On My Mind

If you have read something about Gandhiji, you are likely to have come across the three monkeys. He had a small statue of them. One of them covered his eyes, the message being, "see no evil". The second monkey had his ears covered, urging to "hear no evil". The third monkey covered his mouth who "speaks no evil". I believe we have grasped the message well and are doing the same; the teeny tiny difference being our ignorance of diversity. The three monkey today signify the principle - see no diversity, hear no diversity, speak no diversity; else you're a racist, xenophobic, narrow-minded, et cetera. A simple google search tells that racism is "prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior." Pretty simple to understand, right? Apparently not! Homo Sapiens reside in different parts of the world. Owing to the geographical conditions and lack of...

"Nah, this isn't catchy enough.Add something to it. Be a little creative Manoj!" "Ma'am, she's Muslim. Should we draw the image of a Muslim woman beating conservative attitudes?" "Isn't good, besides, it looks communal. Make her an underdog. That sells 100 out of 100 times." "Ok! Consider it done." Next day, newspapers carried the headline of a poor girl succeeding in an examination -  the story which motivates, the story which inspires, the story which unfortunately killed the girl! [1] The story I am talking about is of a girl from Kannur. She scored 1180/1200 in her HSS exam. But she committed suicide. The media gave her the kind of publicity she didn't want. She had been hiding her background from her classmates by choice. Media didn't bother about respecting her privacy, spiced the story up a bit and served a headline which grabbed eyeballs. The girl felt humiliated and committed suicide. For those who ha...

" It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer " - William Blackstone In his seminal work "Commentaries on the Laws of England", William Blackstone expressed this idea which though not new, was then cemented and became a profound principle in criminal law. I find this quote rather under-celebrated. To confine it to the brim of law and judiciary seems unjustified. For me, this summarises the differences between every ideology with a tinge of liberalism and those inclined towards radicalism. The focus on the rights of an individual associated with the quote has served as the baseline for Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the stepping stone of liberalism. Having journeyed through different ideologies and philosophies, it seemed we were converging to Liberalism. The year 2016, however, has seen a lot of diversions. Brexit could possibly be marked as the first event this year to reflect the shifting ideologies. People of Britain i...

" You see, their morals, their code, it’s a bad joke. Dropped at the first sign of trouble. They’re only as good as the world allows them to be. I’ll show you. When the chips are down, these… these civilized people, they’ll eat each other.  " Sitting in his cave, for the first time Bruce felt Joker could have been right. The little dialogue they shared was still fresh in his mind. With every poll Trump was winning, his apprehensions were on rise. "Do you hear it Alfred?" "Yes Master Bruce. The public is chanting Trump's name." "Could Joker be true? Would people be so ignorant to elect Trump as their president, he who feeds on hate and anger?" "Master Bruce, You should trust the people who rightly trusted in a vigilante with shades of grey. Your Father always believed in the power of people, the people he loved. Trump's presidency campaign wouldn't succeed. It can't. No one presses the button you think they would. T...