Over the past weeks we’ve been bewitched by stunning visuals of the World’s now Tallest Statue – Unity, built taller than Liberty; and the Celebrity Weddings of Actors Deepika Padukone – Ranveer Singh, and Actor Priyanka Chopra – Musician Nick Jones. While the Indian-made couple chose to wed across foreign shores – in Italy, the foreign-going Baywatch and Quantico Star nicked precious space in India. The Wedding dresses ensemble put together over tens of thousands of man-hours could dress-up more than Lady Liberty and Sardar Unity (Lord Ram – when he does arrive on the scene in Ayodhya – doesn’t need them at all). Here’s wishing that the Stars stay united for years to come, else they are at liberty to request the services of Sardar Patel – again, coming down from his statue, to stay united.

Talking about Statues, I quote a recent Twitter tweet from Harsh Goenka, Chairman of RPG Enterprises, that I liked, “Indians when in Paris: Look at Eiffel Tower. Why can’t we build such structures? Indians when in New York: Look at the Empire State Building. Why can’t we build such structures? Indians when in India: Look at Patel’s Statue. Why can’t we build a hospital or school instead!” We cannot level everything in this World with one big scale, can we? I read an article where someone argued, ‘Can we eat statues?’. Well, we can’t eat Movies, Music, Wedding Dresses…yet, they have a purpose, I’m sure!

Event before these Stars started throwing their light, we were enthralled by NASA’s robotic InSight carefully landing on the Red Planet and settling down to a live-in relationship with Mars, at least for the next two years. InSight was dressed for the occasion and it was a delight to see it spread its solar panel ‘train of wings’ and soak in the energy of the Sun. We are still waiting for the Official Wedding Album to be released. Will there be many Receptions (Mumbai, Delhi)? Many ‘eight-minutes’ of Time Distance will tell!

Romance – in every dimension, is definitely in the air despite Nature blowing cold through Cyclones and Hurricanes.

While the star and moon-struck kind succeeded in their missions, an American who was bewitched by Jesus and Christianity took it all too seriously, stripping down to the bare essentials to try to hook one of the World’s most enigmatic, particularly vulnerable Tribes – the Andaman Sentinelese, to the Bible. They took him down with their primitive bow & arrow and left him dead on the beach – Jesus calling. The Sentinelese have lived isolated from the outside World for almost 60,000 years living the ancient hunter-gatherer life and have strongly resisted all attempts to bring them in to the mainstream of our kind of civilization. India has decided to let them be; and it’s a line no one is allowed to cross, which ought to be respected.

Meanwhile, in India, Ornithologists reported sighting the rare, shy Ortolan Bunting – a pale-yellow throated Bird – whose breeding range stretches from Spain to Mongolia, and migrates to Africa (Ethiopia and Uganda) via the Middle East, for the winter. It is a monogamous (the newly-married Stars should look here) bird laying and incubating eggs in a ground level nest built jointly with its partner, who stands guard over the nest. The migration of birds is a fascinating subject and maybe our Stars are also doing their own bit of migration – to warmer nests, across continents, to lay their eggs and propagate the Human species. That’s evolution happening right in front of our eyes!

Our eyes are having the sight of our lives, with so much to see; and girls may finally rest theirs on British heart-throb Actor Idris Elba – being voted the Sexiest Man alive. He is a celebrated Deejay, Producer, Songwriter, Rapper, Percussionist, and Vocalist, besides being awfully handsome. We may know him from his portrayal of Norse God and Asgardian Gatekeeper Heimdall in Marvel’s (Comics) Thor franchise. He has a 16-year old daughter and a 4-year old son – from previous marriages – and is now in a relationship with a Model to whom he proposed in February this year. That’s another sexy Wedding coming up, for sure!

While we near the end of the year, this December 2018, we think about cozying up in our woolens, around some fire-place, and curling around loved ones at home, to ruminate the year gone by and think plans for the year ahead. Reminds me of a species of Spiders that suckles its young and takes care of them so well that the young fellas just do not want to leave home. The mother spider deposits a milk-like fluid around the nest for the hatchlings to drink until they are about 40 days old, after which she suckles them directly; and we thought that only mammals breast-feed their young! Scientists have discovered that this milk contains four times the proteins found in cow’s milk. I’m all for drinking spider’s milk in the year(s) ahead.

I’ve not finished with the Spider story, yet: when the Spiderlings become sexually active adult spiders, they return home for more milk (the taste lingers on and is a big draw, I guess) from Mom, but are driven out as Mom is onto the next round of production and is careful to segregate brothers from sisters. Brothers and sisters cannot marry, even in Spider World. Wonder, whether Stan Lee thought about all this when he passed away to the Heavens above leaving us with Spider-Man, Iron-Man… and the kind, to marvel about! May be, he spinned the web of his stories on the secret strength of Spider’s Milk. Let’s drink to that!

Have a wonderful end-of-the-year time! Life can be bewitching!

In the good old Transistor Radio and pre-Television days of the ancient 1970’s and slowly developing 1980’s in Tamil Nadu, India, most of us got to read a few English newspapers and many local vernacular newspapers and magazines. My favourite was The Indian Express, which printed spicy news and reported boldly and courageously, vis-à-vis The Hindu, which was serious, business-tight, had many Tender Notices, and perhaps better job advertisements. Each attracted its kind of die-hard followers!

I recall many used to buy The Hindu only because it fetched a good resale value and could be cleverly re-used. The Old Newspaper-Wallahs treated it with great respect – gave a higher price per kilogram, for the thick (good quality – in their opinion) ‘old papers’ and it was ideal for lining the many shelves and cupboards of our homes and offices, besides packing street-food, and near about anything. I didn’t fall for it though, except for a brief period when I was just out of College and was hunting for a job. I remember one of my Aunts using the neatly folded Hindu Newspaper on the inside racks of her first ever purchased new Voltas Refrigerator. That’s awfully cool!

While the articles in The Indian Express were well-written, investigative, with lots of action verbs, some humour, and attracted one much like a scantly-clad Bollywood Actress, that in The Hindu was awfully staid and a drag to read, much like a Kollywood Villain. A newspaper being a one-day affair it should only be that – ran my argument in favour of The Indian Express.

While in Boarding School, with the King & Queen of England breathing down my neck to master the English Language, during the holidays I forayed into reading local Tamil Magazine-Newspapers. This was mainly due to another Aunt – the elder sister of the Refrigerator Newspaper Aunt – who pushed me into reading the then famous weekly ‘Kumudam’ and ‘Kalkandu’, which she bought as a ‘Laurel & Hardy’ Package. Both were about the same dimensions, with Kalkandu being very slim and Kumudam being reasonably fat. While the former, written and edited by Writer Tamilvanan, was a superb read carrying the modern-day Twitter like information factoids, and a detective story on the global adventures of Shankarlal – the Indian version of a Sherlock Homes and James Bond mash – the latter carried lots of gossip and serial stories. I especially devoured the King & Queen historical fiction stories penned by then popular Writer Chandilyan in Kumudam. Both the Aunts mentioned here, had a brother who was also a serial reader and he used to pluck out the Chandilyan stories from the weekly Kumudam and bind them into a home grown novel! After all that reading, my Tamil surely improved, royally, and I scored top marks in the Board Exams!

Later, on becoming more learned and well read, I advanced to reading fortnightly magazines and the one that I fell in love with – on first read, was the India Today! Of course, I had earlier experimented with the then famous Khushwant Singh edited The Illustrated Weekly of India – with its rather odd size – which I read for the wild pictures and the sexy Axa comic ‘strip’ hidden inside; and the very colourful Frontline, with its stunning photos; and the Sports Week; and the Sport Star. I went on to subscribe to India Today and became a dedicated reader, but held on to The Indian Express for the daily grind!

Growing into the late 1980’s and early 1990’s with, by now, a well-grown Novel reading habit, along with the Newspaper and Magazine interests, I went international buying into The Newsweek…at the cost of TIME. Being a weekly issue and costing quite a sum, I teamed-up with a like-minded friend, at my workplace, to share the price and the joys! We read it cover to cover and discussed the many things it uncovered! Meanwhile, I still kept The Indian Express and India Today with me and flirted with borrowed Debonair and Playboy on the sly!

By the mid 1990’s and early 2000’s, Television was a full-blown sensation in India and News Channels were talking and showing more easily, what we were struggling to read and see. I quit magazine subscription buying selectively on a wider looser range, rather than by order and dedication. Career and job progression took me further North of India and away from The Indian Express. It got gunned-down after the Bofors Scandal, and despite desperate attempts I could not hold on, and strayed to other papers: Deccan Chronicle while working in Hyderabad, the Telegraph while in Jamshedpur, and The Times of India (TOI), while working in Mumbai, filled-in the voids.

Thanks to the TOI power in Mumbai it infected me; and I got wedded to it (though I consider it quite ‘yellow’ at times!) while at Gurgaon – carrying with me the TOI Mumbai effect. But once a reader always a reader, and while engaged in renovating New Delhi’s Airport Terminal-2, a colleague handed over a few old copies of The Economist for a ‘must read’…and ‘must return’, please. Well, my idea of The Economist, without even looking at it, sprang from deeply ingrained views of The Hindu as one of the hard reading types!

It took me only a few articles to realise that The Economist was in a class of its own and remain hooked to it, to this day! The Authors are not mentioned, every article was wonderfully written with cheeky well-dispersed humour, it had terrific headline captioning and was a pleasure to read. There was no looking back and I got myself into the hard Newspaper (The Economist calls itself a Newspaper) subscription mode again.

With the spread of the internet, and Google News become easily affordable – bringing news headlines from all Newspapers onto one page, I started dropping-off the hard Newspaper Grid: to begin with, the weekly (including The Economist) and then the fortnightly ones (including India Today).

The growth of social-media of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and smart mobile friendly Flipboard, Inshorts… and the kind, further sounded the death-knell to my hard magazine reading. Now I use my iPhone, and MacBook Pro more for reading (and listening) than speaking.

However, I still persist with the daily hard-paper Newspaper, and the TOI brings in its brand of news every day, sliding in through the doorway, which I resell it for ‘The Hindu’ rates; but, only after convincing the Old Newspaper-Wallah that it weighs as good!

Over the past weeks we’ve been more than touched by Nature at its untamed, fully-dressed best: from Hurricane Florence to Super-Typhoon Mangkhut; and we thought that with the Tsunamis, our learning was over. Hold on, there’s a ‘Storm’y Daniels ‘coming’ blowing hot and cold over ‘One US Resident’ in the White House. A tell-tale book is spilling more than we can imagine! I reckon this storm can do what the other ‘super blowers’ – the Nature Winds – could not!

While Storms, hurricanes and Typhoons raged and blew many people off the face of the Earth, the World is still wondering what happened to Chinese movie superstar, Fan BingBing, arguably China’s most famous Actress. Fans tried ‘Bing’ and ‘Google’, with zero results in nano seconds, on her whereabouts. Yes, she acted in Iron Man and X-Men; and perhaps she needs to become an Iron Woman to get out from wherever she’s hiding or is being held, before she becomes a X, Y, Z Woman; will she? While stories of messing with China’s Tax System is doing the rounds, my guess is that she’s probably having a baby of a time – why not? It’s over three months now and the results may show up any moment – unless she’s talking to the King of Good Times, Vijay Mallya, on Tax Heavens and a Kingfisher Model shoot, in a London hideout!

We cannot finish talking about storms and earth sliding floods without thinking about what the rains did to Kerala in India and how scores of its fisherman became ‘flash’ heroes, fishing-out men, women and children from the deadly flood waters, to see them live another day – for sure, none know the waters better than them! Even while the waters were receding and the Fishermen returned to real fishing, the Devil had another ace up his sleeve: the Bishop Franco Mulakkal rape story broke the skies and added to the growing accusations of the Church turning a blind eye to the storms of sexual molestation, World over. The unbelievable stories blew out from US, UK, Germany and many other Countries at cyclonic speeds; and the Pope is praying harder than ever to see how much has been swept under the carpet before the winds blow it (the carpet) away. I hope God hears his thundering prayers – and the confessions, if any! I wish those accused have the courage to open-up with the truth; I always believe than more than sermonising and preaching, religion should be practiced and high-level people should set an example – that’s the easiest to ‘like and follow’.

By now the rains have dried up and its smoking hot again in many parts of the World – the Sun is the new Storm, doing the rounds. Tennis star Roger Federer blamed the heat of Flushing Meadows getting to him to leave the US Open. The heat probably hit Serena Williams too, and she suddenly discovered she was a woman – that’s real cool; accusing the Strict Umpire of being sexist and losing to the same-sex opponent, a first from Japan-Naomi Osaka becoming the first person from Japan to win a Grand Slam Title and she played so well that she deserved to win. Never mind a return-to-play-after-giving-birth ageing superstar stole her nappies. I wish Serena had ‘held her court’ and set an example by exemplary behaviour rather than throw a Woman Tantrum, #YouToo.

Nearer Home, caste storms are gathering everywhere, and it’s in murdering form. In Hyderabad, the shocking killing of a man in front of his higher caste wife, who he married – jumping caste rungs, turned the girl’s father into a monster who placed prestige and caste considerations above love for his daughter’s love, and allegedly had the man murdered. Then there’s the story of another father in the neighbourhood of Hyderabad, again, hacking off his daughter’s hand in a drunken stupor, over the same issue. I would delve into the Bhagavad Gita, where Lord Krishna clearly explains that the so called caste divisions are not permanent structures but based on one’s inner chemical nature: somewhere down the line someone built physical walls and made them permanent, which has to be resisted and broken down. The father’s behaviour shows he is worser that the lowest caste ever, with such horrific thinking. I often wonder why the Gita is not read and understood by the younger generation rather, then when one grows old, so that it can be applied over a longer period. It’s time we grow-up shedding our caste clothes and wearing our thoughts high. There’s so much to do and we are no longer the unthinking animals we once descended from. We are Homo Sapiens – the wise ones.

That brings me to Dr. Yuval Noah Harari’s beautifully crafted sublime book, ‘Sapiens A Brief History of Humankind’, which I just finished reading…and am re-reading. It’s a thrilling account of our extraordinary journey from from insignificant Apes to Rulers and Masters of the World. Read it to understand our biology and chemistry and you may not hesitate to marry our closest relatives, siblings – ‘the very low caste’, chimpanzees; beware the ‘Fathers (the Mothers too may join) of Hyderabad’ may pounce for the kill – for marrying ‘Out of Species’.

While the women of India are having quite a tough time there are stories of inspirational, exceptional, courageous acts by many of them. The story of a Bhopal man’s thirty-three gruesome murders caught my eye – one of the highest in Indian History, of this kind of crime. This man was a Tailor by day and a murderer by night. He started his kill Act in 2010 in Amravati, then tested it in Nasik. He was arrested after a ferocious across-States search, by a daring woman cop, in the jungles of Sultanpur, Uttar Pradesh. She was a Taekwondo black belt and a Asian Games Bronze Medalist in Judo and took down the murderer at gun point, in the dead of the night. That made my day. We are safe at Home, notwithstanding the many storms swirling around us!

Have a great week ahead and stay watchful.

Over the past days and weeks, this August 2018, we have seen the passing away of many famous people in the realm of politics, literature, music, sport, and journalism. The line-up included, an always dark-spectacles-wearing Politician, M. Karunanithi, in Tamil Nadu – wore it in his final fight to his grave on the Marina Beach as well; Literature Nobel winner V. S. Naipaul – A House for him, and Mr. Biswas, in Heaven for sure; Singer Aretha Franklin – the Queen of Soul goes up. I Say A Little Prayer out of Respect for her; former Prime Minister of India, Bharat Ratna Atal Bihari Vajpayee – this time, his long pause was for good; former United Nations Secretary General and Nobel Peace Winner Ghanian Kofi Annan – goes over to globalise Heaven against the laws of gravity; former Indian Cricket Captain Ajit Wadekar – clean bowled this time, Summer of 42 left behind; veteran Journalist Kuldip Nayar – he retold the Emergency and has now gone Beyond the Lines …the list goes on.

Three Indians in the above list crossed 90 years of life on Earth and perhaps they are sterling lessons of longevity in India!

August 2018 has been treacherous for lives on Earth, with the good God calling back his best creations – perhaps to neatly file them in his Heavenly Archives. He also rolled out a devastating carpet of rain – in his own Country of Kerala; torched fires in the USA, launched earth-quakes in Indonesia…and the kind. Maybe, God wants to remind us who’s the Big Boss in our House on Earth?

While God attacked us on Earth, we decided to take the fight to the Heavens: NASA launched the Parker Solar Probe to dare ‘touch the Sun’ and hopefully comeback with blowing hot and cool stories to tell. While NASA was in such solar glare, India’s ISRO got a clean knock on its head with the Prime Minister of India – speaking on Independence Day – setting a goal of independently putting a Man on the Moon by 2022. I’m sure, when that happens we’ll find a Man from Kerala – having escaped the deluge, selling Ice-Tea on the Moon, using the ice that’s just been discovered. Moon-walking may become the order of the day, soon, with or with-out James Bond!

While NASA was doing what it does best, an air-side ground staff man in Seattle’s Airport quietly ran away with an empty Aircraft parked on the run-way: flew it and crash-landed to death, after having enough of the air of life. I think it’s time Pilots lock the Cockpit doors, like we do our cars, while they are parked; if not they are asking for trouble. Airport Security now have another angle to probe, and more doors to frisk! This maybe out of boundary for the upcoming US Space Force, created by its trumping President, but space in Space is being challenged.

There are so many things happening upside down these days that I could not but wonder – as the BBC reported- at Daniel Mirera, a Kenyan Student who has been writing upside-down since he was a child. Well, he also reads upside down too – turns a book on its head and races off to read effortlessly. He has been doing this normally and consistently as the upside-down thing came naturally to him. He has persisted, despite being endlessly teased on whether one’s legs can be found on top of the body or the hands growing at the bottom. I’m sure he must be having a better perspective of this complex world of ours; and they say he is a very bright student.

Meanwhile, across India’s Western Border, a Cricket World Cup Winning Captain becomes its Prime Minister after a long innings of over twenty years in politics, and some ‘deadly umpiring’ by the Pakistan Army during the talibanzied Elections. That’s an incredible journey indeed! Photos showed him glowing with an openly dressed modern ‘gold smith’ first wife; a partially covered TV-anchoring second; and a fully covered, spiritually-guiding conservative third. Now, there’s no guessing in which direction he is headed – with those playboy looks, and acquired captaincy skills. India can expect majestic reverse swings on the Kashmir issue and we need to pad-up to loft them over with hefty helicopter-shot sixes. Imran Khan would require more than the guidance of spirits; some ‘uneven turban-wearing hugs’ might help lubricate the journey to a possible stardom. Lets ‘place our bats’ on that!

With the progress of human civilization, we have moved from living in the open-under the wide sky, to trees, caves, thatched and mud huts, brick & mortar houses to modern Reinforced Cement Concrete (RCC) Structures and multi-storey High Rise Buildings. Recently, an RCC Highway Bridge collapsed in Northern Italy, killing people driving on it, who must have though that they were surely safe on a structure with a life of over 100 years. Engineers build lots of safety factors into these structures, but the elements of Nature, stress and corrosion have a way of getting into the steel – as if to test if it is from Superman’s Krypton, and in the process settle down to make it their permanent home. While some suggest that we may have to shorten the long lives of the RCC makes– we gave them that in the first place- I think we should challenge ourselves to invent new materials and dupe Nature into thinking that they are its own. For a start, I imagine a toughened Graphene RCC bridge!

Maybe, we should go back to the great Opens; the French have hit this seam, and recently Paris has installed open-air urinals, which has raised quite a stench of criticism. Did they get this refurbished idea from India – now that we are slowly doing ‘the one & two job’ from the wild outdoors to the safe indoors? Lots of Work to do in these spaces!

The 18th Asian Games-2018 now playing in Indonesia, showed the real ‘India shining’ through. A young sweet-sixteen-year-old Saurabh Chaudhary shot Gold in the 10m Air Pistol on a superb debut, and Vinesh Phogat became the first woman wrestler to win an Asian Games Gold even as Bajrang Punia wrestled a Gold – dedicating it to the passed Vajpayee. The story and fame of the Phogat Sisters continues to spread and make headlines, going beyond the movie Dangal, as a real–life sequel!

We live in a wonderful World: so much happening all the time. Are we doing our best to hold it together? We must!

Let the games of life and the music play on! Have a safe weekend

Over the past days and weeks we’ve seen a couple of Celebrity Players on the World Stage throw in their hands, and their towels: Hand-Bag Fashion Designer Kate Spade, and gifted Chef, Writer and CNN Storyteller Anthony Bourdain committed suicide – for ‘confidential reasons’, and ‘parts unknown’. In our own neighbourhood, the Newspapers cry sad stories of students taking the extreme step, over failure to pass the National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET) or simply an Exam, in Life; or a Farmer rooting out his life being unable to shoot-up his crops; or a Business man poisoning himself and his family to escape the burden of debt – rather than the wealth he hoped to create.

Perhaps, we do not know much about many of them, until the stories break out, but they affect us in a profound way, don’t they? During the vicissitudes of our lives we encounter hills, and mountains of challenges – some, which we climb and conquer; others, we tunnel through; and yet others, we simply change course and move on. If we are unable to do any of these, in a brief bizarre moment of extreme decision-making we give a very hard look at ourselves and say, ‘goodbye’. Many say it’s a cowardly act; some say, it requires courage; the law once said it was a crime (maybe still so in may countries)- India has recently decriminalised the attempt to commit suicide.

Whatever, it’s now become perfectly all right to speak out about depression and poor inside chemistry, despite a seemingly normal handsome physical appearance. Actor Deepika Padukone did it, to wide acclaim. I think we must do this more often, as depression and dying – to get away from it all, happens in all walks of life, across the high and low, and the mighty. It spares none. Everywhere, there is a dearth of real rock solid conversation and earthy hand-holding connection. Anthony Bourdain spoke well, to all of us through his cooking and travels; Kate Spade did the same through her Hand Bags – I recall she created six types of hand bags she though every working women should have. I read a tweet about Chelsea Clinton – Bill & Hillary Clinton’s Daughter, still holding a Kate Spade Hand Bag, gifted to her, years ago. I read about former US President Barack Obama having cheap but delicious noodles and cold Hanoi beer with Anthony Bourdain in Vietnam, sitting on a low plastic stool ruminating about the ability of food to bring people together. After all that talking, there is still something that they could not get out in the open – which probably took their lives! Being a Creator and an Innovator in one’s field of work must be an awfully lonely job: beyond the flash lights, the fame and the money there is a quiet dark world, where the demons of the mind play havoc; against which we have no weapons. But there is hope: we should go back to the drawing-board and come out ways to get the conversations back in our lives; throw away the plastic, sit on the stone floor, drink plain spring water, and start again – from stone age.

Meanwhile, Reality Star Kim Kardashian West wings into the White House dressed in tip-to-toe black, with a mane of loose black hair, to bring the lights into the dark lives of prisoners serving huge sentences in jail; one of them being her grandma serving over twenty years in jail, with growing-white hair. A Donald Trump Presidential pardon gets her out, dancing; and he then goes overdrive into a pardoning spree, a far as even trying to punch the late Muhammad Ali, with a pardon, which has no meaning at this stage of the fight. Could this be the brick-work for things to come; culminating in a Self-Pardon for wrongs done? Time will tell.

Sticking on with the theme of pardon, while negotiating the stiff and dangerous curves of life should we not get-off the circuit, look from above and pardon ourselves? Why wait for a God to do it, at the very end? Should not we move on?

I leave you with the following quote of Anthony Bourdain, which lingers in my mind, “If, I’m an advocate for anything, it’s to move. As far as you can, as much as you can. Across the Ocean, or simply across the River. The extent to which you can walk in someone else’s shoes or at least eat their food, it’s a plus for everybody. Open your mind, get off the couch, move”.

Well…move they did!

Have a great Week ahead.

It was the year 1991, 21^st May, when Rajiv Gandhi, a former Prime Minister (PM) of India was assassinated by a fanatical Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) suicide bomber at the start of a scheduled Election Meeting at Sriperumbudur, near Chennai. Rajiv Gandhi himself became PM on the death of his mother, Indira Gandhi, who was shot dead by her own Sikh bodyguards, in October 1984, while walking from her Home to the Office – within the same premises. Immediately following the assassination, there was widespread rioting against the Sikh Community in New Delhi, when Sikhs were chased on the streets and clobbered. Indira Gandhi paid with her life for adopting a bold stand of flushing-out Sikh militants from the Golden Temple – the holiest Shrine of the Sikhs, Amritsar, in what was called Operation Bluestar. At that time Rajiv Gandhi, who was newly and freshly sworn-in as PM, infamously said, ‘when a big tree falls, the earth shakes.’ Justice for the Sikhs is elusive to this day as the perpetrators of the violence have not been pinned-down.

Not many would recall that there were similar riots, though in a much smaller scale, in Tamil Nadu, following the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi. During the aftermath, the homes and offices of the then DMK MLA’s (Member of Legislative Assembly) were attacked, ransacked and burnt. The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) with Mr  M Karunanithi as Party Chief and Chief Minister was ruling the State, and the general perception was that they were overtly friendly with the militant LTTE and closely supported their activities – in the name of Tamil supremacy. Those were the times of the failure of the Indo-Sri-Lanka Accord and the return of the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) from its unsuccessful operations – to disarm the LTTE, in Sri Lanka. Rajiv Gandhi had sent the IPKF to Sri Lanka to enforce an Accord signed on the prodding of India. Subsequently, the DMK Government was dismissed from power for its sins of friendship – aligning with the LTTE. The stigma of the Rajiv Gandhi Assassination stuck to the DMK for the next five years after which the people apparently forgot the DMK-LTTE nexus – started wearing dark glasses too – and brought them back to power.

During the time of the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, Mr A M Ramasamy (AMR), a humble, soft-spoken and an extremely rare breed of an honest, upright politician of the DMK was the MLA of Attur, in Salem District, Tamil Nadu, having won his first ever term. He was a self-made entrepreneur and had built a business empire, from scratch: a fiery Workshop, a commercial money safe-keeping multi-storey building for the State Bank of India, a roaring diving-deep Bore-Well Business, a useful White-Goods Showroom, a trendy Men’s Ready-Made Retail Outlet, and some hard Real Estate property. He had created wealth from almost nothing to begin with, even while Dhirubhai Ambani was scaling-up Reliance, in North Western India. While Dhirubhai was offered a place in the Socialist Party, in 1949, for campaigning and ensuring the win of his choice of candidates (he promptly declined and went on to follow his dream of establishing the Reliance Business Empire), AMR was clean-bowled and mesmerised by the clever speeches of the DMK Chief, and found his true calling in politics. AMR had vigoursly contested the previous MLA Term, but lost. He made it on the second attempt, and was more than two years into his stint as a first-time MLA when disaster struck.

Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated at about 10pm and early next morning the attacks on the homes of DMK MLA’s across the State began sporadically. In the heat of that moment the DMK found itself implicitly accused as a partner in crime – with the LTTE – and the wrath of the people charged-up the mobs against the DMK Party. One quietly formed outside 162, Gandhi Nagar, Attur, the house of AMR, and before anyone inside could find their bearings, they surged inside, breaking open the front door and dragging whatever was inside – TV, Tables, chairs, crockery clothes etc and piling them up in the street outside and making a bonfire of them. One of the rooms inside was set aflame, which held the neatly starched white shirts and party colour-branded dhotis of AMR. AMR had the presence of mind to lock himself up inside his small bedroom, with the family. His daughter and a few others quickly left through a side gate and scaled a wall to reach safety. Meanwhile, at about the same time, another mob ransacked his White Goods, and Garments Shop stealing TV’s, Pressure Cookers, Fans, Pants and Shirts and the kind, and finally torching the place – looked liked a burnt-out oven the next day. His workshop was pulled down – only an old iron lathe firmly stood its place to tell the story. His businesses was fully raised to the ground and were reduced to a pile of ashes!

What had AMR done to deserve this? His only fault was that he was a MLA of the DMK, which polices had prejudiced AMR’s fate that day. Maybe, some were envious of his then bustling business – which had nothing to do with politics, and took the opportunity to ‘break even’. He was entirely honest in his dealings and corruption was alien to him.

Now, what do you expect the DMK should have done? They should have reasonably compensated him for the damage, which was only due to the DMK’s reckless stance of openly supporting a terrorist organization outside the Country in the name of Tamil chauvinism, parochialism and jingoism. The DMK Party did not pay even a ‘single Rupee’ to AMR. Once in a while when you flick through the Newspapers you come across Political Parties competing with one another to compensate the survivors of a killing, a suicide or an accident, which are sensitive and have wild political consequences and ramifications. Often you read about the DMK paying compensation to gain sympathy and political mileage. In his hey days AMR had diligently and strenuously raised funds for the DMK, on a regular basis, for the Elections, for Conferences and for Party Promotions. He called-on the DMK Chief every time on his birthday bringing with him the ‘wishes’ of self-abnegating party men of his constituency. Why wasn’t the DMK with him during the disaster which many said was the worst ever in the State at that time? AMR lost everything he had built: his Home-partly burnt, his workshop – fully burnt and razed to the ground; his White-Goods Outlet – every item stolen and the remains burnt. AMR’s soul too was burnt and broken – but who tried to mend it?

AMR did get some miserly compensation in the form of Insurance claims which took enormous time to come, and after many a visit to the then Salem District Collector’s Office (…later they became friends for life). He patiently waited out the bad times and when it was the State Assembly Elections again, he won convincingly, predominantly on the sympathy of having suffered so much. He gradually started over again, going into the Milk Transport business this time, but could never fully recover and settle the accumulated losses and accrued debts. Some even goaded him to ‘learn corruption’ and at least to make up for his losses – but he stood his ground, on keeping his integrity and following his core principles. He died trying to build-up again: a broken man.

When AMR died of a cardiac arrest in January 2012 at the age of 78, none from the DMK Founding Family visited to pay respects and homage to one of the most dedicated and honest workers of the DMK. When the funeral procession passed from 162 Gandhi Nagar to the nearby Cemetery, almost all Shops enroute, in Attur, voluntarily downed their shutters as a mark of respect. I remember an eight-year-old, watching from the sidelines say, ‘I know this Thatta (Grandfather)’. AMR had touched the lives of many in Attur.

After near about two years the son of the DMK Chief does make a visit for a photo opportunity with the widow of AMR, in a quite dilapidated 162 Gandhi Nagar. My heart burns to this day on the injustice meted out to an honourable man. I call him the Kamaraj of our times!

Over the past weeks, our eyes have been doing a lot of work – along with exercising the ‘arching’ eyebrows. Upcoming Kerala (India) movie starlet Priya Varrier’s wink launched a thousand eyebrows while glistering Gitanjali’s Nirav Modi ‘hoodwinked’ our poor Punjab National Bank with over Rupees eleven thousand crores; while winks last a second, diamonds are forever. Do we call James Bond to uncover (the winks and the diamonds)? Dangerous curves ‘lie’ ahead, for sure – trust James to bond with the best!

I’m not a foodie person but I’m an ardent follower of the food connoisseurs who know where to eat, and ‘meat upon’ their selections, once in a while, for a filling effect. My tastes are not epicurean…but I’m getting there!

After returning-for-good and moving to my hometown City, Salem, Tamil Nadu, two years ago, my wife and I have been on the search-mode for a, visit-often, clean, non-airs, non-vegetarian restaurant, to drop in for a healthy, nearest-to-home-cooked, business breakfast, lunch or dinner. The high-end Hotels weren’t in our radar. The few great eat-outs of yester-years that we knew, where we got our stomachs full, were either in the bone-starving mode or had grown-up and taken on new unrecognisable fat avatars. Hotel Sri Parasakthi, whose customers usually spilled over to the nearby railway tacks and which offered mouth-watering street-style chicken delicacies, had moved to a serious, glass air-conditioned home. We did have lunch over there, one Sunday afternoon, and never returned. It wasn’t bad at all, but we couldn’t smell the remains of the old. The then popular Chinese food serving Golden Dragon Restaurant at the dilapidated, once glorious, Santham Super Market area had lost its armor of gold and its fire, and was heading towards a close-down, in keeping with its surroundings. We could just-about recognize the small odours of a glorious past. The nearby Green Park Restaurant was a delight, but the food was costly and wasn’t worth the ambience and the setting. We did keep this is as an option – based on how heavy our purse was at the time.

We tried Junior Kuppanna, Anjappar, Ramalingam Hotel and many other medium to ‘high class’ restaurants, and yet our non-vegetarian hotel search engine stayed open and wouldn’t shutdown. Hotel Mangala Vilas was a hot restaurant during our school days but we didn’t give it a try, as yet. Then there is a Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) Restaurant at Salem, and it’s an all-time cracking favorite, especially when I head for my quarterly Car Service at nearby TVS Sundaram Motors. Nevertheless, we wanted to home-in on an Indian style restaurant!

We then shifted to the ‘like & follow mode’. My late father-in-law having been a constantly-on-the-move former Member of the Legislative Assembly, Tamil Nadu Government, had a superior knack for hunting down places to eat and keeping them in memory (Now, we only had him in our memory). During the many times we travelled with him, he would suddenly stop at some nondescript place and drag us –literally by our bellies, to what would appear to be shabby looking restaurant only to be served some of the best food that we had ever tasted. Over a period of time we learnt to blindly trust him and feed upon his judgment.

You may call it serendipity, but one clear Monday morning we were pulled by the presence of a small hotel, near the Collector’s Office and Super Specialty Government Hospital, Salem, frequented by my father-in-law, and a chosen one. Only we couldn’t recall the name; but like two blind mice we searched, and then surely stumbled upon Hotel Sri Ranga Vilas , on the Old Market Street, off the Fort Main Road leading to Gugai and the Tiruchi Road. It was almost hidden by a crowded & bulging Tea & Snack Stall adjacent to it, and fogging a clear & present view, but a huge board showed us the place. We found our way to a small but neat 15 to 20-seater, strikingly plain Hotel, which served only non-vegetarian food. It was the early days of the Government of India’s demonetization drive, when we were struggling to hold on to some cash in our pockets, and there was a smart POS card machine on the Cash Counter – ‘We Accept All Cards’ smiled a sticker. It was about 9.30 am in the morning and the menu was Idli, dosa, with chicken curry and few chicken-fry varieties. A board displayed, ‘briyani for Rs 170’ We ordered chicken-curry, plain-dosa and egg-dosa, which was served on a washed green plantain leaf. While the flawless dosas, dipped in rich curry melted in our mouths and disappeared quickly, we had the feeling that we were eating home-cooked food. The super crisp egg-dosa was even better than what we make at home (declared my wife – you have to take it seriously when the homemaker says so!) and one of the best we had ever eaten. After breakfast we needed a ‘crane of an effort’ to lift ourselves off our seats!

Later, over a chat with the Owner, he revealed many secrets that made this place a healthy non-vegetarian eat-out and even recommended by Doctors owing to the deep concern for hygiene and commitment to serving non-disruptive ‘animal’ food in a home-made style. They are closed on Dark-Moon Days (Amavasai), Sundays and are open between 8am and 6pm: with breakfast – morning tiffin between 8 & 11 am; meals – lunch between 12 noon & 4pm and Dinner – evening tiffin between 4 & 6 pm. The timings seem to be ‘cooked-well’ to ensure a work-life balance for the few dedicated staff. For Lunch you can chose between a rice meal with chicken or mutton curry and side dishes of your choice or go for a chicken of mutton-briyani. The dishes are simple – only chicken and mutton meat, with egg, and not at all complicated. The menu is painted on the wall for a quick browse.

Ever since, I find every opportunity to eat at Hotel Sri Ranga Vilas, most often for a king’s breakfast and once in a while for a gentleman’s lunch. The taste lingers, and wanting–to-get-back for another fill is hard to ignore. Over conversations, I find many have the Sri Ranga Vilas secret tucked inside their tummies – stories to tell, spread the word and show the bulge with pride !