The Aftermath

                                                   What an Argument!   My penny worth to the fire lit in the unprecedented session of the Lok Sabha. I must extend my compliments to the opposition leader’s keen sense of observation. As a staunch Hindu, I had never paid heed to the fact that the Trishul was placed behind the left shoulder of Lord Shiva and not the right one. For me, he is Mahadev, lord of the lords who just by opening his third eye can cause the apocalypse or pralay. Why would he need to lift the Trishul with his hand? Left, or right? And even if we were to look at it not from a stance of faith but of rationality, how does the position of the aforesaid weapon prove that it was not meant to be used? Has the young leader who proposed this theory read in any shastra that Lord Shiva was right-handed? Maybe the artis...

  I was delighted.   Not just by the sight of the beautiful sand dunes in the distance and the comparatively untouched countryside which spread on both banks of the road or with the smooth, never- ending stretch of tarmac which didn’t challenge my spine with unexpected jolts from hidden pot-holes.     My husband and I were enroute from Jaisalmer to Jodhpur from where we were to catch a flight back to the capital and the drive was like skimming over water. Notwithstanding the prospect of facing Delhi’s erratic mood during the monsoons and the ensuing traffic snags, my spirit soared.   The real reason for my euphoria had been born at a moderate highway motel where we stopped for a midway tea break and which was pretentiously named The Palace Hotel . As we warmed our hands around steaming mugs of coffee, my husband smilingly confided that the cabbie had been enquiring from him whether I was a foreigner or an NRI.   Well, I am neither a blonde ...

The Aftermath So much has been shared on the social networking circuit about the Covid pandemic and its aftermath that one would feel that everything that could possibly be said or written has already been penned, and that too several times over. But, like everyone else I too would like to believe that my perspective is refreshingly different so here goes…. When I was a child I read a story. I haven’t the faintest clue  what it was all about but one line stands out clearly in my mind ‘ it is a ill wind that blows no one any good’ . And I do believe that although this gross tragedy with its disastrous fallout of lives lost and countries thrown into a tizzy,  is a nerve racking experience; at a very microscopic level ,it has its own share of a silver lining. I have started waking to the chirping of birds, a sound that had been lost in the pandemonium of mechanical, fast- paced living. These little winged creatures are subtly asserting  their stake ...