"The Most Tiresome Day of My Life.."

If I remember my past & predict my future , that day in 2008, which I am going to talk about, was and will be the most tiresome day of my life.

It was 6:30 AM when I woke up in the hotel room in Calcutta. The 1st two minutes were insane, I left the bed and started running like a mad man, from one corner to every possible end of that goddamn hotel room. Then suddenly 'realization struck' and I accepted the fact that I missed my flight to Bangalore which was at 6:15 AM (and I was supposed to report the airport at 4:30 AM)

For the next 15 minutes I cried, for the hopeless teenager I was, and I kept crying until I checked out from the Hotel. I reached Howrah station and called papa (still crying) to tell him how I screwed, thankfully my father stayed calm and told me to take the first train back home.

At the ticket counter, I inquired for the earliest possible train to take me home, The man at the counter advised me to take the Poorva express, I bought a general ticket, given I couldn't get a reservation at that time and reached Parasnath Station in the worst possible way, some 4-5 hours later.

As I reached Parasnath, I wanted to afford a Personal Taxi to give my bum some luxury, but since the day was so fucked up, the universe conspired and I couldn't get one. So, what happened that I took a shared tempo for my 40 kilometers ride home with the local rural people and travelling with them was damn irritating, for there used to be occasional laughters after every speed breaker gave them a bump.  Also I was least interested in living my MOHAN BHARGAV dream after missing a flight, so everything irritated me at the time.

Now, I reached the Barakar Bridge, the one constructed in the 1940s or later, well, as it happened, it collapsed a few weeks earlier and every passenger in the tempo was supposed to carry their luggage and cross the water-less river under the bridge. I did the same, painfully carried my two big bags on my back, took another auto on the other side of the bridge and sat in the same fashion. (fashion..?? did I just say fashion).

At around 2:45, I entered Giridih, [my hometown] and sat on a 'personally hired' three wheeled paddle rickshaw and reached home at 3 PM. Later in the evening, after having a good 3-4 hours sleep, as I was sitting idle on my terrace, I realized, that the most tiresome day of my life also happens to be The International Labor's Day. 

It was May the 1st.

Well, I did celebrate it, I guess.

"Hug"

"Can I get a Hug?" He asked

"No, you won't get anything" replied his angry wife

Husband picks up the phone and fakes a call

"Room service? Yeah, I needed a hug, when can you deliver it?"

Wife Smiled and moved towards him

"Nobody is going to hug you old man, Come here." She said

A Hug Followed. 

Revenge #Flash Fiction

As he was filled with vengeance, 
he forgot to keep a check on love and compassion within him. 

He avenged his father's death,
but he could never love anyone again.

You see, even emotions are revengeful,
when you get carried away with one,
the other makes sure you never attain it ever again. 

He got the Revenge, but he lost the Compassion.

Image Source: barnesandnoble.com

AAP: BJP's never imagined problem

In 2009 BJP lost to Congress, it was a devastating period in the NDA Camp. After all it was their 2nd consecutive defeat at the Lok Sabha Elections. 

In 2004, BJP lost in the leadership of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and then in 2009, they lost in the leadership of LK Advani. Since both of their senior most leaders lost one by one, BJP went into depression.

In the next couple of years, Congress did big scams and BJP was somehow delighted with this, knowing this will crumble the UPA govt and obviously BJP will be chosen as the new government, a majority of votes finally looked like a possibility.

In April 2011, Anna Hazare and Arvind Kejriwal, though very active social workers but not popular people started India against Corruption. A movement against the numerous corruptions done by the UPA govt; NDA supported this movement as it was their ladder to being at the centre [in spite of the fact that coal scam is running since the time NDA was at centre and Pramod Mahajan is one of the accused of the 2G scam, but let it be and move on with the post]. Arun Jaitley, Baba Ramdev [associated with BJP], all started behaving like revolutionaries. After all this was the ticket to PMO for a BJP leader. 

It was near the end of 2012, when Kejriwal decided to form a party himself as the Janlokpal bill never came into existence and BJP waved off AK’s Aam Aadmi Party as a non dangerous entity to their ambitions. 

In the mid 2013, it became virtually clear that Narendra Modi will be the PM Candidate for BJP. Congress became synonyms with Corruption and BJP were actually the only choice for people. It was that time when suddenly Gujarat became Gujarat Model and Modi was being projected like Barrack Obama. This even went worse and NaMo became a household term. So, that was it, BJP decided that there isn’t a single party that can beat them at the next LS Elections.

Meanwhile AAP was nothing but a wannabe for everyone who holds power, politicians, media, bureaucrats everyone laughed them off but on 8th December 2013, Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party won 40 percent of the seats in Delhi. This is when NDA skipped a heartbeat and started to worry even though they had more seats than AAP.

AAP formed a govt in Delhi and started working like Vigilantes, they were active all the time, planning things, working on it and sometimes doing mistakes as well but the bigger picture was that here we got a government that looked different and positive and BJP started worrying more and more every day. AK resigned on 14th February 2014 after 49 day governance, the reason was Janlokpal bill not getting enough support from the opposition. You can debate over it as AK wanted to become the PM and not just a CM; but I don’t like to believe that AK doesn’t have an idea that being a PM is not a possibility for him right now, so I respect his decision for showing least affection to a post as important as a CM.

AAP started their election campaign like a national party. AAP is fighting the 16th general elections from more than 350 seats and what could have been an easy BJP Victory is now spoiled by Aam Aadmi Party. Now once AAP declared that they will fight the LS, suddenly the Hindu BJP became a Secular party and the ease with which they used terms like KAR SEVA vanished. 

No matter who wins, but deep within BJP knows that AAP is a pain in the ass for them and will not let them rob the nation like UPA did all these years. Only 50 people from AAP in the LS and every session at the LS will be a disappointment for both UPA and NDA. No matter who becomes the PM, AAP will make sure that never ever again; a bill gets passed by doing a blackout inside the Lok Sabha.

Congress always knew that they will lose at the 16th LS Election; this was a googly for BJP who were anticipating a clean sweep but is now facing a bigger threat. Since when BJP started talking about corruption; let me tell you, BJP has been in opposition for 34 years [with some experience in the centre] and it doesn't make them less powerful. An opposition can stop the govt at many levels to do corruption and if not anything, they can at least develop their constituencies. Why Varanasi is still not developed even though Murli Manohar Joshi, a prominent BJP figure was the MP there. 

But No, every party wants to be at the centre, constituencies are nothing but a number that adds up to become 272.

One Stop Crisis Centre

If you watched the first episode of the 2nd season of SatyaMev Jayate last Sunday, you must have come across this term. But that was not the first time One Stop Crisis Centre [OSCC] was coined in India. In February 2013, The Justice Usha Mehra Commission recommended the establishment of OSCC after the Nirbhaya Gang Rape that happened on December 16th 2012.

This Centre should ideally have a woman gynaecologist, a police officer of at least the rank of an inspector (preferably a woman police officer), a woman counsellor from an NGO which is concerned about rape victims, a forensic expert, a skilled nurse and an approachable Judicial Magistrate so as to record the statement by the victim and ensure speedy action and justice. 

OSCC should be inside designated hospitals. OSCC should have each of these officials available at one place so that a rape victim can explain her trauma at once and not over and over again. Within this centre, there should be a toilet and shower facility.

Government employees in India have a tendency to ignore issues which makes them uncomfortable or if it is a task where there is no money to earn, so the officials recruited for this centre should have a full time job at the One Stop Crisis Centre and they should be paid well.

Apart from Rapes, the OSCC should also handle cases of Sexual Abuse and Child Abuse. In abroad, these centres handle Domestic Violence cases as well, but given the large number of rape cases and domestic violence cases, we need individual centres for each.

Although the recommendation by the Justice Usha Mehra Commission is done more than a year ago, no substantive development has taken place. We as a blogger need to raise our voice in a sophisticated way so I want others to write about this issue and share this article if you can.

Thanks to WriteTribe for making me ask myself, how I am going to contribute to make our country a better place for Woman. 

This article about OSCC awareness is my little contribution.

Happy International Women’s Day

-Amrit Rukhaiyaar