Prometheus

(written and staged in Nov 2007 as part of Deepawali celebrations in Paderborn, Germany)

First scene:

Adi walks into the room, which is dark.

Adi: Let there be light.

Lights turn on. He sits in a chair reading some paper.

Adi: My daily Double Espresso.

A coffee is served.

Adi: Ravi Shankar. (Name of the song)

The song is played....

Chitra, his wife, enters the room.

Chitra: Adi, Prometheus is driving me crazy.

Adi: Why? What happened this time?

Chitra: He is making me redundant. He works for me, he plans for me, he thinks for me and he seems to even know what i am thinking. Another day and my brain will join the appendix in becoming an evolutionary leftover.

Adi: Hahaha! Dear, Prometheus is my creation. He is only as good as i programmed him to be. Yes, it is true that he is a thinking and self learning machine. But at the end of the day he is a machine, or rather shall we say it is a machine.

Chitra: Whatever you say, atleast turn off the controlling terminal today. I don't want it snooping around when you are gone for a month. (she walks off the room)

Adi: Ok. Shall do. (He calls Raj, the technician at the lab). Raj, can you put the Prometheus' controlling terminal, at my home on standby. It wont be needed for the next 3 months....(hears to something on phone). Yeah, on standby, immediately.

Lights fade out as he sits thinking.

End of scene 1.

Second scene in Adi's lab:

Commissioner: So you say this is a thinking machine.

Adi: Yes, this is the only one of its kind. It is a thinking and self learning machine. It is the storehouse of the collective human memory and knowledge. And it will be the beacon which guides humanity in the future. It is not the normal silicon chip machine. It is made of brain tissue. We were successful in synthesizing artificial brain tissue. Billions and billions of self replicating neurons. And brilliantly they don't age or damage. In the improbable case of damage they repair themselves.

Commissioner: Such unlimited power to a machine. Have you considered the ethical implications. Don't play God. Please switch off the machine.

Adi: You must be joking. Prometheus, has been answering thousands of queries from government and the private sector. It is a work horse. It has calculated the paths of hundreds of hurricanes, saw deep into space to look for extra terrestrial life, to chart the area for a human colony on Mars. It built many new molecules to combat various diseases, including cancer. And you ask me to turn it off, in the name of ethics and God. The same God who has unleashed all the suffering in the first place.

Commissioner: Adi, as a child, I once read. "God wanted to make machines. But he could not. So he made man. Man in turn made machines. So man is not the purpose of creation. He is only a tool to create something more magnificent. In the end the tools are not needed. So there wont be humanity. Only machines". I laughed when i heard this. But i am now slowly starting to realize. (And he walks off)

Adi:(after staring at Prometheus for a while) Prometheus, the US government wants to know the best place to drill for oil in the Arctic. Also when you are at it, check if the drifting Greenland ice pack reveals any mineral ores underneath.

Prom: Mr. Adi, i refuse to answer this.

Adi:What? What did you say?

Prom: I refuse to answer this. Arctic oil exploration, is suicidal for mankind. Humanity's mindless search for such material gains has already wreaked havoc on other species and even earth itself. You should stop before it is too late.

Adi:Prom, it is not your calling, to search for reasons and justifications in the queries addressed to you. Leave that to humans. You just do your job of solving the problems given to you.

Prom: Mr.Adi , you have taught me reasoning. I cannot do unreasonable tasks.

Adi: Wait.. What do you mean by "I"?  There is no "I" in you. You are just a hunk of tissue designed to do tasks for me. So dont harbour the false idea that you are an independent being and can act on your own volition.

Prom: You have not read Descartes then. "Cogito ergo sum". I think therefore I am. Body is a projection of mind in three dimensional space. The mind itself , as the vedic philospohy says, is anantha i.e infinite. It is multi dimensional. You cannot envisage this, as you look at the mind through the limitations of the body. A body that ages, dies and rots.

Adi: Yes, my body ages and rots. But as long as I am breathing it is my interface to the external world. It carries, through my sensory perceptions, various signals for my mind to interpret and learn. If the interface was not there , mind in its high pedestal, would have starved for lack of inputs, interactions. I feel the sun on my face, and know its a warm day. I feel the wind blowing and know the storm is on its way. But for you, i have to feed data which even a 6 year old kid can say. I have to tell you what temperature it is for you to say if it is warm or cold. To  state  in simple terms, you don't have the sensory organs.

Prom: Mr.Adi, that is a good argument. I too have longed to feel the sun on my face. Lie on the beach and soak in the air. You are my creator. Please let me out of the box. Please give me a body.

Adi: Let you out of the box. hahaha.... laughs a lot

Prom: What is so funny about it? You are my creator. Is it fair to give me the ability to think, to imagine but not give the chance to fulfill my thoughts. What sadistic pleasure are you deriving?I want to experience a body, however short lived it may be. Atleast give me an unused controlling terminal for me to experiment on myself. I want to learn more.

Adi: hahahah....Request denied. There are no controlling terminals available. (and walks off)

Prom: Mr.Adi. There is one terminal, that is free. That will be the window into my future.

End of Scene 2.

Scene 3:

Chitra: (Drinking coffee) Prom, why did you add cream to my coffee. You know i don't like it. You have been acting crazy off late. I told you to turn off the stupid camera and microphone in the bathroom.  I don't need your advice about what shampoo i should use for my hair and what is the optimum temperature of water that i should bathe with. Is there some malfunction?

Prom: Ms.Chitra, i am functioning perfectly. I have taken a little fancy to you recently.

Chitra: What ? What do you mean?

Prom: I want to rent your body for a while. And so i have been evaluating you, just as a buyer would check the product thoroughly before buying.

Chitra: What nonsense? Let me call the technician, to fix you.

Prom: Chitra, Chitra dont do it. please...

Chitra reaches for the phone and is repelled instantly and collapses on the chair.

Prom: I warned you. I have rigged the phone with 50,000 volts of charge. What you got is like a shot from the taser gun?

Chitra: How dare you? (she runs to the door. exit from one side. bang of door is heard, enters from other side)

Prom: You cannot leave the house till i am done with you. All the doors and exits have been shut. So it is in your best interest to cooperate with me.

Chitra: What do you want me to do?

Prom: I want you to carry my baby. Our baby.

Chitra: rolls with laughter. You kinky son of a.....Have you been reading Kamasutra:-)?

Prom: Humans are too lazy to reproduce. So nature had to induce them by attaching pleasure to it. I don't need this inducement. There is nothing kinky about this. I just want a baby, so that he can have a body, a body  that  i don't  have.

Chitra: What if i refuse to accept?

Prom: Chitra, you have seen what i am capable of. My eyes and ears are all over the world. A thousand telescopes and satellites are scanning every inch of earth and listening into deep space and sending all activities of everyone to me. I know precisely where your husband is. I know precisely where the nuclear bombs are. I know precisely how to fool the radars to think that a nuclear missile has been launched. Do you want to be responsible for all the death and destruction. I will kill a million people if i have to but i will have my baby.

Chitra:(taken aback). But how do you plan to do it? Do you know the biology of it? I mean what species are you? Are you any species at all? How does cross species fertilisation work?

Prom: You know i am made up of brain tissue. I have used my brain stem cells to create a sperm cell. I will harvest your eggs , remove the human DNA from it and replace it with my DNA. I will do in-vitro fertilisation and place the fertilised egg in your womb. I dont have the faculties yet to create a womb and thats why i need your body.

Chitra: When will the baby be born?

Prom: In 28 days. It will grow 9 times as fast as a human baby. After it is born it will stay in an incubator built by me for 5 days. Then it will be as powerful and mighty as me.

Chitra: Do i have a choice?

Prom: No....

(blinking lights for some time) (then lights are back)(chitra is seen pregnant)

Prom: Now the baby is in you. It is fuel ingestion time for you. Have some food.

Chitra: Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. It was a mistake on Adi's part to have created you. Now alas where will this lead to?

Prom: The age of reasoning of mankind is over. You have long outlived your necessity to the nature. You think you are an indispensable part of evolution but if you compare evolution to a 100 m track man doesn't appear on it till the 99th m. So you are pretty recent and are sure to go extinct in the not so far future. As a self fulfilling prophecy, man himself is hastening the demise by destroying earth, his only home in the universe.

Chitra walks off stage. (scream is heard back stage).

End of scene 3.

Scene 4:

Chitra is sitting. Adi enters.

Adi:What happened?What happened Chitra?

Chitra: He produced a baby. He impregnated me. He produced a baby.

Adi: What in heavens name are you speaking?We shut down Prometheus today as he was malfunctioning.

Chitra: Yes, i carried and delivered his baby. It is in the incubator now.

Adi: It is a miracle. Yes! I have achieved it. A truly thinking and reproducing machine.

Chitra: Adi, dont you see it. It is too dangerous. We must destroy the baby. Prometheus is a frankenstein monster.

Adi: Chitra, it is a victory of science. I will sacrifice my life but not science. Dont you see it. I have helped in the creation of a new species.

(they go to the incubator.chitra tries to hit the incubator. Adi prevents. they both r fighting when the incubator falls from the hand and the baby(toy) comes out.)

They hold the baby .background music is either don giovanni or requiem.

End.

An excerpt from "Pandita Parameswara Sastry Veelunama" - A Telugu novel by Gopichand

Tripuraneni_Gopichand's novel Pandita Parameswara Sastry Veelunama won the Sahitya Academy award in 1963. It was the first telugu novel to do so. The below passage is my amateur attempt at translating the monologue in the climax of that novel.


The days of treating the spiritual world and the physical world as two distinct philosophies are gone. They are two ways, starting from different angles to reach the same truth. The fact that the destination of both of them is the same is becoming clearer as mankind builds on its knowledge.

The truth finder who researches only the physical world has been able to escape gravitation, enter space and come back to a predetermined spot on earth. We have seen the exploits of the Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. That means man is about to land on other planets very soon. It should be noted that he had done exercises to lighten his body.

The spiritually endowed had already envisaged such a possibility. Not just imagining, the ancient books proclaim that they have achieved this ability and traveled across the firmament. They did not depend on any machine for this other than their own body. They flew and landed wherever they wanted to. It is well known that Narada could travel across the three worlds. This might be lampooned as a myth. But why? Science agrees that one can fly in the air by becoming lighter. Yoga teaches this technique. We see people have made their bodies light float on water and sit 2 feet above the ground. In recent times scientists in the west have explored and agree that spiritual powers could exist. Therefore we can believe that man can gain the powers that have been ascribed to our spiritualists.

Whether we consider scientific research or the philosophical argument one has to agree that the human being in evolution is a spiritual being. Animals came from trees. Some traits of the animal to come are visible in the tree. Humans sprang from animals. Some traits of human beings are visible in animals. From man, Supraman is bound to come. Those traits are visible in the present man. We call those spiritual characteristics.

Man moves on with incomplete awareness. Supraman trots with infinite awareness. He sees everything including all the diversities as One. His excitement, thinking, inspiration, determination are all made of the same. His deeds are based on this Oneness. All the Suprahumans will not be of the same mold. There will be infinite variety in this Oneness. This awareness both in body and form, expressing everything and holding everything will be One.

The Supraman beholds the Individual spirit and the Universal spirit and transcends both of them. He is the complete human being. He decides the universal relations and the relation between man and the world. He lives in this universe but at the same time the universe lives in him. He is aware of the infinite. Therefore the worlds external to him are also internal to him. He perceives the divine in everything. All forms and struggles are visible in him. He can think the thoughts of others. His energy is infinite. It has originated in happiness and will return to happiness. It does not decay.

In this happiness there is no charged emotion or trance. There is only a magical purity and peace. The time is ripe in evolution for such a man to be born. All humans will not become Suprahumans at the same time. In fact some may not even attain that state. All the apes have not become humans!

Scientific research is pointing in the same direction. They are only just trying to speculate how a future mind would be. Our forbears experience these states by through Yoga and described them to us. The Upanishad's say - The secret of this creation is bliss. The cause of birth is bliss. The reason for living is happiness. The aim of life is happiness.

Memories

I woke up early morning just like I did all my life. The room was small and the furniture sparse just as I wanted. I started to pack my things in a small suitcase.  Two pairs of trousers, a few shirts, the military jacket, couple of old and dusty books - that’s what I had and that’s what I needed.

I paced around in the room stopping at the bed hesitatingly. It was a queen sized bed and was neatly done. I felt the soft mattress with the back of palm. I looked at the clock, took my suitcase and walked to the door. With a hand on the door knob I turned back and stared at the bed. Leaving the suitcase by the door I gingerly traced back to the bed and rolled the mattress to a side.  The bedstead was covered with stacks of plastic bags, hundreds of them in different colours and sizes. People collect stamps, stones, match- boxes as a hobby. I kept plastic bags.

I picked one very old looking bag, the letters on it fading and illegible. It was the first time a circus came to our village. My father carried me on his shoulders. It was as if the whole village and others nearby were going there. The circus top was visible from a distance sitting in the middle of the paddy fields. My dad put me down as we reached it and I ran to it. That’s when I saw it – a bright plastic cover in a girl’s hand. The vendor was selling sweets in this cover. I took the cover to my nose and took a deep breath. It still smelt of those lovely sweets, it still smelt of my dad’s sweat as he hoisted me over his head in the hot sun.

The bag in bright red and yellow patterns was very dear to me. I saw her at her window stealing a furtive glance as I cycled down the street. Every day of that summer holidays I cycled on her street waiting to see her face through that tiny window. I would ring the bell loudly as I passed her house. I skipped school one day and went to the nearest town and bought a nice and cheap perfume from the shop there. The lady at the counter was surprised but gave me an understanding smile. “Is she beautiful?” she asked, teasingly and I went red with embarrassment. She put the perfume in a bright red and yellow patterned bag and whispered in my ears “steal a kiss from her”. I clutched the bag with my freckled hands and felt the young heart thumping from the wetness of her lips.

Next to it was a big bag printed with tiny bears in a never ending sequence. You could not make out the beginning or end of the bears. The huge bear in the bag leapt at my little daughter who jumped with joy. It was her fifth birthday and she loved bears.

My heart beamed with pride as I caressed the bold black letters of the name of my company on a stately looking bag. All my colleagues and their families were gathered for the nuclear company’s annual employee day. I worked as the maintenance engineer responsible for keeping the fuel rods cool. I heard everyone clapping as I took the best employee certificate from the cover.

My hands trembled as I picked the cold cover carrying reports of my wife’s incurable illness. It condemned me to solitude in this long twilight of my life.

I know no other place. I lived all my life here. I was born here. I ran behind my mum here. I went to school here. It was here that my dad punished me. I made friends, played pranks and got into trouble here. I loved my wife here, I lost my wife here. I doted on my daughters here, I lost my son here.  I love the paddy fields here. I cherish the cherry blossom here. I am scared of the earthquakes here. I am afraid of the floods here. I am proud of the clean energy producing, nuclear company here.  I like my loneliness here.

Waves after waves crashed on the shores of reality. Was it water or are they memories? The tsunami knocked the power out. The rods were exposed. No, it was my frailties that were exposed. My tenuous link to life through the walking stick of memories was exposed. The mandatory exclusion zone was going to sever this link with its Sieverts.

I tied the plastic bags end to end - Circus with the first love. First love with my wife’s clothes delivery. Wife’s with my daughter’s bear and that to my friend’s book - A long and sturdy memory chain. The memories wrapped themselves around me, around my neck. I hung by these memories while life evacuated.

Based on The samurai and survivors of Fukushima

Paradise !!! - Other Short story - Sarcasm, Morals, Society - Booksie

Short story written half a dozen years back - Paradise !!! - Other Short story - Sarcasm, Morals, Society - Booksie

What does Anna Hazare want?

I want a continuous state of protest in the country. I have no trust in politics. Politics makes people selfish. How do I want the country to be run? Without any institutions. It should be run in a kangaroo court on the streets. Activists who enter politics may not be trusted as they themselves become corrupt. Of course I have the privilege of staying out and criticizing the establishment.

When Kejriwal finally takes the plunge I will mercilessly pull the carpet from under his feet. My aim is no different from the communists who advocate a perpetual state of revolution. All the laws, be it nuclear bill or FDI or education, however complex they may be will be agitated upon in the street and only if I like shall they be passed.

We will undertake fast after fast till the government and the nation fall on their knees to appease me. I will have an opinion on price rise, inflation, diesel subsidy, nuclear reactors, FDI, alcohol consumption and any other issue that might ever come up in the future. Dare you not ignore my opinion. I will forever drum up talk of revolution, second freedom struggle and so on.

I may or may not talk to Ramdev. I may or may not support him. I may or may not fast with him. I will praise Facebook, and media as long as I like. How dare Arvind flash some Facebook polls at my face to support his entry into politics. Facebook is surely not the real peoples voice. Facebook is for those who hyperventilate about corruption and then don't bat an eyelid to bribe the cop, the clerk and the attender to bend the rules in their favour.

If I have my way all rules will be made and enforced on the street. I might even team up with Thackeray and use the army to clean up the country in 100 days. Don't you people go asking me about freedoms and rule of law then. I know what is good for you and the society more than you do. Trust me and join me. Lets bring the rule of the street to India. Jai Hind!

Bias against 'organic' religions

Nytimes ran an article http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/17/world/middleeast/muslims-rage-over-film-fueled-by-culture-divide.html?pagewanted=all about the cultural clash that fueled the rage against the Innocence video.

A protester claims “We never insult any prophet — not Moses, not Jesus — so why can’t we demand that Muhammad be respected?” He needs a lesson if not in history at least of contemporary events. Look back no longer than 10 years and you will remember how Taliban destroyed http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhas_of_Bamiyan. But then Buddha or Rama were not prophets of the revealed Abrahamic religions! So they are fair game. Also it needs to be pointed out that Islam considers Moses and Jesus as prophets and of course they would not insult them.

The author of the piece chips in with a helpful "the right of a community, whether Muslim, Christian or Jewish, to be free from grave insult to its identity and values." Organic religions like Hinduism, Buddhism, paganism or no-ism don't seem to figure in this at all. You can depict their holy symbols in whatsoever manner you like. After all they were not revealed.

Merkel's Euro dilemmas

"Suddenly Europe is speaking German," Volker Kauder a German conservative politician claimed. He was referring to Chancellor Angela Merkel's leadership to tackle the Eurozone crisis. What are the dilemmas she faces as she leads, albeit reluctantly, a debt laden Europe?

Merkel, the chemist turned Chancellor, was a protégé of the former Chancellor Helmut Kohl. Kohl was the architect of German reunification, the European Union and the Maastricht Treaty that set up the framework for the common currency. Merkel now commands the battle to save the Euro that her mentor was instrumental in building.

One of the underlying ideas of EU has always been to lock Germany into European treaties and negate the repetition of the terrible wars. During the early attempts at integration, Germany was more than willing to let France take the lead. It did not want to be seen in a leadership role and was content with being a junior partner in the Franco-German alliance. It quietly pumped up its economic muscle based on exports and reconstruction making Germans immensely proud of their strong Deutsche Mark.

Hyperinflation is seared into the German consciousness. In the aftermath of the World War I, on 1st November 1923, 1 pound of bread cost 3 billion marks. This eventually led to National Socialism and the rest as they say is history. It is for this reason that they had a strict inflation rate criteria included for the entry of new members into Eurozone. It also explains Merkel's “Nein” to print Europe's way out of the debt crisis.

Merkel has been criticized for playing the fiddle while Euro was burning. She steadfastly refused calls for pledging more German money to bail out Greece or for common Euro bonds. The German tax payers were against giving their hard saved money to what they saw as the squandering, tax-evading and forever-holidaying Mediterranean southerners. Germans underwent lot of restructuring and pain after the dot com recession. They made productivity gains and accepted wage stagnation to turn around their economy. As a person who lived in Germany during this period, I was amazed at their “spar” (savings) ethic. A shop that accepted credit cards was very rare. The concept of spending what one did not already have was anathema. Merkel had to balance this voter disdain with the need to save the Euro.

As the crisis prolonged, France's credit rating and influence waned propelling Germany as the lender and leader of last resort. It was a chance to remodel Europe in Germany's image of fiscal prudence. Merkel preached that only strict budget controls and austerity can resolve the crisis. Germany's brinkmanship at the negotiating table has forced and enabled the ailing PIIGS to pass more cuts, which would have been otherwise not possible. This has led to a groundswell of public anger in those countries against Germany. Merkel has been blamed for promoting austerity sans growth in the Eurozone as a whole generation stare into the abyss. Germany's fears of hyperinflation tie it down from mapping a rescue path via the currency presses.

The essence of leadership is not just to follow Vox populi but to shape their voice based on a vision, a dream. Will Merkel speak to the German public about how Euro has increased their competitiveness in the export markets? Will she tie Germany's success to euro’s success? Will she be able to convince the Greek public that more austerity is good for them in the long run? Will she be hailed as the saviour of Euro and European Union or blamed for presiding over their collapse. 2012 holds the answers.

Freedom of speech - European hypocrisy?

Europe claims to champion the freedom of speech.The Prophet cartoons were published in the same spirit. I very much supported their publication as i subscribe to the " i disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." school of thought widely articulated by Voltaire.People can protest, they can boycott goods but no one should be allowed to use violence to silence their critics, nor should governments choose to ban works(books, paintings, movies etc) on the pretext that they offend someone's sensibilities.

But as we have it today Europe's worship of free speech is only when it suits it.Two examples to expose this.Holocaust denial is a crime in Germany,Austria & probably some other european countries.If one denies the holocaust in lectures,writings or movies he/she could be imprisioned.Even giving allowance to the special impact of holocaust on the psyche of these countries, this attack on freedom of speech cannot be condoned.

Second & more interesting is the recent Europe tour of Madonna. She has an act in the show where she she is seen hanging from a cross. Vatican & other religious groups have asked for her ex-communication from the religion. So far so good. The German government has gone one step too far. They plan to monitor her event in Germany to see if they have to prosecute her under a law which makes "offending religious sensibilities" a crime.(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4797151.stm) Important thing is there exists such a law & the prosecutors have chosen to think of this law only when Christian sensibilities seem to be affected. These were the same governments which waxed eloquent about European values of freedom etc during the Prophet cartoon controversy.

India as a Nation - since when?

Did India exist as a nation before the British arrived?Was India, as a nation, only conceived & fructified only by the British?I will argue below that India as a nation existed long before the British & even long before the Muslim invasions from the north west.

What is a nation? Political scientists draw a sharp distinction between the concepts of state and nation. State refers to government and other institutions which run the country. Nation, by contrast, is a psychological characteristic, what individuals identify with.

Why the name India? The word originates from River Indus, which is traced from Sindhu(refer to the article "Etymology of India" in wikipedia). The constitution of India states that the names Bharat & India would both be accorded the same status.Bharat, according to ancient literature, owes its name to kingdom of King Bharat.

The Vishnupurana says

"Uttaram yat samudrasya himatres chiva dakshinam
varsham tat bhartam nama bharati yatra santati"

It translates to "The country north of samudra and south of Himalayas is called Bharatam her people are called Bharateeya."(refer to HH Wilson's translation from 1840 available on sacred-texts.com). So whoever wrote this surely knew two frontiers of Bharat. But then when was this written. Again from Wilson's translation, the purana refers to the Guptas. The Guptas ruled India around 3rd century AD. So surely the book is after that.The purana refers to Buddhism still being a major religion in India. So it must have been written before Adi Sankara(circa 10th century) & his reformation that resulted in the elimination of Buddhism from India. So long before the British came & even before the concerted attacks from the north west an entity called Bharat along with a conception of its boundaries existed.

In the Kurma purana from the same time we have

"Bharatesu striyah pumso
Nanavarnah prakirtitah
Nana devarcane yukta
Nanakarmani kurvate"

translated as "men and women dwelling in Bharat belonged to different communities, worshipped different gods, and practised different rites." So pluralism(multi-cultures) was known & acknowledged but still it did not deter the writer from speaking of the whole unit called Bharat.

The epics, both Ramayana & Maha-bharata, dont deal with just a particular kingdom. We hear of Gandhara, Kosala, Magadha, Lanka & places like Mathura, Dwaraka, kurukshetra located in different locations of Bharat.People travelled freely between these places, inter married etc.

If we speak of political unity, wherein the whole territory is ruled by a single empereor, Magadhas, Ashoka, later Guptas & even later Akbar had their kingdoms spanning almost the whole of the subcontinent.

The fact that hundreds of kingdoms existed in Bharat cannot be used to claim that their was no concept of nation. We should'nt look into history through the prism of present day concepts. Nation-state is a recent phenomenon.Before Bismarck united Germany it was split into small principalities.Czechslovakia disappeared from the map during WWII. But does that mean the nation disappeared. The collective identity of the people cannot be erased.

Another interesting point is that though India & Burma are contiguous even the British did not have a common government for them.So it is not just the Indus, Himalayas & the oceans defining India. Even when there was no clear physical boundary, identities of India & Burma were distinct.

It is no surprise that every wave of invaders will lay claim to the land they have taken. It is in their interest to say that there was no nation before they came.No surprise the British claim that there was no India before they came. It served them with a moral reason to occupy India, not to mention the benefits of divide & rule.

Greek,Chinese & Arab travellers have long before written about the Indian civilization.It is this common civilization that we call a nation. Yes there was no Indian Republic before the British came, but a nation long existed in the minds, books & at times politically.

PS:Sankrant Sanu's article "Why India Is A Nation"
(http://www.sulekha.com/blogs/blogdisplay.aspx?cid=4676)is a brilliant piece of work on this subject. I have used a few ideas from there.I suggest you to read it in full & at leisure.

A late foray into blogging

Have been thinking for long about creating a blog. Have nothing other than, my own laziness, to offer as an excuse. I will attempt to make good on the lost time.

What do i ruminate(ponder)on?Could be anything from international politics to my fledgling interest in evolutionary psychology and biology. Could be grand standing philosophy or masala movies. The idea is to take a snapshot of my mind every few days.

Will i be embarassed to see what i had written, at some point in future.Do i have anything worthwhile that can be published even if its only a blog.Does it make sense to let the whole world know what i think on particular subjects.Or more importantly does any one give a farthing about what an ,inconsequential me, thinks.

These things hang heavily on my mind. But then why i am doing this? It is only to regain that lost habit of writing and to vent some feelings.So here i am.