Rest in Peace, Vinod Khanna!

Sometimes when a celebrity dies, you feel a certain ache in your heart caused by the void. Not just the void caused by his/her death but by the memory of watching a movie that cast this actor or the song he made his own with his charisma...

I can still picture Munnu singing "O rahi o rahi...", in a high pitch as she looked out of the window and perhaps remembered your style… the scenes of the film.. our last trip together… one of her last songs... 

I can still picture how my most favourite singer Kishore Kumar Sir would have sung it… in his style and the expressions.

Vinod Khanna was not just a Bollywood actor. He was nothing less than a Greek god. I remember growing up watching his Baba zarda and Cinthol ads… I knew I had a crush on him. 

By the time I realised what a crush is... Shahrukh Khan and Sonu Nigam entered my life. Ah, well!

It is not just about him passing away. 

It is the legacy of what you leave behind. What you continue to remind people of. That's our magic. 

I wish this magic to each one of us.

Rest in peace, Vinod Khanna.

A-SHAMED YET?

Be it the December 16th Gangrape case of a 23-yr old woman or the recent kidnapping and rape of a 5-yr old by her neighbour... Nowadays it is the latest trendy thing to say "..Oh, I know how terrible it must feel."

Well, this may sound aggressive and emotional to a few or many, but trust me when I say, No, You Don't.

You do not know how it feels when the auto driver looks at the rear view mirror and his gaze revolves from the cars to your breasts. 

You do not know how it feels when you feel trampled upon by people, being touched by them and  not being actually done so. Their stares do that to you. When you walk past a busy market, people rush past you intentionally so as to brush their hands against your boobs or some even grope them in a crowd. 

You do not how it feels to be a teenager going out shopping in a street market and while trying out a top, the shopkeeper grabs your boobs to "help" you wear the top. And all this while, four other men stand there, looking at the way the man gropes the left boob under the top, and then puts his other hand on the right boob to pull the shirt down. I see innocence evaporate out of the child, right there.

You do not have any freaking idea how it feels to be brushed against at all the time, in the bus. It is so common and so disturbing that I have stopped travelling in the buses at all. If you are sitting a man will come and sit beside you, even if it is a Ladies seat. And the next thing you know is he will attach his thigh to yours, and if you are unlucky, then his bag comes up on to his lap and his hand behind the bag that slowly touches the side of your breast. If you look at the person, he'd look like he has folded his hands, but behind that veil, the man attempts to grope your breast.

If you happen to be standing, you witness a mini-porn right there, too bad if it happens to star you in it though. You just got into a crowded bus and before you realise, men have "strategically" positioned themselves around you, almost in a silent understanding between them. Thus, you find the main culprits, standing one ahead, one behind you, stacking themselves against you while two three men stand right at the sides so that you don't find an escape. Blocked from all sides, one brushes his penis from behind at your buttocks while the other brushes his butt on to you from the front. Do Not mistake it to be Unintentional because believe me,a gentleman knows how to maintain the 'necessary distance'. 

Yes, of course we move away, and no body stops us. But, the smirk on their faces reveal that they have achieved what they wanted to- simply make the woman conscious of her physical vulnerability. So, you may begin to harp the noises and bring out the flags, but when it actually happens, so shamelessly in front of you and when you look into their eyes to make them realise their mistake, you face this beastly stare back, the one that promises to ravish you down, a sexual hunger that is so scary that you do nothing but turn away, silently. Because even if you make a hue and cry about it, you know that the man with a hurt ego will hunt you down and make sure you are 'severely punished' for 'humiliating' him.

You do not know how terrible it feels, when people make passes at you, how while men at a passing motorbike whistle at you, telling you what they want to do with you. How he will fuck you till you cry for his mercy or perhaps till you die. How he will finger your vagina out or fill your oesophagus with his semen.

Image-  www.nsvrc.org

Shaming the woman of her sexuality is the new Agenda, or so it seems. A man in the auto or bus next to you looks at you in a traffic jam. You happen to look that ways too, to see him lick his lips to suggest that he wants to do the same to you, and the traffic signal goes green and he is off in the other direction.

You do not know how it feels when a dear friend comes to you sobbing about how two bikers came and harassed her, and then followed her to her house and kept stalking her, calling out names. Or how someone she did not like, proposed to her and when she declined, he posted maligning information about her on the net, created her fake profiles or posted her as a prostitute on some adult site, revealing all her personal information including her landline number and address.

You do not know how it feels to feel bad for her, and at the same time imagine these things happening to you too. Just because you dared to slap the fellow to tried to grope you or ask someone why he was staring at your cleavage. Just because you shouted back at the men who whistled at you or you filed a complaint against a person for sexual harassment who might send his friends to trouble you even further.

And what if the police never took your case seriously and the man, with his hurt ego comes after you, because you reported about him!

You do not know how it feels when you need to cancel a meet or a girls day out, only because the world out there isn't 'safe' enough, and parents do not allow us to go out because they cannot change the system, or the men but can protect us, thereby not letting us go to far away places or going out after 7pm. You do not know how unsafe you feel when you are in a cab, returning from a far flung place and the cab driver steals glances at your breasts and how they shake every time he intentionally hurdles the car into the potholes and speed breakers.

You do not know how it feels to be bullied around by a sibling or a boyfriend, simply because he is a man. How you are told to take off pictures, not talk to certain people on the social networking sites and how you have to ask for permission a hundred times, and give assurances of every kind, to simply go out for a friend's birthday party.
You do not know how it feels to be told what to do or what not to, what to wear and what not to, what to say and what not to. You do not know how scary it gets to hear news of rapes, molestations and harassments all around. You do not know how it feels to be mocked at, at every step of your life for being a woman who is aware of her sexuality and who protests at every sexist comment that comes her way, on some joke on PMS or her being fat and thus unattractive, her being a feminist and so on.

You clearly do not know how it feels to be a woman in the 21st Century where at one hand she is said to be independent strong-willed and fierce, but on the other hand, she is shamed about her sexuality, and somehow masculinity takes pride in subjugating femininity.

The power relations throughout our histories have shown gender relations as power relations wherein how strong a power is, is depicted in how weak the other power is made to be. But it isn't so. The power-relations in case of gender are complementary. We benefit each other and by each other. A home, companionship is incomplete without the feminine and without the masculine; the house cannot become a home. 

https://www.facebook.com/priyanka.dey1/posts/571776236187993

BOOK REVIEW: YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN YOU'LL GET LUCKY

BOOK DETAILS

TITLE: YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN YOU'LL GET LUCKY
AUTHOR: PRIYADARSHINI NARENDRA
PUBLISHER: FINGERPINT PUBLISHING
ISBN: 978817234009
FORMAT: PAPERBACK
PAGES: 231
PRICE: Rs.150
MY RATINGS: 3.5 out of 5

Seldom does it happen that you find books that entice you to read, in appearance itself. People talk about how it is the content that finally attracts a reader to a book, but come to think of it.. The look does market the product that lies within. Priyadarshini Narendra’s “You Never Know When You’ll Get Lucky!” has a fantastic cover page and I can say so, because I have read the book and the cover and the content beautifully complement each other.

The things that I thought were quite unique in this book were:

The Cover Page

A white background is the perfect base to instill catchy symbols and metaphors for the 70,000+ words that embroider the inner pages. Inverted architectural symbols such as the Qutub Minar represents Delhi while the Gateway of India represents Mumbai, with a pair of sexy long waxed legs wearing red stilettos represents a story set in the 21^st Century, about a woman who is independent, glamorous who during the course of the story, shuttles between Delhi and Mumbai, and also moving back and forth between where her mind lies and where her heart lies..(The hearts are shown as bubbles moving around.)

Of course, the review of Durjoy Datta cannot go unnoticed, who describes the book as “Unputdownable and hilarious!” Imagine, a bestseller author, describing the book with an adjective, that hasn’t yet been created, simply because it rightly is a book, you cannot stop reading only halfway!

Also, every page number had a symbol next to it, a heart with a thread zig-zagged scrolled below it. These little things simply show how much effort an author and the publisher has put in, to attach sentiments and symbolism into this book.

The most striking bit for me was the absence of an acknowledgement page. I being part of the fraternity know exactly how difficult it is for someone to sell their manuscript to a publisher who wouldn’t treat it like any other piece but like a new born, that needs special concern and affection. That does involve a long list of people- family and friends to begin with but later on, agents, publishers, fellow authors, people attached to the marketing and PR…and the list can go on and on.

I do love reading the acknowledgement section in the books I review- they help me connect to the author’s sentiments about the coming up of the book.

Now talking of the book as per its content, No, I won’t say that it has the most unique plot ever. It is a simple story, talking of a lady named Kajal who works in an advertising company, who is more interested in getting her a promotion rather than getting into a relationship or even marriage- that her mother is driving her to do, to a childhood friend that Kajal isn’t exactly fond of. Kajal is in the course of getting a promotion after she bags a prized campaign on Condoms when she meets Sudhir- a guy in front of whom she had earlier embarrassed herself, but she found a connection that was hard to let go of. Events occur such that she spends considerable time with him and they fall in love in Mumbai. But she needs to go back to Delhi where she lives and works. Torn in between work and love, whom does she choose, considering even Sudhir cannot shift to Delhi.

There are other characters that add to the plot, Kajal’s neighbor who becomes a good friend after she realizes that he isn’t as bad as she thought of him; her temporary boyfriend who is a hypocrite-being all modern on one hand, but acting all conservative and orthodox in front of his parents; her boss who keeps tugging at her to work for the campaign on condoms, for her promotion and many more characters that silently play their roles to enrich the plot and bring the characters close.

Priyadarshini touches upon a variety of themes in this story- life of a 21^st C woman, how she looks at love, marriage and thus, life. Also, Gays and how they are pressurized to get married to women, due to the fear of embarrassment they and their families would be ascertained to.

The book feels so real, as if we have at some points, in bits and phases lived and reacted just how Kajal or Sudhir have. I could recollect reading Nikita Singh’s style of writing in it, though Priya actually manages to notch a level or two higher in terms of handling emotions of intimacy, love and desperation in a perfect blend.

All in all, a great ride of emotions. And trust me, you may get lucky, but if you do not work for it, nothing stays. Not work, not love and certainly not life!

Buy it here at a discounted rate 

Get in touch with the author here: https://www.facebook.com/fingerprintpublishing

Time for IBL- More Power to Bloggers!

Being a blogger my friend, is no easy play. 

It consumes your time, your effort and in case you are a personal blogger, then each blog-post takes away a little from you. As a blogger who started off writing only to bring her words to the world, I have always believed in the beauty of the real. But somewhere down the line, what had begun to worry me was the ignorance those bloggers faced who weren't really writing what the world of SEO, search engines and word optimizations ask for. Bloggers like me, who write what they feel when they feel, even if they are not "in demand" as such.


One day I was wandering down the alleys of Facebook, partly seeking a muse and otherwise, for simply passing time. That is when I received a notification from Deepak Karthik, a friend with whom I'd not interacted with. He'd added me to a group called Indian Bloggers League. I sulked at first, yet another group! And I sighed,  Yet another set of notifications!


I went to the group to change the settings to No Notification after which I was determined to go off to sleep. But to my surprise, I was hooked on to it all night! Why? Here's why.. The Indian Bloggers League or IBL  is a battle between blogs just like the Indian Premier League  or IPL.. Here, the teams are made by conjoining them to a city but players can be chosen from the entire sub-continent.
Thus, that night I participated in all the discussions, from discussing the team names to no. of players, genres and blogs and so much more. 

The Indian Bloggers League

The next day I was appointed as Captain of the Delhi Team and was asked to choose 16 members for my team. This was one of the most intensive-kind of work I have undertaken recently. The Document I had made for people to enlist their bog details for the short-listing, was the only one, Overflowing! Some captains   mocked about it while others were observing. It was fun, looking at how in a matter of few days, we were trying to understand each other and our teams, and there was a quest to make one's team, the best. I began to sift through the list. About 25 people had filled in the doc and about 10-15 more had messaged me to include them. Now the biggest question was How!
The IBL provided us the 8 genres which would be focused upon during the entire league, and thus, I needed a team that was strongly capable of tackling all the genres.


The entire league is divided into the following manner:
There would be two rounds, Round 1 Starting from July 1, 2012 followed by Round 2 after which there would be a semi-final round and then onto the finals where there would be a clear winner, and a runners up.
There would be more awards such as one for the best captain, best team in fair-play, best emerging blogger and many more.

The teams are: (in order of the logos in the picture. L-R)


1.Team Ahmedabad
2.The Bengaluru Blogger's Bistro
3.Bombay's Bloggywood
4.Pune Blog-in
5.Chennai Super Bloggers
6.Kolkata Knight Writers
7.Delhi Sutras
8.Patliputra Wordsmiths

The Delhi Sutras~ Simply E-wroughtic!





Being the captain of our team, called the Delhi Sutras has been exhilarating! From deciding the team members to keeping a team name..from discussing how to do what and not..
It has been a memorable journey which by the way has just begun! The actual showdown begins from the 1st of July. I am all set and my team is roaring with passion. We Delhi Sutras are Simply E-wroughtic! Hope to have a great competition and loads of fun!
Hop in! Here is how!


Join us here: 
Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/IBLDelhi

Write-Up Cafe
http://www.writeupcafe.com/group/27

Anna Revolution:Force or Farce?

Humor is a powerful tool. Use it wisely.
Issued in public interest
,
*To people who think lame jokes about sensitive issues is their right to expression*







I was shocked to see a very good friend of mine, upload a horrendous series of Jokes
 associated with the Anna Hazare movement today.And when confronted, she said, It was her freedom of expression.
Which makes me wonder, look at the Irony. The Man, is fighting for the rights of this very youth- Who chooses to post baseless rather, frivolous jokes and carried it forward within the circle of friends through the likes and the comments on a popular social-networking site.

Ironical?
Well, I'd say, Unfortunate.
It is not to say that one doesn't have the right to take sides. One may observe things and then judge for their Own. That is Freedom. That is, Democracy, my friend.


But, to make fun of A Peoples Movement by someone who has no idea what is happening in and around, has no right to comment. And to joke upon such a sensitive issue, is A Crime.
As simple as that.




Today, I was there amongst thousands of others, and the uproar my friends, has no adjectives to be aptly described upon!
It was phenomenal!
I have never seen so many people come together, chant their national and religious songs and all of it, Unitedly.
There were people transcending all stratas, all schemes.. All scopes of economy, religion, society and polity, who wanted just one thing: Their Right to Freedom of Expression. They wished to protest, and they were denied so, by the UPA(2) government.
And this, my friend is just the beginning. This time, the chants were heard not only in the Capital, New Delhi but in almost all parts of the nation.
That is the people's manner of using their Freedom of expression


.
But how unfortunate it is, for my Nation and for every person, who went to support the movement today and who would ahead in the coming days, that the same Freedom, is being "used" (I'd prefer writing misused, rather) by privileged sections of the same youth, to Call the movement.. A Farce.


Farce? What is farce? A 73- year old man wanting to make a difference? Not for him, but for You? Me?.. Us?
That he sat for indefinite fast, keeping in mind, his  age?
Arvind Kejriwal, a highly diabetic patient, has been unwell for the last 3 months, but is undeterred to continue his fast too. Is this farce?
Or as a matter of fact, today, almost 7000 Indians were "detained" by police officials, who were peacefully protesting.
In fact, even as I write this, I get reports of my friends being detained too.
All this, is Farce?


If it still is, then yes, Democracy in India is a farce.. If anything is Farce, it is this illusion that "Sab Theek Hai" ( All is well)
because all is not Well. Like someone well said today, All is rather, Bhel ( A mixture, eaten as snacks, which is basically a mixture of crisps). Why are people silent, when it comes to Speaking for political indecencies. Why is it a taboo, for the youth to Speak out.. To Protest. Why is political activism taken to be derogatory by our society?


People compare the Anna Revolution to the French Revolution and the Russian Revolution. Though I most certainly agree that the uproar of the masses, took the government by surprise by its tumult..I decline to compare it to any other revolution. The two revolutions, had specific mass backings and a limited spread. In contrast, the Global Indian too spoke up, not only the Indian in India. People from all walks of life- Students, Common Man, officials, Lawyers all came together, criss-crossing all stratifications, for the cause of a Common Goal- The Freedom our forefathers had fought for and had achieved 64 years back.

I may be thought upon as a pro-Anna supporter. But this revolution is not a one-man show. It is a Peoples Movement. Anna Hazare, is our icon. He motivates us. Inspires us. Encourages us. But it is our fight. We make it happen. What would have one frail old man done without the cause? It is the cause, that is the backbone of the movement.
I am, perhaps too emotional about it, because I seen it all. The People..The Cause..The Anna...


I am an Indian citizen and I feel, the Lokpal Bill is a necessity to ensure accountability..Yes, even from the people we elect, through our votes. And for everyone else! Even the Prime Minister of India!


I support the anti-corruption Movement! 
Do you?
It is.. NOW OR NEVER.