Tomichan Matheikal's blog

Short Story Manmohan returned home from the market with a bottle –  among the usual things –  that was totally unfamiliar to Meera, his wife.  “The tide is turning,” explained Manmohan, “and I’m going to celebrate it.” Manmohan was a teacher in a residential school which was taken over by a new management a couple of months back.  The new management was of the opinion that the old faculty was responsible for the “downfall” of the school.  “A school is its faculty,” asserted the new chairman.  So most of the faculty was asked to leave.  Manmohan was among the few who did not merit the axe yet. Yet! That’s not what he was celebrating, however.  “I won’t be able to meet you the whole day from tomorrow,” said Manmohan to his wife.  “See, I work in a residential school where I’m not just a teacher.  I am a parent to the students in the hostel, a guide to the students when they are in study, a tutor to the weak students, ...

The King said, “Who can get rid of that priest for me?” And Thomas Beckett was killed. Party workers go beyond the wishes of the Leader. I wish I could be a party worker.

“But you worship money, Nate.  You’re part of a culture where everything is measured by money.  It’s a religion.” “True.  But sex is pretty important too.” “Okay, money and sex.  What else?” “Fame.  Everybody wants to be a celebrity.” “It’s a sad culture.  People live in a frenzy.  They work all the time to make money to buy things to impress other people.  They’re measured by what they own.” This is part of a conversation between two characters, Nate and Rachel, in John Grisham’s novel, The Testament (1999).  Rachel is a missionary in a remote part of a swampy land called Pantanal in Brazil.  She was the illegitimate daughter of one of the richest men in the world, an American industrialist named Troy Phelan.  But she had severed all links with her father (there was little more link than her name) after the death of her mother.  She had even changed her name so that nobody would ever link her with Phel...

“One 2010 study of 16 of India’s biggest states did look at the effect on poverty in backward groups of their getting quotas of representatives, from 1960 to 2000. The report’s authors, Aimee Chin and Nishith Prakash, say theirs is the only study ever to ask how an affirmative -action policy, of any sort, has affected poverty in India. Their conclusion: for “scheduled tribes”, who are conveniently crowded near one another on electoral maps, greater political clout has indeed led to a small drop in poverty. But for the “scheduled castes”, by contrast, it has made absolutely no difference at all.” This is the concluding paragraph of an article in the latest issue of The Economist .  The article argues that the policy of reservations implemented in India for decades has been ineffective.  The vast majority of the marginalised people who were supposed to have derived the benefits of reservation continue to be poor though their leaders like Mayawati have become filthy rich...

It was Mr Viswas’s belief that a man without a religion was like a bird without wings, though he relied on Kingfisher Airlines whenever he really wanted to fly.   Business took him to many places.   But he knew too well that the ultimate place would remain beyond his reach without religion.   Where was the time, however, for praying?   Independence Day, Republic Day and Gandhi Jayanti were the only holidays he had during a whole year.   All the other days kept him engaged from the early morning alarm to the midnight chime of his bedside clock.   Thus it was that the idea flashed in his brilliant mind: ‘why not have robot do all the praying for me?’ A praying robot was instantly arranged.   Viswas called the robot Monk.   Monk knew all kinds of prayers.   Viswas programmed Monk to recite appropriate prayers to appropriate gods at appropriate hours of the day.   Monk also knew a lot of theology and a bit of philosophy and ot...