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Sitting Ducks. That's what we are. The Covid monster is back! In a more virulent strain, with a renewed vigour. And you know what? We are responsible for inviting it back. Unfortunately, we depended on the Government to take care of us.  Till the lockdown went on, we were very careful and obedient in following all precautions. Innumerable misery and loss of livelihood during the lockdown was justified as necessary in the greater interest of public health and safety. We remained cooped up in our houses, gave up going out, children lost their childhood games and outdoor play, so many of us lost their jobs, pays were downgraded, businesses and workshops closed own. All because of the looming threat of being affected with a disease that knew no cure. A year later, with two vaccines in our kitty, we are back to square - not one, but zero. Why?  Because we thought the government has built hospitals with the public fund they had collected last year? Or did we think we have made excep...

Dear Average Indian Men,  Another warning issued to women from one of your tribe:  "Don't wear ripped jeans or society will be destroyed!" Wow, such high thinking levels. It truly meets the lofty standards set by MCPs throughout ages. See the similarities with the 19th century Victorians who forced women to wear uncomfortable corsets and keep their voice low? Or even better, with the Sheikhs who kept their women in purdah and flogged them for trespasses? Closer home, maybe similar to the village patriarchs who insist that women keep ghunghat drawn over their heads and faces. And issue death warrants when a girl marries someone of her own choice. Everyone worth his dhoti or lungi or trousers seems to have an opinion on what women should or rather should not wear!  I am amazed.  When did we tell you what to wear, guys? For the record, we detest these things: You roaming around in torn/dirty vests or with your hairy thighs flashing in tight shorts Unshaved and unwashed ...

When 2020 began, no one had imagined this year will turn out like this. At 12.00 am on Jan 1, we seem to have entered a different realm or dimension. The Advanced Level of some Jumanji-like game! COVID -19 has swamped our lives and left us shaken, tormented and gasping for breath (literally). This year we have almost bidden goodbye to travelling for leisure, watching movies in multiplexes, eating out, strolling around window shopping in malls, grooving in nightclubs, cheering at the stadium, etc. etc. Life will never be the same again, that's for sure. So what are you doing to up your game? Are you ready for the post-COVID life? You need to be prepared to do a lot of unlearning, both emotionally and physically. Wanna know what all to unlearn? Nothing in life is permanent or secure - relationships, jobs, financial standing, mental peace, good health -  all come with an expiry date.  No man or woman is an island. We need each other - physically or virtually...

Yes, it's tough, very tough. To keep your head above water in these troubled times of COVID 19,  is nothing short of a Herculean task. To keep plodding through uncertainty and confinement, with the threat of the disease looming over us, is an uphill challenge each one of us is facing. However, we must keep at it. Must follow precautions, guidelines, barriers. Must stay away from each other, create walls around us, must suffer the claustrophobia and the sense of imprisonment. Must stare at the possible loss of future employment and advancement opportunities. It isn't easy, but we must do it for the sake of preserving our own sanity and peace, and keep calm . Following are a few hacks to deal with the stress and tension, the despair and the gloom: Take each day at a time. Do not think about what is likely to happen in the future, don't conjure up images of hopelessness, worst-case scenarios. Just take each day on its own, live through the day. Remember, ...

So, we have entered the seventh day of the nationwide lock-down that was suddenly imposed on us to ensure social distancing. We get that it is necessary to prevent the spread of Coronavirus or COVID 19, but how the lockdown has thrown our lives into a tizzy! Though a lot of positive messages are circulating about how this period has made us pause and reflect on life's blessings, I beg to differ. I am going to be a hardcore pessimist. COVID 19 has emerged as a larger monster than terrorism and ecological disaster combined. Its cruel jaws are still very active, pulling thousands of victims into them everyday. So it is necessary for us to be holed up in our homes avoiding outside contact as far as possible. STAY AT HOME is the strict order. Granted. We are put up at home, without our support lifeline of helps, cleaners, cooks, drivers, home delivery service, restaurant takeaways and deliveries, etc. Lets see how we are coping..... Why ME? Mini wars are raging da...

A year and a decade ended yesterday. As we begin a new year and a fresh decade, let's take a quick look at what we did and what we lost. Some epoch-defining changes occurred: The Blahs and Nays:           Social media platforms took over our lives, gave us virtual persona and made us do things that couldn't have been imagined earlier (think eating/brushing/birthing/kissing selfies being posted).  We made many many friends on social media, and not even a fifth in real life. Connecting with family and extended family translated to texts on WhatsApp or Facebook. Phone calls became rare, visits rarer. Likes, comments and virtual pats became our lifeline. Mobiles with front, back, triple, quadruple, 360 degree cameras started replacing actual camera equipment, though the DSLR still has its followers. Mother nature and our home earth have been pushed to the extreme with our overuse of natural resources and large scale urbanization ...

A few days back we all watched shocked while a man held a girl hostage in her own house in Jaipur. Further, he knifed the girl, left her bleeding, and had the audacity to live stream her condition and his act!! All this while the police were dumbly watching from below the building. He kept showing the sign of seven,  indicating the time when he would end his drama. Finally, after threatening the girl all day with a knife and a gun, he gave himself up in the evening, saying the girl had agreed to marriage. After the whole disgusting episode, the girl revealed that she was forced to say yes to marrying the lout for fear of her life. And the reaction of the police takes the cake! They indulgently termed it a lovers' tiff , only terming the method used as wrong! Lover's tiff? What kind of love is this? Threats, abuses, bullying, intimidating,  are all these signs of love? And this cold, calculated savage act is being seen indulgently by the enforcers of law? What have we a...

Have you noticed a child studying in a reputed English medium school in an Indian city? Have you seen the slouched shoulders, the unenthusiastic gait, and the resigned expression on the face? School children who mechanically go through the motions of assembly, classwork, lab work, project work, extracurricular activities without any enthusiasm or genuine interest? Why is this so? Do you also feel our children are going to school to become automated creatures without life, without heart? I have felt this for a long time, especially when I compare my English medium educated child with municipal school students. Children from the lower strata of society, who go to government sponsored vernacular schools, are much better off than our elite school students, I feel. They can play, shout, roam around as per their own sweet will. They have the time to play and run, unlike our children who rush from one tuition to another all day. Municipal school children get a sit-in mid-day meal every...

The world over these days, beauty contests for women are pretending to be contests for judging the overall personality of the contestant, not just external appearance and vital statistics. If that is the case, then why do they have the rather blatantly-titillating swimsuit round, may I ask? If a lady is not being judged for her vital statistics, then why is she made to strut around in a teeny-weenie bikini, and pose with a pout for the judges and cameras?  Why does it matter whether she stuns the audience in a strapless figure-hugging evening gown, balancing herself on inch-long stilettos, or not?  If her final answer is what determines whether she ultimately wins the title or not, then why the rigmarole of parading her in various kinds of provocative clothing? I failed to understand the double standards of these contests, and also of winners (think our local Aishwarya Rai or Priyanka Chopra) who seem be deep thinkers on world issues, judging by their answers. Why d...

Right now in India, the raging topic on social media and on television is the controversy related to the Hindi film " Padmavati ", made by Sanjay Leela Bhansali, with reigning Bollywood queen Deepika Padukone essaying the eponymous role.  Since the time Bhansali has started making the film, sundry Rajput groups have claimed to have been offended by the fact that their revered queen Padmini or Padmavati (who was devoted to her husband, and desired by the enemy - Alauddin Khilji), and who had committed jauhar or self immolation to avoid being captured by Khilji, was being belittled in the film.  Somehow, it has gone into their heads, or perhaps been drilled, as part of a political agenda, that the maker was insulting their culture and bravery by making this film. They burnt down the sets, protested violently and created enough ruckus to make their displeasure felt. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that the director had cast the real-life couple of Deepika ...

Much has been said about changing the education system in India, but the ground realities have not changed even slightly. Till today, we have the learning by rote system, and regular examinations to test how much one can learn by mugging up or memorizing. The focus is still on how much a child can score using his/her memory and not any other factor. Native intelligence, every child's strength and individual qualities, all these are blissfully ignored in the this rat race to earn more and more marks. Schools may give lip service to all-round development of a child, but ultimately they felicitate those with the highest marks. Academic brilliance, rather the ability to score more numbers, is the single most important criteria of evaluating a child's worth in most schools. What about average students? What about slow learners? No one thinks about them, as they are pushed and forced to earn marks to prove their worth. If a child fails to pass her exams or has to repeat a year...

MBA – the tag spells magic! Or so thought the thousands of hopefuls joining one of the innumerable management institutes in the country. Till a few years back it was the ultimate key to a lucrative career in the corporate world. Today the MBA cookie has crumbled, leaving behind shattered dreams and sluggish careers for many. For the past few decades, an MBA degree from a reasonably well known management education  institute was considered good enough to guarantee a prestigious job in a reputed organization. A student knew that if he/she had moderately good communication and presentation skills, coupled with high CGPAs, chances of being secure career-wise were high. Institutes basked in the glory of affiliations and accreditations to national and international universities, and boasted of 100% placements in MNCs and blue-chips. This, in turn, ensured a steady flow of hopefuls to the MBA and BBA courses run by these institutes. Things have changed, with the shrinking of j...

There are Bengalis and there are Bengalis. On the day after the Bengali New Year - Poila Boisakh, let me dissect a few for my own enjoyment. The "Hocche Bangali": It is a mock title given to those pretenders to the role of the true-blue Bengali, those who are the "probashi" or non-resident Bengali. These guys are distinguished by their propensity to add a "Hocche" to every sentence, a replacement to the Hindi "hai". They are also marked by their affinity towards the places they have lived all their lives in, and the cultures that they have adopted over the Bengali culture. They prefer, horror of horrors, to speak in Hindi at home, call their sons "Beta", and like to eat rotis over rice and fish. Their language is spiked with Hindi words, much to the indignation of their West Bengal home-grown counterparts. They also sometimes go without fish for days, something the average Bengali cannot imagine. The "Bheto Banagali": ...

Homemakers in India are controlled by only one entity -  the kaamwali bai or the ubiquitous housemaid. India happens to be one country where manual domestic helps still run the show, unlike western countries where every chore is done through automation. We still prefer to be dependent on the daily help who comes for an hour or so, and mops, cleans and washes with machine-like efficiency. Some lucky, or unlucky ones, as you look at it, have cooks too, who come and do the cooking. And mothers of very young children, and conversely, children of very old people, have ayahs who assist in managing the babies and the infirm. I am sure that if these people stopped coming to our houses one fine day, our households would come to a standstill. In that way, you could say, they are the backbone of our domestic life. Our homes are spic and span, and we can go about our business with a free mind because of these people. Every housewife's ultimate nightmare is the moment she hears those dre...

Autumn has a melancholic feel about it. Especially the long evenings. Twilight fading away brings with it a strange kind of sadness and nostalgia. You almost unconsciously begin to think about days gone by, lost friends, forgotten experiences... Maybe it has something to do with the weather and changes in nature. The crisp slightly chilly wind blowing around, the long, starry nights, the stillness when fans stop whirring, and the heaps of dried leaves on the ground, all come together to create nostalgia and melancholy. How can one forget Keats' memorable lines in his "Ode to Autumn"? I quote: " Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find   Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,   Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;   15 Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep," Yes, there is a strange languidness associated with this season.... A desire to lie back and watch as nature changes hues, seems overpowering.  In India, autumn ushers in the ...

Bengal's favourite festival, Durga Puja is just over. In Kolkata this time, it was spread over a week instead of the regular 3-4 days. An outburst of celebration and gaiety marked the festival in the city. It was as if everyone was determined to have a good time, and cock a snook at sadness, despair and hopelessness.  Which is not such a bad thing really. Festivals are after all meant to spread joy and cheer. Except that the gaiety came across sometimes as forced and overpowering. Microphones blaring, people thronging the streets, incessant sales and buying sprees and in-your-face celebrating, at times it was rather irritating. The media played its role in creating a feverish pitch and hype, with emphasis on how much you plan to indulge yourself during the festival. What? You are not planning to let go of all routine and normal work? You have not bought at least twenty sets of clothes, shoes and accessories to deck yourself to the T? You have not undergone cosmetic makeovers...

A housewife's job, as they say, is never done. It goes on 24/7, 365 days a year.  While corporate and other jobs have holidays and weekends, our load increases on these days. Because with others at home, we get busy getting them to enjoy themselves. So we work twice as hard!! What with cooking, cleaning, washing, drying, ironing, making beds, dusting, arranging things, etc. etc., what we really treasure is the rare moments of peace we manage to find out in our non-stop schedules. To ignorant snobs our job is easy - after all we are at home, unemployed, lazying about - what can targets and deadlines mean to us? But only we know the significance of serving hot and delicious meals on time, getting children ready for school, being there for the family when they need us, lending a patient ear to all problems. And while corporate jobs are easily filled with replaceable incumbents, our job is hard to fill up with anyone else but us. As our designations became glamorized to homemake...

So Women's Day has come and gone with the usual fanfare. Celebrities and whoever is worth anything have pitched in their two bytes about treating women with respect, giving her her due, acknowledging her contributions etc. New age guru Chetan Bhagat even had a word of advice for us - he told us not to take undue pressure on ourselves to be alpha women. So far so good. But the bottom line still remains - have things changed at all for women? Yes, some of us have indeed secured our freedom from shackles of injustice, illiteracy, and unjust expectations. But the majority of Indian women are still miles away from self-reliance. Why, they are even not allowed to take simple decisions for themselves. What they should wear, whom they will talk to, what they will study, when they will return home, is all pre-decided for them. As far as life altering decisions are concerned, they have their fathers/brothers/husbands/sons to decide their fate. And this is not only in rural India, or i...

Euthanasia or mercy killing continues to be a debatable issue in most countries. In India, the so-called human rights and medical associations raise their hackles whenever the issue crops up. No one has the right to decide when a person becomes totally unfit to leave, they say, with their holier than thou attitudes. As long as their is life, there is hope for survival, etc. So we have a long bed-ridden, vegetating Aruna Shanbaug kept alive just to suit the opinions of these experts. She has no consciousness, can't even do the basic functions, except breathing, but she has not been granted mercy death. I am sure there must be countless patients like her, brain dead, limb dead, mere vegetables just kept alive on the ventilator, by money squeezing doctors and hospitals. Of what use is such life and for whom? The patient has long ceased to live, is just existing with external aid. How long do you want to prolong the misery of the patient and that of the relations? Doesn't eve...

Is it important to be nice to get ahead in life? That's a question I am sure bugs almost everyone at some stage or another of life. Is it okay to step on someone's toes or even sidestep somebody while running the rat race? People who don't matter, who are "nobodies"; should we bother about them? I feel yes, we should keep people's feelings in mind, even if they don't matter. Of course, that doesn't mean that you keep asking permission for doing things, or repeatedly apologizing to people. It simply means giving other people due consideration, saying a thank-you, letting your ego go and so on. Nothing can be achieved alone. Remember to acknowledge and thank your team members when you succeed Your life doesn't end at the workplace.....your family is your backbone. Remember and appreciate the sacrifices they make to see you go up the ladder When someone comes to you with a problem, it does not mean you have to deny responsibility. Take your sh...