The Brave Engineers

It is human nature to start reminiscences when one is a little idle and when I go through my life the time in N.I.T.Rourkela seems the most surreal one. I or rather we did things that seem completely improbable now and depending on the way you look at it they were completely bizarre or just hilarious.

It was Holi. The campus was situated next to a tribal settlement. Suddenly the rumours started flying in campus that a student of second year has been drenched in colours against his will and then mildly beaten up in the settlement. It was enough to start a virtual war against the tribal settlement. The revenge had to be taken-the village had to be attacked.

And it was the fashionable thing to jump into such activities. It fetched you tremendous peer respect and favourable publicity. So here was I, 53 kgs of weight, thin and wearing a spectacles of negative 3.5 power and the only violence I had indulged in was killing mosquitoes. I was desperate to get the glamour and star appeal of the studs who could go to such villages and create some mayhem.

So a group of about two hundred students then marched with broken tree branches, hockey sticks, cricket bats, lots of bluster and bravado. I was there with a twig right in the front. We reached the village after a minor trek and suddenly discovered there was absolute silence and all doors were shut. The brave marching contingent halted –confused and looking for strategy.

Then suddenly an arrow flew from one of the houses. And panic and pandemonium broke loose. The students ran for their lives. I was there in the front and I still remember after almost twenty years my feelings that moment. When I looked back I saw everybody had disappeared or was running like a gazelle and I was the only one left within the boundaries of the village. It is somewhat akin to what an antelope would feel when it sees itself surrounded by a horde of lions in the African bushland. I think I ran though I do not remember where or how fast. In the process I remember outrunning stones, sticks and somehow surviving almost like Sunil Shetty does in the middle of a bullet storm. Bollywood is imaginative but everything they show is not fantasy.

The marauding engineers were that day exposed for their bravery.

What Makes Italians So Hot?

What is it that makes Italians the best-rated lovers in the world by women consistently year after year? I am sure men all around the world want to emulate their Italian counterparts. Here is my attempt at throwing some light on the most educative and useful of all subjects.

First, of course the looks. The men have olive complexion, sharp features and being of Roman lineage anyway fit the generally conditioned idea about male beauty better than other races.

Second, they are genuinely interested in women. They love everything about women and the women notice that they actually light up from inside when they see them. It is also not a sexual kind of interest, which is a special trait of the North Indian male but a true desire to spend time with the women and make them happy.

Third, of course the famed Italian charm. It flows naturally from their genuine interest in women. But they can be insouciantly charming and their body language in presence of women is devastatingly seductive in a non-threatening way.

Fourth, their sense of dressing is awesome. Somehow they manage to carry off the most audacious of touches. Like an Italian could be wearing a woollen jacket and light blue shirt with a cuff open and the wrist would be exposed to show a stunning wristband design. Or he would be wearing a dark suit without a tie and the open buttons of his black shirt could be showing a large cross on his chest.

Fifth, the reputation precedes them and sort of makes everything they do so innocent and appealing to the women.

There are of course some Indian men who could give Italians a run for their money.

AIDS in Nigeria

Nigeria is a country obsessed with sex. The President, a highly respected man otherwise, has eight wives reportedly. Amongst the wealthy and the powerful not having multiple wives is the exception rather the rule. The women are as aggressive as men in hunting for partners.If you go to a cyber café ,the only thing you see is boys and girls chatting on yahoo to hook and fix up their rendezvouses. A significant proportion of single women are willing and available for a price. If you want a girlfriend all you have to do is go to the university and ask for one. It is not unusual for fathers to ask their daughters to fix up a school/college girlfriend for their colleagues.The FM stations in the morning are full of pastors exhorting the sinning masses to restrain themselves sexually.

No wonder with so much promiscuity, AIDS has struck. In absolute numbers South Africa and India are ahead but in percentage terms Nigeria has 5.3% of the population affected by AIDS against 1% in India.

To find out the real extent of the spread of AIDS, we have to factor in the statistics that the life expectancy is only 48 and only 58% of the population is above the age of 15.Assuming that the population below 15 is relatively AIDS free, then approximately one in eleven Nigerian adults has AIDS. It is a horrendous figure and it is today a leading cause of death like in many other African countries. Thirty percent of the prostitutes (called harlots rather colourfully) have AIDS and are a principal source of the spread of the disease.

It is a point to ponder, if you ignore the tremendous human tragedy, how the natural system has in-built checks and balances. For promiscuity now there is AIDS, a disease as dreaded as any in history.

The Other Rath Yatra from Puri

I spent a large part of my childhood in Orissa,a state known for its bucolic beauty,stunning temple architecture ,frequent floods, poverty and Lord Jagannath.In fact Lord Jagannath occupies a more prominent place in the life and psyche of Oriyas than any God for any other community,I can think of. Of course, the chariot festival is well known but less known is that Oriyas of all ages, classes and types think of him as protecting and helping them everywhere. He is Jagannath meaning lord of the universe, a lord for all. Some of his most famous devotees have been Salabeg,a Muslim and also an elephant who was trapped by a crocodile in a river. He is the Lord who is for universal brotherhood;kind,compassionate and very much a part of your own milieu rather than a powerful God ruling you from a distance.

So it is with a lot of pain that I read that Rajnath Singh’s rath yatra will commence from Puri.I understand that he has his right as an Indian citizen to travel anywhere.But it is tragic that he uses Puri and its rathyatra tradition and in all likelihood he will try to take Lord Jagannath’s blessings for his journey .This is a political stunt,a cheap and devious trick to exploit the Hindu insecurities.

Lord Jagannath always stood for harmony,peace and tolerance.The Oriyas were always a peace-loving people.In fact,I remember growing up without even once being exposed to any caste and religious identity.I remember in the engineering college I studied in,I lost out the award for the Best Actor despite a brilliant performance.I was told later that the Mathematics professor who was the judge had preferred somebodyelse for the award because I was not a brahmin.I remember being utterly stunned by this for days at the narrow-mindedness of the man.In fact today almost after 20 years,I think of him with revulsion.But this was the only incident of someone trying to define me as a member of a caste or religion and acting on that basis.The harmony amongst different identities,castes and religions was faultless.We used to treat Muslim or Christian boys with a fond quaintness rather than with suspicion.

So it is even more tragic that the people and the soil of such a state are being defiled to further narrow,divisive and communal agenda of a rustic cow-belt politician and his party.

India-Two Different Millennia

India is a more fascinating country from a distance.Everytime I travel abroad ,I realise the greatness of the country which sometimes escapes my attention in the din and noise of its daily life.It has grinding poverty but it also has unique grandeur.It has its venal politicians but also a brilliant middle class that is making waves around the world for its prowess in IT,management and engineering.It has its centuries old caste inequalities but also its rich,distinct culinary tradition.Amartya Sen’s “The Argumentative Indian” does a fine job of delving into the splendid tapestry that is India.Alongwith Nehru’s “The Discovery Of India” ,it will remain a fine example of throwing light on the cultural,social and knowledge mosaic that is this 5000 year old civilisation.

But the disconcerting fact remains that the great contributions of India to the world like concept of zero,the decimal system,elements of trigonometry,buddhism,ayurveda or formal rules of grammar all belong to the period till the end of first millennium(till 1000AD).The last thousand years have not seen any great contribution to the world even though there has been some great architecture like the Taj or Konark built.So today inspite of India’s rising status the average Argentine or Dane does not use anything intrinsically associated with India.He probably talks on Finnish phones(Nokia),watches American movies,secures himself with a Chinese lock,drives a Japanese car,plays in a German shoe(Adidas),drives with Saudi oil.The impact of the IT sector is of course high on the corporates in general but not on the common man.Logically the inventions of the last thousand years will always play a more dominant role in life than the inventions and discoveries of the previous millennia . So the relative importance of India in the average life of a human being today in the world is lesser than what it was in the first millennium.

The most probable reason for this seems to be that the world discovered the riches of India in a big way in the second millennium.Combined with better routes and technology, it could travel and attack the country.So the last thousand years seem to have been a time of wars,battles for dominance and bloodshed.The British rule of course typifies this.This meant that the resources and time of the rulers and the people were more focussed on survival rather than on developments on the frontiers of knowledge.This over a period of a thousand years led to the relative decline of the country in the world standings.

One can only hope that the people and politicians understand this and South Asia gets out of its history of bloodshed and rivalry as we enter another new millennium.