Itch of Writing

Just around when some people wanted Taslima Nasrin to leave India on ground of her actions (described as ‘behuda harkat’ i.e. indecent antics by one of the MPs) hurting the sentiments of people of India, I was engaged in a reading “The God Delusion” by Richard Dawkins, where Dawkins bats passionately and logically for atheism. My decision to read that book was not inspired by the ‘controversy’ around Taslima but out of a friendly, yet animated, discussion with a friend who is deeply religious. My friend believed (as per my comprehension) that all things in this world, including our lives, are governed by God and it’s our duty to submit to him/her and act in deference to his/her wishes/teachings/ commands, even if our own good sense/convenience/desires tempt us to act the other way. I was not pretty sure. Well, I must admit that this was not something very unique or strange that I had come across in my life, but maybe coming from a very close friend, it suddenly caused me to think deep...

Coming to study at IIM Ahmedabad meant setting a foot on Gujarat's soil - a state that has been in news for most of the times in the last three years or so, and on most of the times, for the same reason again and again. Of course I'm talking about the riots - a subject that attracted dozens of documentaries, hundreds of editorials, thousands of news articles and millions of murmurings. And so when I arrived at Ahmedabad airport, a mix of excitement and curiosity grabbed me. Excitement that I was going to be a part of an institution that was inarguably the best in India, and curiosity to find out how much "ground reality" was there to all the documentaries, articles and murmurings. Well, in the last 20 days that I have spent here, I have not been able to find out much. In fact, I've hardly made a conscious effort to find out or talk about the riots that took place in February-March 2002. I've moved out of IIM campus either to buy something for my personal ...