A late reply

I am a troubled soul. You possibly can't tell that looking at me- all chirpy and vivacious every time we run into each other but deep down inside today I am a troubled soul. My soul, dear friends, is troubled.

Before you start wondering what is wrong and go through the entire drill of - "Is she okay? Do I call and check? How much does an STD cell to cell call cost? Maybe an sms is the right thing to do. No wait sms is Rs. 2 per national sms. Maybe I will just ping her next time I see her on Gtalk?" - I will just tell you what the matter is. Succinctly.

A friend of mine accused me yesterday of being a Congressi and a hypocrite. ‘You all are such HYPOcrites!’, he said. He stressed on the ‘hypo’ part for a little longer than necessary. Among the heated words exchanged which are now acknowledged as ‘deeply regretted’ were sprinklings of accusations that I have heard quite often –that I am apathetic, that it is because of people like me that the majority has to suffer and that how much longer was I willing to tolerate this unnecessary and uncalled for appeasement.

Now I didn't quite like that. I agree I am not the most active of political beings in the country. And if you are looking to give someone the ‘best citizen’ award I will not be on your list of nominations. You can also safely discount almost all I say about politics and politicians as clichéd yuppie responses. My knowledge about the Indian politic is abysmal and my inclination to changing this in near future is negligible.

But still this so called ‘Pilibhit brand of reasoning’ annoys me immensely. What is further infuriating is when people judge me for not sharing their prejudices. I mean, why should I share your prejudices when I have a truck load of my own! My friend said the C word (Congressi) as if it were a bad thing to be ; as if Congress was the genesis of all things bad happening to this country. I don’t buy that. For the record I am not a Congressi. I am not a clan obssessed follower of the party as most Congressis are made out to be. Nor am I enamoured with the Gandhi mystique. My appreciation of any political party is very limited. I am the person who in all political discussions comes out with the cliched "Chor hain sab" response and dismisses all politicians with a wave of hand. But yes, I do respect Sonia Gandhi for her grit, her ethical, standards and her resolve.

Generations of my family might probably swear by Congress party but I have not inherited their political enthusiasm. My views on politics reflect the same lackadaisical ambivalence that is characteristic of all my other views. But still if push comes to shove my leaning would be towards Congress than parties who favor communal polarization. What took a gentleman 16 years and Rs. 9 crores to prove was something I was already aware of. I had in fact visited Ayodhya many years back and had seen the make shift temple that exists there. I had then been proudly shown the preparations that were being undertaken for making the new temple.

But S. said his stuff with a lot of vehemence and a lot less sense. He gave me the usual - "toh tum kya Itlay jaa kar PM ban sakti thi. Hum log bahut tolerant hain." Now I never discuss politics with friends especially friends who don't share my political views. But if in a discussion, I would rather people stick with facts and rationality than mere rhetoric and unexplained bias.

But this isn’t the troublesome part. The issue troubling me since last night is that I did not have a befitting reply ready. All the things I wrote just now well I didn’t say any of that. I just let the other person speak his mind, made some feeble excuse and hung up. Somehow arguing then didn’t make much sense and escalating this discussion seemed a tad foolish. And this is troubling me. I wish I could go back and argue my facts. I cant now. Hence, this post. :)