Ever wondered why some worries remain unaddressed or insufficiently addressed. The worries that may not be existential in nature. But important. You know that the explanations are there. With someone. But that someone decides to keep you in a constant state of un-explained-ness. The predicament agitates you. In your pursuit of explanations, you want to shake the world. May be, do what most wouldn’t. The time passes. The conventional wisdom takes over. Your systolic pressure measurements take precedence over the need to seek explanations. You hum the famous Bobby McFerrin number “ Don’t Worry Be Happy”. And let it be. Here are a few of my many worries that remain unexplained or insufficiently explained. I couldn’t let them be.
27% > 73 %
We had made peace with the ways of the Indian politics. Well, till Mamta Banerjee created a paradigm shift. She tried creating a nation within the nation to perpetuate her rule. Her prompt was to stop proliferation of Hindu nationalism to protect her turf any which way. That led her to unabashedly patronize the Muslim vote-bank. Parallelly, she rode roughshod over the others into stillness, using her unbridled party cadre (read goons) and a neutered administration. She believed, almost correctly, that consolidated 27% Muslim votes outweigh disparate 73% non-Muslim ones. It did work. For fifteen years. Come May-2026, the tables were turned. Her politico-religious constructs were demolished. Not by the Bhartiya Janata Party which, at best, offered a viable alternative. What put paid to her plans was the simmering anger among the commoners against her insensitivity towards their predicament. The shenanigans (land-grabbing, threats, extortions, corruption, rapes and murders) of her goons added fuel to the fire. A state of affairs that had turned the lives of most into an agony and the state into a hell-hole. High on power, she was dismissive of the day-to-day concerns of non-Muslim & non-cadre Bengalis. Lest we make an exception of her, it be said that Mamta is just a case in point. Most political parties in the states like Assam, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana have a history of leveraging high Muslim population to tilt the electoral compass in their favour. The West Bengal experience poses, once again, a million-crypto question. Shouldn’t we worry that commonality of religions, castes or languages are being remorselessly used as foundations to build political structures on ?
Dhurandar-2 (धुरंदर-2)
In November-2016, the bank notes of Rs.500 and Rs.1,000 denominations were demonetized. The objective was to address the issues of counterfeit currency and black money which were being used for illegal activities. Particularly for financing terrorism. The next-level idea underlying the exercise, though lacking public conviction, was to promote digital transactions. Most of us have seen Dhurandar 2. Recollect the printers (Khanani brothers of Pakistan) who turned out to be the fountainhead of counterfeit printing. Then there was the conniver (an Indian Minister) who allegedly delivered the printing-plates to the Khanani brothers at Dubai. Coming to the distributor (Atiq pahalwan), anyone who has anything to do with Prayagraj (formerly Allahabad) would know of his demonic activities. Having watched the film multiple times, I now have a better understanding of the reasons underlying demonetization. A tad (ten years !) later, though.
Back to the basics. What is black money ? Money that hasn’t passed through the tax regime and / or sources of which are illegal. Besides the undisputed poor planning, the demonetization exercise was termed a failure. Why ? Nearly 99% of a total of Rs. 15 lakh crores of the demonetized notes in circulation was deposited in banks. By implication, 99% of the black-money too was returned. It was the job of the government to seek explanations on the sources of the black-money so deposited, subject such deposits to taxes & penalties and proceed legally against those who deposited the same. One believes all that was done and the black-money was dealt with fittingly. Purely from the viewpoint of unearthing and mainstreaming the black-money, was demonetization still a failure ? Do we have more reasons to worry about beyond this elementary hypothesis, Dr. Watson ?
Saiyaan miley larkaiyya (सैयाँ मिले लड़कइयाँ)
My father was a believer-Congressi. So were most other adults in my family including my resident fufa-ji (not the naaraz variety). Well, till the disenchantment started setting in. Like it happens with each generation, I too questioned their convictions and, in due course, built my own set. Congress did whatever it could, given the limitedness of their vision for the country and the Machiavellian ways of its leaders. But there is no gainsaying that because of the ways of the dynasty helming the affairs of the Congress, India missed many buses. Hoping against hopes, many thought that things would improve. But that was not to be. Today the crown-prince, whose coronation has been frustrated by the electorate time and again, is proving to be the party’s nemesis.
I cannot help humming a hugely popular folk song by Dr. Malini Awasthi (the renowned folk singer) every time I see or hear Rahul Gandhi. The song goes like “saiyaan miley larkaiyya main kaa karu”. The lyrics capture the sentiments of a young, worldly-wise lady who is at her wits’ end as to “what to do with an un-initiated, juvenile paramour”. It’s a song crooned privately by most Congressi believers and empathizers, given the antics of their always-in-the-making leader. The man questions the integrity of all national institutions. Bad-mouths everything that is Indian. Carries a massive persecution complex. Hobnobs with the people with known anti-India positions. Accuses individuals and institutions but scoots when it’s time to substantiate accusations. Runs down, shamelessly, India’s armed forces only to get rapped on the knuckles by the Supreme Court. Parrots another God’s-gift-to-the-mankind (Donald Trump) in saying that India’s is a dead economy. Calls the Pran Pratistha of the Bhagwan Shri Ram temple in Ayodhya a naach-gaana (song & dance) event. Enters into shady understandings with India-baiting individuals / institutions / countries and refuses to let the public in on the same. Vicariously desires acrimony between India and unfriendly-countries to swell only to know which way the cookie crumbles. Why ? So that he can sink his teeth into a politically convenient outcome. Congress is needed. It is the only surviving political party with pan-India presence. But it’s led by a lame, direction-less leadership. It doesn’t know if it’s coming or going. Shouldn’t the Congressis worry and let go of this larkaiyya-saiyaan whose default is destruction ?
Eko aham, dwitiyo naasti (एको अहं द्वितीयो नास्ति)
The enlightenment that “Eko aham dwityo nasti. Na bhuto na bhavishyati”(I am the only one, there wasn’t one and there will be none.) was imparted by Bhagwan Shri Krishna to the Pandav prince Arjun. There are some who believe this assertion came from Ravana, the King of Lanka. The origins notwithstanding, two Indian corporates seem to have taken in its meaning a tad too seriously. Indigo and Adani. The core proposition here is that our country runs the risk of the civil aviation sector coming under the control of corporate mafias.
Indigo enjoys a whopping 60% share of the market. Emboldened by its near-monopoly, Indigo created a crisis in the country for four days in December-2025. Around 3,000 flights were cancelled, creating chaos across the country. Thousands of passengers were stranded in almost all major airports / cities, facing harrowing times due to cancelled flights and missed domestic or international connections. Airports were choc-a-bloc as cancellations were not conveyed to passengers in time and they were not advised against coming to airports. The checked-in baggage were not returned to passengers for days. Instant refunds were shamelessly declined. Indigo’s ground staff, otherwise also infamous for their uncouthness, misled all with their uninformed responses. Why ? Indigo management wanted to cock a snook at the regulatory compliances and blackmail the country. The brazenness did not stop there. Indigo also mocked at the national security by engaging pilots and crew from an enemy country Türkiye, citing some lame reasons. Türkiye which is known for their anti-India and pro-Pakistan stance. The same Türkiye which supplied and operated military drones from the Pakistani soil against India during the Operation Sindoor. What gives Indigo the gumption ? Their heft ? Their alleged strong, sub-terranean connections with the ruling dispensation ? Don’t we need to worry about the state of affairs ? As we talk of Indigo, there is another Indigo-like situation emerging in another area of the aviation sector. Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Ahmadabad, Jaipur, Lucknow, Guwahati, Thiruvananthapuram and Mangaluru. The airports in these major cities are owned by the Adani group. Though we haven’t heard of any serious arm-twisting of public by the group as yet, one fears that it’s just a matter of time. Or, some more airports.