–almost impractically artistic or aesthetic-–scheme of nature. So, who cares about the silent fact that the ducks in their unrestricted sojourn here could’ve been useful in weed and pest management in the adjoining paddy fields without disaffecting the crop in any way? And in reality also, the poor birds had been helping the farmers by sneaking into the fields during nights to prey upon the weeds and rest of their ilk.

Now, gauge the extent of their operations. About hundred ducks on their night-long vociferous tryst against the pest family can turn 4000 to 5000 square metres of paddy crop free from the bugging trouble-makers within a week or so. But we can’t know (or don’t want to know) such nuanced facts holding the sinews of nature together. We think that their role is just limited to unnecessarily flapping their wings in the water.  In addition to that, constant straddling and raking by their webbed paws makes the soil muddy, thus, checking the sprouting of weeds. It also clogs the root aeration thus mustering up the crop’s growth. Above all, their sternly pecking bills prey upon stem borers, hoppers, mole crickets, aphids, cockles, fox-tails and many other diasporic subjects of the pest and weed kingdom. So the ducks aren’t just fluffy water-toys, because that supposition leaves all of us as mere kids. Now children will be quite happy with that tag for the whole of humanity. And if grown-ups protest then they will have to accept few more knowledgeable facts like their beaks aren’t just meant to foolishly hen-peck in each other’s featherings. In addition to this tiny fact providing play as well as a duckish perception to children, their motherly beaks eat up the golden snails, root grubs and other bugs in the marshy conditions grisly stuck around the seedlings’ base like parasites suckling away the nutrition. And one still larger, unplayful bit of information about the ducks: their wings aren’t just meant for flying; in nuanced addition to that their maternal flappings disturb and sway the crop and thus allowing the greater penetration of light and air to prevent infestation for the better health of the plantlets.

So much of voluntary labour done by the winged visitors, still no trace of it in the humans’ knowledge chambers! This is the neglecting credo of human society: impassionedly stern bigwigs of the twin kingdoms of flora and fauna.

Now this morning a big crowd had gathered before the High school which was to serve as the polling booth. A pack of winged visitors swirled over from the northern side in their typical aero-dynamic ‘V-shaped’ pattern to assist them during long flights. It aspirationally swooped down over the endearingly smiling waters of the pond. Frail hands of the watchman tightened their grip around the firecracking tong. Standing upright, anxiously looking at the birds just about to land in the waters, he struck the gunpowder filled end with all his might on a brick. With a loud bang and lot of smoke his watchman’s manoeuvre promptly took away the winged visitors’ natural right over the pond. Time was exactly eight o’ clock. The pond upkeeper’s thud had signaled the start of the most important ritual in the great game of democracy as the policeman opened the small gatelet at the foot of the huge school gate, allowing the first voter to walk into the trap.

With one sound, the pond caretaker’s frail figure took away the liberty of still frailer ones, and with the same sound he joined the voice of liberty in its archetype lecherous, puerile hoot jangling for the people’s hopes and aspirations. The poor ducks continued their march in the southern direction once again forming their ‘V-shape’ flying pattern; their sullenly sober birdie brain hoping to come across some unrestricted puddle of water. Similarly, the people had started swarming the booth, mystified by the political aroma and beatitude, hoping to witness some magical fructification out of this most potent wizardry.

Yes, this hazarded hope never dies!  The ducks for a place to land, to feed, to breed, to survive; and the public for good and clean representatives, who at least take the trouble to chronicle a sympathy with ears to hear the voice of the deprived masses. Swashbuckling noise of the watchman’s tong had scared away the ducks, but its regrouping on the way further after some time showed an exemplifying parallelism with the five long belittling political years, which betrayed the voters’ all hopes of landing in some safe waters in lieu of their priceless votes. Hats off to the people! After all hadn’t they expeditiously survived the explosion for five years, during which the present government colossally smoked around their hopes and aspirations. After bearing all that shock, the forgiving masses were now once again regrouping to take a political flight hoping to land in some politically correct waters.

Along the front windows of the school, the polling agents had set up their hawker-style booths, stands and stalls for political shopkeeping. Party flags, posters and placards of the candidates and other propaganda advertising symbols cluttered this chaotic market place with full political ambience. They were leaving no stone unturned with their salesmanship as they handed over slips mentioning the voter’s name, number and the ballot booth number; gyrating beats of their hearts were counting the number of voters who got their voting vouchers from them, and this in turn gave some implicit indication about the support base of their candidate, because people normally get their slips prepared by the agents of the candidate they are likely to vote for. However, there was one factor which was constantly driving a wedge between their calculation and the uncertain result. It was the people’s sweet-sour tendency to cheat by getting their slips from one agent and voting for someone other’s candidate.

Among the conflicting straddles of a largish crowd some policemen were discernible, trying to stonewall the tussling chaos rearing its head with each passing minute. Hordes of women, attired in best of their clothes, were pouring out on road from the street between the schools. Their traditional songs sounded autumnally lamenting lyrics in the morning stricken with disputatious air.  But still, to the coy village women the election day provided a rare opportunity when they could dress well, do some make-up in place of their as usual addlement born of fields, cattle, household chores and domestic violence . To many of them the day provided a chance to feel the air inside a classroom for the first time and sense the ditsy rhythm of the place from where the perkily cramming chorus of their children reached their proud maternal ears, while they were engaged in a mauling hardwork in the nearby fields.

The monk was standing before his hut. His citizenry of the God’s state obviously deprived him of a voting right in this bedraggled state of the earthly humans. Standing on the parados, he felt himself cruelly castrated from the highways and byways of an earthly world booming with its fudging beatitude. Ochrous, long triangular flag at the top of his reclusory was flying in the direction of the school; its pointed flying end verily attracted to the place where politics was being played; the pennon’s raddling sway to the political rattan.

The undomiciled watchman-–thus the second voteless fellow on the mound–-was preparing chapattis for his breakfast or lunch, whatever one may prefer to call it. In all verisimilitude he was politically uninitiated. His senses in their complete unattractedness to the poll scene gave inkling of the fact that his fingers might’ve never borne the tokenism of a voters’ ink. His neighbour meanwhile threw copiously hideous looks at the smoke rising from the other side of his neighbour’s hut, angry with the God that ‘if so many in this world have so much’ he gave a jealous look at the esoterically extolling mob around the school ‘then why can’t I’ve a little elevation of earth in the name of Thee?’

There, amidst the scene of real hectic activity, a voice was affecting a cleavage. His baritone idioms percussioned a revolt against the politics’ sweeping extols.

“Don’t cast your vote! It’s not as cheap as you people have made it to be!” from his pulpit he exhorted a passing horde of women, whose looks turned in a sheepish predicament.

“Oh, don’t bother about him. The teacher has gone mad,” a polling agent blossomed at the cusp of courtesy.

“What good have you got in return of your votes? You still have to fetch water from two kilometres away. Can’t sleep at night after a hard day because of the mosquitoes, as there is no electricity. As state subjects you work day and night and in return your children rot illiteracily in these government run schools which’ve become a stigma in the name of education,” the man chronicled a groaning tale.

The women however couldn’t understand the feminine version of public woes at the hands of an inefficient administration and vampired politics. Realising that his hoarsy throat had completely failed to disaffect the superfluously salacious aura of the political travesty, Ram Singh jumped down from the brick heap and resorted to his last weapon.

“They do nothing to the rapists!” he quailed a pleading.

But even this vilifying fact didn’t sound obnoxious enough to affect a poll boycott by even a single female heart in the group. Only one or two of them looked back with a mild anguish, some giggled and one of them put an end to the matter by quipping, “Masterji has gone mad.”

Rebuked by the apathy of unquestioning female woes, the anti-election campaigner turned to other general, unctuous lacunae.

“See the condition of this road. It’s seen five such circuses, still no improvement in its condition. They just eat away the sanctioned money in crores,” he drew attention to the archetype lecherousness. “Where’s that pond ghat for which the district authorities handed over one lakh rupees to the sarpanch almost three years ago?” he pointed to the entrance to the pond, where the brick embankment had been broken and cattle hoofs were fastly cutting the roadside earth into the pond’s water.

But each and every politically hypnotised soul seemed so self-opinionated that the un-political crusader’s words seemed asininely internecine. His irritated and dismayed words had no effect on the ears whose eyes had never seen anything begetting from the state’s initiative during their life time. It was just like weeping for the extinct dodo, while nobody knew what dodo was and what extinction meant. And if someone understood, it was simply a boisterously lackluster fact. What if the final dodo had died a good century back? Everyone has to die one day. Why should we weep about a bird? Similarly, why should we cudgel up our brains about the politico-administrative discrepancy?

But being as he was, a Young Turk in the army of great Bengali, he was now just a representative of the fag end of the school maker’s once effulgent movement. A disgruntled Pradhanji had died about five years ago. Helplessly lying on the death bed, the 85-year-old’s once vigorously bulky figure could no more fight against the caustic reality, and when his eyes closed for the last he’d very clearly seen the disembarkation of the institution he’d irrigated with his blood and sweet-–disorganised, factionalism in the working committee, severe resource crunch, so few selfless volunteers in the pipeline, and to top it all the state education board waiting like a spider to eat up the terminally webbed sprawling institution. While the head beetle lay devitalised due to the old age, no more able to fight for the jewel of his dreams, people wrote a hasty eulogy and the government braced up efforts to lay claim to the old man’s educational property. Within a couple of years of his death, the school’s name came to be written as Government Higher Secondary School. Samaj Kalayan (Social beneficence) the earlier prefix was entombed in the great man’s samadhi, which-–thank God!-–the government allowed to remain in the school’s garden, where he was cremated by some diehard followers of his, like Ram Singh.

Taking heart from the same amorous light, Ram Singh-–primary teacher in the great man’s institution-–now transferred (as a government primary teacher) to the adjoining smaller school, was still alive to the social sensitivity which took him on numerous forays into the politico-administrative offices at the district headquarters in the wake of sharp degradation of the schools under government occupation. Earlier, the great man would dash down to the spot wherever there was a softest complaint from a single brick, to get it repaired under his filial supervision. But now the orphan institution looked tellingly tattered-–just within five years from the great man’s demise! And his lonesome follower seemed just a pale figure trying to take revenge against the political apathy.

Unavailingly the teacher had been running from pillar to post, adducing the school’s plight and other stinging chinks in the state’s scheme of rural administration. But except false promises and some excerpts from the sympathy book, anything else was not even worthy of hazarding an expectation. Completely frustrated with the fraudulent impropriety of the administration, he could only think of forming an Election Boycott Morcha. Not too many people showed interest in this petaline effort against the thorns. Even the very few people who’d formed the working committee to work out a plan for anti-electioneering deserted him as they very easily walked into the trap laid by the lissome campaigners. It left the harbinger a poor figure tantalisingly latching on to his mad ideas. Some even cruelly jested that he was haunted by the great Bengali’s spirit. So, standing on his mound of shattered dreams, ignorant of the festivity of casting a vote, to all the political revelers he seemed a lunatic whose soul was in an internecine discrepancy with the surroundings.

So, today he was alone like the Godly legacy of the ‘Father of the Nation’, while there was huge excitement among the amnesiac villagers (whole country with its neglecting credo in the case of the Mahatma) after a dull cocoony state for five long years (roughly about 45 years for the country after the departure of the modern incarnation of God).

Aren’t we the people whose negligence of the Mahatma’s principles equals the nasty limits of atheism? Aren’t we totally fractured from our most immediate greatest legacy? The great Bengali’s soul should not rue the criminal neglect of its light, because the fate of the greatest soul of modern India lies in the same dustbin of the past. Every Tom, Dick and Harry ghastly kicks up the holy ash. A petty politician calls him ‘the son of a devil’. A socio-religious body pumps pride into the sluggish veins of its cadres by recalling that they were the patriots who got rid of the ‘Muslim-sympathiser’. A political party is ever trying to hide the loot and plunder of almost five decades beneath the veneering remembrances of the great man. Maybe it itself is responsible for turning its God’s legacy so dirt cheap. Wasn’t he in favour of its demise and disbandment with the coming of India’s independence so that it could glitter goldenly, forever as a sign of our freedom struggle? But governing a whole new, free nation-state was too greedy a proposal and thus his cadres revolted. And here we’re now: the teeming masses who don’t know even an iota about the Mahatma’s philosophy criticise him as if he was just a berated buffoon or a plotting gangster. Here in this countryside also time-pass puns and taunts had a fair amount of Gandhian masala like the one below, which can  aptly surmise what most of the people know and think of the ‘Father of the Nation’:

“Have you heard Gandhi, the name?

Yes, the one who made pauperisation his fame!”

For the great soul’s sake we shouldn’t open the pandora box and keep us glued to the polling scene.

There was an exploding round of sloganeering, as an ideal persona of a politician stepped out of a car, and straightway headed for his polling agents vendoring by the school wall. He was the standing MLA of the constituency, who’d toppled everybody’s expectations by winning as an independent candidate in the previous elections. After the government formation he was easily purchased by the Chief Minister as a junior member in his cabinet. But this time the witty CM’s pre-poll coalition with the rightist nationalist party had shattered the dreams of the standing MLA for another term in the assembly. So back he was to his independent ways against the draconian injustice meted out to him.

“Aaha! Mr. Jaypal you!” unpolitical straggler spiffed up his tirade. “So at least we’re privileged to see the face of our representative.”

The politician’s goons instantly showed the inclination to go apolitically haywire. He but forbade them, brick by brick cogitating the political implications of any off-hand manoeuvre. The offence was nothing in his terms; he would’ve just smiled even if the protestor had spat into his face.

From his turnstiled precincts the lone campaigner further instigated. “Now you’ll behave like a beggar. Say that time was too short for you to work out the problems. That you need another chance to serve the people,” Ram Singh (literally meaning lion of Lord Rama) arrowed his words.

But the politician was cool as a cucumber-–the fury should not surface in the open, otherwise little will be left for behind-the-scene audacity. So he once again smiled picturesquely.

“Now you smile. Why not? It’s the smile after digesting at least five crore rupees.”

The smile promptly vanished as if angry for bringing down the figure. His face seemed serious as if he was mulling over the exact figure of his hard-earned money.

“My God! Why aren’t you afraid of God?” the man moaned. “You even gobbled down the one lakh rupees given to you by a poor Dayanand for getting a job for his graduate son in the state police. He died of shock. You are his killer... you killed him...” the blamer’s face burst of redness.

The crowd meanwhile had been joined by one more spectator. The monk, unable to control his heart’s gyrations under the spell of coercive bogles let loose by this spectacle, had stuttered down to the place, allowing himself to be caught into the mob’s pickle.

It was now clearly going beyond the limits of democracy, which even an election time politician couldn’t tolerate. Thus, the agents ran, few from the leader’s coterie joined them. In the melee the crusader got some slaps and bruises, which the deft politician minimised lest he might lose even a single vote. After all, aren’t there so many other occasions to settle scores. And moreover, a single slap on the cheek of a good human being is million times insulting than a thorough fist-work battering and bruising the whole body of a bad one. Also, isn’t it a fact that politicians temporarily leave their adversaries with mountains of interest to be taken at an appropriate-–politically unharming-–time in the future. So, in order to enable the voting crowd forget even the tit-bits of this trivially untoward incident, the cavalcade sped away from the scene to reach some other village.

A lampoon group, brick by brick synonymous with the devil, enjoyed the teacher’s humiliation to the farthest fringe of its evil jestery. Its components were the main protagonists of the chaos which was ever rearing its ugly head during the Ramleela.

The joking sense arose in the Sadhu as well. Poor teacher had stopped, his humiliated face incurring a halo of defeat. It looked as if his energy of rebellion was transformed into the defaming laughter from the crowd.

“Poor man he was preaching like Mahatma Gandhi,” the monk charred the teacher’s remaining honour by this repulsive murmur. “See what he gets in return. Some bruises like Gandhi used to get,” he mused to a bystander who nodded heavily, happy that the old foe as well as some distant incarnation of his legacy had been battered and bruised in the same totem.

“Preaching is only for the sadhus!” he declared nosily, which wasn’t heard specifically by any ear in the commotion.

Another political vehicle stopped. Once again a politician got down. The monk was standing by an agents’ booth whose decoration had lots of colours from his robe, the flag on his hut and the placards all over the politician’s vehicle. Ram Ratan, his apparel and attire shining like the armour of his faith, straightway headed to boost the morale of his people. There was a sudden spurt in his politico-religious enthusiasm, as he saw the majestic medallion of his party’s honour book standing by his supporters. For a few moments the ascetic seemed to him just a mendicant-mannequin employed as a living cutout of their ideology. But as he approached near, the religioner’s genuine credo struck his myth believing political-modernism.

The pale-faced politician got a rush of blood to his mask. His narrow, light eyes abandoned their inhibitions. Long and thin neck now seemed ready to bear the burden of religion, nation and its masses. His sharp nose and finely, firmly set chin looked more attractive now. He was heavily garlanded. Unburdening himself of a few strings of flowers he put them reverentially around the religioner’s neck.

“Sadhu maharaj be the immortal one! Bless me with victory, maharaj,” without any inhibitions the gracious politician bent down to touch his feet, but in the process almost hit against the ascetic’s wood.

The monk wasn’t quite prepared for such a high profile devotee, so he almost stumbled over the prostrating politician.

“God bless you with a pealing victory!” the ritualist managed a blessing, his ears eavesdropping on some hope buried deep inside this figure swathed in costly khadi clothes.

A few minutes later he was proudly sitting on a chair. Expeditiously the politician ordered tea for the scion of their ideology’s substratum. With the political tapestry over his reliquary, the monk sat puffed up like a balloon holding on to the maximum air inside. In between his humble affirmatives to the politician’s flippant tongue, he stole tiny glances at the women group’s festively bestirred steps to the polling booths. Piggybacked on the company of the politician his hopes soared very high, as he got nimble thoughts about how all of them will prostrate before him for favours, for magic, for healing powers, all of which will be taken by the villagers in the same way like they easily wear the politics and its promises on their sleeves. There across the pond his flag of asceticism was fluttering more vigorously now.

“Maharaj, which dera do you belong to?” essentiality of an answer broke the godhead’s reverie.

The God’s servant was well aware of the prestige fetching legacy of his first discipleship.

Amid the polling affray the monk drew an introspective quatrain over his face. “Bhagat, I’m from the ashram of Sadhguru Parmanand,” he shifted himself on the chair.

The politician didn’t need a second reference to recognise the monk’s guru. A very, very old-–archaically old-–Sadhguru was still surviving in some corner of the same state. By now his spirituality had drawn its own myth.

“Oh Sadhguru Parmanand! But he’s too old and does not meet anyone these days,” Ram Ratan rued over the unavailability of the old war-horse on the path of spiritualism who had retired.

The fact was that the old monk had spurned all efforts of the party’s state leadership to politicise his largish religious bequest. “Have you ever been to Ayodhya, maharaj?” the politician’s expression drew a dank due to the above fact, so he changed to the more relevant topic.

The monk had heard some smatterings about the breaking of some mosque there, but his knowledge about the subject wasn’t enough for a politico-religious conversation on the topic which was burning inside the host’s political heart.

Failing to fetch some appeasing words from the Sadhu, the contestant himself pacified his ruffled and agitated soul. “Ayodhya maharaj, Ayodhya! How can you be so ignorant about it? Only the year before last, valiant defenders of our religion, people like you, vanquished that blot on the face of Hinduism!” searing rigmarole of the happenings got into his head and he sounded a bit irreverent to the ignorant religioner.

“What a foolhardy constituency I’ve been thrown into!” his soul pined, as the Sadhu looked apologetically into the crowd.

Just then the Muslim blacksmith, the small man with enormous hands, bulgingly glazed red eyes, didactic lines across his lower cheeks and a muezzin’s goatee-–a typical miyanji as the villagers jested–-chanced to saunter into the political travesty. His knees having a slight arthritic pain and numbness due to the hard work he performed while sitting by his anvil. So he was on a relaxing stroll.

“See, here comes the Pakistani,” the politician kicked up his sagging spirits.

This mundane sleaze directed at most of the Muslim subjects of India has its provenance in the rabid two-nation theory-–Pakistan for the Muslims and India for the Hindus-–initially yelped by the Muslim communalists of pre-independent India.

The Sadhu just grinned at the politician’s remark, because he wasn’t aware of the intricacies of a grisly narrowing down nationalism, religio-political organisations, breaking of mosques, new-found mannequined bravery of the major religion of India, Islamic terrorists and their godfathers spreading consternation throughout the world to bring about an Islamic theocratic state, and many other things paneling in and around.

“Miyanji, come here! Sahib is calling you,” the polling agent, bedizened in the best of a politically correct dress to impress the leader, barked above the dementia; his otherwise meek voice acquired a booming baritone stature.

“Hello miyanji! How’re you?” the politician accosted the blacksmith with a strange smile which’d unfettered moorings in the lustrous halo of some newly discovered star.

“I’m O.K. janab! Shukriya!” the blacksmith bowed in courtesy and his pronounced lips parted for an effusive smile.

“And what about your brothers in Pakistan?” the politician tried to uncalm the Muslim’s poise bestowed by hammering hardwork on the anvil.

“They’re also fine there! But, I’ve more nice and happier brethren here,” clever blacksmith chirpily quipped in his flowery Allahabadi accent.

From the politician’s face feigned humour went adrift. The agitated tip of his tongue groped in the mouth as if trying to find a cleft there.

“Do’u really love India?” he mumbled cagily and kicked at a pebble with his black leather shoes having pointed toes.

“Why... of course janab! Our Hindustan is worth loving. But if you ask me to show or prove it, then I’m sorry, I can’t do that,” he replied adjusting his frilled cap; while traces of sullenness graduated into the Muslim’s tone which fed upon the enthusiastic spring in his heels.

“And if we ask to show it then!” the politician asked with an airy movement of his nimble hands.

“Then order this air to present itself before all of us to prove its existence. Ask the God to be present here and now. And by the way, why don’t we call the Mother India to decide who loves her and who doesn’t,” Urdu’s endearing lacing in his protest made it so strong and docile at the same time.

Rustic villagers who couldn’t delve too deep into such ideological compunctions, laughed from the blacksmith’s side, taking his gentle retort to be a great winning pun.

“If you people love Hindustan that much, then why have you become terrorists in Kashmir? There at the whims and fancies of Pakistan you kill Kashmiri Pundits, Sikhs, military jawans, and blow up buildings!” from the look of it the politician’s skin was on the verge of crawling over his flesh.

“They mightn’t love India that much, but I do. And I don’t see the need to show it to anyone, sir,” saying this on a respectful note, strong-willed iron-worker took to his stroll, as he’d a lot of work to finish in his shop.

This stream of Hindu consciousness struggling in imputation with the Muslims, Pakistan’s archetype lecherousness, Kashmir embroidered over both these issues, and the resultant Hindu rightist politico-religious organizations; till now, all these conflicting straddles were known to the illiterate religioner in their mild, uncribbing intensity. But now the politician’s, someone so respected and influential, sarcastic tirade against the Muslim blacksmith deposited in his mind a new version; some definite repulsive strands into the epochal, instinctive loath of a Hindu religioner at the mere sight of a Mohammedan (or vice-versa). So, he now realised and smelled the religious patriotism reaching into his wide, hairy nostrils; the lines changing into wrinkles around the corner of his eyes went somewhat awry in contraction with this new information; his full bearded chin sipped some juice of this new dharma.

With an enthusiastically hateful look-–much obliged as he was to the good and nice politician for proffering so much respect to his starving, begging mendicancy-–he turned his face to the mound. ‘You fool, you were not entitled to break that!’ echoed in his mind. The undefined angst he felt at the time of breaking of that Hindu pitcher by a Muslim, now turned into a fanatical rage, a heresy, a crime.

The monk’s chimera was broken only when the protector of Hindu pride in this safest of land-–because there were almost negligible poky-weeds here in this countryside constituency-–prostrated for the second time and left with his accolading fraternity.

The crowd meanwhile was noisily going on a fool’s errand, their amnesiac voters’ minds now completely forgetful of the one man Election Boycott Morcha’s useless enterprise. The growing disenchantment with the elected representatives, which the voice of Ram Singh ‘calling a spade a spade’ symbolised, had no penetration in this part of the country where rude humour and ignorance easily rolled over such inscrutable issues like state functions, role and responsibility of the elected representatives and constitutional rights of the disparate masses. So, the formation of government had become an inevitable myth, which was to be brought about through the ritualistic performance of elections. Beyond this the people’s psyches were completely shut off to all other chattel of democracy, which was at the plunderers’ stake through inefficient, unaccountable and nontransparent governance.

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Tawny, humorous, nationalistic chidings by the Hindu rightist politician, which of course served no purpose other than pouring some oil upon troubled waters, personified an effort on part of the Hindu dramatists to create a false show of valiant puppetry to counter the jihad from the neighbouring Islamists. Sluggishly awakening and evolving sectarian attitude of the Sadhu typified the new version of Hinduism based upon the politically conscious local gurus and subsects claiming their sub-infeudation to gargantuanly aspirational big sects, ashrams and shankaracharyas.

Should they (the Muslims) clutter their support around the Communists who had supported the Muslim League’s communally rabid demand of Pakistan? (There could be another luring bait to the line of communism in the form of China---the presumptive father of the leftists after the debacle of ‘real father’---providing full support to Pakistan’s anti-India manoeuvres.) Or should they still keep their faith anchored in the middled, neutered and castrated political focus (helpless to control its depravity born of its own weakness) now fastly losing the spellbinding sheen of its focal point so blindingly etched in the new rays of a new, free sun?    

And where do the Muslims fit in this newly spangled majoritarianism’s vociferous tryst? For simplicity’s sake, take the district of our tale. Three-four thousand of them, socio-economically backward, engaged in petty occupations like small retailing, vendors, tailors, blacksmiths and butchers, had no role and responsibility in the jihadi python which was coiling around the north-western border. This would be well exemplified by the fact that even a well informed Hindu knew more about Islam than any individual from this mostly illiterate community.

Their silently unstark position in the whole game can be gauged even from a little incidental conversation between the blacksmith and an educated young man from the village. The former on being asked by the latter about the Prophet and some other things related to Islam found himself at a loss of knowing even the mundane Islamic words. So, instead of adding to the conversation ‘the religioner by birth’ just kept on reddening an iron rod in his furnace. His unphilandering concentration indicated that work was his real religion.

Humorous idlers as well as farming thespians of this nondescript countryside, sore with Pakistan’s much vaunted role in aggravating Indian problems, verbally targeted these Islamic sinews---even amid a bonhomie talk---to vent out their share of angst against the sworn enemy. So, in an-effort to belittle the enemy country they would laugh about the mullah’s goatee, about riggish-red eyes, dexterity in butchery, tongue’s bonhomie with meat, many wives and numerous children and many other things arising out of comparative cultures belonging to two different religions.

But all this was said in such an easy and undemented way, that thousand such remarks would still weigh lesser on a common Muslim’s mind than a few phrases read out by a politician like Ram Ratan from the rightists’ ideology book.

Also, when it came to the humour aspect of this desi culture, their fabled sword of pranks fell equally severely even upon the head of a Hindu religioner-–mind you, unprejudicedly even on a full time professional religioner. Validating the above point, an easy minded farmer sitting by the side of miyanji working on his farming tools, let loose his pranking tongue on a young monk from the Gorakh Nath sect lumbering along his huge and heavy staff:

“Sadhu maharaj, you have fucked a whole tree trunk for that devil’s penis in your hands!”

Some people loitering near the barber shop and the miyanji’s rolled over in clouds of laughter, as the young ascetic thieved away from the scene in order to avoid the joking ordeal whose lid had been just opened: the knight of puns who once again raised his head, mustering up all his washing prowess through breach-busting manners of laughing and all the funnily abusive versions of obscenities.

There on the other side of the border hard-core Islamists and murderous jehadis were collecting money and bodies from every pious Muslim family to kill more and more Indian soldiers in Kashmir, spread communal venom through vast veins and arteries across a secular, united India and thus nullify the thousand years of Indo-Islamic cultural evolution.

And how does Hinduism react in stimuli to this real sword of fundamentalist Damocles hanging over its head? Some seemingly coward, unharming, and non-weapon yielding religious bodies (save some sticks and rusted little tridents) raising the alarm, trying and pretending to be politically aggressive to save the motherland of Hinduism. But such efforts resulting in nothing else, except the fissiparous heat of this ideology–-with the propensity of a hydrogen bomb-–drawing a communal wedge many times ghastly than the two-nation theory at the time of independence; raising the possibility of further disintegration of India in the unpredictable future. Mayhem-centric policies of Pakistan were in fact implicitly being fulfilled by these rightist socio-religious and politico-cultural organisations. Pakistan had been successful in rejuvenating the two-nation theory by instigating this superficial and showy game of Hinduism which very aptly awakened some disintegrating but uneasily asleep memories in Indian Muslims’ psyche.

The trident, the kamandla, the chariot, morale boosting Godly chanting, chariot tours, curse-ordaining clarion calls of nationalism whenever India loses a cricket match to Pakistan: all this in opposition to the AK-47s and other deadliest weapons of terrorism! A travesty and farce on the surface of it. But beneath the seeming surface, all these trinket bickerings were in fact unbelievably venomous and deadly for the fifteen crore Muslims of India. It was million times more effective than all the jehadi ammunition of bombs and bullets---religious figures flying to the politicians (and vice-versa) for the rescue operation, puns and pranks being directed at the unharming Muslims in and around the area. And they called it aggressive and a resurgent Hinduism! What could it result into? Maybe one day, whole Indian Muslim populace, boiling in its typical Islamic anger will demand a different homeland. If someone asks ‘why this farcical repeat of history’; then the answer is ‘just politics’.

Politicians need issues to garner as many votes as possible. So they prop up many at the whims of their political fancies. What’s however sad is the fact that Pakistan never plays politics when it comes to its single-mindedly crammed state idea of destroying India. Very  calculatedly it is damn on target-–doesn’t matter whether it’s a civilian government or a military one-–knowing fully well that meanly issue-hunting Indian political class would go on giving one chance after another for the fructification of its unfulfilled partition time designs.

Earlier it was the turn of old iron-lady of the Congress to give a chance to Pakistan in Punjab. We were saved from a doomed situation there by the khalsa bravery of two lions of Punjab... of India, sorry! In this context, our secular minds shouldn’t forget what happened in the aftermaths of her demise in Delhi, when a sobbing son had said these were just the shocks felt when a big tree falls. And now the rightist party, hell bent upon tasting the power at the cusp of Indian democracy, was promontorily jutting into the foray with its cleverly researched tools and techniques of capturing mob psychology. So, here they were wandering with suffering-alleviating eclectic sway of some political God’s wand.

Even in this state where there was almost no soil to be dug up for a new political flooring with its narrow and sharp nationalistic spadework, it could hope-–by its hollow chanting of patriotic mantras-–to exploit the national, patriotic undercurrent subtly flowing through the vast countryside, born out of the fact that almost ten, twelve percent soldiers in the Indian defence services were from this state only. Many of these young valiant fighters were deployed in Kashmir to combat the cruelly tough and treacherous militancy.

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Within a week of the elections the results were declared. Huge uproars lambasted the gloomily staid countryside air. People were preying upon any conveyance to get to the district city. Tractor trollies brimming with people dancing to the steadfast beats of drums dashed down the broken road making stridently intemperate noise. They were going there to enjoy the post-result saga dauntingly unfolding at the city.  The winner Ram Ratan-–who else could it have been if the incumbent CM had himself campaigned for his placid partner?-–was to be lovingly doted on with slogans of immortality, cuddly congratulations and of course efforts on the part of his supporters (who became manifold once he won) to leave a last permanent impression on his victoriously dreamy eyes.

They were expected to return around midnight. Passing through the road by the village, the winner was to be carried to his native village at the farthest end of the constituency, where an unprecedented welcome awaited for the patriotic son of the soil. Houses by the roads which bore the posters of losing candidates almost shook apprehensively under the spell of these vibrantly taunting drum-beats and throat-splitting sloganeering as the cavalcades went strumming over the torn and tattered road.

An old milkman, a bullish wrestler in his heydays but now an old wreck with a dissuading look and colour gone capriciously tabby due to a haggling skin disease, was returning from the city on his bicycle with two empty drums hanging down both sides of the carrier making vitriolic little defeated noises in protest against the loudly booming victorious chimes. Throughout the journey his old age woes had got chilly burns due to the furtively serrated victorious shouts about the immortality of the winner. The old man’s mourning liver was stuck in his throat for the defeat of his favourite wrestler candidate. In such a torrid state when he reached the school, some persons from the village were fretting and fuming at an old and rickety Maruti 800 car. Under the hectic heartbeats of the man on the wheel the engine had baulked down. To forget their frustration they had a victorious taunt at the struggling old man.

“Ram Ratan has won by 15000 votes!” one of them jubilated, boosting up the winning margin three fold.

“Say one lakh, you left testicle of that weakling!” defeated strongman’s supporter settled the score.

“Count the blots on your skin, old sack and you’ll know the exact margin!” one of the would-be-celebrating gang, who was sorting out the problem inside the messed up engine, freaked out as if the problem was sticking somewhere on the old man’s skin.

In retaliation the obscenities laden milkman took up his empty milk drum from the bicycle and threw it at the foe’s toe. Missing its target the iron vessel rolled into the pond.

Elsewhere the diehard supporters of the first loser (brawny independent contestant) were not able to digest the defeat and they summed it like this:

“The Chief Minister bribed the polling officers who expertly stage-managed ten percent bogus voting in the first hour of the polling. And then counting itself was fudged.”

Lower caste supporters of the losing strongman were shivering out of fear because very soon he was to take back the money; and slaps, kicks, abuses as the interest.