Tomichan Matheikal's blog

‘Can you teach a 55-year-old man to drive a car?’ I asked the woman who sat in the driving school’s office. That was four years ago. I had quit Delhi and taken up job in Kerala. Since Maggie and I worked in a residential school in Delhi which provided us with staff quarters on the campus, we had never thought of buying a car. For emergency, there was my ancient Bajaj Chetak.   ‘Why not?’ The woman gave me a broad smile. She was nearly as old as I was. ‘Recently a 60-year-old man got his license through us.’ Her son was the instructor and he succeeded in teaching me driving in a few weeks. I wasn’t quite confident in the beginning and even thought of giving up more than once.   My nights were haunted by spectres in the shapes of gear lever and other car parts. But learn I did. Eventually I bought a car and drove through the rugged terrains of surrounding villages just to reinforce the confidence that had found its way into my being. I am not a reluctant learner, however

Your eyes sparkled with love when you came My eyes longed for the sparkle But the sparkle was stolen long ago By gods. God, oh gods, Why have you forsaken me? Too many hues and colours you have And no heart. I have a heart.

A question that has been haunting me for quite some time is whether heroism is as dead as the dodo especially in India. Heroes died quite a while ago in literature. Writers replaced them with ‘protagonists’. Protagonists are entitled to their peccadillos while heroes are not expected to have even a toe of clay. Not only Caesar but even his wife should be above suspicion.   Gauri Lankesh Heroes must possess certain qualities. They must be brave , first of all. Gauri Lankesh was brave enough to question the atrocities of the mighty and the powerful. She paid for her bravery with her life. She couldn’t have been braver than that, of course. There have been others too like her: M M Kalburgi, for example; killed again for the same crime. A few like Sanjiv Bhatt IPS will spend their lifetime in prison.   Sanjiv Bhatt Bravery is not enough to make heroes, however. Villains are brave too. Heroes are guided by an exemplary moral code in their personal life. They have very

Rampur, July 1947. “You have lived your life,” Yakub Khan said to his mother. “Mine lies ahead of me. I don’t think there’ll be a future for Muslims in India.” Major Yakub Khan was a young officer in the British Viceroy’s bodyguard. Lord Mountbatten, the Viceroy, had drawn up the details of the country’s partition.   Soon the landmass that the British called India would be cut up into three segments and two nations. True, the Pandit and the Mahatma had not given in to the demands of the extremists to name the new country Hindustan. True also, the Pandit and the Mahatma were magnanimous enough to let the new nation be secular. But a time will come when puny-minded people with small hearts in big breasts will rise to power and create a nation of heartless citizens. “I don’t understand this,” his mother told Yakub. She looked out at the drive that led to their family mansion. Her husband was the Prime Minister to the Nawab of Rampur whose palace stood a stone’s throw away

I was doing a little research on the princely states of India prior to the country’s independence. I wanted to construct a reading comprehension passage for my students on those states so that the students would realise what a complex country India was when Mountbatten was grappling with the Congress leaders and Muhammad Ali Jinnah to determine the destiny of the independent India. What I stumbled upon turned out to be as entertaining as enlightening though I couldn’t use much of that stuff in a passage for my students. Quite many of those princes were fabulously funny creatures. Their egos and their antics made me wonder how such caricatures become rulers [even today] and why the substantial part of human history dedicates itself to recording the follies and villainy of these cartoons. Of the 565 princely states, over 400 were nothing more than fiefdoms of some 50 square kilometres or less in area. A good number of them were efficient administrators, no doubt. But some of

Jonathan Livingstone Seagull is a short novel by Richard Bach. Jonathan is a seagull that is bored by the usual routine of life: eating, mating and sleeping. He wants to do something more meaningful. So he chooses to perfect the art of flying. The moment he makes that choice he is stepping out of the crowd; he becomes different from most others in his community. Soon he is cast out by his community. Jonathan goes on to learn the subtleties of flying and becomes a master of that art. He remains outside his community during this period of learning. Once he becomes a master, he returns to his community to teach those gulls that are willing to learn from him. He has more than flying to teach. He is a real Master. We can divide Jonathan’s life into three phases: 1. The Novice . He is a learner at this stage. He has the urge to learn something new rather than go with the herd. The usual routine of life, what most others do without thinking a bit about what they are doing, fai

“My cat is dying, Swamiji,” Aravind says to Yogi. “Please perform a miracle and save him. I love him and cannot live without him.” The yogi is famous for his miracles. He heals the sick merely by a touch. Sometimes he materialises ashes from the air with a wave of his hand and the ashes heal those sick people who cannot come to the yogi’s presence personally. Of late, the yogi is thinking of joining politics where he can perform greater miracles like healing the whole country. Moreover, yogis becoming politicians has become the style of the day. The yogi-king, Plato would have approved. “Your problem will be solved, my son,” Yogi says to Aravind. “Go home in peace.” Aravind is happy. It is not easy to gain such personal access to the yogi. Only those who offer fat donations to the yogi’s ashram get such access. Aravind had given half of his property to the yogi’s ashram and the yogi was mighty pleased since the property lay just adjacent to the ashram complex. “Isn