मुहल्ले में तेरे नखरों के चर्चे हैं,
तेरी जुल्फों का फ़िर से हंगामा है;

हवस तू ये बता,कब दिल्ली छोड़ेगी?

फिर तेरी आवारगी, चराग़ सी इतराने लगी है
बंद रौशंदानियों से, रौशनी फिर आने लगी है

ख़ामोश ठहरा खँडहर, सदियों से यूँ बेज़ार था
ज़िन्दगी तेरी लुकाछिपी, फिर गुदगुदाने लगी है

Generation Gap

I was born in a middle class family and sent to a boarding school for my secondary education. We had a separate dormitory for class sixth entrants. I was a shy guy. I rarely talked to strangers and so I my initial days interactions were limited.

The very next day, I landed in the school, I was told to run 2 kilometers as my morning physical training exercise. I had no options, but to run. After that tiring 45 minutes exercise, we all returned to our dormitory. I felt too much tired, frustrated and home sick. While I was planning to frame some medical excuse for the next day, my hostel kids were challenging each other for the next race. I was shocked to see jubilation at their faces. These were all merely ten to eleven years old kid.

Boarding schools had their own ecosystem, their own social structures, their own universes. We used to wake up 4 am in the morning, clean their canvass shoes and compete each others in the ground. We hogged like pigs in the morning breakfasts, shouted our heart in the morning assemblies, strove to stay best in the class,  hogged like pigs in the lunch, exhausted ourselves in the playground, studied in the evening, hogged again in the nights.

I didn't have the luxury of playing games on computer until I joined the engineering college. Our school games never included digital interfaces. Most of my batch mates came from Hindi medium schools of villages in Bihar. Some of them had never seen something like color TV, cable connections, computers in their villages. Therefore, our seniors suggested us to carry pocket dictionaries all the time. We carried them most of the times. Infact, over the time, vocabulary competitions flourished as the best show-off technique for us.

We bloomed altogether to different personalities by the time we reached class 9th. Some of my friends were representing nation in NCC, sports, republic day parades and some of my friends were solving mathematics and physics of class 11th on their own. While some of those Hindi medium class 6th entrants were ready with their own English novels, some other had research papers in Hindi and History. Importantly, I was no more a shy kid :)

These were not all geeks or extraordinary kids. They just struggled a lot to strengthen their roots. They studied in the morning, but never left a chance to cross the boundary and pluck mangoes from principle's residence. They represented state in sophisticated events, but teamed up to build small canals and bridges in nearby villages.

Of my batch of 120 students, 40-45 joined Indian defense organizations (army, navy, air force), 30-40 joined IITs, NITs, IIMs and other premiere institutes, rest others are excelling in art, economics, cinema, etc.

Fifteen years down the line, I see a new generation. The kids are given better education, better facilities and better guidance. The parents are much more conscious about day to day activities of their kids. Every one is given laptops, ipads, and mobile to facilitate their grooming. They have access to facebook, gmail, computer apps, computer games, etc. These kids are given best possible exposure to English from their child hood.

I feel surprised when I read vowel less English, grammar less Hindi, baseless historical arguments, 'fuck offs', omg, rofls, etc.

May be I am yet to accept the generation gap!

Dreams

Moon couldn't answer all the questions, so people started exploring the Mars. 90s introduced crazy inflection points to the social survival curves in India. Ambassadors, Fiats and Padminis could not hold their charm for long. Liberalization was already introduced. We smelled the possibilities of multistorey apartments, air conditioned offices, coffee vending machines, US/Europe trips; we scanned the probabilities of our dreams basking on flat organizational platforms. The new generation engineers heard a similar degree of freedom and freshness in these acid free, tar free, coal free jobs as they heard in those newly introduced Lenon and Floyd songs.

Hello, is there anybody in there?
Just nod if you can hear me.
Is there anyone home?


Private jobs came with a bang and changed the DNA of all the social ideologies.

Coding was the buzz word.  Engineering colleges turned into gateway to so-called luxurious lives. Pre-graduation and graduation education diluted to the alphabets of C/C++ and other computing languages.We had a fabulous by product called 'salary slips' to slap and mute all the critics. Graduates were paid 5-6 times more than any government employee. Generations never heard of such salary packages for middle class family graduates. The white collar job also ensured their distances from corruptions, bribery and politics. We worked late nights, earned good and spent that lavishly.

Foreign trips and scope of outside India settlements metamorphosed creativity, knowledge, skills and desire in engineering colleges. We all study to earn and so it was all justified. Hefty salaries, album pictures on snow laden US streets, BMWs, Mercedes, flight travels were good enough to inspire people not to run for 'Sarkari Babu' jobs. 1995-2005 witnessed a huge decline in engineering graduates preparing for UPSC or IES. No one wanted social responsibilities to chain their freedoms.

We had good salaries, long sedans, apartments, US settlements, blah blah... We traded our social and cultural identities to explore the flat world. We traded our work life balance to have an air conditioned stay in offices. We skipped weekend sports to get paid enough and join gym and yoga classes.

Most of these private job holding guys spent months in the US/Europe. Many of them walked these days alone, away from their families, surviving on pieces of cheese breads. When their families were celebrating Holi, Diwali and Ganpati, they were gulping mugs of beer on any random melancholy tunes.

We know that we were cheated for our dreams, but we have compromised. We have signed an unsaid mutual pact with the life. We have all learnt to settle down on air-conditioned couches. 

Mars was as flawed for dream as moon was.


The child is grown, the dream is gone.
I have become comfortably numb.

Innocence

तुम सान लेना रेत को 
मैं बांध लूँगा पेट को 
हम चाँद के किसी कोने पर,
रिश्ता जोड़ आयेंगे
रात भर ताकेंगे नीली रौशनी, धरती की 

ठेंगा दिखाकर दुनिया को
थोड़ी चांदनी 
ओढ़ आयेंगे 

Leh - Laddakh

It was 2 am in the night. All four of us were struggling to inhale oxygen in a small tent at that mountain top. Outside the tent in Sarchu, temperature was 5 degree Celsius. Noises of turbulent chilly wind and Indus river flowing beneath the mountain were creating internal, external and eternal chaos. All four of us had torrents of thoughts running inside our heads.

Salad, Shelter, Security and Sex do not make all the ingredients required to 'live'. Bored of mundane job life, stagnant weather and philosophical debates, we concluded to trip Leh on Bike. Unplanned and unstructured, we rented bikes from Manali to Leh. With the news of cloud bursts telecast on news channels, it was not best of the seasons to plan the trip. But Who CARES!

We started. It was all smooth, comforting and picturesque, untill we reached Rohtang. It rained previous night in Rohtang and therefore the roads near Rohtang were mired enough to only offer speeds of few cm/sec to buses and trucks. Those two hours turned out funny, exhausting, irritating and adventurous. I could hear the echoes of agneepath inside my funny head. Every one was searching for hope. Few of the travelers actually turned back from Rohtang only. Random stuffs like gum-boots, eno, cakes purchased from Manali turned out life saviors for those roads.

I did drop my new Samsung Galaxy phone on the bumpy road. Of the 0.001 probability to find it back after 5 km of travel, I turned out to be the lucky one. It was as blessing as enlightenment at that particular moment. Crossing clouds and stones through dark scary valleys at night we traveled till Keylong for the first day. I swear, the first cup of tea at Keylong was the most awesome thing that happened with us that night. Next morning we found ourselves wrapped in beautiful clouds under the influence of Buddhist chants and serene river flow. We moved ahead on one of the most finest roads and most difficult roads to Sarchu. Our night stay at Sarchu enlightened us with the existence and requirement of oxygen. Our tummies took loads of medicines, boiled water and Old Monk to struggle that low oxy-zone. We left Sarchu as early as possible to cover all other low oxygen area by the day time.

Royal Enfield is the most Loyal in field. We reached Leh on 3rd night, had glasses of 'nimbu pani' and fine dinner. Next day we covered Pangong Lake, Alchi monastry, passes, falls, mountains, plains, etc. It was quite interesting that any landscape with more than 4 houses were termed villages and more than 50 were considered somewhat close to cities. The villages are so beautiful. People are always ready to welcome you with maggie, yak milk, momos and beautiful smiles.

I have never been to Europe, but I suggest to visit the lanes of Manali to Leh before blindly praising Europe. Most of the visitors of Pangong lake consider themselves a part of 3 Idiots. Truly, we are so filmy in our existence. Aren't we :)

मुझको ऐसा ख्वाब चाहिए

मुझे जवाब चाहिए,
मुझे इंक़लाब चाहिए
रात को sensational news
चने के साथ शराब चाहिए

मुझे ख़िताब चाहिए
मुझे आदाब चाहिए
छिप कर करता रहूँ ज़ुर्म
मुझको ऐसा नक़ाब चाहिए

तुम्हारा कौम, मेरा धर्म
मुझे चेहरों तक का हिसाब चाहिए
धुंए से ढका शहर,
जलकर राख़ हो जाये
मुझको ऐसा ख्वाब चाहिए

क्या मुझको ऐसा ख्वाब चाहिए?

Gangs of Wasseypur 2

नंगे पांव घुमने की ख्वाइश रखने वाला फैज़ल, चुतियापे में आकर, ख़ून से सना जूता पहन ही लेता है 
दुनिया का आख़िरी सत्य existence and conservation of चुतियापा है.  Gangs of Wasseypur starts with the platonic dream of a family concerned about ''इक बगल में चाँद होगा एक बगल में रोटियां" and concludes with same question. 5 दशक के उठा-पटक और eternal struggle के बाद वासेपुर में आखिरकार बस चूतिये ही बच पाते हैं.

Puffed between smokes of चिलम and Bullets, the movie continues to entertain with diversified characters, having varied reasons for their self existences. GOW 2 emphasizes the impact of cinema on various nukkads of our lives. नब्बे के दशक के बाद इंडिया में हर massive चुतियापा का 3 ही reason रहा है Politics, Sex and Cinema. GOW 2 ने बारीकी इसे document किया है.

Love-Hate relationship of a father's identity and his son's respect for him is depicted through one of the nicest scripts.The movie revolves around Faizal Khan and his desires to exist in his parallel universe. फैज़ल गले में रुमाल बांधकर अमिताभ बच्चन बनना चाहता था. फैज़ल के लिए सेक्स और धुआं ही उसके purest wild emotions थें. माँ को बुढ़िया, भाई को तोतला, बाप को संजीव कुमार बोलने वाला फैज़ल, उनके लिए उतना ही emotional था, जितना किसी को गोली मरने पर unemotional रहता था. GOW 2 is struggle for establishing an equilibrium between peace and vengeance. 

Kashyap has maintained a continuous flow with brilliant acting of mathematical (Tangent, Perpendicular, Definite) and non-mathematical (Ramadhir Singh, Sultan, etc) characters. Music and Lyrics are again treat to ears. There are plenty of witty scenes, bloodshed, moments of trust and deceptions.

Too much can be written about the movie. Its better to go and experience it through own perspectives.

Identity

Certificates पर पड़े नाम से
आप समझ लेते हैं, सबकुछ;
सबकुछ ...
हमारा सच, हमारी सोच, 
हमारी संस्कृति, हमारी  राजनीति 

मैं birth certificate के गोत्र पर जन्म लेता हूँ;
दसबी, बारह्बी और graduation के grades
माँ बाप के उँगलियों की पकड़ define कर देते हैं.
मेरा job -description ,

मेरे अंतरात्मा की गूंज बन जाती है
मेरे अपने विचार,
आपके स्याही की खून सन जाती है

ये घर, कार और रुतबे की भूख आपकी,
और पेट मेरा मरोड़ता रहता है
ये मज़हब, ये जाति का तमगा आपका
और चादर मेरा सिकुड़ता रहता है

डरावनी है हमारी identity

फूहड़ता बिकती है

घर में, शहर में
जंगल, खेत, नहर में 
चूल्हे पर रोटियों की तरह सिकती हैं
फूहड़ता बिकती है 

हम मानने के लिए मान लेते हैं कि 
सामने वाला भद्दा और मैला है
हम चेहरा देख कर परख़ लेते हैं कि 
ज़ेहन में उसके पनपता हुआ सोच - विषैला है 

आईने में सब दिखता है
ये तम झाम,
ये शोर शराबा
अपनी दरिंदगी ही नहीं दिखती है
आईने का सच नहीं बिकता, फूहड़ता बिकती है