And why do we
reduce the beauty of relating to relationship? Why are we in such a
hurry? Because to relate is insecure, and relationship is a security.
Relationship has a certainty; relating is just a meeting of two
strangers, maybe just an overnight stay and in the morning we say
goodbye. Who knows what is going to happen tomorrow? And we are so
afraid that we want to make it certain, we want to make it predictable.
We would like tomorrow to be according to our ideas; we don”t allow it
freedom to have its own say. So we immediately reduce every verb to a
noun.

You are in love with a woman or a man and immediately you
start thinking of getting married. Make it a legal contract. Why? How
does the law come into love? The law comes into love because love is
not there. It is only a fantasy, and you know the fantasy will
disappear. Before it disappears settle down, before it disappears do
something so it becomes impossible to separate.

In a better
world, with more meditative people, with a little more enlightenment
spread over the earth, people will love, love immensely, but their love
will remain a relating not a relationship. And I am not saying that
their love will be only momentary. There is every possibility their
love may go deeper than your love, may have a higher quality of
intimacy, may have something more of poetry and more of godliness in
it. And there is every possibility their love may last longer than your
so-called relationship ever lasts. But it will not be guaranteed by the
law, by the court, by the policeman. The guarantee will be inner. It
will be a commitment from the heart, it will be a silent communion. If
you enjoy being with somebody, you would like to enjoy it more and
more. If you enjoy the intimacy, you would like to explore the intimacy
more and more. And there are a few flowers of love which bloom only
after long intimacies. There are seasonal flowers too; within six weeks
they are there, in the sun, but within six weeks again they are gone
forever. There are flowers that take years to come, and there are
flowers that take many years to come. The longer it takes, the deeper
it goes. But it has to be a commitment from one heart to another heart.
It has not even to be verbalized, because to verbalize it is to profane
it. It has to be a silent commitment; eye to eye, heart to heart, being
to being. It has to be understood, not said.Forget relationships and
learn how to relate.

Once you are in a relationship you start
taking each other for granted'" that”s what destroys all love affairs.
The woman thinks she knows the man, the man thinks he knows the woman.
Nobody knows either! It is impossible to know the other, the other
remains a mystery. And to take the other for granted is insulting,
disrespectful.To think that you know your wife is very, very
ungrateful. How can you know the woman? How can you know the man? They
are processes, they are not things. The woman that you knew yesterday
is not there today. So much water has gone down the Ganges; she is
somebody else, totally different. Relate again, start again, don”t take
it for granted.And the man that you slept with last night, look at his
face again in the morning. He is no more the same person, so much has
changed. So much, incalculably much has changed. That is the difference
between a thing and a person. The furniture in the room is the same,
but the man and the woman, they are no more the same. Explore again,
start again. That”s what I mean by relating.Relating means you are
always starting, you are continuously trying to become acquainted.
Again and again, you are introducing yourself to each other. You are
trying to see the many facets of the other”s personality. You are
trying to penetrate deeper and deeper into his realm of inner feelings,
into the deep recesses of his being. You are trying to unravel a
mystery which cannot be unraveled. That is the joy of love: the
exploration of consciousness. And if you relate, and don”t reduce it to
a relationship, then the other will become a mirror to you. Exploring
him, unawares you will be exploring yourself too. Getting deeper into
the other, knowing his feelings, his thoughts, his deeper stirrings,
you will be knowing your own deeper stirrings too. Lovers become
mirrors to each other, and then love becomes a meditation. Relationship
is ugly, relating is beautiful.Hence I say relate. By saying relate, I
mean remain continuously on a honeymoon. Go on searching and seeking
each other, finding new ways of loving each other, finding new ways of
being with each other. And each person is such an infinite mystery,
inexhaustible, unfathomable, that it is not possible that you can ever
say, “I have known her,” or, “I have known him.” At the most you can
say, “I have tried my best, but the mystery remains a mystery.”

In fact the more you know, the more mysterious the other becomes. Then love is a constant adventure.

O ver the last few weeks, several things
happened that got me thinking of the true nature of patriotism in
modern India. The first was Republic Day, then came the Mahatma's death
anniversary and finally the ongoing debate about which patriot should
be rewarded with the Bharat Ratna. I had been quite busy at work, so I
never really got around to completing my line of thought. However,
there was a niggling feeling in the back of my mind that something
somewhere was disconnected. When I stepped into my office on Monday, it
was to meet a new client who would bring such thoughts back
centre-stage in my mind.

My client was an aged gentleman who looked like he had
forgotten the struggle for independence had ended decades ago. In his
crumpled khadi clothes, topped off by a Nehru cap, he looked like
someone who had dropped out of the sets of a movie about Gandhi or
Nehru. He introduced himself as Mr De Chowdhury and took out a pair of
cracked reading glasses as he shuffled through some papers in his bag
before he handed them to. The first thing I noticed was a hand-written
letter that looked faded and ancient.

'Son, this is the brief I want you to work on.'

'What's in it and who wrote it?'

'Mahatma Gandhi wrote it.'

That certainly got my attention.

When I probed further, it turned out that my client had been a
young Freedom Fighter who had spent years in jail and sacrificed a
promising career in teaching by throwing himself headlong into the
struggle to secure our independence. During one of those prison
'visits', he had the good fortune of meeting Gandhi, who apparently
impressed by the young man's fervour, had given him a short note of
encouragement. A note that, more than sixty years later, I held in my
hands. He pointed to one line in the note. It said, 'When a nation's
youth embrace patriotism, it becomes unstoppable.'

When I asked him how he thought I could be of help, he told me
that he had re-started his career as a professor after 1947, and after
his retirement some years ago, had formed an NGO to increase national
awareness and consciousness among the youth. Its goal had been, as
Gandhi had instructed him, to recruit youth who would actively work
towards social and political reform. However, it had been tough going,
as he was struggling to find members or to really connect with today's
youth.

'It's as if they don't care of all we had sacrificed to get our
freedom. All they seem to care about is enjoying today, not about
respecting the past or preparing our nation for a better tomorrow. I
want to know how I could recruit more youths to my cause.'

When I asked him what he had tried, he said that he had actively
sought the support of young politicians whom he felt the youth could
relate to, and who may epitomise younger generations taking the plunge
into national service. But even with such 'brand ambassadors' he was
struggling to find new members, especially among the urban, educated
youth he sought. He had also tried to highlight the legacy of the
Freedom Struggle and leaders like Gandhi and Nehru, but with similar
results. He wanted to know what it would take to get the younger
generation more interested in participating in national service.

What began as straightforward exercise in market research ended
up being an exploration of what patriotism really means in today's age
of an increasingly connected and globalised world. Scores of interviews
later, I thought I had some answers as I met Mr De Chowdhury again
after a few days.

'Sir, first of all, I think it would be wrong to conclude that
young people today aren't patriotic. They are, but in a different way.'

'What do you mean?'

I told him that his generation had been shaped by the struggle
to get freedom and the next generation by the struggle to create a
national identity. Today's generation faced a new and different
struggle ? that of finding their, and India's, place in the world.

'So to connect with them, you need three things to work for
you. The first is relatability. They may respect symbols of the Freedom
Struggle, but they can't really relate to them. If you want to connect
with them, you need to find contexts, people and symbols that stand for
the struggle they are facing. So an Infosys or a Tata are great
examples they can relate to of Indians making a mark on the global
arena, and probably better symbols to rally them around.'

'The second is credibility. The problem with our Freedom
Struggle and its leaders is that today's political leaders who lack
much vision, respect or credibility have hijacked their legacy. The
more patriotism is seen as a political exercise, the more today's youth
are turned off by it. Your getting so called young leaders doesn't help
much in appealing to the educated youth, since these leaders in many
ways epitomise all that's wrong with our politics- dynastic politics,
nepotism and a culture where leadership goes to sons and relatives of
leaders and not based on any merit.'

Mr De Chowdhury was nodding along, and asked me what else I had found.

'The final issue is of actionability. Today's generation wants
deeds, not words, and sitting around bemoaning the state of affairs
doesn't appeal to them. The problem is they don't have an outlet to do
it- entering politics isn't an option for most, and once they get
caught up in the rat race of getting a job and progressing in their own
lives, they find themselves increasingly disconnected from broader
national issues. If you want them to rally around national causes, help
provide an outlet for action.'

The old man looked at me thoughtfully and finally said, 'Makes a lot of sense. Any ideas on what I could do?'

The two of us spent the next couple of hours brainstorming, and
I was amazed at the old man's passion, willingness to listen to new
ideas and enthusiasm. The body of the young Freedom Fighter may have
long decayed, but the fire within still burned strong. By the time we
finished, he had a plan to recruit young professionals to his cause,
and create a forum that would have two objectives. First, to inspire
these young professionals to not forget India and to strive to build
Brand India whatever they did and wherever they were, through coaching
by inspirational leaders like Narayana Murthy, APJ Abdul Kalam etc, and
secondly to get them actively immersed in national service in a way
that bypassed the dirty politics they loathed so much. This could take
simple actions like partnering with NGOs in the field of education and
development. For those who didn't have the time to get involved
'hands-on', they could donate to such causes in a centralised and clean
way through Mr De Chowdhury's organisation. It was hardly a panacea for
all problems, but it was a beginning, and already a big burden to be
placed on the frail shoulders of my client.

As I thought more about it, the more I realised that the real
issue in my generation was a fear of commitment. We had grown up to be
a generation of fence sitters, who would analyse every situation with
detached interest, but hesitated to really plunge headlong into
something the way Mr De Chowdhury and his generation had done. We had
gained much education, opportunities and a broader outlook, but had
lost some of the fire in the belly his generation had. It shamed me
that the burden of rousing our generation to shake off its apathy lay
with a man who had fought his battles sixty years ago. If we were to
reclaim our status as the deserving successors of his generation, we
would need to pick and fight our own battles.

So a couple of days later, I met Mr De Chowdhury, volunteering
to join his organisation and saying that a few of friends and I would
help with the operational aspects by using some of our weekends to help
out. He was genuinely touched and thanked me profusely. It was a small
act, but in meeting him I had learned that patriotism lies in doing,
even the smallest of deeds, and not in speeches and talking. As I
walked out of his office, I realised that I didn't really give a damn
which politician or his crony got the Bharat Ratna, real patriots
didn't always sit in Parliament or hog the headlines- they were, like
my client had been, unsung foot-soldiers in the ongoing battle to
rescue our nation from ourselves.

"Comedy dekhne aaye the, bete?"

Sometimes you get inspiration
from the most unlikely of sources. The above comment was made by one of that
sizeable breed you get to meet so often, but tend to ignore mostly, in Indian
theatres ' the tapori variety. But today, the above comment fitted so
beautifully with one's frame of mind after watching this movie, that for a
change, even I had one huge laugh with the gang.

I mean, consider the kind of
cinema Priyadarshan has beem famous for, atleast of late. Agreed he is the same
guy who came up with a 'Sazaa ' e ' Kalaapani' or a 'Viraasat' or my-personal -
favorites ' of ' his 'Gardish' and 'Doli saja ke rakhna' , but then isn't he
made his name almost synonymous with comedy. His biggest success to date, and
rightly so, has been Hera Pheri. And since then, he has been coming almost
exclusively with his brand of 'ae raju, itni raat ko kaun sa khel khelenge?'
humour. And in all those setups, even the actors have remained the same without
fail. Be it the powerhouse performer Paresh, the completely re- invented and
truly rocking Akshay, the plain brilliant Rajpal Yadav, or even the small time
roles of Asrani and Manoj Joshi. And they all are here too. Add to that the
fantastic pre- release hype, the hugely popular 'Hare rama hare krishna' video
and marketing campaign that was aimed at making this look like another of those
laugh riots and you have hordes of public lined up, even more so because this
is the Navratri and Eid period. Though the initial footfalls only will surely
ensure that it becomes a box office hit, but for all of those who still plan to catch up this one, people
be warned - " YOU ARE IN FOR A
SURPRISE".

Ok, enough footage and suspense
build ' up. This one is a psychological thriller. Based in one of those
heritage havelis (though here it probably was a set) in Rajasthan, it is a
story of a couple who visit their ancestral home and plan to live in the rich
setup of their haveli, after being warned by one and all of the bad elements
roaming around. But we all know the city bred mindset ' The more they tell us
not to do something, the more we wanna get a first hand experience on that. So
the doors that never should have been opened are opened and things start to
turn interesting!!!

Actually even when they tell us
about the spirits in the first half, you only wanna laugh, and at every point
you expect something humorous to happen. And the presentation does nothing to
make you wanna change your mind. They just keep one believing that you are in
for a hilarious ride and man, do they take you for a ride in the second half?

Acting wise, Akshay's entry is
delayed a bit too much, specially considering almost everyone in the theater ,
including me, was rooting for that rockstar to make an entry and that he was
the reason most of us had even purchased the tickets (Yeah friends, I am a die
hard fan). Albeit when he makes his entry at the point of interval, you expect
fireworks. Well the fireworks are a bit subdued here, as this one, as mentioned
time and again, is different. Yeah he still has that amazing screen presence
and even his brand of humour keeps cropping up from time to time, but this
performance somehow is so not ' Akshay like. Shiney has not much to do, more so
after Akshay's entry but he is efficient, though a bit loud at times. Paresh,
Asrani and Rajpal try their usual hilarious stuff and to some extent succeed
too, but then even they take a backseat
to the script and the environs.

Ok now, for the real star of the
show. "Salute' Madame ".

Vidya Balan has given one
absolutely knock out performance. In the first half, she is so subdued as the Indian bahu that you just take her as
a part of the proceedings and then, it's like the multiple personality disorder
takes effect on her in the second half. Her expressions (I concede that she
managed to scare me), her voice modulations (obviously technology was a big
help) and her complete moves on the classical dance make this as one of her
real best performances, if not the best.

The music has done it's bit in
the promotion. The title song has become kind of a national anthem. Everywhere
you go, it's barging down your ears and for a change you don't mind. Again,
Akshay is a big help (told you I am his fan). Everyone in the theatre wanted to
listen to this track right from the time the movie started. They were all like,
"abhi aayega, abhi to pakka aaayega" but to their disappointment, the song
comes right at the fag end with the end titles, by the time you almost are out
of that comfort zone. Other songs are just fillers, nothing special except the
new Bengali version of 'Gumnaam hai koi' and this one is a good listen too but
please don't listen to it in the lonely nights. You might just have a
visitor!!!

The choreography is brilliant on
the classical song as mentioned earlier. Picture frames are good to look at
most of the time and the dark alleys of the special room are well lighted and
nicely captured. Sets and the other art pieces like the swords, paintings and
the jewellery are amazing. Editing could have been a bit crisper, more so in
the second half which gets a bit taxing at times.

The movie overall, is a decent
watch. It's not completely original, you might get reminded of one of those
Ramsay flicks, Hell No, it's not even close to that bad. But the movie sure did
have one effect on me ' I took the next weekend vacation to our ancestral home
in Rajasthan and this time, I wanted to explore the whole place and listen to
all the folk tales of the oldies of the village, the ones I never cared to give
a hoot to earlier. Take your girl friend
along, she will hold you tighter (there were many around me, mind you, none
with me LOL). Take your mother along, she will curse you. Or the best thing, go
alone and you might just be pleasantly surprised. And please when you come out
of the theatre, make your best hilarious face and tell everyone in the ticket
row just like my tapori friends ' " Are kya dhinchak comedy hai boss" and have
a hearty laugh afterwards.

In the first place, I have
altogether failed to comprehend as to how undue pride or vain-gloriousness
could ever stand in the way of a man in believing in God. I can refuse to
recognize the greatness of a really great man provided I have also
achieved a certain amount of popularity without deserving it or without
having possessed the qualities really essential or indispensable for the
same purpose. That much is conceivable. But in what way can a man
believing in God cease believing due to his personal vanity? There are
only two Ways. The man should either begin to think himself a rival of God
or he may begin to believe himself to be God. In neither case can he
become a genuine atheist. In the first case he does not even deny the
existence of his rival. In the second case as well he admits the existence
of a conscious being behind the screen guiding all the movements of
nature. It is of no importance to us whether he thinks himself to be that
supreme being or whether he thinks the supreme conscious being to be
somebody apart from himself. The fundamental is there. His belief is
there. He is by no means an atheist. Well, here I am I neither belong to
the first category nor to the second.

I deny the very existence of
that Almighty Supreme being. Why I deny it shall be dealt with later on.
Here I want to clear one thing, that it is not vanity that has actuated me
to adopt the doctrines of atheism. I am neither a rival nor an incarnation
nor the Supreme Being Himself. One point is decided, that it is not vanity
that has led me to this mode of thinking. Let me examine the facts to
disprove this allegation. According to these friends of mine I have grown
vain-glorious perhaps due to the undue popularity gained during the
trials-both Delhi Bomb and Lahore conspiracy cases. Well, let us see if
their premises are correct. My atheism is not of so recent origin. I had
stopped believing in God when I was an obscure young man, of whose
existence my above mentioned friends were not even aware. At least a
college student cannot cherish any short of undue pride which may lead him
to atheism. Though a favorite with some professors and disliked by certain
others, I was never an industrious or a studious boy. I could not get any
chance of indulging in such feelings as vanity. I was rather a boy with a
very shy nature, who had certain pessimistic dispositions about the future
career. And in those days, I was not a perfect atheist. My grand-father
under whose influence I was brought up is an orthodox Arya Samajist. An
Arya Samajist is anything but an atheist. After finishing my primary
education I joined the DAV. School of Lahore and stayed in its Boarding
House for full one year. There, apart from morning and evening prayers, I
used to recite “Gayatri Mantra” for hours and hours. I was a
perfect devotee in those days. Later on I began to live with my father. He
is a liberal in as much as the orthodoxy of religions is concerned. It was
through his teachings that I aspired to devote my life to the cause of
freedom. But he is not an atheist. He is a firm believer. He used to
encourage me for offering prayers daily. So, this is how I was brought up.
In the Non-Co-operation days I joined the National College. it was there
that I began to think liberally and discuss and criticize all the
religious problems, even about God. But still I was a devout believer. By
that time I had begun to preserve the unshorn and unclipped long hair but
I could never believe in the mythology and doctrines of Sikhism or, any
other religion. But I had a firm faith in God’s existence.

Later on I joined the
revolutionary party. The first leader with whom I came in contact, though
not convinced, could not dare to deny the existence of God. On my
persistent inquiries about God, he used to say, “Pray whenever you want
to“. Now this is atheism less courage required for the adoption of
that creed. The second leader with whom I came in contact was a firm
believer. Let me mention his name-respected comrade Sachindra Nath Sanyal,
now undergoing life transportation in connexion with the Karachi
conspiracy case. From the every first page of his famous and only book, “Bandi
Jivan” (or Incarcerated Life), the Glory of God is sung vehemently. In
the last page of the second part of that beautiful book his mystic-because
of Vedantism ' praises showered upon God form a very conspicuous part of
his thoughts.

“The Revolutionary leaflet”
distributed- throughout India on January 28th, 1925, was according to the
prosecution story the result of his intellectual labor, Now, as is
inevitable in the secret work the prominent leader expresses his own
views, which are very dear to his person and the rest of the workers have
to acquiesce in them-in spite of differences, which they might have. In
that leaflet one full paragraph was devoted to praise the Almighty and His
rejoicings and doing. That is all mysticism. What I wanted to point out
was that the idea of disbelief had not even germinated in the
revolutionary party. The famous Kakori martyrs 'all four of them-passed
their last day in prayers. Ram Prasad Bismil was an orthodox Arya Samajist.
Despite his wide studies in the field of Socialism and Communism, Rajen
Lahiri could not suppress his desire, of reciting hymns of the Upanishads
and the Gita. I saw only one man amongst them, who never prayed and used
to say, “Philosophy is the outcome of human weakness or limitation of
knowledge“. He is also undergoing a sentence of transportation for
life. But he also never dared to deny the existence of God.

UP
to that period I was only a romantic idealist revolutionary. Uptil then
we were to follow. Now came the time to shoulder the whole
responsibility. Due to the inevitable reaction for some time the very
existence of the Party seemed impossible. Enthusiastic comrades ' nay
leaders ' began to jeer at us. For some time I was afraid that some day
I also might not be convinced of the futility of our own program. That
was a turning point in my revolutionary career. “Study” was the cry
that reverberated in the corridors of my mind. Study to enable yourself
to face the arguments advanced by opposition. Study to arm yourself
with arguments in favor of your cult. I began to study. My previous
faith and convictions underwent a remarkable modification. The Romance
of the violent methods alone which was so prominent amongst our
predecessors, was replaced by serious ideas. No more mysticism, no more
blind faith. Realism became our cult. Use of force justifiable when
resorted to as a matter of terrible necessity: non-violence as policy
indispensable for all mass movements. So much about methods.

The most important thing was
the clear conception of the ideal for which we were to fight, As there
were no important activities in the field of action I got ample
opportunity to study various ideals of the world revolution. I studied
Bakunin, the Anarchist leader, something of Marx the father of Communism
and much of Lenin, Trotsky and others the men who had successfully carried
out a revolution in their country. They were all atheists. Bakunin’s “God
and State”, though only fragmentary, is an interesting study of the
subject. Later still I came across a book entitled ‘Common Sense’ by
Nirlamba Swami. It was only a sort of mystic atheism. This subject became
of utmost interest to me. By the end of 1926 I had been convinced as to
the baselessness of the theory of existence of an almighty supreme being
who created, guided and controlled the universe. I had given out this
disbelief of mine. I began discussion on the subjects with my friends. I
had become a pronounced atheist. But, what it meant will presently be
discussed.

In May 1927 I was arrested at
Lahore. The arrest was a surprise. I was quite unaware of (he fact that
the police wanted me. All of a sudden while passing through a garden I
found myself surrounded by police. To my own surprise, I was very calm at
that time. I did not feel any sensation, neither did I experience any
excitement. I was taken into police custody. Next day I was taken to the
Railway Police lock-up where I was to pass full one month. After many
day’s conversation with the Police officials I guessed that they had some
information regarding my connexion with the Kakori Party and my other
activities in connexion with the revolutionary movement. They told me that
I had been to Lucknow while the trial was going on there, that I had
negotiated a certain scheme about their rescue, that after obtaining their
approval, we had procured some bombs, that by way of test one of the bombs
was thrown in the crowd on the occasion of Dussehra 1926. They further
informed me, in my interest, that if I could give any statement throwing
some light on the activities of the revolutionary party, I was not to be
imprisoned but on the contrary set free and rewarded even without being
produced as an approver in the Court. I laughed at the proposal. It was
all humbug.

People holding ideas like ours
do not throw bombs on their own innocent people. One fine morning Mr.
Newman, the then Senior Superintendent of CID., came to me. And after much
sympathetic talk with me imparted-to him-the extremely sad news that if I
did not give any statement as demanded by them, they would be forced to
send me up for trial for conspiracy to wage war in connexion with Kakori
Case and for brutal murders in connexion with Dussehra Bomb outrage. And
he further informed me that they had evidence enough to get me convicted
and hanged.

In those days I believed '
though I was quite innocent ' the police could do it if they desired. That
very day certain police officials began to persuade me to offer my prayers
to God regularly both the times. Now I was an atheist. I wanted to settle
for myself whether it was in the days of peace and enjoyment alone that I
could boast of being an atheist or whether during such hard times as well
I could stick to those principles of mine. After great consideration I
decided that I could not lead myself to believe in and pray to God. No, I
never did. That was the real test and I came, out successful. Never for a
moment did I desire to save my neck at the cost of certain other things.
So I was a staunch disbeliever : and have ever since been. It was not an
easy job to stand that test.

‘Belief’ softens the
hardships, even can make them pleasant. In God man can find very strong
consolation and support. Without Him, the man has to depend upon himself.
To stand upon one’s own legs amid storms and hurricanes is not a child’s
play. At such testing moments, vanity, if any, evaporates, and man cannot
dare to defy the general beliefs, if he does, then we must conclude that
he has got certain other strength than mere vanity. This is exactly the
situation now. Judgment is already too well known. Within a week it is to
be pronounced. What is the consolation with the exception of the idea that
I am going to sacrifice my life for a cause ? A God-believing Hindu might
be expecting to be reborn as a king, a Muslim or a Christian might dream
of the luxuries to be- enjoyed in paradise and the reward he is to get for
his sufferings and sacrifices. But what am I to expect? I know the
moment the rope is fitted round my neck and rafters removed, from under my
feet. That will be the final moment, that will be the last moment. I, or
to be more precise, my soul, as interpreted in the metaphysical
terminology, shall all be finished there. Nothing further.

A short life of struggle
with no such magnificent end, shall in itself be the reward if I have the
courage to take it in that light. That is all. With no selfish motive, or
desire to be awarded here or hereafter, quite disinterestedly have I
devoted my life to the cause of independence, because I could not do
otherwise. The day we find a great number of men and women with this
psychology who cannot devote themselves to anything else than the service
of mankind and emancipation of the suffering humanity; that day shall
inaugurate the era of liberty.

Not to become a king, nor to
gain any other rewards here, or in the next birth or after death in
paradise, shall they be inspired to challenge the oppressors, exploiters,
and tyrants, but to cast off the yoke of serfdom from the neck of humanity
and to establish liberty and peace shall they tread this-to their
individual selves perilous and to their noble selves the only glorious
imaginable-path. Is the pride in their noble cause to be ' misinterpreted
as vanity? Who dares to utter such an abominable epithet? To him, I say
either he is a fool or a knave. Let us forgive him for he can not realize
the depth, the emotion, the sentiment and the noble feelings that surge in
that heart. His heart is dead as a mere lump of flesh, his eyes are-weak,
the evils of other interests having been cast over them. Self-reliance is
always liable to be interpreted as vanity. It is sad and miserable but
there is no help.

You go and oppose the
prevailing faith, you go and criticize a hero, a great man, who is
generally believed to be above criticism because he is thought to be
infallible, the strength of your argument shall force the multitude to
decry you as vainglorious. This is due to the mental stagnation, Criticism
and independent thinking are the two indispensable qualities of a
revolutionary. Because Mahatamaji is great, therefore none should
criticize him. Because he has risen above, therefore everything he
says-may be in the field of Politics or Religion, Economics or Ethics-is
right. Whether you are convinced or not you must say, “Yes, that’s true”.
This mentality does not lead towards progress. It is rather too obviously,
reactionary.

Because our forefathers had
set up a faith in some supreme, being ' the Almighty God ' therefore any
man who dares to challenge the validity of that faith, or the very
existence of that supreme being, he shall have to be called an apostate, a
renegade. If his arguments are too sound to be refuted by
counter-arguments and spirit too strong to be cowed down by the threat of
misfortunes that may befall him by the wrath of the Almighty, he shall be
decried as vainglorious, his spirit to be denominated as vanity. Then why
to waste time in this vain discussion? Why try to argue out the whole
thing? This question is coming before the public for the first time, and
is being handled in this matter of fact way for the first time, hence this
lengthy discussion.

As for the first question, I
think I have cleared that it is not vanity that has led me to atheism. My
way of argument has proved to be convincing or not, that is to be judged
by my readers, not me. I know in the present, circumstances my faith in
God would have made my life easier, my burden lighter and my disbelief in
Him has turned all the circumstances too dry and the situation may assume
too harsh a shape. A little bit of mysticism can make it poetical. But I,
do not want the help of any intoxication to meet my fate. I am a realist.
I have been trying to overpower the instinct in me by the help of reason.
I have not always been successful in achieving this end. But man’s duty is
to try and endeavor, success depends upon chance and environments.

As for the second question
that if it was not vanity, then there ought to be some reason to
disbelieve the old and still prevailing faith of the existence of God.
Yes; I come to that now Reason there is. According to. me, any man who has
got some reasoning power at his command always tries to reason out his
environments. Where direct proofs are lacking philosophy occupies the
important place. As I have already stated, a certain revolutionary friend
used to say that Philosophy is the outcome of human weakness. When our
ancestors had leisure enough to try to solve out the mystery of this
world, its past, present and the future, its whys and wherefores, they
having been terribly short of direct proofs, everybody tried to solve the
problem in his own way. Hence we find the wide differences in the
fundamentals of various religious creeds, which some times assume very
antagonistic and conflicting shapes. Not only the Oriental and Occidental
philosophies differ, there are differences even amongst various schools of
thoughts in each hemisphere. Amongst Oriental religions, the Moslem faith
is not at all compatible with Hindu faith. In India alone Buddhism and
Jainism are sometimes quite separate from Brahmanism, in which there are
again conflicting faiths as Arya Samaj and Sanatan Dharma. Charwak is
still another independent thinker of the past ages. He challenged the
authority of God in the old times. All these creeds differ from each
other on the fundamental question., and everybody considers himself to be
on the right. There lies the misfortune. Instead of using the experiments
and expressions of the ancient Savants and thinkers as a basis for our
future struggle against ignorance and to try to find out a solution to
this mysterious problem, we ' lethargical as we have proved to be ' raise
the hue and cry of faith, unflinching and unwavering faith to their
versions and thus are guilty of stagnation in human progress.

Any man who stands for
progress has to criticize, disbelieve and challenge every item of the old
faith. Item by item he has to reason out every nook and corner of the
prevailing faith. If after considerable reasoning one is led to believe in
any theory or philosophy, his faith is welcomed. His reasoning can be
mistaken, wrong, misled and sometimes fallacious. But he is liable to
correction because reason is the guiding star of his life. But mere faith
and blind faith is dangerous: it dulls the brain, and makes a man
reactionary.

A man who claims to be a
realist has to challenge the whole of the ancient faith. If it does not
stand the onslaught of reason it crumbles down. Then the first thing for
him is to shatter the whole down and clear a space for the erection of a
new philosophy. This is the negative side. After it begins the positive
work in which sometimes some material of the old faith may be used for the
purpose of reconstruction. As far as I am concerned, let me admit at the
very outset that I have not been able to study much on this point. I had a
great desire to study the Oriental Philosophy but I could not get any
chance or opportunity to do the same. But so far as the negative study is
under discussion, I think I am convinced to the extent of questioning the
soundness of the old faith. I have been convinced as to non-existence of a
conscious supreme being who is guiding and directing the movements of
nature. We believe in nature and the whole progressive movement aims at
the domination of man over nature for his service. There is no conscious
power behind it to direct. This is what our philosophy is.

As for the negative side. we
ask a few questions from the ‘believers’.

If, as you believe, there is
an almighty, omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent God-who created the
earth or world, please let me know why did he create it ? This world of
woes and miseries, a veritable, eternal combination of numberless
tragedies: Not a single soul being perfectly satisfied.

Pray, don’t say that it is
His Law: If he is bound by any law, he is not omnipotent. He is another
slave like ourselves. Please don’t say that it is his enjoyment. Nero
burnt one Rome. He killed a very limited number of people. He created very
few tragedies, all to his perfect enjoyment. And what is his place in
History? By what names do the historians mention him? All the venomous
epithets are showered upon him. Pages are blackened with invective
diatribes condemning Nero, the tyrant, the heartless, the wicked.

One Changezkhan sacrificed a
few thousand lives to seek pleasure in it and we hate the very name. Then
how are you going to justify your almighty, eternal Nero, who has been,
and is still causing numberless tragedies every day, every hour and every
minute? How do you think to support his misdoings which surpass those of
Changez every single moment? I say why did he create this world ' a
veritable hell, a place of constant and bitter unrest? Why did the
Almighty create man when he had the power not to do it? What is the
justification for all this ? Do you say to award the innocent sufferers
hereafter and to punish the wrong-doers as well? Well, well: How far shall
you justify a man who may dare to inflict wounds upon your body to apply a
very soft and soothing liniment upon it afterwards? How far the supporters
and organizers of the Gladiator Institution were justified in throwing men
before the half starved furious lions to be cared for and well looked
after if they could survive and could manage to escape death by the wild
beasts? That is why I ask, ‘Why did the conscious supreme being created
this world and man in it? To seek pleasure? Where then is the difference
between him and Nero’?

You Mohammadens and Christians
: Hindu Philosophy shall still linger on to offer another argument. I ask
you what is your answer to the above-mentioned question? You don’t believe
in previous birth. Like Hindus you cannot advance the argument of previous
misdoings of the apparently quite innocent sufferers? I ask you why did
the omnipotent labor for six days to create the world through word and
each day to say that all was well. Call him today. Show him the past
history. Make him study the present situation. Let us see if he dares to
say, “All is well”.

From the dungeons of prisons,
from the stores of starvation consuming millions upon millions of human
beings in slums and huts, from the exploited laborers, patiently or say
apathetically watching the procedure of their blood being sucked by the
Capitalist vampires, and the wastage of human energy that will make a man
with the least common sense shiver with horror, and from the preference of
throwing the surplus of production in oceans rather than to distribute
amongst the needy producers to the palaces of kings built upon the
foundation laid with human bones…. let him see all this and let him say
“All is well”.

Why and wherefore? That is my
question. You are silent.

All right then, I proceed.
Well, you Hindus, you say all the present sufferers belong to the class of
sinners of the previous births. Good. You say the present oppressors were
saintly people in their previous births, hence they enjoy power. Let me
admit that your ancestors were very shrewd people, they tried to find out
theories strong enough to hammer down all the efforts of reason and
disbelief. But let us analyze how far this argument can really stand.

From the point of view of the
most famous jurists punishment can be justified only from three or four
ends to meet which it is inflicted upon the wrongdoer. They are
retributive, reformative and deterrent. The retributive theory is now
being condemned by all the advanced thinkers. Deterrent theory is also
following the same fate. Reformative theory is the only one which is
essential, and indispensable for human progress. It aims at returning the
offender as a most competent and a peace-loving citizen to the society.
But what is the nature of punishment inflicted by God upon men even if we
suppose them to be offenders. You say he sends them to be born as a cow, a
cat, a tree, a herb or a best. You enumerate these punishments to be 84
lakhs. I ask you what is its reformative effect upon man? How many men
have met you who say that they were born as a donkey in previous birth for
having committed any sin? None. Don’t quote your Puranas. I have no scope
to touch your mythologies. Moreover do you know that the greatest sin
in this world is to be poor. Poverty is a sin, it is a punishment.

I ask you how far would you
appreciate a criminologist, a jurist or a legislator who proposes such
measures of punishment which shall inevitably force man to commit more
offences? Had not your God thought of this or he also had to learn these
things by experience, but at the cost of untold sufferings to be borne by
humanity? What do you think shall be the fate of a man who has been born
in a poor and illiterate family of say a chamar or a sweeper. He is
poor, hence he cannot study. He is hated and shunned by his fellow human
beings who think themselves to be his superiors having been born in say a
higher caste. His ignorance, his poverty and the treatment meted out to
him shall harden his heart towards society. Suppose he commits a sin, who
shall bear the consequences? God, he or the learned ones of, the society?
What about the punishment of those people who were deliberately kept
ignorant by the haughty and egotist Brahmans and who had to pay the
penalty by bearing the stream of being led (not lead) in their ears for
having heard a few sentences of your Sacred Books of learning-the Vedas?
If they committed any offence-who was to be responsible for them and who
was to bear the brunt? My dear friends: These theories are the inventions
of the privileged ones: They justify their usurped power, riches and
superiority by the help of these theories. Yes: It was perhaps Upton
Sinclair, that wrote at some place, that just make a man a believer in
immortality and then rob him of all his riches, and possessions. He shall
help you even in that ungrudgingly. The coalition amongst the religious
preachers and possessors of power brought forth jails, gallows, knouts and
these theories.

I ask why your omnipotent God,
does not stop every man when he is committing any sin or offence? He can
do it quite easily. Why did he not kill war lords or kill the fury of war
in them and thus avoid the catastrophe hurled down on the head of humanity
by the Great War? Why does he not just produce a certain sentiment in the
mind of the British people to liberate India? Why does he not infuse the
altruistic enthusiasm in the hearts of all capitalists to forgo their
rights of personal possessions of means of production and thus redeem the
whole laboring community ' nay the whole human society from the bondage of
Capitalism. You want to reason out the practicability of socialist theory,
I leave it for your almighty to enforce it.

People recognize the merits of
socialism in as much as the general welfare is concerned. They oppose it
under the pretext of its being impracticable. Let the Almighty step in and
arrange everything in an orderly fashion. Now don’t try to advance round
about arguments, they are out of order. Let me tell you, British rule
is here not because God wills it but because they possess power and we do
not dare to oppose them. Not that it is with the help of God that they
are keeping us under their subjection but it is with the help of guns and
rifles, bomb and bullets, police and millitia and our apathy that they are
successfully committing the most deplorable sin against society- the
outrageous exploitation of one nation by another. Where is God ? What is
he doing? Is he enjoying all I these woes of human race ? A Nero; A
Changez : Down with him.

Do you ask me how I explain
the origin of this world and origin of man? Alright I tell you. Charles
Darwin has tried to throw some light on the subject. Study him. Read Soham
Swami’s “Commonsense”. It shall answer your question to some extent. This
is a phenomenon of nature. The accidental mixture of different substances
in the shape of nebulae produced this earth. When? Consult history. The
same process produced animals and in the long run man. Read Darwin’s
‘Origin of Species’. And all the later progress is due to man’s constant
conflict with nature and his efforts to override it. This is the briefest
possible explanation of this phenomenon.

Your other argument may be
just to ask why a child is born blind or lame if not due to his deeds
committed in the previous birth? This problem has been explained away by
biologists as a more biological phenomenon. According to them the whole
burden rests upon the shoulders of the parents who may be conscious or
ignorant of their own deeds led to mutilation of the child previous to its
birth.

Naturally you may ask another
question though it is quite childish in essence. If no God existed, how
did the people come to believe in him? My answer is clear and brief. As
they came to believe in ghosts, and evil spirits; the only difference is
that belief in God is almost universal and the philosophy well developed.
Unlike certain of the radicals I would not attribute its origin to the
ingenuity of the exploiters who wanted to keep the people under their
subjection by preaching the existence of a supreme being and then claiming
an authority and sanction from him for their privileged positions. Though
I do not differ with them on the essential point that all faiths,
religions, creeds and such other institutions became in turn the mere
supporters of the tyrannical and exploiting institutions, men and classes.
Rebellion against king is always a sin according to every religion.

As regards the origin of
God my own idea is that having realized the limitations of man, his
weaknesses and shortcoming having been taken into consideration, God was
brought into imaginary existence to encourage man to face boldly all the
trying circumstances, to meet all dangers manfully and to check and
restrain his outbursts in prosperity and affluence. God both with his
private laws and parental generosity was imagined and painted in greater
details. He was to serve as a deterrent factor when his fury and private
laws were discussed so that man may not become a danger to society. He was
to serve as a father, mother, sister and brother, friend and helpers when
his parental qualifications were to be explained. So that when man be in
great distress having been betrayed and deserted by all friends he may
find consolation in the idea that an ever true friend was still there to
help him, to support him and that He was almighty and could do anything.
Really that was useful to the society in the primitive age.

The idea of
God is helpful to man in distress.

Society has to fight out this
belief as well as was fought the idol worship and the narrow conception of
religion. Similarly, when man tries to stand on his own legs, and become a
realist he shall have to throw the faith aside, and to face manfully all
the distress, trouble, in which the circumstances may throw him. That is
exactly my state of affairs. It is not my vanity, my friends. It is my
mode of thinking that has made me an atheist. I don’t know whether in my
case belief in God and offering of daily prayers which I consider to be
most selfish and degraded act on the part of man, whether these prayers
can prove to be helpful or they shall make my case worse still. I have
read of atheists facing all troubles quite boldly, so am I trying to stand
like a man with an erect head to the last; even on the gallows.

Let us see how I carry on :
one friend asked me to pray. When informed of my atheism, he said, “During
your last days you will begin to believe”. I said, No, dear Sir, it shall
not be. I will think that to be an act of degradation and demoralization
on my part. For selfish motives I am not going to pray. Readers and
friends, “Is this vanity”? If it is, I stand for it.

' Bhagat Singh (1930)

Read once again the writer's name above. Trust me, I didn't choose it that way. Guess some things are just meant to be.

GN: "Who is your favorite actor?"

NM: "Amitabh Bachchan"

GN: "So have you seen all his movies?"

NM: "Yeah Zanjeer, Deewaar, Sholay, Satte pe satta "

GN: "Parwana?"

If your answer is also negative to the above question, my suggestion is
before entering the theatre to immerse yourself in this hell ' of ' a '
ride, go watch Parwana. You might just figure out the goings on a
little earlier than most.

The 1970's were one of the best
decades for Indian cinema (No, it wasn't known as Bollywood then). Many
people who grew up in that era have glorious memories of some of the
best scripts ever seen on Indian screens. Now, it's one thing to enjoy
the movies while in the theatre and move on with life once out of it -
our normal movie going audience. But there are people who live out the
memories of those visuals for years, if not the whole of their lives.
Sriram Raghavan happens to be one of that breed. His passion for the
cinema of his growing up years is very much on the view while one is
watching Johnny Gaddaar.

The tributes are so heart felt
that he didn't even feel the need to hide the source of inspiration
like most of the other filmmakers. Be it the receptionist of the hotel
watching Dev Anand's Johnny Mera Naam, full screen view of Amitabh's
Parwana (that though is crucial to the story) or the easily missed Neil
Mukesh's rather bad imitation of Sanjeev Kumar, the tributes are just
tough to miss. Add to that the James Hadley Chase novels that are on
view so often and you start thinking is there anything novel or
creative in this movie?

Make no mistakes; JG is one of the best
thrill rides you would have ever made with Hindi movies. It's not one
of those suspense thrillers where you keep trying to figure out the
killer. Here you know from the start, and some intelligent ones even
before that, of who is going to be the "Gaddaar" here. But the flow of
the movie is such that the goings on are almost always fresh and
thrilling. The twists and turns are numerous and they keep the viewer
well engrossed.

First half is plain brilliant. The murder
sequences almost without fail, are brilliantly shot, especially the
train sequence. Emotional appeal is also well in place with the
characters of Dharmendra and Vinay's wife. The negatives are mostly in
the second half. The film loses its most attractive feature in this
half ' its pace. There still are enough scenes though in this half
those hold your attention.

Neil Mukesh makes a confident and
stylish debut. Though his character doesn't demand too much histrionics
and acting skills, but that very essence of underplaying the emotions
works so well in favor of the actor. Add to that an amazing screen
presence, especially in the face of some of the most brilliant acting
talent, and you already get the feelers that his singing family lost
out one of their own to the acting world. There is an absolutely
brilliant balance between guilt and naughtiness in the character that
gives you goose bumps. Rimi has so little to do in the movie and she
hams her way through it. Dharam paaji is really making a comeback akin
to AB and seems to be making some wise choices now. After METRO and
APNE, this one completes a hat ' trick of decent performances that are
in sync with his age unlike some of the others of his generation. Vinay
Pathak is trustworthy as usual. Leaving his well practiced comic timing
behind; he tries to portray a character here that probably is the most
genuine one in the whole group. Zakir Hussein is his usual dependable
self. And the CID gang enacts their part well enough too, though
Ashwini Kalsekar [Vinay Pathak's wife] could have been a little less
loud.

Screenplay is effective, though as mentioned above, not all
scenes are happening one after the other. You come back at the end from
where you started. Though it's not as confusing as it sounds and it's a
tactic that is being used a lot nowadays. Dialogues are apt most of the
time. Cinematography, especially the night lighting and the use of dark
colors add to the feel of the movie as a taut thriller. Music doesn't
have much role to play here, since none of the songs are picturised in
the movie completely, only tiny bits here and there and they don't give
away much. One heartfelt request though ' Please listen to the soundtrack. It's one of the most different and rocking sounds of the year. Title track is easily the best of the lot.

Sriram
Raghavan, as a director, who already has the well-appreciated EK HASINA
THI to his name, is a guy who definitely knows his craft. And even more
importantly, he has his heart in the right place and his passions
intact.

Overall, Johnny Gaddaar is a very nicely made
and well-intentioned movie. If you love your thrills and respect your
brains, do give it a try. You sure won't regret it. Having said that,
there were a handful of people with me in the first show of its
screening. That's very tough to accept. Hope with word of the mouth,
the collections pick up. Such genuine efforts need to be applauded or
we might always be stuck with those sugar coated romance and family
dramas and we would have only ourselves to blame. GO WATCH IT.