Scribbles

Year 2015 was in its twilight, when I found myself in between sheets of the brilliant memoir by Amitava Kumar, titled ‘Lunch with a bigot’. All the twenty six essays left me with something to ponder. The language is very fluid and it stays there in the mind, even when you have closed the book and kept it in your rack. However, its not that simple things are always beautiful, but they are scary at times. The most haunting line that I have ever read in my life was written with the same ink as the whole book was. But the sentence appears resplendent than any other sentence in the book. It was on page number 122, the page where essay number 13 ‘Ten rules for writing’ ended. It is about VS Naipaul’s rules for the beginners which include Kumar’s tested rules as well, which he prepared for his students. Kumar, at the end of the essay quotes Annie Dillard who once wrote a simple thing “How we spend our days is, of course how we spend our lives”. Kumar says in the following lines, “Th...

These days nationwide protest is going on against institutional murder of Dalit scholar. He committed suicide because of the hostility he faced since he and his friends opposed and condemned the Yakub Menon’s hanging and screened Muzzafarnagar baki hai in the campus. The most unfortunate part of this protest is that no political party is leading the protest. It is lead by activists and students only. As read about caste, class atrocities, I feel more hallowed, I feel smaller. I know I can never understand their agony. This thought came to my mind on 24 Janury, 2016 around 11:00 pm, to be precise. I was to leave for Patna on 26 January 31, 2016, for a workshop. My roommate was more fearful than me. She told me, you did not get better day than this to travel. Her fear emerged out of her concern for me. I was confused that why she was so scared. She happens to be a Muslim and she has some valid reasons for her fears. It came to me as shock, when my Muslim friends told me they ...

Q: How do I pay tribute to women whom I read? A : Write to them; write about them, one and the best way to pay gratitude to women whom you read. They write endlessly, even when they are caught in the busiest schedules they manage to write and survive. They travel so far, get jet l a g, their brain gets tired but they write. They work so much and still remain humble, thus I sat tonight to write about women whom I read. One day I want to write long hand letters to all those women whom I grew up reading. Earlier I read Simone de beauvoir and Virginia Woolf, but ever since I started reading Indian women, my life has become sane and insane in parts; both parts complement each other very well. Maybe I connect to them more .They are home grown crops, came from small towns and made choices and stood firm on those choices. They inspire to write. As I sit in classroom, walk on roads their words keep echoing in the mind. Their work tells you to look beyond the problems, petty issue...

                                                                        Fiction She was always tied with chains of customs, rules and regulations of home. Whenever she travelled outside; she travelled behind a masculine figure -father or brother-a guardian to guard her movement in public space. Thus no matter how much she moved, chains pulled her back and despite feet in motion, she as a being was a stagnant creature. Then one day she got maroon colored steel body with two wheels, two pedals, two handles, one seat which to her was an ‘incongruous freedom’ instrument- A cycle. Every time she pedaled a chain broke that tied her to old rules of her life. Her body stir...