Awaken

Is this my country anymore?

All around me I can see people ask themselves this very question.

I believe I am a part of the golden generation of youth, deemed to be carrying the hopes of progress and glory of the nation on my shoulders along with those around me. I believe I am as much a part of the promise to my country as everyone around me is. Or am I?

If we are those touted to be proud sons and daughters of this country, to glorify it, and bring it success, then why do I sense a growing wave of cynicism amongst us? Why are so many of us choosing to pursue dreams outside this country? Why are so many of us disillusioned with the hopes of finding justice? Why are so many of us dreaming of embracing the west?

To me, those of us guilty of the above have committed the greatest sin against the hopes placed on our shoulders - Acceptance.

We have shaken our heads and resigned to a state of passive surrender as our ability and our own potential to revolutionize the state of affairs we are so discontent with, ebbs away with our sense of belonging to this truly great nation.

What we require is a burning desire to change what is around us. What we need is the realization that it is indeed US -the youth of the nation, who will decide the fate of this country. What we need, is a strong feeling of renewed patriotism.

But what is patriotism?

Is it embracing the country and shunning all that signifies western culture and its growing stranglehold on our country's youth? Is it patriotic to burn jeans and t-shirts chanting slogans of swadeshi?

To put it simply, no.

Donning a khadi kurta makes me no more Indian as wearing jeans makes me American.

Patriotism as I believe it is, can be found in anyone irrespective of his attire or style statement. I could be as patriotic in a kurta as I could be decked with Levi's and Adidas.

So what is patriotism?

I believe patriotism today must take a whole new meaning.

In a crude but not inappropriate manner, it would be simplest to define patriotism as an overwhelming sense of restlessness.

Patriotism must stem from discontent. This discontent, ought to be directed at he current state of affairs although no to the point of frustration and a potential apostasy of sorts. To me, patriotism is a longing for change and a desire to be part of that change.

Patriotism must involve a shift of thought and rationale. If you don't intend to do anything about the corruption in the bureaucracy of this nation, why scoff in a show of pointless sarcasm? How is your ranting and raving changing the system? Criticism is by no means a method of solution.

I recently got an email forward which rather passionately told me to exercise my right to 'vote no one' as a sign of discontent with the system. Apparently a voter can cast a valid vote to vote for no one. This is verifiably true.

The email called for an awakening of patriots nation-wide. A noble gesture, but more damaging and ignorantly destructive in consequence.

If people actually followed this, of course the message of dissatisfaction would be loud and clear but the action would send the already delicately poised democracy into a downward spiral. There would be political chaos to an unimaginable extent. I ask you, if no one is elected; if you are so dissatisfied, who will you turn to, to voice this opinion? Who would be in office to really care?

The most dangerous threat posed to the success of this generation is a false or mistaken belief. It is better to be passive than be misled by a false sense of patriotism.

The revolution that this country needs is on far too great a scale to take place in a short span of time. The bureaucracy and its shortcomings can only be changed from within.

Unfortunately, I speak for myself and most of my peers, when I say that I lack the will and motivation to become a part of the system. That, is the biggest problem faced by this generation

It is our duty and our obligation to do all we can to bring about a change in this system that many of us have grown to dislike. However, by not doing anything about it, we are merely compounding our woes.

Ask yourself the question again - Is this my country anymore?

I answer you - Yes, and it is now more than ever.

By,
Nikhil Menon
IV CSE B

Live-in Relation- The Practical Relation

Today, the world is progressing in a fast pace. We see developments in all fields. Even the people who had distanced themselves from all the modern changes have started looking beyond the veil. New customs are accepted as customary and new practices, traditional. But this is only one side of the coin. There is another side where the “Aam Adhmi” does not want to change with the changes. Not that it matters. But not only does he refuse to change, he also criticizes those civilized few who also changed. The recent violence that sparked out on Valentine’s Day speaks a lot about this. One of the many new customs and practices that these so-called “orthodox” people don’t want to accept is the practice of “Living in a relationship”.

Volumes of white have been stained and many a throat has argued itself to dryness on this issue. The main factor that people bring up against this is-“Society”. The fear of what the other man would say if I were to do like this, is making man to fulfill his wishes, whims and fancies within four strong walls, all alone. Practically, there is nothing wrong in two opposite sexes living together without the bond of matrimony. Is marriage really necessary for two people to get along together? This concept really sounds simple and practical. Let’s live together as friends and if we share common interests, let’s get bonded through matrimony. Else let’s continue being friends, only with different spouses. Rather than getting married to a complete stranger, about whom you are yet unaware of, this sounds and is practical and a lot better. Live in relations allow you to be choosy about your spouse, know his/her taste, interests, whims and fancies. It’s a love affair in another form. But it is a much better way than the age old “Stranger Marriage”. This does not mean that I draw lines over the age-old marriage tradition. I just emphasize that the concept of live in relation is not as bad as it is seen.

Tell a man or woman that you are “living” with an opposite sex and suddenly their attitude towards you becomes cold. The usual rigmarole about culture and tradition jumps to the people’s lips even before they actually want it to. Let me ask those gentlemen. What is culture? What is tradition? Show me any scripture, which mentions or at least hints that two people must not live together. These culture, traditions etc… were created by us for a neat way of living. Our ego does not allow us to accept the changes. Just because we do not want to change, we feel that the others who change are foolish. Tradition and culture are just masks that people wear to hide their ego.

Sex is another issue. Does live in relations mean only sex? Or is pre-marital sex wrong by any account? There are lots of other things between man and woman other than sex. And even if this relationship entertains sex, what is wrong? Sex is not something to be shared only by married people. It depends on the interest and willingness of those who are involved. One forgets that marriage is only a ritual. It is just a public announcement that two people are going to live together for life. But this has changed over the years and lots of Indian movies have added sentiment to marriage that people have got it rooted in their mind that relations or sex outside marriage is wrong. They consider it as a sin.

These false conclusions and superstitions have led people to believe that anything other than their normal way of living is dirty and sinful. But as I have said earlier, this is one side of the coin only. The other side thinks in the right way and does everything for its sake and not for the sake of those living around them. Personally, I find nothing to find fault in the concept of live in relations. Of course, nothing is free of fault. But we must realize that if we find something faulty, the source might also have been us for that. So let’s follow our hearts instead of what everyone does and bring a difference, not only in the practice of live in relations, but also in everything deemed useful to mankind.

From The Diary Of A Killer

I lie, crouched, behind the broken stump of a tree. It provides me the cover I need. The sun has not risen. My half-burnt cigarette keeps me warm, keeps me going. The ashen smoke merges with the mist, yet it fails to hamper my vision. My nerves are stiff. I do not know how long I have been waiting here. What might have been minutes seems like hours. Time has no meaning.

It is cold. Yet the sweat breaks on my brow. One wrong move, and I will lose my cover. I am on a mission, I need to kill. I've done it before. Killing means nothing. I check my sniper's rifle, again. The single bullet lies in wait, to do its duty. That is all I get - one bullet, one chance. One bad shot, and I will lose my life.

The breaking of a twig snaps me into attention. I see my target. Adrenaline rushes back. My finger grips the trigger. Aim. Fire. I was amazed at how nonchalantly I pulled the trigger. No hesitation. I see my target, dropping dead. Another mission completed.

As the sun rises, I wait for a helicopter to take me home.I have cheated death once more. But how long will this last?

Krishna R

II CSE

LONELY N LOST

I still walk alone
Trying to find what went wrong
Gone are the days when you were by my side;
Gone are the days when we shared everything;
And now gone some days without talking.

Tears glisten in my eyes
You may forget me but never will I,
I wonder….
Can we go back to living our lives at all?
Can we start all over again?
Maybe this time leaving out the sorrow.
Can we live our lives with feelings.
Will there ever be such a tomorrow?

Life just seems to go on and on
Seeming at all times empty and long
No spirit to endure
Or no hope to find a cure
But there’s a comfort inside so used to losing
Hollow ambitions
Struggling to maintain what’s left
Trying not to break, but I am so tired of this deceit
There’s a wound that’s always bleeding.
I don’t know whom to trust.
Nobody any more ushers me on my way
The tiring time in between.

Amenities of the past make me nostalgic.
But to get elation even in separation is what I am looking for.
There’s a path I am always walking
And I hate it when you are not around
Hate the fact that you didn’t call
Hate the fact that I trusted myself with you
Hate the fact that we turned the world into what we see
But most of all I hate the fact that I don’t hate you at all
Or nor have I got any close to hating you at all.

There’s an earnest longing deep inside
For something to come along and change the tide
I am stuck in, trapped her
Trying so hard to realize what is it that didn’t get along
Is it lack of warmth in love
Or is it that I jus feel so feel
Or was this all someday just meant to be?
What use is it if you cannot feel love inside and out?

The world indeed is void of love in all its way
The word happiness seems like such a lie.
I don’t know what I want
Practically lifeless with forgotten aim am I.
Contentment is now but a fabricated, blurred vision.
I kinda feel I have lost the real me
The one I used to be
Feeling so lost and lonely in this world
Is there anybody out there who cares for me.
Who can help me find the real me.
The one I used to be the better part of me.

SOWMYA
4th sem ECE

On the Past and Causality

It only seems all too poetic sometimes - This thing we casually refer to as life. What is rather remarkable, is how an action which was dealt a hand that deemed it nearly insignificant, could one day acquire a form of sheer power to drastically effect one's life at another point in time. Cruelly unfair, I'd like to think. Cruel, because it seems like one could be subject to 'persecution' for something which wouldn't normally be noticed in passing. Cruel, because it requires one that is living to truly conceive every possible outcome in all its various permutations and combinations before performing an action. Cruel, because it ruins the relevance of all that is temporarily insignificant. Cruel, because it makes the word temporary redundant in its own right.

How relevant is the past anyway? What is the point of what has already come to pass? Do those events, or those actions whose sole purpose was condoned by the simplicity and the spontaneity of a single moment truly earn a right to have some bearing in later times? Like I've said before, I believe it is cruel that they do.

After giving some thought to this whole concept, I believe I see only one logical path to define our mode of thought. When it comes to our actions, we perform each one with our own present scenarios in mind. We deem the action to be performed as 'beneficial' to our current needs, or if not 'beneficial', we maintain only our most immediate situation in mind. However, by virtue of being human we do, consciously or subconsciously , bear something else in mind. By our own innate tendency to want something better, we are only too human to avoid glancing at the action's implications on another sacred section of time - The Future.

I suppose I've answered my own question on the relevance of the past through my last sentence. By committing an action with a view to it having some bearing on the future, then I believe the past does automatically get endowed with the ability to drastically, or in some small way effect later times. It has only just dawned on me. Come to think of it, I change my view on this whole concept. It isn't cruel at all. It is merely a verification of the principle of Causality. Our actions don't innately and spontaneously possess the power to come back and haunt us one day... We give it that power.

Causality - The belief that everything happens due to a reason; The belief that everything exists due to something; The belief that something necessarily presupposes everything. More importantly, this is the belief which warrants the existence and exactness of reason itself. Personally I believe Causality is as fundamental and as logically justified as our need to breathe. It is that which exists so that the existence of everything else is deemed to have a presupposing reason. Causality, is that which exists as a product of reason itself, and promotes the faculty of thought to the highest degree.

One false belief, however, is that the principle of Causality necessarily warrants the confirmation of the hypothesis widely popular as the concept of 'Destiny' or 'Fate'. I believe this concept is a misguided interpretation of the principle of Causality.

Defenders of the 'Destiny' hypothesis who are familiar with Causality and its provisions seem to subscribe to a modified version of Causality's credo. Causality states -

"Everything happens due to a reason."

These fine crusaders of the 'Destiny' hypothesis subscribe to the following (false) summarization of Causality -

"Everything happens FOR a reason."

This, to me seems more like a poor understanding on their part, rather than an attempt at chicanery or manipulation.

If you find my idea a little obscure, then let me point out to you the difference between the two summarizations and the drastic alteration in meaning when the word 'for' is used instead of 'due to'.

The first statement, which for the sake of casual reference and analysis I shall name True statement 'A', conveys a meaning which deems everything's existence as a result of something else. 'Everything' here, must not be restricted to material objects but also emotions, actions,etc. It merely highlights the logical conclusion that for an action, there necessarily must exist an originating cause. Hence, the name 'Causality'. Perhaps my using the word 'merely' is understating the importance of this ideology. Causality has far-reaching effects in the realm of human belief and intellectual thinking. Indeed, the principle of Causality, when clearly understood, provides an alternative route for rational thought processes. It also provides a completely different outlook on life. Thus, True Statement 'A', in all its simplicity possesses phenomenal meaning. It eliminates the need for the word 'coincidence'. It replaces that word with 'consequence'.

Now consider the second statement which I shall (again for the sake of analysis) name Altered Statement 'B'. Although it differs (literally) only to the extent of a single word, its meaning and thus, its implications drastically differ from those conveyed by True Statement 'A'. Where True Statement 'A' highlights the action as a result of a specific cause, Altered Statement 'B' aims to present the action AS a probable cause itself. It modifies the core value of Causality by presenting a view that an action was MEANT to happen as a part of some 'grand scheme of things'. This 'grand scheme' forms the core value of the 'Destiny' hypothesis. It provides for the possibility that whatever has taken place, could not have happened any other way. This then sheds light on the act of choice. It presents the act of choice as an illusion only meant to serve the immediate conscious senses. Thus, Altered Statement 'B' negates the existence of choice itself!

A world without choice sounds rather difficult to perceive don't you think? Well it most certainly is. In order to envision such a world, one would have to believe that everything from when a nation goes to war, to why you rest your head on your right hand instead of your left at your desk has already been decided. You would have to believe that everything in the world is in accordance with some divine script written by some unseen hand. Even if one were to try and deliberately defy one's 'Destiny' and continually change one's decision on a subject, even then the missionary of Destiny would argue that your final decision has already been made and irrespective of one's choice, that decision was in fact preconceived. Personally, I find that rather amusing.

Causality and its far reaching effects are manifested in our lives everyday. It is in the nature of the way we go about things. In short, Causality is the one force one cannot avoid. It underscores the importance of reason and the importance of the faculty of thought. Everything must have a reason. Even if that reason is not apparent at the moment, it does not provide any 'divine' implications. The reason always exists. After all, reason presupposes existence and existence to us, is sacrosanct.

By,
Nikhil Menon
IV CSE B

worn out...still wonderful.....

Most of us enjoy shopping for new clothes every now and then. It’s quite a natural inclination which just manages to fall short of consumerism. For a change, I feel otherwise. Just scrape beneath and look beyond the freshness of brand new clothes, you may find your old, routine shirts and trousers as dear to you as the new ones. Perhaps, even more. At least I opine so...
Gradually, the fresh scent of the clothes fades away and it attains a characteristic odour of your 'personality' which has impeccable distinctness in the case of each individual. When your dear ones are away, they are most missed when you happen to find some of their shirts or saris left behind. This is so very nostalgic.

As the clothes get older, they can be personified as becoming more mature and gracefully aged than before. This can be a perfect metaphor for the course of events in a man's life. Am at my ultimate comfort when i walk around in my old tracks and faded shirt(with the collar button missing!!). This feeling is very fulfilling and hard to communicate. Dad looks at his best when he is in his age old kurta and dhoti. Mom is most adorable in her peach salwar (peach because of the fully faded colour!!!). The pink and white tee gifted to me on my 14th birthday by mom is my favorite shirt till date! So is my dark blue pant even though it’s torn and darn at the knee!! Clothes I feel are your most faithful material companion throughout your journey of life and are often "pregnant with memories". Sensitive ones share a strong bond and belongingness with their attire. In this world of diplomats and backstabbers, I sometimes feel so thankful and grateful that at least my clothes are here to reassure me. I shudder to think of the consequence otherwise! Thank you...

Prateek M

4th sem,cse

Nomad

Inaugurating the February archive.

Alone I entered,
without friend or foe.
Along the journey, adorn like jewelry,
they rise from seeds I sow.

Along the path,
they stand like trees.
Endearing but entrapping me
offering outstretched leaves.

But when Autumn comes,
the leaves being to fall,
until none remain,
to answer my call.

As I continue to wander,
only my thoughts follow.
Now hollow trees laugh at me,
mock my sorrow.
And beside them, yet not,
I dig my own burrow.

Krishna R
II CSE