Mr. Buyer, please return Mahatma Gandhi's blood

At the outset, I thank you, Arnab, for bringing to our notice the most absurd auction to have ever taken place on this earth. Otherwise, our great country wouldn’t have come to know that today Mahatma Gandhi’s blood soaked soil along with a few blades of grass gathered from the site of his assassination by someone with ‘real foresight’ was bought over by a buyer with ‘equal futuristic vision’. As I had mentioned in my sms, it is the most undignified and an utterly greedy attempt to commoditize a great soul and in the process desecrate a Mahatma’s body.

India, as usual, could not prevent this most insensitive display of commercial sense in London.

I know that all things belonging to Gandhiji are immensely valuable because of the legacy attached; and because he did not possess many material things, thus, whatever little items he had on and around him, keep getting propped up at various high value auctions around the globe and sold to the highest bidder. But auctioning Mahatma’s blood soaked soil is so macabre and mindless that I took a couple of seconds to comprehend the entire issue.

The irony of the situation is that the anonymous buyer could own a piece – literally – of Mahatma Gandhi for less than 12,000 pounds! If only his intact body was preserved and now available for auction, I wonder what price the world would be ready to pay for his various body parts. Or, instead of getting a Hindu funeral by his body being consigned to fire, if Gandhiji were buried post his murder, I am sure that some “fellow with real foresight” would have dug his body out, pulled his skeleton out of his decaying muscles and hung it in a biology laboratory, and auctioned every possible piece of his body to a few enthusiastic buyers at the highest offered price! The buyers in turn could preserve their bought possessions for a few more years and get maximum returns on their thoughtful investments through auctions.

No wonder, Mahatma Gandhi is so valuable to the humanity!

But why is Mahatma Gandhi not so valuable to India? Why has India failed to preserve things related to the Mahatma? That too in spite of having legislated a law in this regard only a few years back. India for sure has adequate resources to bring back these treasures and respectfully preserve them for the future generations to see them, feel them and get inspired by them. It is time India started valuing its own heritage. Because then only the world will value India.

Gandhiji is universal in his appeal and relevance as is proven by the fact that he and his principles have inspired all the great world leaders of the contemporary times. But the same intensity of reverence is lacking amongst his own country folks and that is really unfortunate. This aspect got firmly established and exposed to the world when it took a Richard Attenborough to dedicate his film to Mahatma Gandhi; interestingly the former was a British against whose country’s rule Gandhiji had led a peaceful movement and got India its much due Independence.

A few crazy people have the argument that if we could not preserve Gandhiji and his principles in our hearts and life, what is the point lamenting the loss of his belongings including his blood in auctions. Well, to those people’s twisted sense of argument my counterpoint is that his blood cannot be grouped under his memorabilia. Why only Gandhiji’s blood, any person’s blood for that matter, or any part of the body post death has to be consecrated with full dignity and respect. In Mahatma’s case, as opined by his great granddaughter, the blood soaked soil should be bought back by the Government of India from the buyer by paying him his price – 12,000 pounds – and immersed either in an ocean or in a river.

Till then Gandhiji would keep wondering from up above the sky so high and saying in his heart, “Thanks, Arnab!” J …

I hate my female-killer India

Baby Afreen, 3 months old, when still alive, in coma, struggling to battle for life post being battered by her own father; her fault -- being a female. May you rest in peace.

Yes, I hate my India which kills its females en masse. And India has been doing it shamelessly and remorselessly for many millennia. To highlight the height of mockery, India is one of those rare societies that prides itself on its tradition of worshiping female Goddesses, putting them on the highest pedestal in the hierarchy of power in the pantheon.

The point of proof is India’s pathetically unmatched records in its gender ratio. Amongst Indians, approx. 150 females are missing for every 1000 males. I firmly believe that in an increasingly globalizing world with shrinking boundaries, the world needs to know how exactly does India manage to achieve this shocking distinction in female foeticide. Well, by simply killing its unwanted females – wherever it can lay its hands on - in womb or in any of the various phases of a female’s life cycle.

I am sure a sneek peek of the Indian traditional methods adopted to get rid of an unwanted female fetus or a kid is as diverse as the country itself! And the unity displayed in the mission is also incredible!

India has an array of tricks up its sleeves which would be beyond the wildest of the imagination of the rest of the world! And it is not the privilege of the poor; rich are equal champions in this game of eliminating females. The difference however lies in the manner and the method. A poor prefers to kill the unwanted female member once she is born. A rich on the contrary doesn’t have the time so the killing is planned in the pre-natal stage itself; in aid come the omnipresent ultrasound shops which boldly flout the legal restrictions on gender identification of a fetus. The former of course cannot afford this luxury thus sticks to the traditional methods. And whoever said that India is a developing country needs to rethink; India is for sure much advanced in technologies to determine the sex of a growing fetus! Also, whosoever said that Indians are sympathetic and kind, please reorganize your thoughts as the boys-obsessed citizens of this great country do not even blink before literally beating the hell out of a mother’s womb! Yes, it is true. Here, the “hell” is the female fetus.

The techniques followed in the post natal stage are equally diverse. Some would put large dosage of chewing tobacco in the mouth of the newborn baby, intoxicate her with nicotine and kill her. This is of course “mercy killing”. The other ways are so barbaric and brutal that the dreaded Auswitz camps in the Hilter era would seem like heaven! Many resort to drowning the girl child in milk immediately after her birth; some put her in a pot and bury her alive; and if you still have the guts to listen further, then, many male child obsessed Indians brutally torture her by biting, beating, burning, breaking her bones and bringing her to such a physical vegetative condition that a normal person with an average sized heart would pray immediate death for her – in case, of course, the little one has endured and survived the hell in hands of her own parents – that is the father and his family in almost all cases. And we Indians pretend to be messiah of kindness!

In India if a girl child has survived because of whatever factor, she is given a life which is worse that hell. There is blatant discrimination in all aspects of life – be it food, education, healthcare, clothing, freedom to live per se. A “google” would throw up shameful facts about how Indians treat their female population. And a walk in any lane in an Indian neighborhood would give a clear picture of the life of a female.

Though India is an independent country, a democratic one on top of it, but there is absolutely no freedom for a female. Her entire life is in hands of her own people and the people around her – at home and in streets. My definition of a free life for a female is when she is able to determine her own mobility, sexuality and fertility. And India cannot provide any of these. Every aspect of a female’s life is decided by somebody else – if she survives of course. She is subjected to numerous role plays at various stages of her life. She is either a daughter or a sister or a wife or a mother or a grandmother; never ever she gets treated like a human.

A sacred union like marriage is bizarrely called an institution in India. It is not considered a union or a relationship. A female is required by a male because by default she carries a womb inside her. For sexual gratification he can always have the pleasure of the company of a prostitute or he will have his prey. Rape is taken as a birthright by Indian males – and this includes marriage. And that is the reason why absolutely no value is attached to the aspect of “liking” or “choice” as in a male’s mind the private parts are the “same” in every female which is good for copulating and producing legal offspring – male child at the first go and then a female child to have a “complete” family! Wow! We Indians are so evolved that we exactly know how to control the conjugation of an ovum and a sperm! God couldn’t have been so perfect in making them mate! In India, this unique phenomenon is called “Family Planning”!

In case you are still pondering over this uniquely Indian phrase, let me tell you exactly how it is executed in an Indian family, practice being directly in proportion to the wealth one has! As soon as somebody’s wife gets pregnant, he and his family – yes, nothing moves in India, especially when it comes to ‘family’ matters without the consent of one’s family! – get the sex determination done of the developing fetus and the decision to “keep it” depends on the gender of the fetus. 100% of the male fetuses are allowed to grow further and most of the female fetuses are aborted. A woman has to undergo this trauma – both physical and emotional – many a times if “she” is unable to conceive a male child. Repeated forced abortions are a norm. Then there are families where “no girl child” policy is practiced with perfect ease.

Now you know why India has a grossly skewed male:female ratio of 1000:850. The case is worse in affluent parts of the country and its cities. And now, perhaps, you would understand why most of the Indian families in cities especially are “complete” with one elder male child and a younger female child – well in almost all cases.

What I find even more shocking is the fact that in spite of females being in “short supply” still she can get married only after having “purchased” a groom, often at exorbitant price! “Dowry” as a term may not be in use or relevant in many societies of the world, I am sure of it.

The story doesn’t end here; if she is unable to bring in “enough” dowry, she is tortured both physically and mentally and in many cases burnt alive by her husband and his family. Yes, this is how marriages are made in India! Still somehow the Indian society has remained in the traps of “arranged marriage” with caste and religion considerations as intact, which I think is the root cause of most of the malaise afflicting the Indian society since centuries till today.

Then there are other horrendous treatment meted out to females in India.

And India is a country which had the second female prime minister in the modern history of the world. Even today, the most powerful politicians are mostly females.

And, as a nation – I repeat – we pride ourselves on being worshippers of female Goddesses.

I say, it is time for us to evolve as a society. Till the change sets in, let us throw away all the Goddesses idols in the trash bin. At least we will rid ourselves of the sin of “hypocrisy”.

…………….

First it was Falak, and now it is Afreen, … these are only two of the millions of babies killed brutally every year in India. We know and are talking about them thanks to the vibrant Indian Media. It is time we corrected our mindset. India is a great country; but its citizens will also have to exhibit the same greatness. We have to evolve from being animals and become humans – evolve from being medieval in our mindset and become citizens of a modern world.

May you rest in peace, Falak and Afreen and scores of murdered baby girls of India. Your butchers will not be spared. They will be hanged till death. … Till the “changes” set in India, in the society and its judiciary and polity, I openly say that I hate my female-killer Indians.