Thursday, February 10, 2011

Sometimes a deliberation invites appreciation



Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh      Feb 9/10 , 2011   Thu  12 : 44 AM
Sometimes a deliberation invites appreciation. I deliberate to appreciate at times. Nothing insensitive about it. Contrarily, it is quite liberating. I feel liberated when I read my Father. Each time an angle a phrase a thought provokes me into wanting to immerse greater into it, with reason.
The strength of the written word has through generations held value. Those early days the manuscript and its preservation was indeed a special cause. Now with science and advancement in technology, the effort and physical strain to be able to replicate that, has largely disappeared or is about to.
The fingers that do that magical job of formation of the written do the same even now. Only the fingers move in separate directions and at diverse moves. Holding a writing utensil in your hand has been through a manifold change in meaning and in effect. Our writing utensil today, is also an element held by our hands and fingers, the format having undergone change and reform. The pains and aches of extensive usage during the times of the chalk and pencil and paper, has been replaced by computerized screens and chips that hold everything under the sun for you. Mankind, or to be politically correct, humanity has always devised means to ease the process of doing something in a more accomplished and easier way. Lets build a faster train, a larger aeroplane, better phones to communicate. There is always the need to find fault in what has been prevalent and to discover how that fault could be reversed and a better option manufactured to make life and its functioning easier.
Every moment of our existence we have always tried to improve on the past. Make that better medicine, conduct our habits involving the most modern inventions, the more efficient car, the better constructed building and that attractive clothing. In doing so we have always invited debate and discussion on whether this has diluted the attention that we gave to reason and understanding, to belief, to generational aesthetics, to our values and culture.
There is no need to be surprised with what the modern thinks - they will have reason for it, and justifiably so. The phrase ‘those were the days’ shall catch up with you sooner than before perhaps, but the equation shall not change.
I am horrified to learn that most of the modern generation abhors reading and writing. Their reading comes ready made on Google and Wikipedia. Their writing from the gauge on the mobile and the laptop at most. That odd piece of waste paper, those scribblings for reminders of important dates to remember, lists of things to do, people and timings for them to meet, all almost gone.
You do not remember your own mobile number at times, or the number plate of your car, or appointments and wishes to fulfill. All of it now substituted by the computer. That has become your alter ego, your soul mate, your brain, your body. Getting up to meet and sit and talk a point or moment through with your friend your relative or close family member, is executed through the sms mechanism, or the twitter or the response that I shall put by the morrow on this page of my personal blog. It has all been systematized. Regulators on life have never been welcomed. Especially when the importance of living in it to know and experience in real terms has always been looked upon as a necessity. Immediate response to an issue has become a rarity. The research and comment by people of some standing follows and then recognition, passage, obligations take over.
However, it has to be said that the need for immediacy - to transfer, to relate to reach out, in the shortest and quickest possible way, has always been preferred. And with the execution of rapidity come other ailments too. Too quick a response, no time for assessment of fact, no time to repair unwanted material gone out because of repairing a ’sent’ is never as good as that traditional rubber to rub out the undesired.
What then is the preferred stop ?
I am handicapped by the finger usage  … and am fast becoming unaware of the written word in my own hand. In time to come and at the rate that we move, I shall perhaps forget how to sign my own cheque. Dangerous !
But the truth is staring at us from these screens of light and information. We are now its slaves, much like most of us are committed to do, despite opposition and revolt. We may have been the originators in the past, we are now sufferers of the present. And there is no remorse in that at all. You either catch up or miss the train.
The mind then of the past runs on limited petrol. Its consumption is slow and its effect taking time to revert. Some of us change, some do not. In fact they find it a great deal offensive when in the company of those that do. It is a moment of choice and decision. To go or not with it. Those that do continue to struggle with the speed of its constant discovery. Those that do not are content. Content because they do not have to educate themselves to the fresh, they would rather use whatever they were conversant with and remain delayed slow and out of cue. But cued !
It is a mode that humanity finds itself in most of the time. A simple daily planner gadget of the 90’s still operates for me and I do not feel inclined to bring it to change. There are better versions of the mechanism, but also there is no need really to follow a planner, when all of it can and is being conducted on your mobile, or iPad.
I find the greatest problem for the previous generation is their dogged fixed motive, of how they would like to lead their life - slow sluggish and somewhat premature. Or fast and easily recognizable in todays inventions. Both let me add, are worthy of co existing and neither shall be the worse off, but yes, when options appear, they are certainly either a deterrent to them or when the need to acknowledge them surfaces.
The strength of those that remain in the past is quite formidable. It hurts their self confidence when they are challenged and cannot keep up the competition, but at the same time they will insist on running their own styles. It is, they would say too late now for change.
But let me tell you something .. they may all stick fast to their own philosophies, but are ready to mingle when asked or requested - latest test gadgetry or not !!
There is the extreme cased individuals too. They are the hoarders. They feel outdated when not in command of what is prevalent. So even though they may never ever, be capable of defining or handling the modern and the latest, they shall not hesitate to possess one.
So long as I can talk of the possession of the latest, I am fine. I may not use it ever, but so long as it lies by my side unopened and unused, it has taken care and control of the situation. Its a syndrome of never wanting to be left behind socially. Of never being the has beens, but instead be the beens and perform privately like the has beens.
That is some doing !!
Goodness ! Its getting on to 2 AM and I still have not exhausted myself from this … not this blog, but this discussion !! I shall pursue, perhaps later and perhaps in some other context ..
Its been a day like that … you know, how it is ..!!
Love and much more than  …. ya … !!

Happy for those that loved my verse Not being adequate is so adverse



Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh  Feb 8 , 2011    Tue  10 : 41 PM
Happy for those that loved my verse
Not being adequate is so adverse.
Yes I know you talk of genes
Ha ! jumping jacks and boiling beans !
Far I be, t’ward such greatness dears,
You give me more than deserving cheers.
These are languid, mean less, lesser words
Words and words and words and words !
No heed to them, no cause and reason
Just gluteus, bore-sum, ugly flotsam !!!

The world is small and so intriguing. What goes up comes down, what vanishes once takes a while to turnaround.
While I work today I discover my director having family links with those that had links with my family years and years on. Amarnath Jha, the Vice Chancellor of the Allahabad University at the time my father was there and with whom there was a great respectful association, has turned out to be a grand uncle of Prakash Jha my director of ‘Aarakshan’. LK Jha a distinguished and prominent bureaucrat in Delhi and with whom my parents had a close association and who’s daughter Piku Jha studied with me in the Delhi University, the petite, soft gentle and a most cultured and wonderful wonderful person, is a close relative to Prakash ji ; his aunt. Piku married Kenneth Maharaj Singh, a colleague of mine in the University from a different College and with whom I was chosen as one of the three men that were to perform in a play in Miranda House, the ‘it’ girls College !
And I just cannot believe that this conversation came about quite by accident on the sets today. Goodness what a small world and how life brings it around in the most peculiar way.
My Father’s biography and his days with the Allahabad University are full of descriptions of the time spent with Jha Saheb, as Amarnath Jha was respectfully called. His meetings on education, on life and the course of his own personal pursuits, in particular his decision to go to England to do his PhD in English Literature, all coming from Jha Saheb. And the most remarkable incident that occurred when my Father had gone to the office of Jha Saheb for his very first meeting.
Jha Saheb was not in the room and my Father was asked to wait for him at his desk. While waiting, my father noticed a few jewel stones lying on Jha Saheb’s desk and he stated playing with them when suddenly the V-C entered. In his nervousness the stones being played with, got disturbed and one such stone fell off the pile on the ground.
On noticing this Jha Saheb in his powerful and grand voice immediately blurted out to my Father :
“Pick that up Bachchan ! That is your stone !”
The stone was a blue sapphire, an astrologically very powerful stone according to Indian astrological tenets. Known to bring great profit success and wellness when worn, and also for its devastating negative effects if it does not suit your horoscope. A stone that is recommended even by the experts to be worn with great care, because of its great pro and anti qualities. It is worn as a ring on the middle finger and my Father took that stone home and wore it as a ring for the rest of his life. After his passing away we have kept it secure in the house. The incident happened in the 40’s, my Father passed away in the early 2003. Wore it so, for over 60 years every day !
I have been also recommended similar blue sapphire stone to be worn and  have been wearing it from the late 90’s till date. Stones of various kinds and value and color and intensity are a common recommendation from those that study horoscopes as a scientific profession, and this recommendation and the emerald on my small finger has been given their blessings. I do not know if the effects as they say do actually work, but the sincerity with which it is given and the purity of its intent by family, coerces you to keep it on.
Ah ! Those days of yore and its nostalgia are so infectious. Every thing comes back like a memory page of a well read book. Each character well defined, each incident clearly enacted, each moment vivid and full of detail. Who would have ever imagined that sitting in Bhopal, miles and years away from Allahabad and Delhi, on the set of a film being shot inside the College premises of a renowned Oriental College, the director of the film would suddenly bring up this association and topic and talk. At times one feels it has been all ordained by some force, as it were. A force unknown to all of us !
There are then the patterns of life which we are so unaware of, but when they do occur, it is difficult to ignore the thought that someone sits and plans very meticulously, the how and when and where of it. Believers shall have theories that may support such argument and equally the non believers shall have their strong protestations, but it would be very difficult to completely do away at times, the manner in which tides of time and life perform and unfold !!
Would I have ever imagined that the process of typing in a few thoughts every day would build for me and for many others, an association, a ‘family’, that has become a force to reckon with, in deed and word and action !! You were all just another name in my existence, but now a powerful personal presence - aliteration and all !!
My love to you .. do not be too taken in by the astrology .. and yet may you perhaps learn not to ignore it entirely ..
abhindi
Amitabh Bachchan
Source:  Big B Blog

The morning hours of early rise Bring forth momentum



Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh      Feb 7,  2011        Mon  9 : 58 PM
The morning hours of early rise
Bring forth momentum, or end in cries.
We are but bound to private lease
High above in clouds of peace.
Reading and catching and calling on news,
There are so many, of multiple hues.
Low on land of destination
The clarity of objects our habitation.
Walk to pleasant climes, and into work
Straight on to face ‘er nothing to shirk ;
We are but creatures of instant command
Follow forth in dress in word and demand
Repeated repeated repeated we reap,
Satisfied until we be in deep heap.
There is a strain on vocal galore
Tomorrow in base in measure secure.
Fed by the kindness of age love and care,
A daily routine a generous fare.
And now to the board to link to write
Wonder if all would liken in spite !!
I wish at times to possess the liberty and protection of a journalist. The freedom to express what I felt, secure in the knowledge, that it shall never ever be questioned. That it shall always have the protection of its vast but immensely possessive fraternity. That even in error or damage it would be umbrella-shaded, diluted, made inconsequential, and quickly forgotten. That it shall have the power to remain a reference for posterity, irrespective of its authenticity or caliber. That it shall form opinion for billions, set their minds, be conclusive and have a permanence beyond time. That it become the base from where other decorated bases could prosper and emerge. To be in the exalted belief of possessing superior qualities of literacy, knowledge and education. Of knowing continuously that all the ‘other’ is but a reflection of an inferiority, in a realm which envelops your superiority. Of having the strength of power to demolish belief, standard, effort, opinion, decision, without ever having to live through the pain and joys of their creation. Of sitting regally on throne of judgement, of passing dictat, order and watch kingly like, its orders being obeyed and followed. Of making decision on who’s pandering to pander to and who to keep in abeyance. Of who to juggle and who to spin. Of how to lead one to prominence and pull the other behind. Of having the authority of value and designation and number. Of being in tune continuously with all that is in vogue and be able to declare another’s shallow form at will. Of having determined presence at any time place or hour to demand attention and response, and to judge it by your own personal breeding of it - or perhaps the breeding of the senior.
Of seeking desperately that exclusive column, that hint of evidence to build along. Of possessing the joy of manufacture and connive, belching it out after its done, for fresh morsel. Of being oblivious to sentiment and feeling. And still be able to end the day in comparing how the day fared outrageously favorable, in bringing to distress those gullible, innocent clients, living and existing in morbid defame and horrified public impression.
Knowing, that as I rest the night in peace, I would have disturbed the peace of the ‘other’ for life and perpetually.
But then I think … do you reckon I could ever become this entity …
Naaahh !! Never ! I could never be as qualified as them !
Good night !
Amitabh Bachchan
Source:  Big B Blog