Tomichan Matheikal's blog

We are the beggars begging for our own money Standing in serpentine queues before Automated bureaucratically heartless machines. The boss will charge a cess For giving us our own money and peddle us promises in return. There is food in the market. Vegetables rot on the stands For want of money to be bought. Fruits rot. Fish and meat rot. Money rots in our accounts. We live in a rotten country. Having everything, we have nothing. Not even voices to speak out. We mistrust the very air we breathe. The person standing behind or in front in the queue Is my enemy in all probability. There are only patriots with burning hearts And traitors to feed the passion’s blazes. My government is the wizard of words. Words conjure up a utopia, paradise, in people’s fancy, Swachh Bharat where wealth and all else is white, Whose godman sells  miraculous   fairness creams For whitening all that is black. Whiteness is Prakriti ka ashirwad. The

One of my favourite books in my early twenties was Richard Bach’s Illusions .  It begins with the story of a water creature whose fellow beings spent their entire lifetimes clinging to the river bottom “for clinging was their way of life.”  This one creature decided one day that its existence was absurd.  “Clinging, I shall die of boredom,” it said and let itself go. It went down the stream trusting itself to the current.  The creatures downstream said, “See a miracle!  A creature like ourselves, yet he flies!  See the messiah, come to save us all!” The creature told them that he was no messiah.  That only they could be their own messiahs.  He asked them to let go and embark upon the adventure that life really is. But the creatures loved to cling.  Clinging was what they were used to for generations and generations.  Clinging, they made stories about a Messiah who came to deliver them once upon a time.  Richard Bach’s story ends there.  We may carry on and say tha

India is passing through a historical period of self-purification.  Our Prime Minister is putting an end to black money and corruption.  Our Supreme Court is feeding patriotism into our hearts via cinema halls.  Now the apex court has weaned our politics from our gods.  125 crore Indians may go down in history as the people who sanitised a whole polity. Can politics exist without corruption?  Can greed be washed out of human hearts?  Can religion be separated from public affairs especially politics? Politics and Corruption Corruption is an integral part of politics simply because politics is about power and power is about subordination of most people by a few.  Subordination, swindling, manipulation, exploitation... these are the normal synonyms of power unless you are a dyed-in-the-wool idealist.  There is no power structure without bribery, cronyism, nepotism, extortion, parochialism, embezzlement, and whatever helps one climb up the endless rungs of the ascent.