THE INDIAN COMMENTATOR

Image Courtesy: Google Imagination often becomes my factotum in daily affairs. It helps me wake up at the start of every lousy day and pushes me forward, showing me impressive things, giving me the baksheesh of hopes and so on. I am not against this elusive partner. I, sort of, like it. That is the reason why I suspend my questions about what would happen in the future, if the ‘what if’ of imagination leads my way. Image Courtesy: Amazon To tell you the truth, imagination never betrayed me, although some times, the grand pictures it shows about the time to come and the time present fail to materialize completely. But that is OK. Materials are of this world. Imagination is of another. Jan 14 th , 2013 morning, I woke up thinking about what if I create an idea for a sequel to James Patterson’s new series of novels, Private . I wanted to keep that thread of imagination hidden away in my coffer, so that no one could copy it or take advantage of it. Patterson had alr...

Image Courtesy: Google A rt. What is it? May be, just may be, if you answer this question, you will forever  cast out  art! That is, if art is the spontaneous and requiring the interference of the Divine, the indefinable  then  by defining it,  you are ruining it . Or perhaps, the answer to the question above is art  itself . If art exists for its own sake, then the answer to what art is, carries everything it needs to survive. Let’s go down to the bottom of this question now and find out what the basic element in both these hypotheses is.  Undoubtedly, it is the spectator. Image Courtesy: Google Art is created for eyes, ears, minds, souls and beings. Without them, art is meaningless and has no right to exist. To some part, this is close enough to exhibitionism, isn’t it? Well, we better do not judge. I said that because most of us believe in the power of judgment to either simplify everything for them, or just to...

Image Courtesy: Google The epilogue to Jaipur Literature Fest was a police notice to the organizers. The police had asked them to stay in the city until the investigation on the sociologist Ashis Nandi’s statement is completed. Ashis Nandy, a prominent figure in the Indian socio-political and cultural scene had made a statement regarding corruption during one of the speeches he made in the festival. His whiplash was not just targeted at corruption alone, but caste. And not just any caste, but those who are traditionally classified as the “lower castes”. Image Courtesy: Google Ashis Nandi said; “most of the corrupt come from the OBC, the Scheduled castes and now increasingly STs, and as long as it was the case, the Indian Republic would survive.” The question of truth in this statement is meaningless to search for. As one can see, he had made a blind generalization on the relationship between corruption and people from lower caste. People from these communities enjoy rese...