Hold the thought, Get the point

What is that they say about silence? Silence is golden, right? Probably, the reason our Honourable Prime Minister is silent.  While people die outside of his privileged sanctum of calm and health, Mr. Modi is conspicuously silent.  He probably doesn't have much to say.  Or maybe he does, but he doesn't need to say it.  Or maybe he does need to say but doesn't know how to say it.  Or maybe he knows how to say it but doesn't know why he needs to say it now.  The dead aren't helpful to him anymore anyway.  The seriously ill will never live long enough to vote and is thus not helpful to him either. The ones living in fear of getting sucked into the vortex of government apathy and corporate greed will forget in time for the next elections. One biriyani and liquor combo lunch with Rs 500/- will guarantee their votes. The rich will flee to their cocooned fortresses and ride out the crest.  The poor will rather die asphyxiated than of starvation. This lea...

The last few years have been tough. But let's admit it - The last few days have been harder. 5 days ago, our PM did it again. He delivered a primetime speech, filled with enough anecdotes that included breaking Corona into an interesting acronym, to shut down our country.  Yes, we had to shut down. Because let's face it. Our healthcare infrastructure is not prepared to handle an epidemic, let alone a pandemic. Yes, we need to do what we need to do to prevent India from becoming a powder keg for the deadly virus. My beef is with the way our PM does this. Sure, this virus much like black-money and corruption needs be to nipped and tough measures need to be taken.  Like demonetization, he gave a country of 1.2 billion just 4 hours to shut down and stay home for 21 days.  He had to be seen taking a tough and a much-needed stand. He had to be seen in control.  But what ensued was utter chaos. Today, he came out with guns blazing defending his decision.  Wh...

They say age is just a number. As I get to the big four O, I both agree and disagree. I don't feel forty but I'm not as fearless as I was.  It's all in the mind they say. But is the mind weary or are you willing to celebrate the glass half full? The decade that just passed has been tumultuous. As someone who follows politics, regional and otherwise, I've been getting sicker. Modi with his unique brand of statesmanship has done a fair enough sleight of hand tricks to retain the voting majority.  We have morphed into a nation where freedom of speech has become a precious nonrenewable resource. Like slow-cooked frogs, we neither have the muscle to rise up nor the money to keep our fight focused.  As politicians openly campaign for violence against those who don't share their political enthusiasm, I lament. I've stayed quiet for the better part of the past decade fearing frivolous lawsuits and death threats from people who don't believe i...

I don’t think people are meant to be by themselves That's why if you actually find someone you care about, it’s important to let go of the little things, even if you can’t let go all the way.   Because nothing sucks more than feeling all alone even when you are with someone. We all see people bitch about relationships all day long, Sometimes, people are so scared of what may or may not happen that they sabotage their relationship. I am so sick and tired of being alone. I am sick and tired of staring at the ceiling, thinking about the one person I am crazy about and wondering if she feels the same way about me.   I am tired of wishing I had someone that I could wake up to, eat a meal with, listen to, come home to and see before I close my eyes. We don’t realize how lucky we are until we’ve lost it. Somethings I do won’t please you. Somethings I won’t do without you. Because we have to find our paths -   Paths of happiness, paths of an...

The last 5 years swept by pretty fast.  It feels fresh. It seems like I wrote about Modi just a few days ago.  It seems like it was just yesterday we couldn't tolerate a PM who wouldn't speak and wouldn't be able to act decisively. We lamented about his puppet master and the scams of the Grand Old Party. We just wanted to get him out.  We thought it was the worst thing to happen to an economist.  And we thought we had enough of scams and we deserved better. And then we voted .  We kicked out the Congress and brought in the butchers. er.. the BJP. The Hand gave way to the Lotus. Green turned Saffron.  We cheered. Well, albeit cautiously. We weren't used to politicians who spoke with such gusto.  Modi swept the quasi-literate off their feet by sheer technological brilliance and digital blitzkrieg.  I personally know of bloggers who were offered close to 1 lakh per month (tax-free) to write up to 4 favorable posts a ...

Over the past few weeks, India has latched on to its newest hashtag - #MeToo. Dozens of women have called out men with any semblance of power and accusations of how they harassed, abused, molested, tortured, or in any way inconvenienced them. The men who have been accused have predictably reacted with shock, denial, and counter-accusations. Some have even apologised.   And as usual, the media has taken sides - We are pro-feminists. And as always, we have condemned the men in the courts of our consciences. So in the spirit of coming out and calling out, I want my 5 minutes of fame too.   I am a 36 year old Indian woman, born and brought up in New York. I was drugged and raped by my friend at a frat party. I’ve been ‘raped’ twice since then by men who wanted to be my boyfriends and then dumped.   When I moved to India 10 years ago, I thought my past was behind me and I could leave the scars of my past behind. How wrong I was! My first boyfriend ...

There are two times in your life when you see the truth.   Two times when you realise who’s got your back and who’s going to stick that knife on your back. Two times when you will know who wants you to succeed and who wants to fail you. One, when you lose all your wealth. Two, when you decide to change career. Over the past several years, I’d been fantasising and preparing for this move. And then one day, the opportunity fell into my lap. I was going to be an UX designer.   As a writer, I knew there are only a couple of ways I could grow and fortunately none of them really wet my lips the way UX made.   I’ve met starstruck youngsters who’d give an arm and a leg to be a technical writer. Part of the allure was in the fiction that we lead super glamorous work-lives. A lot of them thought we got paid for nothing. Ofcourse unless you are Dan Bilzarian, that isn’t true. But that’s a post for another day.   And then I was beyond thrilled wh...