My Reflections

Perumal Murugan’s novel ‘Kazhimugam’, translated as ‘Estuary ’ into English by Nandini Krishnan is a story set in a technologically advance but morally decayed town. It depicts struggle of a government servant to fit in a fast changing world, his unease and incompatibility with the changing social norms.  ‘It is the world where ugly habits prevail, where rules are broken, a world with no values, a world of greed and desire and cruelty, a world that has rotted from all these that best lends itself to fiction, and this world is that of asuras, Asuralokam’. The novel is as much about midlife fear of its protagonist as it is about flaw in education system and a commentary on modern times. Kumarasurar, the protagonist of the novel lives a disciplined and modest life. He doesn’t carry lofty ideals and is bereft of big dreams. His predicament starts with education of his only son, Meghas. He admits him in school which has very strict rules. Kumarasurar laments when he sees his ...

Title: An Ordinary Man's Guide to Radicalism: Growing up Muslim in India Author: Neyaz Farooqee British ‘divide and rule’ policy created unending feud and distrust among different communities in India whereas partition of the country left huge gulf between hindus and muslims. Instead of bridging this gap, the othering of muslims in society continued. In recent past, demolition of Babri Masjid and communal flare up thereafter provided momentum to this phenomenon. Political parties played sinister role and provided impetus to it. Election after election, vote bank politics damaged the social fabric. The marginalization and ghettoisation of muslim community went on uncheckded. Sense of communal identity took firm root and people started migrating to the place they perceived safer. This led to creation of community specific pockets. Jamia Millia Islamia in South Delhi is surrounded by such pockets where muslims from all over India migrate and cram the place. In 2008, in...

India is an economic bright spot and one of the fastest growing economies in the world. India is also one of the most unequal economies. One third of world's poor live in India. It produces talents who can compete head to head with the talents anywhere in the world. At the same time Indian schools and colleges produce graduates who are unemployable due to poor quality of education. India is attracting people from far away countries for health care at the same time Indians in large number do not get basic health care facility. The expensive health care is single major factor which pushes people down the poverty line. Indian villages especially villages beyond 5 KM of district head quarters lack basic infrastructure very badly. The public schooling system has improved but the quality of education remains a challenge. These contradictions make India a land of paradoxes. Anirudh Krishna, in his book ‘The Broken Ladder’ diagnoses the causes and effects of economic dispari...

Reading Nadeem Aslam is like living with the characters of his novel. The words keeps echoing, the scene keeps flashing and the characters stay with the readers much after one finishes the book. The author has penchant for detailing scene, event, emotion and expression in his writings. The reader experiences and visualizes Color, smell, sound, pain, fury, cry, smile, and laughter in the course of reading his stories. In fact, the portrayal is so vivid and engrossing that reader is transported to the imaginary world created by writer. Without rousing the sentiments, the author lets readers simmer with the empathy and sympathy for the characters. “Many things in my books come from real life; but a novelist has to be careful in transporting a real event into the landscape of a novel. It is patient work, like moving a lake from one place to another with a teaspoon” writes Naeem Aslam about his own craft. The writer of five novels including “Maps of lost lovers” and “The ...

Book Review - The Party Worker by Omar Shahid Hamid When a cop writes fiction depicting the unholy nexus of crime, politics and religion, the line between fiction and fact is bound to get blurred. The party worker by Omar Shahid Hamid is a realistic crime thriller. After his father was murdered in cold blood he joined Karachi Police as an officer, witnessed crime world from close quarters, survived Taliban’s attack on his office, took sabbatical and decided to write. Omar produced three best sellers one after the other; overshadowing the previous ones. ‘The Prisoner’ is based on the killing of American journalist, Daniel Pearl, the second novel, ‘The Spinner’s tail’ is on root of terrorism within Pakistani society and the third one ‘The party worker’ is on crime and politics of Pakistan’s largest city, Karachi. Omar Shahid Hamid, son of slain bureaucrat is currently SSP Intelligence of counter Terrorism Department in Karachi. He studied at London school of Ec...

Book Review -           Dvarca by Madhav Mathur Imagine a country having one race, one language, and one religion where the state intrudes into personal life of citizen. State decides pregnancy and traits of progeny to be born, distributes quota and type of food for individual, decides profession of people and promotes one language and one religion. The control is such draconian that the thought process is manipulated and conditioned. “Multi-culturism is dead” is boastfully declared. It is futuristic imaginary country depicted by Madhav Mathur in his new novel ‘Dvarca’.  Madhav Mathur a Sigapore based writer, works for an MNC. Dvarca is the second novel by this writer-filmmaker. His first novel is ‘ The diary of an unreasonable man’ . His award winning films ‘ The Insomniac’ and ‘The Outsiders’ have been screened at numerous festivals.  At a time when the ultranationalists and right wing forces are coming to cent...

Warfare is as old as human civilization so is its history. Indian subcontinent has been witness to bloody conflict and clashes since ages. Epics such as Mahabharata, Ramayana, Alha- Udhal are masterpieces of South Asia's age old tradition of rendering and preserving conflicts in different literary and art forms. India inherited thorny issues left behind by colonial masters at the time of partition which led to altercation and conflict with neighbors. These issues are still pestering making understanding of military history an essential part of statecraft. India can ill afford to ignore the history of conflict in this part of the world. Still t here are few good books on this topic worth visiting. The academics have largely ignored this important area whereas one comes across account of military conflict in memoirs of politicians or retired soldiers. There is dearth of well researched accounts on military history of India. This gap has been filled by  Arjun S...

               I’ve begun moving mechanically like a zombie, like a sleepwalker. And everything appears to be like a bad dream…nothing but a sleepwalker’s dream.’ The sleepwalker’s dream is first novel in English language by prolific Assamese writer Dhrubjyoti Borah. He is one of the eminent writers of Assamese language who received several award most notably Sahitya academy, a prestigious literary award of India. Being a practicing medical doctor Borah deftly deals with psychology of individual and group. Many shades of human persona are finely depicted by the author. Loyalty and treachery, Cooperation and suspicion, discipline and defiance, love and lust are nature of human beings and the same is displayed in this remarkable work of fiction. Through the novel, the readers peep into Bhutan’s beautiful valley of lush green forest. The readers travel through tortuous terrain, the inclement weather, high mountains and deep gorges....

The great Derangement: Climate change and unthinkable by Amitav Ghosh tells stories, history and politics of climate change in a single book. The deftness of storytelling of fiction giant of our time is at full display in this remarkable book on imminent crisis the planet earth is facing today. Amitav Ghosh, the celebrated author expiates or in other word introspects on behalf of fellow writers by writing this extraordinary non-fiction.  Why the master story teller resorts to non-fiction? The answer comes from the author himself - “Yet, it is a striking fact that when novelists do chose to write about climate change it is always outside of fiction”. The author rues elsewhere in the book, “If certain literary forms are unable to negotiate these torrents, then they will have failed- and their failure will have to be counted as an aspect of broader imaginative and cultural failure that lies at the heart of climate crisis”. This era of collective failure of art a...

Saeed Naqvi’s “Being the other: The Muslim in India”  is a partial memoir and partial his account of unfolding events in modern India which he witnessed from close quarters as a journalist. The shilanyas ceremony of 1989 at Ayodhya, the writer says acted as catalyst for writing the book which germinated for six decades.  The book is also an elegy to the syncretic Hindu-Muslim culture of Lucknow and its vicinity which was cultural capital of erstwhile Awadh.  The noted journalist grieves in the introduction of his book, "Rather, it's a chronicle of my growing disillusionment, disappointment, with the direction in which the country is heading". The lucid language is a joy for a reader. The style is adorable and gripping. But the esteemed scholar failed to shed his biases. Only three chapters into the book and one encounters writer’s elitist, sectarian prejudices. The writer quotes Akbar Alahabadi’s couplet. Council mein bahut Syyed Masjid mein faqat Jumma...