The Baton

I walked down the hill, it lead me to a beautiful lush green meadow, such a surprise was never to me before. Grasses were all with the morning dews, I could feel the wet mat all over, I could feel each of my steps welcomed and comforted by every grass blade below. The non-agitated and fondling cold breeze had a feel of a comforting embrace for its every stroke. I was unsated for the fresh air that it brought in me for every swig I inhaled. I was lead, don’t know where to, but was guided without my consciousness. I don’t know who, but some unknown mesmerise was seizing me to somewhere unknown to me.

I saw a shallow lake nearby, the lake was calm and serene, it plated beautifully the inner blue of it to its outer porch, its purity showed the bluntness of its kind. It pictured everything beneath to it without a cover up; its intention was all diffused to its nature with a solacing charm. I stepped into it, the tranquillity of the system got shattered in a moment, I could see the curves of agitation spreading all over. I was worried of its dislike, I felt to retreat, but the consoling puff of the water layers made me not to. After a few while, I realised the slow diminish in the protest, I became a part of it. The water ran around and soothed my feet; I felt no less to anything I knew.

I could see a big community of flora and fauna happily enjoying the travel with the stream. I could hear their sing and hum tuned to the flow of the current. I admired of the wonderful service the stream was offering, the carrier for everyone, by not differentiating any on any grounds. I wished if I was such a stream. A stream that carries everyone to their happiness irrespective any differences they possessed, to inculcate everyone for a journey to the eternal destiny. I saw a small boat nearby; it virtually invited me for a service in it. I hurriedly jumped in to it out of excitement; I knew I would be boarded to nowhere, but still couldn’t resist the invitation. Nobody was there to row, but I boat moved on.

It was early the morning in the village with a full moon lighted up. I could see wonderful streaks of red stripes in the sky. The fresh and the cool breeze of the morning gave me a new beginning with every inhale. The lush green meadow, the dark red sky and the blue stream down there made the whole scene very picturesque with strokes of splendid colours and blends of unmatched shades. It was like a great artist’s masterpiece, an art that he just finished the previous night; he has just put it outside to dry it off with the sun yet to rise. The village was blessed by all the heavenly blessings of the nature, as if it was specially moulded for its uniqueness by Him. For every blink, I saw images that nourished my eyes. The murmurs and hums of birds there never equalled any music I heard before. The air around was so soothingly hugging me that I could feel it from within. In that ecstasy of being blessed, I wished if I was to stay there for a while, but no, I found myself walking ahead.

I could hear the sweet “Suprabhaatham” (a bajan) from a nearby Temple. I walked ahead, I was not alone then. Some passerby villager’s accompanied me. They were uttering some bajans and were all heading to the Temple. The pathway was a narrow stripe of earth cut out from the grassy meadows for walkers. I felt the fresh dew drops on my feet for every advance I made stroking the sideway grasses. The smell of so many new born flowers and leaves were intoxicating my sensation, the fresh air around were dragging me to haunt on, but I had to walk, for a mission unknown.

Every step I made had a different imprint in me; every step I made was a new record and never a continuation of the prior. Just then the Bajan’s from the Temple got paused, heard a “Thakbeer” of “Azaan” from a nearby Mosque, when it got over, the Bajan continued. I walked ahead and then I reached the Temple pond. I saw the sun yet hiding beneath that vast pond, it’s yet to come out. The Sky was yet to paint it with bright red. Birds were all awake, the hums and murmurs were heard from miles. In that cold and fresh water I saw villagers taking their morning bath. I too was lead, I stepped down the stairs, when into that cold water, reflective stimulus took me back with a hick. It was hard for my body to stand that icy water, but my inner self dragged me ahead. Slowly I went on down and beneath; I could feel every hair in me feeling it, every sensory pore in me accepting it. I got fully immersed. When I came up, I was rejuvenated to a complete newness, felt as if I was new to the time, with a new birth, with a new life to live the day.

As others, I followed the path were worshippers to the temple were moving. I walked further and reached the Mosque there. Inside the Mosque I could see so many there with fresh faces greeting and praying for each other for peace from the Almighty. I felt myself too welcomed by the caring villagers, I replied back, Walaikkumussalam. I had my morning prayer there with the villagers and moved on. I got out of the mosque for my journey ahead.

The sun was out then, the pale red was getting transformed to brighter shades, the moon and the stars were going for their usual nap after their tedious job of torching the villagers the previous night. I stood outside the mosque and wondered about the beautiful world I saw there, the amazing people I met, the dazzling nature I witnessed. I asked the Almighty if that was the heaven He promised, or was heaven any better than that? I never saw any better place than that, I wished if I could be immortal there.

Villager’s got ready for their day; everyone got spread into their own world. They all knew their role and responsibilities. I was happily digesting the sweet honey of the peace and harmony they lived with; with each other, with the nature and with the Almighty. I was stunned to witness the stunning alchemy they practised with the rest of the world. But to my sad plight, I was not to stay anymore there but had to move on to unknowns. I walked on, lakes, hills, mountains all passed, astonishing me every time with its innate impressive qualities.

I then saw a small procession advancing my way. Their faces were unclear from that distance, so I walked nearer to them. The haziness slowly disappeared as I advanced, I saw the man leading the procession. I was taken aback to see him face, I always adored to see. I couldn’t stand the blaze of his bright face. The abundance of bright rays fell on me that I stood blinded-off for a while, as if I opened the door of a dark room on a sunny day. There stood my beloved Dad, my Uppa. He looked young, determined and stubborn. The magnitude of outburst in his slogans revealed the strength he had within, the perseverance he practised, the commitment he professed. I tuned my ears to hear what they were uttering. “No to Globalization, Yes to Humanisation”. I followed the troop, when we reached a nearby bazaar; he stood on a small platform and gave a speech addressing the public, the villagers around. My memory didn’t register many of his lines, but few;

.......The blood cloned looting hands of the capitalists have re-reached us. Years back they had to send their army for capturing and colonising countries and continents, but now they are matured for a much easier and cheaper strategy. The role of soldiers and tanks are now done by the marketing and sales department of some big shot private companies. The hegemony of their rule is on the go with hand in hand with our elected representatives. To squeeze even the last drop of blood from you and your resources, they have again boarded their flight to loot you, they bring unto you their desire arousing packed branded products and uncensored filthy culture to enslave you.

.....It’s a free India, its people’s democracy, then why not a rule for us? Why not a tomorrow planned by us? Why are there economic plans designed by the capitalists, why should any stranger plan our tomorrow?

My dear people, the answer is simple and plain. It is because none can make a tomorrow of their interest without their funds, none can make the social progress they suggests without their technology, none can make a stronger country what they advise without their machinery and arms, and none can uplift the standard of living to equal their culture without their products. In short, in the struggle to be a developed country with their “mighty help” they would flourish to be mightier and we perish down below the poverty line of the huge debts we would owe to IMF and WB. I warn you of a day to come, not very long ahead, when you would pay to these private giants for the water of yours, for the soil of yours, for the roads and pathways of yours, the air you breath and what not, for the very space you occupy.

.........Dear people, these capitalists are controlling not only our economy but our consciousness too. They are tuning us to be a sect who doesn’t respond to their massacres, who doesn’t question their injustice, who doesn’t protest their carnage, who doesn’t shout against their cruel oppressions. A numb and an insensitive society wandering behind the maiden formula they created for all of us; women, wine and worship. They are opening centres in whole sale across the country promoting these W’s. When I say worship, I am not here against any divine religion, but against the demigods and the social cult they advertise. These human gods are not with any pennyworth values, not with any new teachings. They preach the same slanderous and superfluous words across the world with same hymns, with the same essence, just that they have different names.

They jail you, your thoughts, your feelings, and your very self existence. Once into such Gurujis and Mathas, you become devoid of any energy to fight back any atrocities you face, you become easily slave-able, because you mortgage your brain and your thoughts for some fallible peace you get promised off. Such institutions make you nil happy in real, but rotten slaves of the oppressors.....

......My dears, its time that we realise our roots, its time to go back to our divine teachings, to our original revelations and prophetic way of life. The teachings which rants none, rather respects all. Which accepts no injustice, no cruelty and oppressions, rather which attaches the morality of considering every creature on earth with the eternal sensory of universal justice. Dear people, its time to realise for the change, the revolution is on; we invite you too for the same. Inquilab zindabad.

I was benumbed with a stalled consciousness after the speech. Like many in the public, I too didn’t realise many of his lines. I couldn’t imagine a tomorrow like that to come in for that beautiful village, where some strangers would rule and loot, where human gods would be replaced with the original one. Just keeping aside the undigested topic, I ran near to him, he and his small group was hurrying for the next town. I called him softly with greatest of emotions from my within. When I uttered that magical word referring him, I felt the huge gush of happy-hormones throughout my body. The word which was never so familiar to my tongue, but the one very popular in my heart made such a tremendous sensation that I was trembling with the outbreak of the warm air my throat pushed out with the word. I called my Uppa again. He didn’t hear me; I called him the third time, still in vain. I ran and stood in front of him. He passed over me as if I was a hollow, as if I was of air. I ran behind the procession, town to town, but couldn’t reach unto him. Fully tired and exhausted, I took a break and had a deep nap under a banyan tree nearby, the shade pampered me to the deepest of sleeps I ever experienced.

I got up with hick of a blaring honk, to my surprise I found myself on a cemented footpath. I saw buses and cars zooming on the road. I hurriedly stood up with astonishment. The hazy air around me was making things unclear and misty. I was sneezing; I was unstable and unsound with the dust and stench from around. I could see concrete buildings all around, immodest posters and ads touching the skies, asphalt roads all the way, unattended and overloaded waste drums over which street dogs were storming. It was early morning, but the stale and dusty polluted air was undiluted for me, I had to breathe it with no other choice. I walked on, no. ran to nowhere.

I saw a sign board, “drinking water”; I went inside, there were no taps, no operators, just a vending machine inside. The machine displayed to insert two ten rupee coins. I searched in my pocket, could only find a five rupee coin. I had never seen a ten rupee coin yet. I inserted in what I had, but in vain for any water. I had to quit from there by quenching my thirst with the bitter feeling of the pity plight I was with.  I proceeded to the street, the streets were all coloured with grabbing shades and nude posters of women. Every street had many outlets of bars and prostitution camps. Supermarkets, branded showrooms and cosmetic shops ruled the street. I was shocked of the drift and such a drastic difference between the village and the new city I was with; it was hard for me to make things digested.

I walked on. I didn’t see any humans on the street yet. Everything below my feet was cemented and metalled; the earth was fully covered and sealed. Every step I made on the floor made me feel of my presence in a sealed chamber. Sensors on my feet made me feel of a kind of helplessness of a jailed, of an oppressed. I saw from a distance a board of a Reading room. I went running to read some news. I was more than happy to see so many newspapers and reading materials there. I took a newspaper and started reading, but it barely allowed me to read any rather it showed me many. Every page was numbered to be Page three, sex and lust gulped in a huge chunk in every page. I switched newspapers, just the name at the top header changed but the contents all were of the same kind, as if those were all from the same press and from the same reporters. Had no option but to pity the people for helplessness to watch such news everyday. With an unresolved agony within, I got out to the street biting my teeth hard.

Streets got filled with people by then; all were in great hurry. My eyes fell on to a bus stop nearby where people were waiting for their office buses. They looked very peculiar; they were all dressed like humans, but looked mechanical with a bar code over their bald head, were that a tattoo or their empirical value fixed by their employer? Were they androids or trained humanoids? I just went near to them, they all walked the same busy life, talked the same topic of their interests; sports, movies, women and work. They all looked to be from the same mould. Or were they moulded later by a common interest in exchange to the salary they draw?

I walked along; I saw a familiar face from far of a distance, who was talking to a small group. I ran unto them. My eyes rained down of excitement when I saw him, I hugged him warmly, but he didn’t notice my presence. My elder brother; He was giving a class to the public on the untold exploitation of the water resources of the Perumazha village. A village nearby where a new ultra large scale factory for bottled water had its run. He was warning the public of the future of Perumazha and nearby villages with nil water and dry land devoid of any cultivation, and the poor farmers there who makes their living only by cultivation. “Androids” around never gave an ear, they were rather trained not to gulp in such subjects. He was in fact hoisting a rally against the water bottling company that day. I pledged solidarity for their selfless service, with the top of my voice I utter the slogan for their revolution to succeed, but my shouts gave no extra loudness. Was I autistic?

I walked on; I was in front of an educational institution. The hub were from the future gets churned and nourished. I saw two youngsters in front of the gate with placards, the writings on it were denouncing the educational system of the country. I was for sure, it to be my beloved brothers, Fazil and Jouhar. I knew I can’t hug them, because I was a hollow. Just wished them all success in their way too. I joined them protesting against the brutal practice of the pre-college surgeries the authorities do to remove out the rational brain of the students before their admission. I really didn’t understand if such a practise existed or if it was sarcastically addressed to refer the ineffective educational system which makes its products inefficient and impotent, a system which produces only androids and no rational humans. I showed my solidarity to them and walked down, as I was to walk ways unknown to me.

 

I saw no un-plastered walls in the street; all were filled with posters and advertisements. Many of them were about Aashramas and retreat centres. It was to me for the first time that I saw advertisements of “Gods” and “Goddesses”. With an expectation of no sane being to be present inside, I stepped into one such retreat centres. To my surprise, it was packed to its fullest, completely occupied. To the hiss of a human Devi, I saw the pathetic plight of these “human-likes” dancing and singing in groups. I could do nothing, felt the most for their pity plight, tears flowed my eyes of my helplessness. I walked away; quit the site calmly with a heavy heart. Outside this building, a boy was distributing some leaflets of some Sri Sri, claiming of some breath exercise for ultimate peace. I neglected and walked away, a while down the street, on the wall I saw a torn poster. It read;

There is no peace for a human when his brothers are killed, his neighbours starved, his sisters raped, his resources looted, when there are injustice everywhere. Peace is not any tablet the demigods manufacture. Nobody can attain any peace from any retreat centres, not from the blessings of any Devis or Sri Sris, not from any uni-sexual dancing and singing, not from any physical exhales and inhales; unless one pawns his rationality for such idiocies.

The one looted, the raped and the exploited tomorrow could be you and your family, when you are deeply unconscious with the hope for such futile peace to happen. Open your eyes and see the world beyond the veil. For real peace, abide to the divine teachings – Solidarity.

The Alarm blew off, I got up. It was then time for my morning prayer. Went to the basin and had my ablution. The cold water when splashed over my face triggered me to remember the wonderful journey I had in the village, I got big smile within me to start my day. I saw my mother in the prayer room. I went and hugged her, this time I was not a hollow, I could feel her. Oh, was that a dream? It was hard for me to realise that it was one. How can that be a dream when I experienced every bit of it that underwent?

After the prayer Umma (mother) served me a cup of tea in the kitchen. I was in the peak of narrating my experiences about the village and the city of the previous night. Meanwhile Jowhar came into the kitchen. He was looking for Fazil, I enquired the reason for. He told that, that day they had actually planned to paste posters about the campaign of their social organisation SIO against the miserably adulterated educational reform plans by the Government.

I was taken aback for the maturity he professed in understanding his social responsibilities. I leaned unto him and asked for the reason and trigger for such a realization. He boldly replied, “My existence”. I really didn’t understand his answer, but to ask him a counter question would be too low for my stature. I smiled and thanked him. His answer taunted me back and forth. I connected his ideas to be similar to that of my Uppa’s and my elder brother’s in my dream. I decided to visit my Uppa’s library in our family house, Haleema Manzil.

I was not visiting that library then for the first time, but never had realised its vast collection of books before. I stood with nil gumption when I stared the shelves packed with treasures of knowledge and cognizance. I gaped with unconsciousness with nil idea, where to start from, which book to begin from, to understand what “My existence” really meant. I found a big red book in the left rack, the holy Bible; I turned a few pages, read a paragraph in random;

Leviticus (26:3-6): “If ye walk in My statutes, and keep My commandments, and do them; then I will give you rains in their season, and the land shall yield her produce, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.... And I will give peace in the land.”

I sat back, refreshing my dream of the previous night and relating it with what I read. I realised that the naturally blessed village I saw was the “yesterdays”; the physically and intellectually polluted city I witnessed could be the “tomorrows”. I stand marking the “todays”. It’s the call of the time and the rule of day that the “todays” are from the “yesterdays” and the “tomorrows” to be from “todays”. Today would metamorphose to tomorrow with the passage of time. Being part of “today” I become morally responsible than any others for the “tomorrow” to happen, because I witness and live the time that makes them two different “days”. I volunteered to accept the baton of rationality from my leaders of yesterdays to strive for a tomorrow not any worse than today. I decided to tread the path of my leaders who conceived their ideologies with their sweat and wealth to gift us a liveable today. I decided to succeed their understanding with the books they digested, words they preached and the struggles they undertook. I decided to begin, begin a new beginning with the baton I received.