Concise Kansaratva

The ancient R̥gvēda has a lovely line which goes "आ नो भद्रा: क्रतवो यन्तु विश्वत:", loosely translated as, "May noble thoughts come to us from all directions." The list of "noble" thoughts this week includes the unfunny Navratri meme of Meena Harris, the inaccurate Sanskrit translations of names of US election candidates, the incredible moral grandstanding of Surat Police while wishing Navratri (and they are not alone in this, not by a light year), and of course, the unacceptable degeneracy of Eros linking Navratri to some sexual playtime. Also, a detour on what you would do if you are in a ristorante and you are served a pizza with a slice eaten by someone else? With such thoughts around us, does the lovely line from R̥gvēda remain relevant? While exploring that, we venture into the not-so-idealistic world of our ancestors during the Vedic times, and ensure that the there is a fire that is steadily burning within us, and not just during festival times.

Navrātri, the nine-day festival, defines passion, energy, and devotion, and heralds the season of brisk business. Everyone looks forward to profitable months, unless, of course, you are Tanishq, in which case you would be busy with corporate social activism with your ad for Ekatvam, your new line of jewelry. While I outline four reasons why the ad is fictitious, I also delve into the fictitious board meetings, with a hard-stop in 15 minutes, that must have happened to come up with a new product line, and then, release the final ad as if it were Kraken. The outrage that followed, as we know, was unprecedented, and Tanishq did not help their cause by a letter which contained no synonyms for the word "apology". Just to worsen the situation, NDTV came up with an attack in Gujarat, something they have been doing since 2002. From that side of the story, we move on to political social activism, this time with Dr. Harsh Vardhan, the minister best known for banning firecrackers during Diwali because they pollute more than stubble that burns for weeks and fires that rage for months. Dr. Vardhan has the dubious distinction of the only BJP minister to have spoken to God and share with us Her thoughts. While politicians pose a potent danger to Hinduism, which I will simply take as a simple rule, the situation on the ground is quite different. Ekatva(m) is emerging, but not the one that the likes of Tanishq envision - that is just a condition of being deluded, mithyātva.

October 2 is celebrated as the International Day of Nonviolence, to honor Mahatma Gandhi. What does Gandhi mean in today's world, or for that matter, what does the symbolism of charkha, on which he used to spin yarns all day long, mean in today's world? Did the utopian idea of nonviolence become a stick for the global powers to beat India with? The emergence of angry Gods, such as the sticker of an angry Hanuman, is seen as some form of belligerent Hindutva in the post-Modi era, which assumes that the Gods were not angry earlier, and were going about their divine lies nonviolently. The whole idea of Gandhi and nonviolence disappears, however, when convenient, and then reappears in the form of that beautiful bhajan, Vaishnava Jana To, which has as much to do with Gandhi as chai latte with coconut milk has to do with tea. In this podcast, I question the idea of nonviolence, and also, ponder over Navratri, Durga Puja, and outrage that extends to regional heroes but not to universal Gods.

The parliament session saw Derek O'Brien, along with others, turn to what can only be called as constitutional vandalism. On the other hand, Mahua Moitra from his party gave a fiery speech that Rajdeep Sardesai considered "stirring". The topic of concern was why PMCARES and why not PMNRF which, by the time Nirmala Sitharaman had given a reply, was forgotten by Rajdeep and he had moved on to question the timing of the NCB in summoning Deepika Padukone. TIME also announced Narendra Modi as one of the 100 most influential people in the world, along with 99 others, and also reminded us why democracy is not what it used to be in the good old days, like freedom of speech. What would have TIME done had they known about the recent FCRA Amendment? What, for that matter, would Peter Subramani do? If you would like to know more about him, and the other events of the week as above, tune into this podcast.

Astronomers have, potentially, found life on Venus, which is ironical because we were not looking for it there. Irony becomes the theme of this podcast with Jaya Bachchan claiming that there is an attempt to defame Bollywood, the Supreme Court asking if controversial programs can be allowed in a free society, Global Times, a low-quality mouthpiece of the Chinese government talking about the views of the Chinese people, and some people questioning why the Home Minister did not go to AIIMS for a check-up. Oh, and there are Moghuls too, in the form of a song with a catchy tune.

The week has been busier than usual, with red roses, smashed patriarchies, rusted moon, bulldozers driven by invisible strings, and if that were not enough, there was this ship with rearview mirrors. Also, I talk about a very interesting, and promising idea, of a strategy game, for which I expect my royalty, of course.

Politics around language has been around since decades, leading to enforcement and opposition in interesting, and interestingly annoying, ways. The National Education Policy, NEP, recently restarted the debate around language, with responses ranging from this being the best move because we could finally become like Japan and Germany to this being the worst move because there is no global domination without English. In the middle of this is programming, livelihood, culture, and also, a reason why we are calling someone a "harvest king".