Tomichan Matheikal's blog

Fiction “We can’t postpone the delivery anymore,” Shiv Kumar told his wife. Lakshmi’s labour pain had started long ago.  A week ago, to be precise, the day after the Prime Minister had declared all high denomination currency of the country invalid.  There was only one private hospital in the small town near their home where delivery cases would be entertained.  That hospital flatly refused to admit patients who didn’t carry valid currency. “We can pay by debit card,” pleaded Shiv Kumar. “Sorry, we don’t have that facility yet.  Take your wife to the government hospital.  They will accept invalid currency.” Lakshmi flatly refused to go to a government hospital.  “I won’t have my son born amidst filth and that too paid for by invalid currency.” Son, yes, they knew it was a son and not a daughter they were going to beget.  Lakshmi had conceived after they had undergone the Divya-Putrasanjeevani treatment carried out by Gurudev Baba who had miraculous cures for

Book Review We live in a world in which “fair is foul and foul is fair” much more than in Shakespeare’s time.  Good people often become victims of foul systems or villainous individuals.  What if some good people are also shrewd enough to understand the hazards underlying the system and come forward to help the good but helpless people? This is an interesting question raised by Madhav Mahidhar’s murder mystery, Blood in the Paradise – A tale of an impossible murder .  The book is a straightforward murder mystery, a suspense thriller and a tremendously gripping read.  It is literally unputdownable because the police questionings and the court trials are riveting.  Madhumitha who has an unhappy married life as her husband Vikas Nandan became an alcoholic and womaniser decides to end her life along with those of their little twin daughters.  She survives, however, and the children have not been administered the poison yet.  But the husband dies absorbing the same poison

When the going is tough, exhortations are the cheapest. In the wake of the currency crisis, Baba Ramdev has asked us to starve for a week like the soldiers at the borders .  “ When there is a war, soldiers face many hardships and starve for weeks. Can't we, for welfare of the nation, endure this hardship for a few days?" Ramdev asked. The donation box opened in a church in Kerala A church in Kerala opened up its donation box to the public.  People were allowed to take the change available so that they could meet their urgent needs.  That’s better than doling out exhortations.  What’s religion if it only preaches?  Ramdev is a man who owns a business empire whose assets run into thousands of crores of rupees.  Could he not set some examples by providing medicine and food free to some deserving people instead of merely dishing out an exhortation?  Every good deed spreads more positive vibrations than a million exhortations? My personal experience with the demonet