Yard Of The Bards – A revolution is simmering in your neighbourhood!

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The expansive Cubbon Park seamlessly transforms into a cultural melting pot of the city on weekends. There are so many events happening at any particular time that one shouldn’t be surprised to find a couple of poetry events underway in two different corners of the park at the same time. However, when one is faced by the question – how much is enough? it becomes clear that no number of such events would be enough. Imagine a city, a village or a town with lines of the named and unnamed poets and vacillating voices of various developmental philosophies of the time, floating in the air. What pleasure it would be to see people discussing ideas and just ideas everywhere! Utopian dream? Maybe, but this group doesn’t care.

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Grapes of Wrath -‘We take a beatin’ all the time.’

Gunjan Vashisht2 Comments

I like to look at a book as though it was formed like the universe (with all the conjectures) and grew and nurtured on the world around it. However, a book is incumbent to live up to this perspective.

Grapes of Wrath is such a book. It starts from the dust bowl Oklahoma and moves to California, tracing the trajectory of becoming and unbecoming of migrants, a family seen from close quarters by the author and the graph it scales. While it is the essential storyline of the book, Grapes of Wrath has been able to capture life as it is. I can conclude the book with this imagery: concentric circles, where, in the outermost circle lies nature, in the middle is the Manself (a word coined by the author to denote man and his desires) and within their lap lie the Joads (the family). Continue reading “Grapes of Wrath -‘We take a beatin’ all the time.’” →

तैमूर-Timur-Lang-Langda Tyagi और नाम में क्या रक्खा है?

Abhishek JhaLeave a comment

लंगड़ा त्यागी ने अपने लड़के का नाम तैमूर रखा है। इस से ट्विट्टर वालों का मुंह फूल गया है। गुस्से की वजह है – तैमूर का मतलब होता है लोहा। कोई अपने बच्चे का नाम लोहा कैसे रख सकता है? लोहा अली खान पटौडी – कैसा अटपट नाम रख दिया है! जब चाँद, सोना जैसे नाम उपलब्ध थे, तो ये लोहा क्या सोच कर रख दिया ? Continue reading “तैमूर-Timur-Lang-Langda Tyagi और नाम में क्या रक्खा है?” →

Insulting the Quran!

Abhishek Jha1 Comment

While browsing through the books on my bookshelf last night, ‘The Quran’ published by the Salaam Centre, Bangalore landed in my hands. I believe that each book that we buy or read gets a memory shot tagged to it. When we come back to pick those books again in distant future, we invariably travel time. Same happened with this book. I had to travel only a year back – 2015, Bangalore Book Festival at Palace Grounds. One incredible experience that I had thought of penning down and for some reason, completely forgot; it has come to this day that I write about it.

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To See Is To Believe?

Abhishek JhaLeave a comment

A circular was read out in the classroom. It had been decided by the school management that students from Std 8th – 10th would be taken on an educational tour to Calcutta. I was in 8th standard then. I was excited enough to convince my parents about the idea. I set my plans straight about the places I had to visit and spent the night taking a virtual tour of the city in my dreams.

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Bangalore Mirror ran this blurb for its news story. What happened next …

Abhishek JhaLeave a comment

What happened next shall be a lesson for Bangalore Mirror. When the citizens act more mature than the so called conscience keepers of the society, we should not lose hope of a better future for our nation. The story runs like this – Bangalore Mirror reported a crime incident in the city – “A 40-year-old man is fighting for his life in the ICU after being stabbed and robbed behind Mecca Masjid in Austin Town in the wee hours of Sunday. After the robbers left him bleeding on the deserted street, he ran 1.5 km to reach home, and collapsed at the doorstep……”
The man is fighting for his life in ICU and we hope he recovers well. However, men at the social media desk of Bangalore Mirror wanted to get more visitors and shares and likes and follows and what not – so a plain report detailing the incident wasn’t enough. The social media link came with the following blurb while the article didn’t have a single mention of ‘Patna‘-

“Shocking! Is Bengaluru the new Patna?”

Now, how much of the comparison is true/untrue is something I will leave to the sensibilities of the readers. It’s not very difficult to bring up a comparative study of crime rates of Indian cities. However, there is no denying that the introductory note to the article was in utterly poor taste and a vulgar visage of sensationalism. However, many of the readers chose to react to this mockery of journalism in a way that surprised me. While I had expected an unfortunate bickering between Bangaloreans and Patnaites because of Bangalore Mirror’s hara-kiri, I found something that must have made the social media rookies at BM chew their own feet.

Following are a few comments that we have chosen to highlight from the article link on Facebook. We salute these sensible readers for showing such maturity in an age when media is trying its best to disintegrate the society.
Do let us know what you think about all of these –

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Nothing to write about!

Abhishek Jha24 Comments

And suddenly I have nothing to write about. A long night at work – I wanted to write about it – how tiring and hopeless situations you grow into at around 2.30 am in the morning typing in some code that you are no longer sure of. I wanted to write about that. I wanted to take a shot at poetry – dead of a night – smoky chilled air – rains – thunderstorms – trees wavering like tresses of the love I deserved – I might have jotted down the perfect poem for the moment. I wanted to write about my struggles. I would  have liked to finish my debut novel  in a one night’s shot. I wanted to write a tale – a disarming one or maybe even a spooky one that would leave me in despair by the end of it – perfect setting of a night and an under-construction would-be corporate building – cranes, dump-trucks, excavators all lying dead like there never was any life in them. I wanted to make new metaphors and similes- like a bulldozer’s night sleep  or lie like a windowpane!  Continue reading “Nothing to write about!” →