Skip to main content

Bastards, Saints and India


This cartoon fascinated me.  Just like most cartoons in The Hindu, this too unfolds the infinity before us, the ordinary mortals.

The sadhu and the sadhvi are supposed to live a life of renunciation.  They should be somewhere in the Himalayas braving the snow and the landslides.  Or in some jungle covered with a gargantuan anthill.  Acquiring the wisdom that they failed to acquire in the normal course of life.  Instead they are in the Indian Parliament calling some Indians bastards.   

The Parliamentary proceedings in India have been stalled for days because of one such saintly woman who became a sadhvi by climbing up the elevator of success with the help of the Prime Minister rather than climbing up the arduous stairs of austerity and contemplation.  Or plain hard work like a few of us Indians.

In the meanwhile the government of India, under Mr Modi’s dynamic leadership, had already cut down Rs 11,000 crore from the Education budget.  Education is not important.  Becoming a sadhu or a sadhvi may help.  (Sanskrit is important in that process.)  Becoming a trader will help better.  Becoming a politician will surely help.

I am a bastard teacher in this country.  Bastard, because I belong to that category  officially designated by Sadhvi Niranjana Jyoti, Union Minister appointed by Mr Narendra Modi.  Teacher, because that is my profession for the last three decades. 

Thank you, Prime Minister, for giving such wonderful laurels to your citizens.   

But look at the cartoon once again, please.  The halo keeps changing even before the people are dead.  Today’s hero is destined to be tomorrow’s bastard, especially in your regime. 

Comments

  1. It was indeed a humiliating and embarrassing remark from a Parliamentarian. Wonder if future parliamentarians will have people from all factions except the smart and educated class.

    Teachers are next to parents and there's hardly any respect to this profession unfortunately.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Even if one is not highly educated, one can be civilised, I'm sure. A sadhvi has to be more than civilised. Such remarks coming from a sadhu or sadhvi make us sit up in shock.

      The profession of teaching was mentioned only to imply that I consider it my identity. Such identities are also under threat these days, it looks like.

      Delete
  2. That is too unfortunate about the slashing of budget for core sectors. Really worried what negative effect this is going lead to.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm afraid Mr Modi has got his priorities all wrong. He may bring in some economic achievements and also succeed in making Pakistan a more intimidating enemy. Beyond that, he is likely to do a lot of harm to the country - that's my perception.

      Delete
  3. we beat ourselves in derogatory remarks, uncouthness and barbarism ... corruption, misdemeanour and not being human ko to hum bahut pehle hi peeche chod aayen hai... it one of the many the lowest of lows which we can go ...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Perhaps, it is more about winning Brownie points, Kokila. I think the BJP workers are vying with one another to get noticed by the PM who has already become a Superman. They are making such statements merely to get his approval. He opposes such statements in public but appreciates them privately, I guess. See the kind of people whom he promotes to higher positions.

      Delete
  4. I was so impressed with our prime minister when he spoke to the students of our country on teachers day. I have no shame in admitting that I like our PMs style of working. This time though I am at a loss of words, how does it make sense in cutting the budget? Teachers are already paid peanuts, there aren't enough schools and now this budget cut. Working when kids are small is important for us to have a good set of citizens, this cut is going to harm us in many ways, specially our future.

    Sadhu and Sadhvis in today's world are people who are entire caught in every aspect of every sin, but they wear the saffron color and are given respect.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Priorities are changing, Athena, as I commented above.

      Religion is a commercial enterprise today. Nothing to do with spirituality. See the ways Babas are being exposed.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl

Joys of Onam and a reflection

Suppose that the whole universe were to be saved and made perfect and happy forever on just one condition: one single soul must suffer, alone, eternally. Would this be acceptable? Philosopher William James asked that in his 1891 book, The Moral Philosopher and the Moral Life . Please think about it once again and answer the question for yourself. You, as well as others, are going to live a life without a tinge of sorrow. Joyful existence. Life in Paradise. The only condition is that one person will take up all the sorrows of the universe on him-/herself and suffer – alone, eternally. What do you say? James’s answer is a firm no . “Not even a god would be justified in setting up such a scheme,” James asserted, knowing too well how the Bible justified a positive answer to his question. “It is expedient that one man should die for the people, so that the nation can be saved” [John 11:50]. Jesus was that one man in the Biblical vision of redemption. I was reading a Malayalam period...

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...

The Real Enemies of India

People in general are inclined to pass the blame on to others whatever the fault.  For example, we Indians love to blame the British for their alleged ‘divide-and-rule’ policy.  Did the British really divide India into Hindus and Muslims or did the Indians do it themselves?  Was there any unified entity called India in the first place before the British unified it? Having raised those questions, I’m going to commit a further sacrilege of quoting a British journalist-cum-historian.  In his magnum opus, India: a History , John Keay says that the “stock accusations of a wider Machiavellian intent to ‘divide and rule’ and to ‘stir up Hindu-Muslim animosity’” levelled against the British Raj made little sense when the freedom struggle was going on in India because there really was no unified India until the British unified it politically.  Communal divisions existed in India despite the political unification.  In fact, they existed even before the Briti...

Loving God and Hating People

Illustration by Gemini AI There are too many people, including in my extended family. who love God so much that other people have no place in their hearts. God fills their hearts. They go to church or other similar places every day and meet their God. I guess they do. But they return home from the place of worship only to pour out the venom in their hearts on those around them. When I’m vexed by such ‘religious’ people I consult Dostoevsky’s novel The Brothers Karamazov in which there are some characters who are acutely vexed by spiritual questions. Let me leave Ivan Karamazov to himself, as he has been discussed too much already. In Book II, Chapter 4 [ A lady of Little Faith ], a troubled woman comes to Father Zosima, the wise monk, and confesses her spiritual struggle. “I long to love God,” she says. She knows that she cannot love God without loving her fellow human beings, or at least doing some service to them. The truth is, she says, “I cannot bear people. The closer they ...