ENS-1, Annie -0

I've been living in the world of books for a long long time... taking my cues and inspirations from the characters i read.. wishing my life could get magically sorted with the stroke of  a pen... but whose life do we really know about anyway??

at the end Marianne does give in to the pressures of her sister and "everyone else" around... does that mean she settles or does she actually be happy..?
Elinor finds her love, as do Elizabeth and Jane... its the not quite the heroine sisters who you are left wondering about... does Lydia ever be happy or is she forced to live the rest of her life regretting the bad decisions she made at 15? is it enough that Brandon fancies himself in love?


I have always wanted the fireworks.. the impossible love that makes you feel giddy like you're soaring into the sky and nothing else matters.. I always said that i stayed because it was the only place where i felt like home.. like that is where i was meant to be...


Marianne had the good fortune to have been 18 years old.. I am much older and was regretfully not born in the 1800s.. I am supposedly an intelligent grown up..

so do I let go of the rainbows and butterflies and agree to the compromise of "maybes" and cynical realities where the teenage fantasy of love does not exist and what you really want is someone who cares about you and you understand and share values with and have the society's blessings to be with....?

I haven't bought a new M&B in a while... i gave up on the "no matter what we will sort it out and live happily ever after" tripe years ago... so why does it raise a wall of revulsion in me when everyone around me wants me to come to my senses and do the sensible thing??
in any case, there is no way in hell of finding a spark if you never let yourself go anywhere near fuel...

Patriarchy, DDLJ and disappointing brothers...

my brothers have seriously disappointed me.. not the brats, the remaining horde of cousins/best friends that I have, have seriously dashed all my DDLJ fed ideas of how Karva Chauth is supposed to be…

yes I know that is a very very bad line to use if I want to sound like an adult at all and not like a starry eyed tween… but I DID expect better from my big brothers.. I swear I did.. first of all, I will never in my life understand how fasting prolongs someone else’s life.. this is the 21^st century ladies and gentlemen.. WHY are we still following the patriarchal model where the woman has to “sacrifice for the happiness of the family” and somehow starving the poor soul would bring salvation to the family…

secondly.. if you HAVE to believe that this deity with no sense demands fasts in exchange for years on earth, why aren’t the husbands fasting for their wives’ lives? why shouldn’t the husband “show his love and devotion” to the marriage just like the poor starving wife?

in any case.. if we have to go along with this loony idea that the husband’s life has to come at the cost of his wife’s health and sanity, WHY the effing hell is it not reciprocal? specially when the scriptures go on and on about being an “ardhangini” and the married couple being the basis of all life and society??

and (read this as being said in an irate voice with a stomped foot) why did no one out of the dozens of the newly and not so newly married couples of my generation put their foot down and DO something?

sure the previous gen has waaayyyy too many married couples for me to have harboured any remaining hope, but they are all old people, in arranged marriages where ‘the family’ scuttled all attempts at overt mush.. atleast in front of the children..

 but this lot?? my generation! they ALL have married for love and stay far enough away that the entire gamut of aunts and aunts in law and grandmothers and mothers does not descend on them to make them do whatever arcane ritual the lunar cycle demands.. and yet… Karva Chauth remains as boring and old people-ey as ever for my assorted brothers and bhabis…

whatever happened to the “don’t bother babe, religion is stupid, keeping yourself hungry is not prolonging my life”.. or “okay since it’s a required married people ritual, I’m fasting with you (Thanks SRK for that one) or at the very least “ since you’re stuck doing this, let me get up at the crack of dawn and cook you something nice and shower you with presents”…

ANYTHING??? hello?? guys??

Do you HAVE to be all boringly unromantic to my bhabis and be all “what are you getting worked up about” at me??

Go watch DDLJ again … all of you.. if I’m not allowed to question the cultural imperative and must accept that the fast must be kept, I’m gonna continue to be SO disappointed at the lack of reciprocal fasts and dancing and presents and unapologetically unromantic behavior in general... Shahrukh Khan.. you have some serious explaining to do.

hmph…

sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me... yeah right...

I work as a journalist. I'm trained as a lawyer, and my dream is to become a writer... and yet when it really truly matters, when it comes to things that have the power to seriously hurt me and upset me and make me want to cry and scream and hit back, i get quiet..
I may rant and fight and do whatever when it comes to protecting or lecturing someone else, but somehow i go mute when it comes to me.. I've never been able to stand up to bullying when I was the one being picked on, i've never been able to say the right thing as a response to an emotional attack or when i'm feeling vulnerable..
somehow i've gotten past every incident... being lots in the music in my head and whatever cloud i happen to be floating in at the time also helped..
but there are times when it gets to me..
when it makes me question everything about myself as to why the bloody hell i allowed it to get that far or stood there and said nothing...
I still have to figure out how to handle this particular incident... How does one react without being downright rude in a professional environment wen people around you cross the line from making a joke at your expense to actually hurting you by making "jokes" about your work and work ethic..
one is simple... ignore, and concentrate on my work so that the "little things" they found hilarious to laugh at no longer exist..
the other is to confront.. but i hate confrontation and they already realised that they crossed the line and sort of apologised ans said it won't happen again...

i think ice is better than fire in this situation... its not like i'll be missing anything i care about missing....

you're the Man now...

misogyny and affirmation of patriachy come in hues so varied that sometimes you can't even tell its there, and sometimes it is so brutally in your face that you're left gasping in shock at it..
i could write reams about the recent incidents of "harassment" at workplace that happened in the much venerated halls of teh judiciary and the media.. but enough newsprint has already been spent on it.. my concern is with a little more insidious and "oh its a joke" kind...
has anyone seen the new Park Avenue perfume advertisement? the one which shows a guy 'marking his territory' like an animal?? THAT ladies and gentlemen is what has my hackles rising..

since i'm writing on a computer where youtube is blocked, i'm gonna have to write down the story sequence of the ad..
there is a woman siting at a bar
a guy approaches, tries to chat her up
another guy, presumably a husband or boyfriend, all dolled up in a nice suit and gelled back hair, sprays his Park Avenue perfume on the bar stool beside her, and says "my territory"
Guy 1 tries to pick up her drink, Guy 2 sprays on that too, staking his claim
finally, guy 2 sprays the perfume on and around the girl, saying 'all mine' as he does so...
the girl? oh she's staring vapidly at the two men as if she has no b%^$ idea whats going on..
the ad ends with the tagline of "real men mark their territory with their scent"

ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME!!!!

what exactly is this ad trying to show?? men are animals? women are to be 'protected'? or simply that people in whatever ad firm that thought this up have zero respect for women or men for that matter..??
mark your territory??
so you're a dog or something that needs to piss on things to feel like the master of the domain?? the woman is "territory" with no brains or tongue of her own?

civilization and civility demands that we learn to respect people as People, as individual persons, and here we have an Ad that not only reduces a woman to an object with no mind of her own, you also have an ad that suggests that even the well heeled, (hopefully) educated upper class men have to behave like anmals and disrespect their partner if they want to "be Men.'

its one of the worst, most brainlessly put together ads I have seen in recent memory... 

panic attacks at best friends' weddings...

i am officially feeling over the hill "damn i'm on the wrong side of 25" and in the midst of a semi panic attack... had a nearly full blown one complete with elevated heart rate and difficulty breathing just a few mins ago but was on the phone with ash so he talked me out of completely unraveling...
N got married in an ostentatious and gorgeous as a movie set extravaganza last week.. which lasted all week and is only "officially" ending with a reception from the Groom's side tomorrow... and in April, Ansh will get married too..
i'm used to seeing N with a bf, so her with a husband wasn't nearly as OMFGness inducing.. but right now.. at past midnight in the middle of a working week talking to ansh about a plan to get mad drunk and catch up when he comes back to Delhi next month.. i realised that this relationship is about to change completely... for the longest time I was the one in a relationship and took time out to spend time with him.. for a very long time now we were both single and alone and we were always there for each other.. and even though i have had nearly a year to get used to the upcoming wedding.. it hits me every single time that i think about it that our friendship will HAVE to take a backseat.. one could bid a boyfriend/girlfriend goodnight and then go and talk to friends.. once you're married with your wife in your room, you can't exactly pick up a call/skype with an insomniac friend in the middle of the night can you??
i am very well aware of the fact that i'm being weird and selfish.. he's happy, he's finally found someone he wants to be with.. after all these years of being alone.. as his best friend i am ecstatic for him... and i'm also sad about me...
i realllly have to go meet my bhabi to be in jaipur and then get off my ass and actually go for that mad vacation we have been planning for years.. i'm nearly 26 years old, by best friend is getting married.. the least i can do is throw that bachelor party/vacation we have been planning forever....

frazzled

INCESSANT WHINING ALERT!
PLEASE MOVE TO A DIFERENT BLOG/BLOGPOST..
this one is solely so i can get the whine out of my system and maybe get motivated enough to get off my ass and actually do something about it..

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or maybe its a keening cry for a hug and chocolate? or a swift kick in the ass even...
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so i was flipping through my day planner diary and realised that there are verrry few pages left for the year... where the hell did  2013 go??
I had made a list of things i wanted to accomplish over this year... and i can't even right now remember where i put it... the few things i DO remember putting on the list are undone...

I seem to have lost a year without really having anything to show for it.. I haven't done any spectacular stories, haven't really done anything memorable really... sure i have made a few more contacts in the courts, but no breakthrough stories yet...

 was supposed to take a holiday.. that fantasy holiday where I let go of my fears and just get up and explore whatever place suits my fancy with whatever company I can find... I went to Goa for a week but thanks to the rain and my own laziness the only things i really did in that week is sleep and read on the terrace.. unlike the mad picture of exploration and debauchery i had painted in my head or a fun holiday romance, what i DID come away with from there was a horror of my sister's crazy dog and a whole new collection of romance novels...

i was supposed to get over my mental hangup about the AB and move on.. maybe date again, maybe just have a damned fling.. have  done that?? NO..

i was supposed to FINALLY write or atleast start on that novel that makes some sporadic appearances in the recesses of my half asleep mind...the most i have to show for that is a few pages of rambling text that even I cant bear reading through...

what IS the point of life when all i feel like doing lately is to hide under my bed with a book and forget that life exists...

would this judge hav said something like this had the lying complainant been a man?

ofcourse not, no one would EVER imply that simply because one man made a false complaint, the entire 'male species" were lying bastards would they? atleast not on judicially stamped judgements they wont... but please feel free to paint ALL women black because one woman lodged a false complaint against her friend's  ex boyfriend... even when you don't actually have any proof that the complaint in question was actually filed on the ex's say so.. you just take the fact that its "probable" the the ex's friend filed a fake complaint, and blame ALL women for being vindictive b****s
The Pioneer

The Indian Express


Justice indeed...

Court acquits man, holds he was implicated at ex-girl friend's
behest
    New Delhi, May 13 (PTI) A Delhi court has acquitted a man
of the charge of attempting to kill a woman, saying he was
implicated at the instance of his ex-girl friend to settle
scores with him.
    While deciding the case, the court said there was no
apparent reason or motive for the accused to assault the
victim, who was the friend of his estranged lover, and the
possibility of framing him in the criminal case could not be
ruled out.
    "Female of the species are more dangerous, which seems to
be correct. A woman scorned is capable of doing anything as in
the process, the social norms, customs and for that matter
even the law cannot be an obstacle or a deterrent. The instant
case seems to be one such example," Additional Sessions Judge
Vimal Kumar Yadav said.
    The court acquitted East of Kailash resident Jitender for
allegedly assaulting the woman on the night of April 12, last
year after entering her house and, thereafter, fleeing the
spot by locking her inside. The woman's brother had lodged the
complaint at Amar Colony police station against Jitender.
    The court said the woman's testimony and the surrounding
circumstances were not appealing to logic and reason and the
testimony of other witnesses were contrary to normal human
conduct and behaviour which could not be relied upon to hold
the accused guilty.
    Holding that the whole episode was "shrouded under
mysterious circumstances", it said, "Apparently, things have
got intertwined in a complex jumble which makes the picture
quite hazy and in turn case doubtful."
    The court said that the story on behalf of the accused
seemed probable that "he has been falsely implicated in order
to settle scores at the instance of his ex-girl friend with
whom he was having a kind of affair, which had reached the
stage of getting married also..."
    It asked as to why the victim was not taken to hospital
by her brother on the night of the incident or the next day
and instead her friend had called the police control room and
had taken her to the hospital.
    "Thus, the possibility of framing the man in the criminal
case due to the injury sustained by the victim accidentally or
self-inflicted, cannot be ruled out," it said.

penrose staircases...

The bright azure of the open sky with fluffy white clouds scurrying across it make me stop and wonder at my life sometimes.. think of the things I’ve planned and dropped, of the paths that I almost took or got turned around in.. I feel like I’m at the bottom of a glass walled well and while I can see everything around me reflected in the glossy shards that enclose my existence, the only open sky that is within my reach is that little patch that is visible where that glass and stone confine ends..

I feel turned around sometimes.. not quite as if I’m directionless or not trying to get anywhere.. I feel more like sissyphus rolling the heavy rock up a hill, and then picking up a different one after it promptly rolls away from me after the halfway mark…  I’m not exactly directionless or stagnant or not doing anything… I’m just moving rather purposefully down an escalator doing up…or maybe climbing a penrose staircase whichh keeps folding back on itself... no matter how many steps tire out my feet, I haven’t moved much towards the direction I’m trying to head towards…

watching a devotional movie with the eyes of an atheist

So what makes Jab Tak Hai Jaan's Meera different from the dyed in the wool devoted sati savitris of yesteryear Bollywood? the type that we saw in movies like "jai santoshi maa"..??

The intensely devoted to god with a Pooja ki thaali perennially in her hand 'good girl' of the days gone by has been replaced with a "i don't wanna marry an Indian boy" cigarette smoking, minidress wearing 'businesswoman', but she is still following the 'god will do as i ask if i pray hard enough" motto of any true blue (K)Ekta Kapoor heroine....
She makes bargains with a perpetually surrounded by candles statue of Jesus in a gorgeous London church, but ultimately decides that her love's life is at stake since she broke her promise to daddy and Jesus to marry whoever daddy had chosen for her..

I actually cringed at her dialogue when she told SRK that she had to pray to all gods for his wellbeing since he kept getting into'life threatening' accidents! (and if i start ranting about his f%^&%# accidents thats another whole blogpost)

I guess Meera personifies my own confusion about what 'feminism' and 'strong womanhood' is... and where faith and devotion fits into the convoluted lines of tradition and modernity... is a 'god will provide' attitude an outdated concept? or is making life choices with faith firmly entrenched in your conscience modernity, coz you have a moral validation for your life choices that do after all remain YOUR life choices, notwithstanding the 'god' looking over your shoulders...

She behaves as her daddy and 'society' expects her to, is devoted to god completely, even though she tends to bargain with god, saying that she'd give up chocolates, or cigarettes, or her boyfriend, if god would continue to give her daddy happiness and keep her lover alive. and yet she is strong in her convictions... she goes out whenever she wants, does charity work for the poor and underprivileged every day, falls in love and decides NOT to marry daddy's choice and wait for her love... she is a 'businesswoman', even though we don't ever see her doing anything except looking pretty in tiny dresses(in the London snow no less) and gallivanting around with SRK the 28 year old..

 Heck she's strong enough to deny herself her love, refuse to marry daddy's choice and live the life of a nun coz she choose not to be with the man she loves in order to "keep him alive" as is her last bargain with god...

Shahrukh's 'Samar' is the opposite of Meera's devotion. he constantly challanges god, dares him to do his worst.. He doesn't believe in any divine plans, he doesn't care about god but has his own moral code in which his lover's the sole deity... he only backs down from what he wants not coz its something 'god' decreed, but its what Meera wants... "do this for me" is the line that gets him everytime... even when he rushes to join the army and put himself in front of live ammunition and explosives for breakfast,lunch and dinner... i half expected him to go "aaj khush to bohot hoge tum" when he's arguing with god and the surprisingly aptly named Meera about her choices and his life...

Samar reminds me of Krishna's words in the 12th chapter of the Bhagvadgita... "he who does his duty with complete devotion and aids his fellow man is my favorite, even if he denounces me and refuses to worship me..."

and yet the image of Katrina Kaif holding an arti ka thaal while wearing a little chiffon minidress (which i would LOVE to get) is just so incongruous that i can't figure out what the hell the movie trying to show..

"its not a story of courage, its a story of undying love"... blerrggghhhhhh

...............
on a slightly different note...
I think the depiction of journalists/filmmakers and army personnel in the movie turned my head around so much that i think i'm incapable of  liking it despite the awesome music...
When i heard of an Army Bomb disposal squad with an embedded documentary filmmaker..  THAT is not how i pictured it!!!!!!!! i don't know any 21 year olds who behave the way Anushka Sharma does in the movie... i can't even IMAGINE anyone 'serious' about their work being that unprofessional during a shoot..
and SRK.. i'm officially over the adoration i had for you as a teenager.. even though you've finally given up on trying to play a college kid.
Hamare ishq k waqt nikal chuka hai...
hmph...... 

Has anyone seen this show called 'PunarVivaah'?

Having grandparents at home guarantees that you will be exposed to those god-awful saas bahu sagas that run on TV all day.. I get fleeting glimpses of most of them since I tend to drift in and out of the living room at various points of the day..

Has anyone seen this show called ‘PunarVivaah” on Zee?? It started out as this progressive sounding show about a widower and a divorcee who get married to each other via an arranged marriage. It started out showing the heroine as this awesome independent woman who took care of her 4 year old son and her in-laws and took on the world with a hockey stick… and now the woman has been reduced to the caricature of the downtrodden Bahu in the home of her new husband, who incidentally is still so in love with his dead wife that they live in a room that is little more than a shrine to the dead girl.

lets recap the episode I saw today shall we…

• ·         The couple, plus their three Kids (one hers, two his) return from a holiday with the man in a towering temper for some unexplained reason.
• ·         The woman walks in crying, the man frowning, and the family is stunned and stares at them walking in
• ·         the man walks off somewhere, presumably work or whatever
• ·         the ENTIRE 20 member family, including elder brother and bhabi, Father and mother in law, little sister in law and aunt in law, alongwith the girl’s mother corral the girl in the drawing room and start asking her why their boy was so unhappy “when she had promised them she would make him happy.”
• ·         NO ONE of the gathered lot tries to comfort her in any manner whatsoever..
• ·         The mother in law gets into this whole “I will never trust you again coz you made my son unhappy” rant
• ·         meanwhile the poor heroine is literally on her knees on the floor in tears, begging them all to say that they trust her. She’s asking them all to listen to her, she’s begging them to understand that she hasn’t done anything to anger him or hurt him.
• ·         and then the MIL stalks off after giving her an earful.
• ·         and NO one questioned the man because he’s simply stalked off in anger.

what I don’t get is, does no one care about the fact that this woman is also desperately unhappy???? The in-laws treat her as some servant who is only there for their son’s sake. she can’t eat or wear or go anywhere as she pleases. She is no more than a nanny for the kids because that man refuses to accord her so much as the respect due to a wife. She is living in a room filled with pictures of another woman, who is remembered by the entire family as this paragon of perfection. She has to practically beg the family to even be allowed to live in the house. Her happiness of no import?

why is the man not asked a single question? why is it that the sole responsibility for the marriage working out on her??? why does NO ONE care that the injured party in the case is HER and not that man who simply shoved bags in a car and drove off?

and most importantly.. WHY the hell is the family interference limited to badmouthing her??? if they are so interested in scrutinizing their marriage, why do they not ever see that the man is doing nothing whatsoever to make his wife even feel comfortable and wanted?

why is it that TV shows simply reinforce these disgusting stereotypes? Why is it that the man can just do anything and the woman is so dependant on his approval for happiness that she has to grovel before the entire family to be allowed the right to live in her marital home? Why is it that the wife is blamed if the man is even slightly inconvenienced but no one raises an eyebrow at the fact that this man obviously wants nothing to do with her and is simply living in the past? She has gone through a hellish divorce, but no one has ever said that the guy should be trying to put a smile on her face just as she is made responsible for his happiness.

She is supposed to find contentment simply because she is married again?? why is no one asking the In laws about why they treat her with so much indifference?? even her own mother departs the house after some platitudes about how true love conquers all!!

She is supposed to be happy simply coz she has sindur on her forehead and her son has a “father” again?? even though her in- laws treat her so poorly and the husband is indifferent? just because he claims to “respect” her and lets her stay in his house??

She seemed much happier to me in the initial episodes. When she zipped around the city on a scooty, taking care of her son, assisting her parents in their business. taking down rude shopkeepers with sharp words and goondas with a wicked right hook.

hot cakes to hot potatoes

So this judge made a rather interesting observation today... "The questions raised by the arrest and detention of SM Kazmi will have repercussions on the entire judicial process that is being followed under the stringent Unlawful Activities Prevention Act"... No shit sherlock... I, a barely graduated law student cum rookie journo could've told you that....when the police and courts start taking decisions without clarifying points of law, somewhere or the other the lapses will come back to bite the entire system on its ass.

I wonder why the criminal justice system in this country is so messed up... on one hand you have police officers and lawyers who take money to bury cases of rape and murder, on the other hand you have overzealous or just plain careless prosecutors who come strutting to court without clearly figuring out just what their argument is going to be, on a different hand you have prosecutors who bludgeon their way through procedures and laws just because they're the "state" and can do no wrong.. another hand shows you judges who either don't care about what rules they're bending, or just let their exalted status inflate their egos and then refuse to hear any plea that's against their opinion. on yet another hand you have turf wars between the police departments, on yet another ego clashes between prosecution and judges.

any way you look at it, that is far too many hands groping around and sullying the criminal justice system of the country..
 

the little blue stone thats taken up a corner of me

so you say that men and women can't be just friends,.. that the only reason you were around was because you thought you had a chance to get into my pants...
fuck you
i have far too many friends who negate your little stream of thought.. better peopler than you.
and i'm done feeling guilty for hurting you.


there was a time that i blamed myself for the mess that you were in... a time when i promised myself that i'll be there for you through everything.. just to make sure you didn't ge upset..
but now that i've seen what a coward you are..
i'm done

I'm done trying to figure out excuses for your behaviour.. when you choose to pklay the injured party despite knowing exactly where my affections lie..

done trying to invove you. contact you and try to retain a friendship that never was.

since you require a 'lip man' to say whatever it is that you don't have the balls top admit to my face, i'm gonna stop trying to get you to speak.

goodbye
i honestly thought we were better friends than this.

what happens to a sleep deprived brain at 4 &$^*&%$ am..

somewhere i have never traveled, gladly beyond : e.e.cummings

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near
your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose
or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;
nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing
(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands




Poetry is usually not my thing... but this just was too beautiful to not share....

There are a million things happening in the word that i should be writing about.. the proposed divorce law, the proposed change in the 'age of consent', the upcoming exams and other stuff in my life.. hel i could very well put up a post about family and the brats' latest antics.. but lately i find myself unable to put in words what i feel. or maybe i don't have any words because my mind is quiet..
its nearly 4 am on a friday.. and my exams start in less than a week.. but i had to share this poem that i just came across...

You aren't a 'woman' here.. you're the "Vakil Madamji"

Child marriage is an accepted, if outwardly hidden norm for a large section of Indian Population even today. despite the various warnings and "social awareness"  about the detrimental effects of child marriages on the children, the family and society. Having an express Law banning child marriages doesn't seem to have worked very well because people are still stuck in the "lets get them out of our hair and to their 'own' family as soon as possible" mindset. 

infact, i recall having a major argument with someone recently about child marriages and the impact they have on the girl. shockingly, this guy was a "social worker" employed at one of Delhi government's 'Gender Resource Centres', which are run by NGOs in the city and provide employment, education, self help aid, legal and medical aid to poor women.This man has been working there for over a year, raising awareness about education and social issues such as gender based violence, population, sanitation etc. he's a graduate from IGNOU and belongs to what passes as a 'well off family' in the area, roughly as lower service class family. 

and despite the fact that this man is employed by an NGO that seeks to empower women., his outlook is set firmly in the tiny little box that his 'community' allows. 

The first argument he gave in favour of child marriages was a very cliche'd "why bother educating girls when all they have to do is take care of the house?" this while more than half his co-workers are women. 

the second was "these people are poor, they cannot afford to feed and take care of girls". This when his co-workers are active contributors to the family coffers and he himself is working with women's financial self help groups.

third- "madamji people say bad things about women who roam around outside the house and tallk to strange men" THIS when i was sitting in the office of the NGO with him alone and having this discussion.. so did that  mean that according to this man I and all teh wormen working in his pffice were not worthy of his 'respect' because we were out of our houses?? 

he apologised for the last remark though when he realised that i had taken serious offence to al his arguments. He stubbornly refused to take back his arguments though, and as a last word, his closing argument was "madamji you belong to a different society. Here people respect you because you are from a different social strata and are educated. No one sees you as a 'single young girl' here. You are the "Vakil Madamji".

so when the society refuses to give these girls and boys any identity beyond their membership of the family, when their aspirations, their very existence as a rational being is denied, is it really a surprise that the government needs to take seemingly weird, drastic measures to ensure that laws are complied with?

This is the news item that prompted this post:

Bharatpur admin makes DoB of bride, groom must on wedding card

PTI | 06:03 PM,Mar 31,2012

Jaipur, Mar 31 (PTI) To check child marriages, Bharatpur district administration in Rajasthan has taken an unique initiative of making it mandatory to print date of birth of the bride and groom on wedding invitation cards. A circular was issued on Thursday, directing all press owners in the district to print the cards only after taking age proof of bride and groom. "Legal action will be taken against such press and registration would be cancelled if they fail to do it...To check that they are following the guidelines, we will conduct surprise check," Bharatpur District Collector Gaurav Goyal said today. "The step is aimed at ensuring that no child marriage takes place on the upcoming occasion of Aakha Teej," he said, adding that the order is for two months now and may extend further. Child marriages are rampant on the occasion of Akshya Tritiya particularly in rural areas in the state.

lets talk about Sex baby...

how does one define 'morality'?
doesn't public morality change practically with every generation? even with every new development?


whats 'natural' and whats 'unnatural'? or the even vaguer 'NORMAL'? when you have 7 billion people on the planet, and several million ways of doing things, then what defines 'normal'?


is it 'normal' to hate someone just because they do things differently, even when what they do is not affecting anyone at all?
why is it 'normal' to look down upon half the population because they weren't born into the right family or community or gender?
how is it 'normal' to live in fear and cover up when one steps out or lie about one's family or sexual preference to protect oneself?
how is it 'normal' to conform at the point of a sword, literally being killed for not following social diktats?


just yesterday, Fali S. Nariman stood up for the rights of Homosexuals in court and stated that

things had changed so much in recent years that family planning and population control now find a place in the Constitution. “What are the petitioners moralising about? In 1860, the thoughts that prevailed were of a different kind. We live in different times. We have to move with the times.”

(the Hindu March 2, 2012)


but then, he made a statement that completely perplexes me..


"any homosexual act may be unnatural but not against the order of nature"


what IS this 'natural' and 'unnatural' in today's context anyway?
Victorian England was of the opinion that sex was simply for procreation and therefore 'unnatural sex' was the sort that did not fall within the boundaries of sex for procreation between a man and a woman. but in that era, Sex per se was not something that was 'allowed' by polite society.. it was hidden away as a 'Baser instinct' and hallowed into a sacred task between man and wife for the furtherance of the species. 


And even THEY knew that this opinion was a load of crap because Sex for pleasure existed way before some church decided to restrict pleasure for the sake of religion.
so why does today's supposedly secular modern society have such a view of sexuality? 


the same country whose population rises by the millions each week keeps sex hidden away as a taboo topic. its a 'we shall not talk about safety or informed decision making because someone somewhere decided that simply banning a topic was enough to ensure that the consequences of the action would be minimised.....


if you don't talk about it, it will go away... but that doesn't happen now, does it?


Sex for pleasure exists, Homosexuality exists, AIDS exists, the ever increasing population EXISTS because people refuse to actually deal with sexuality and safety in a rational manner 
because 'polite society' doesn't talk about it


because apparently, talking about  it makes people want to do it.. because acknowledging the existence of something will make more people "experiment with deviant behavior" and "destroy our ancient culture"




what IS this morality that they're trying to protect????

you asked me how i felt last night...

so you say i'm not tough enough
and then when i am, i'm heartless
and if i change my mind, i'm frivolous
and if i don't i'm stubborn..
if i take a stand, i don't see other sides
if i do, i'm confused
so what IS it that would be right.....

Mills n boon fever

would you marry someone you didn't "love" because your parents chose them for you and you can't come up with any earthly reason except "but I don't think it'll work out" for saying no...???

i'm wondering just what it is that people "see" in an arranged marriage... how does one check for compatibility, common interests, that elusive 'spark' when both are under pressure and performing a role in accordance with society's wishes???

but then, how much do you really know a person even when you've been dating for a while??

 Does that "kissed till their senses swam, and she swooned in his arms" chemistry really exist????
love stories really do generate unrealistic expectations...

so as everyone with a brain had predicted, the lokpal bill is back to gathering dust...

i haven't written anything on the blog in a very long time.. i havn't even had an opportunity to read the blogs i follow for a while.. blame it all on my technological ignorance because somehow i'd managed to halt my laptop's ability to function... 

anyway,

There have been many many things i should've written about.. 

As predicted, the lokpal bill is back on the backburner while politicians who pretended to favour the bill have hidden behind issues of caste and representation and 'fairness' ... though i find myself absolutely unable to understand why the question of reservation in a body like this ever came up.. the criteria should be whether the person has any allegations of corruption against them, and have a certain level of education.. and the backbone to stand up and tell powerful people that they are on to them... but what do i know of politics and policy, i'm just a humble student...

The comments made by some "people in power" about what a girl should wear to avoid rape were true gems... now if they could just explain why i'm still getting whistled at when in a salwar kameez and shawl and coat with even my hair covered up because the Delhi winters are murderously cold... i would supposed i "invited" the eve teasing were i strutting around in an LBD, but why would these "decent men" be "enticed" by someone who looks like a bear???? 

the new year has come in and we're all waiting to see if 2012 will actually be the end of the world.. i'm sorta hoping it will because my parents are getting increasingly agitated about my marriage and once i'm done studying i won't have an excuse to stop them from "atleast looking for a suitable boy"... so here's hoping the Mayans were right.. but considering they also thought that people were made of corn i'm not so sure my prayers will get answered... plus the Hindu calendar never ends and being an Indian i'm gonna have to believe that one...

forgive my lack of sunshine and roses... January 2012 has been a bang up month so far...and to top it all off Sachin never got that 100th ton...

i think i'll stay in bed and watch movies till the apocalypse.. oh wait.........

Jaa Chudail

i've always hated people who indulge in personal politics.. people who would just for the heck of it make up stories to trouble others, to get out of doing work or to simply make themselves look or feel better.. i'm not gonna take some holier than thou road and say that i hate them coz they lie.. but because they actively hurt other people by making up things when things would have been just fine without them havong to have said anything whatsoever

another kind of people i really have trouble handling is people who never ever listen to anything anyone has to say.. who are such hypocrites that they go back on the sentence they speak the moment it leaves their mouth coz their ego can't take it..

unfortunately i've had to deal with both such people just today.

this is for both of you.. may you live long and realise what kind of people you are....

two roads diverged in a yellow wood.......

journalism. law. journalism. law. journalism. law....
i have less than six months to decide..

i have pros and cons lists
i have opinions of friends
i have inputs from parents...

and i cannot make up my freakin mind!!!!!
maybe.. as someone told me recently.. careermaking is as much by chance as by choice.