The Balore Wars

Though everyone in Ai knew that they were actually ruled by the rich and the powerful, the politicians at least acted as if the Mangoman (a mythical fellow like Shamrock Jolnes or Santa Claus. This fellow was seen only once in five years: at the time of elections.) controlled them. "Whatever they did, it was for the Mangoman. They thought only of him. They worshipped him; would lay down their lives for him."

All this was, however until the Balore wars, which turned out to be a turning point in the history of Ai. The Balore war marked the beginning of naked, shameless display of the power of money in the politics(till then, at least they wore bikinis!). It showed the people what the politicians would have to bear if they turned out to be a wee bit more scrupulous than the Lucifer(I guess Lucifer will now file for defamation!)

Balore was the capital city of Kan. Kan had its name changed once, and Balore too, had its name changed from Balore to Baloru as soon as Yapa was elected as the CM of Kan. Yapa had a lady, Sho as his confidante and she, as is usual is the case with pet ministers, was interfering in the work of all other ministries. Yapa belonged to the XYZ party. It was helped to attain powerby the Rotty brothers, two warlords in Bary. They poured in so much money in the elections that Ganga considered her reputation as the 'Giver of Wealth' gone with the wind that blew. She considered linking with other rivers to put up a united front against all these. After all, the rivers had to bear all the sins of these fellows. They were becoming so polluted nowadays, that instead of being purified, a man was sure to roast in hell if he took a bath in one of the rivers of Ai.

To Rotty brothers, however had not done all this for displacing Ganga. They had understood, like our old Godfather Corleone that political power is equivalent to ten regimes. (The Ambani brothers know this too, though they don't have regimes. And the elder one knows better! ) They were rich and powerful and unlike Ambani brothers, did not fight among themselves. They were as close to each other as Ram and Lakshman were, like Krishna and Balram were but unhappily lacked most of the good qualities of all of the above mentioned rulers and couldn't prevent Lord Indra from pouring out his wrath on the people of Kan. (To be fair, nor was Yapa able to do it. But this is Kaliyuga. Even the holy RXX feels it.)

So Kan was flooded, and the Rotty brothers alleged that it was because of the actions of Yapa and Sho that Lord Indra was angry. They wanted Yapa removed.

Yapa was a fool.(Forgive me for this outburst, but I'll tell you why.) Nobody in his right senses (I wonder whether it was because a politician that he hadn't the 'right' senses!) would go for such an all-out attack on his chief benefactor, his chief patron without considering all options. History is a mute spectator to the debacles of Sangma, Heptuallah, Pawar etc, etc. In these cases, no money was involved; even then the downfalls were spectacular, to say the least. Here, the Mammon was involved too, and so the bets were incredibly against Yapa.

My dear readers let me advice you thus: If you are a politician, and you are in power, never move against those with whom Mammon is pleased. Otherwise you'll have to share the fate of Job.

Power and honesty were never bedfellows. Nor will they be, ever.

The people thought that their CM had gone mad when he said he would tax the Rotty bros and tried to rein in the officials of the Bary district.

What could the Rotty bros do? And oh! what did they do? They struck back with such a vengeance than Medusa would have thought of changing her hairstyle for something better, in case she were living. They laid mines on all the highways the CM was expected to travel.

And what could the CM do? He cried, he wailed for the leadership to help him. But neither the national leaders of XYZ(there were far too many of them. I fear they exceed the population of Gods in India.), nor the RXX, nor his own supporters, not even his community could save him. You see, mines evoke fear in the minds. And Mammon rules the weak!

A thunderbolt, far more damaging than that of Indra, had struck Yapa - that of fate, that of the Rotty brothers!

Now, the XYZ had a famous lady doc, Sush Swa, who was close to the Rotty bros. She had suspected from the beginning that Yapa was actually under some spell cast by Sho. Or else how could a politician have the craziness to be honest in Ai. She fixed some appointments with him and brought in the Rotty brothers as well. Within a week, the war ended with all of them shaking their hands. Sho was removed. Yapa cried. For what, we do not know. Rotty bros were given back the control of Bary. The taxes were withdrawn. They declared victory. There were many small episodes of fierce battles, but they do not matter now.

The whole thing reminds me of Bollywood movies. But alas, this one reads more like one of Chanakya's conquests than Panchatantra.

Yapa and the people learnt the following lessons from this episode:

Politicians are never honest. They can never afford to be so.

Sometimes family dynasties are good. Especially, if you have a Rotty against you - whether it is one of the bros or a son.

You can fight the power of Mammon only if your forefathers were intelligent enough to leave you a legacy of being the unquestioned rulers of the country. Otherwise, you stand no chance.

Never fight against anything openly - neither the Holy Cows nor the Mammon if you want to retain your chair.


And above all,

"Anywhere in the Universe, though political power is derived from the plebeians; in the end, it is the power, and it is only the power, that matters. The concerns of the subjects are always secondary to the pursuit of the power; it doesn't matter if thunder strikes them or typhoons swallow them. The only thing that guides and should guide a politician is the lust for power."

Mangoman smiled at me now.

(Coming up next: "Ai and Chi: The Real Story" or "Love Thy Neighbour")

Structure of the (mis)government: Ai

Ai was a (namesake) republic. The President was usually called a rubber-stamp. His/her favourite pastimes included gardening, visiting other countries, jumping out of security cauldrons to make news the next day and occasionally sending back bills. Presidents were usually men, and there was a huge jubilation when a woman was made the rubber stamp.(It seems everyone was tired of seeing men being made rubber stamps. According to popular notions, women make better rubber stamps than men.)

Oooh! I forgot that the President had to help the illiterate members of the government read something known as 'oath of secrecy' and 'oath of office'. Now, this could actually be taken in any language, but people usually preferred languages they couldn't understand - so that they'd not have to bear the prick of the conscience (I do not know what the last word actually means: never met a politician wearing that flower.). in case they couldn't keep their oath (which was usually the case).

Ai had a Parliament too, with two houses - one was for the elders: you had to be 90 to qualify. Exceptions were made if you were suffering from the diseases afflicting people belonging to the age group mentioned above. Then there was a 'lower' house. You had to be a criminal or a crorepati (The members of the latter usually belong to the former category) to enter it.

The party with majority in the lower house formed the Cabinet which had a Prime Minister. The PM, as a rule was a highly educated person(to keep up appearances). The ministers were usually goons with a sprinkling of good persons (just like salt: shouldn't be too much).

The members were elected through elections. Now half the population did not know how to read and write and so never voted. Out of the remaining half, about 50% voted if they could find time for that. So the members could be said to be elected by popular vote.

Ai was divided into 25 or 28 or 30-something states and Union Territories which kept changing their names wreaking havoc with Geography textbooks. When they couldn't change their names, they changed the names of their capital cities into something unpronounceable. In case someone opposed this favourite pastime of the state legislatures, goons' associations would force them to apologize. The people were so entertained by all these that their film industry began to suffer.

(Watch out now for the next post: Balore wars)

A country called Ai

(This is a novel about the destiny of a country called Ai, which was born with grand hopes for the future and grand ambitions. Though it fulfilled many, it failed in a lot too)

Once upon a time, there was a country named Ai. Ai was a developing country with lots of people of many religions, languages, superstitions and political parties. There were two national parties (their EC said there were more; but actually there were only two): ABC and XYZ. There was CDI too, but they can be ignored.

ABC was headed by Lady San, the widow of the former Pres, Sir Ran. Sir Ran's family had ruled the country almost since independence with one or two commercial breaks in between to reduce monotony.

XYZ was a headless party (you know what I mean) whose state leaders had no national appeal and national leaders too had no national appeal - that is, no appeal anywhere in the nation. This was supposed to be controlled by a religious body called RXX, whose main aim was to build a U-no-vat at a place called U-no-vere. This was strongly opposed by the largest minority, Mi. Also, RXX and its other outfits wanted to bring in some rather arcane laws, like deciding what the citizens of Ai should eat, what they(esp, the women of some states) should wear and so on.

The Mi had an uncountable number of organizations, which from time to time issued so many bizarre orders to its followers that many people went crazy reading about them. In fact, it can be said that there was a competition for issuing the most bizarre order between RXX and its outfits on one hand and the Mi organizations on the other. Thankfully the citizens of Ai were intelligent, though not literate(I sometimes wonder whether intelligence and literacy are mutually exclusive. Just look at the re-election of the last U.S President). And so, whenever XYZ was elected to form the government, just like us, it had to form coalitions which meant it could not pass bizarre orders at the behest of RXX.

Oops! All this reads like the description of scenery in some books in which the actual story is buried so deep inside verbose descriptions of all other things in the novel except the actual story that finally the reader has to give up and wait for a review of the book or google out one to actually know what happens(hoping that at least the critic would have had the patience to read it.)

(To be continued in the next post)

Peace and death

No one seems to agree that death is peace. Death, in my opinion, is the ultimate peace. You have no worries anymore, no bad feelings to hide, no more false pretensions - you cease to exist. Though that sounds like bliss, we are afraid of death (that includes me too). The only person genuinely unafraid of death I have ever seen is my mom. I still remember the scene when she was taken to the operation theater after having a brain haemorrhage. She was damn cool, smiling at me while I could hear my heart pounding against my chest and tears rolling down my cheeks. The surgeon had told her that she stood a good chance of not coming out of that room alive - yet she was unafraid. That is true bravery - you are unafraid to meet your Maker. That takes real guts.

Thanks to the surgeons and the hospital staff, I got my mom back. My only regret about the whole thing is that I couldn't meet the surgeons who carried out the operation. I'd love to tell them how grateful I am to them - for giving me back the most wonderful, the bravest person I have met on this earth.

And of course, to God for the great favours He keeps on giving me in spite of my inherent wickedness! ;-)

Dead people are generally considered lucky as they have escaped most of the responsibilities waiting for them. This is especially true for young men and women who die. I don't know how true that is, however. This world, though not exactly heaven, is a great place to live in. It is like a blank book God has given us to write our story in. In most cases, you get to write whatever you want to. It is a great game. In fact, it is the Game.

Suicides are altogether another matter. I have still not understood why people commit suicide. There still remains life no matter how deep you have let yourself sink. You can always redeem yourself. All that it takes is courage - moral courage and not the physical courage. In fact that kind of courage is the difference between the truly great and the rest.

P.S: There is a great discussion on whether suicides are to be decriminalised. In my opinion, a person who is driven to commit suicide will already be in the depths of desperation. What such a person needs is someone to tell him that life is not about running away but fighting till the last breath. Putting such a person in the prison is actually a crime against humanity. Such persons should undergo counselling. All help must be provided to bring such persons back to life. For, we do not know, what he/she may actually turn out to be if reformed.

Death is peace alright, but a rather eerie one. I prefer a war to it - and a grand one at that.