Celebrating The Death Of A Terrorist

A. A. Kasab

Kasab was hanged. It was a quick decision from Pranab Mukherjee who has been a President for less than 4 months. He assumed office on 25^th July 2012. According to our best judgment, we may assume that Mukherjee’s predecessor, Mrs. Pratibha Patil, was busy with other more important Presidential duties.

We must understand that after the hanging of Kasab, the noose is being tightened on Afzal Guru. People of the likes of Afzal Guru are political pawns. Kasab was a pawn. And every citizen could be a probable pawn. To clarify, the preceding statement should not be read that Guru is innocent.

As a citizen of India, this is not a time to ‘celebrate’ the death sentence. It’s the time to ask questions.

The question that comes to my mind is that why an Arnab Goswami of Times Now doesn’t shout for the thousands of innocents who are wrongly implicated and deteriorating in Indian Jails? Similarly, why is it that only Sarabjit Singh is the only Indian that all Indians care about? After the media coverage of vandalism, who pays the damage to the public and private properties that are vandalized by the members of infamous political parties?

Independent media is not independent the way we all assume. It is run like corporations, backed by corporations and corporations are backed by parties in command. This is something what we all know!

Dear citizens of India, please understand that this is all a façade to keep us occupied in verbal banter. To overlook the more important areas that directly affects our lives. Yes, the media asks the questions; but are these really important questions?

As citizens we should organize and with or without the support of media, let us not just ask questions; Arnab and company are doing a good job of questioning; let’s ask the right questions and follow up till we get the answers.

Authority was the second point of Henry Fayol’s 14 Principles of Management. I would like to word it as, ‘Responsibility without authority is difficult. Authority without responsibility and accountability is stupid’. But this adage, in India, unfortunately reads like this: ‘Authority without accountability is a political right and responsibility without authority is ordained for the people’.

The basic problem lies in accountability. Let’s start with the biggest question and to the people whom we know the best, i.e. ourselves; the question being: How can we become accountable?

Corruption and delay in administration, etc. etc. are like the bacteria in our intestines. They were there and will be there. They were and will be present in all the countries. Once we accept this, only then can we move ahead.

The difference in the largest democracy (India) and the some other smaller, yet functionally better democracies is that they are accountable. And I believe, our democracy is not. If governments and its officials have authority, they should be accountable for their actions. And the same should be true for the citizens.

When an ordinary citizen writes derogatory comments on a social networking website, he is held accountable and is arrested without proper procedures and then let of with an apology followed by an inquiry. But when an official, appointed by the government, be it a minor babu to a minister, commits a crime, there is an inquiry first and then action later! Is it because the citizen is more responsible than a public servant? No, because the public servants claims zero accountability as a matter of rightful inheritance!

It is a matter of accountability and nothing else. The RTI Act is a wonderful tool in the hands of the citizens to measure the public servant's accountability. It is already proving to be a thorn in their dhotis. But it is a curative measure. We need a system to make the public servant's accountability acting as a preventive measure to avoid further pain to the ordinary citizen.

The day people holding public office are made accountable, that day we would be a better democracy. Let us build a case for accountability.

For that we need to stop obsessing that we are the largest democracy. Large is quantitative, lets aim to be better, which is qualitative and that is what matters!

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Aamir Ayubi

Citizen of India

Why 'Chutiya' Is Not An Expletive.

For Reader's Discretion: The following is an attempt to explain the usage of the beloved, much loved, adored and most commonly  Indian remark Chutiya. If the word sends the yucky feel down your spine, please read the other 61 posts on my blog ;)
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When most of us listen to the Hindi word Chutiya and its two most commonly used derivatives, Chutiyapa and Chutiyagiri, we get a little uncomfortable.

A lot of these people take offense because literally, it means, 'born through the vagina' and the profane 'cunt born'.

Unfortunately the people who take offense don't know that the word may have come into existence from the above explanation, but it does not mean the same thing!

For ex. the exclamation 'Oh  Shit' is not uttered when someone encounters faeces in it's innumerable sizes, shapes, textures, smells and forms! Is it?

Chutiya can be defined as 'a uniquely Indian expletive which is endearing and rather harmless compared to other abuses, classifying the recipient as an idiot, ignoramus or someone behaving stupidly'. (definition sourced from www.urbandictionary.com) 

Chutiya is a word which is often found in the lexicon of many households, which is equally uttered by women. This should not surprise you. These people know that the word is not a verbal abuse, but a term to describe a moron. The usage is similar to the American slang word 'dumbo' to describe a stupid and especially dim-witted person.


We must understand that our Hindi word is very dynamic and usage is prolific. Our word is neither an expletive nor a verbal abuse, it is slang-ish. verbal banter.

We are smart enough to understand the difference between an expletive and a verbal exclamation.

A person will take offense of this friendly world, depending on the context in which it is spoken. Let me exemplify it for you give you a few examples.

Ex. 1: An employee has been asked by his boss to do a simple task, and yet he keeps on failing to complete it, and the boss in frustration says, "Abbe Chutiye", then the recipient will get angry because in this case, the boss is directly commenting on this employee's intelligence and capability, leading to anguish in employee's mind.

Now, see the same word when spoken in a different context .

Ex. 2: A group of friends decide to watch the latest release 'Babloo Can't Dance' and Pappu volunteers to get the tickets, but when he reaches the venue he realises that he has forgotten to bring money to buy the tickets. When Pappu calls one of his friends, he yells at him, "Abbe Pappu, kya chutiya hai be tu! You wait, I''ll come there with the money". In this case the recipient won't get angry and most probably when the friend comes, Pappu himself will have a good laugh at his stupidity.  

In both the cases, the doer acts stupidly. When the word is uttered in a formal setting (Ex. 1) it is interpreted as a verbal abuse; but, in a casual setting (Ex. 2) it is interpreted as a remark highlighting the doer's stupidity, which the doer himself, in all probability, would laugh at.

The most common derivative of Chutiya is Chutiyapa and Chutiyagiri. Both the derivatives mean the stupid action of a stupid person. So Ex.1 could have been, "Kya chutiyagiri kar rahe ho?" and ex. 2 could have been, "Kya chutiyapa kia yaar?"

Why am I trying to write a 'scholarly article' on this word? The word which the society dubs as an expletive but yet the people living in it love to speak? Because words in itself do not have a meaning. One word has different connotations depending on it's usage, context, setting, tonality, etc. We cannot blatantly penalize people for using a word!

The matter here is not of this one word, but words in general. Think about it...


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1) Thanks Mihir for pointing the grammatical errors.
2) This shows that I should not post the first draft or in haste!

You Need 2 Things To Succeed In Life, Ignorance and Confidence.

I never really understood the meaning of the quote ‘Ignorance is Bliss’ until recently.

Before we could utter identifiable words, we became part of the education system. Most of us attended kindergarten school by the time we were 3 years old. Most managed to graduate, i.e. 2 years of kindergarten and 15 years of formal school and college or university. Some of us were courageous enough to attend a post graduation or Masters, so add another 2 years. Some rare bright minds manage to pursue a Ph.D. which is another 3 years. So this is where most people fit:

• Graduate: 17 years of education
• Post Graduate: 19 years of education
• Ph.D.: 22 years of education

Assuming that most of us are graduates, it’s a really sorry situation to be in! Our minds have been ravaged and distorted in these 17 or more years. We have been told so much about everything, that we have stopped thinking for ourselves.

Unfortunately, whatever we are today is not because of us, it’s because of what we are told. And making that a base, we acted. We never knew or questioned about the things we were told. Did we? Did YOU?

Our mind is filled such elaborate, convoluted, highly structured and sophisticated GARBAGE that we have become victims of our ‘education’.

Why do I say so?

Tell me, how many of us ‘highly educated’ people of society really realize our true human potential? I can’t even give a percentage, but it’s a handful out of millions of us.

Who made it really big and make really big? Or to put it eloquently, who really come close to or achieve their real human potential? IGNORANT people!

Yes, Ignorance is bliss!

When you are ignorant, you don’t know the rules of the world. When you don’t know the rules of the world, you make your own rules and follow it. When you make your own rules and follow it, you are the master of your ‘own world’. And that’s how you achieve for what you were born.

Ignorant people are fearless. Why? Because they don’t know the rules. And when you don’t know the rules, you are not afraid to break them. Simple!

Let me exemplify. You stand in a long queue at the railway ticket counter because that’s the rule and that’s the ‘right’ thing to do. An ignoramus walks to the counter, shoves his hand with some currency and walks away and hops that train. And what do you do? You stand there and stare and do what? Most would gulp their anger. Some would sigh audibly. And one of you might shout! And by the time you buy your ticket, you missed you train, but the ignoramus was already ‘ahead of you’.

That’s true in life too.

Many of you would argue that education is the means to a content life because the learned men said so. These learned men who have passed away lie dead in their graves and are quoted in universities! Had they been practical, they’d been entrepreneurs and their names would have been alive on the things they made which helped humanity!

You need two things to succeed in life, ignorance and confidence.

– Mark Twain

Read the above quote once again. What are you watching? Read again!

Now, in context with Twain’s quote, think of every entrepreneur you know. Billionaires, millionaires or even the happy small time entrepreneur we all know in our societies. The two qualities mentioned by Twain are the heart of fearlessness. And I quoted the example of entrepreneurs because they are the most fearless people that the world today knows and respects.

Did that quote give you goose bumps? It would, if you are dissatisfied with what you’re doing after being ‘educated’.

I believe the ‘education system’ does more damage by instilling more fear than confidence.

Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore knew the essence of education. 

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments

By narrow domestic walls

Where words come out from the depth of truth

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit

Where the mind is led forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

The education we wanted was ‘where the mind is without fear’. And look what we got? We have lost reason and we are lead forward only by our fears, not into the heaven of freedom, but shackled in restraint, enslaved by the false rules, only to be searching for true guidance.

Due to the ‘distorted education’, you just know a lot.  When you know a lot, you think a lot. When you think a lot, you develop fear. When you develop fear, you fail to act. When you fail to act, you are stagnated. When you’re stagnated, you don’t grow. When you don’t grow, you DIE!

The damage is done. We all have to unlearn the false ‘facts’ and ‘rules’. That’s what I mean by ignorance. Probably that's what Twain's soul whispered in my ear! That’s how Ignorance will save you.