PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE

Bits and pieces of a long gone past
Taped together somehow.
Floating into an unknown future
Did I ever exist in the now?

Akin spirits lost just like me
Forming what I call my life.
Slaves of routine, aimlessness
Marching to the fife.

What am I then, if I don’t live in the present?
Waiting for each moment to be gone?
Waking up to find that my life’s lost and over
Passing over dejected and forlorn.

Sometimes I wonder what I’ve been doing
How did I end up here?
From a carefree child to a complicated adult
I soared so fast it’s a blur.

If only I could unscrew my mind!
Open it to move things around!
Figure out how that damn thing works,
So I can retrace how I got to my now.

“Don’t live in the past, don’t fret over the future
Live each moment as it comes!”
Whoever said that is either very happy
Or to the sadness has already succumbed.


Because I try my best, to do my best.
But the past somehow catches up with me.
Leaving me stressed,
Completely depressed,
Until I can no more believe.

I have these moments when I’m happy and smiling,
What the world seems to know me by.
Fooling them all! And sometimes myself
Locking up what’s really inside.

That’s how I interact and communicate with others.
With a barrier that I cant seem to break.
But I’m trying, and this writing is an attempt,
To destroy in me all that is fake.

Nothing is impossible

Who said India is lacking behind. Here is the example.

Govind Jaiswal IAS!


Govind Jaiswal, 24, the son of an uneducated
rickshaw puller in Varanasi, had
grown up with cruel taunts like
‘However much you study, you will still
be a rickshawpuller.’ He had studied
with cotton stuffed in his ears to drown the noise of printing machines and
generators below his window in a poor
neighbourhood where small workshops
existed cheek by jowl with tiny
residential quarters.

He had given Math tuitions to
supplement the paltry sum his father
could afford to send him each month.
His ailing father had sold a small plot of
land to give Govind about Rs 40,000 so
that he could move to Delhi which would provide him a better place to
study.

Throughout his life, he had lived with
only one dream — to become an officer
of the Indian Administrative Service. For
him that was the only way. And when
he broke the news to his family, that he
was ranked 48 among 474 successful candidates in his first attempt at the
exam — it was the turn of his three
sisters and father to weep with
unbridled joy.

Icould not afford to have any other
career goal. My life would have been
absolutely futile had I not made it into
the civil services,” says Govind, just back
from his medicals in New Delhi,
mandatory for the IAS.

“You must understand that my
circumstances were such that besides
the Civil Services, I had no option. I
didn’t have much of a chance with
lower government jobs because they
are mostly fixed, neither could I start a business because I had no money. The
only thing I could do was work hard at
my studies.”

It was almost impossible for him to
study in the one room he shared with
his family. To add to his woes was the
power cut that extended between 10
and 14 hours every day. The moment
the lights went out, he had to shut the window to block out the deafening
noise of generators in the many
workshops around his home.

So in search for a quiet place to study,
he briefly shared a friend’s room at the
Banaras Hindu University. Since that did
not help him much, he did what many
civil services aspirants in northern India
do — he moved to New Delhi.

Working for ten years at the
government ration shop, Narayan
earned a living by weighing goods at
the store. One day when the shop shut
down, he bought one rickshaw and
hired it out. He added three more and at one time was prosperous enough to
own about 36 rickshaws.

On his meager earnings, the uneducated
rickshaw vendor with a hearing
disability continued the education of his
children. The girls were married after
their graduation — Narayan sold two
pieces of land for the weddings, the last plot was sold to achieve his Govinda’s
dream.

Narayan gave his son Rs 40,000 to
prepare for his Civil Services exam in
New Delhi and pursue his childhood
dream of becoming an IAS officer. For
the next three years, he sent his son
between Rs 2,500 and Rs 3,000 every month, sometimes foregoing the
expense of treating the septic wound in
his foot that continues to nag him till
today.

Outside his narrow lane, opposite the
Varanasi City railway station, where
Narayan Jaiswal parks his rickshaws
and spends most of his waking hours,
he still walks barefooted with a
bandage, one end hanging loose and scraping the dirty road.

“Beyond this year, my father could not
have afforded to send Govind any more
money. It was getting very tough for
him. Govind was earning Rs 1,500 from
tuitions, I don’t know what he would
have done if he didn’t make it to the IAS this year. My father could not sleep
for 10 days before the results came,”
says Govind’s eldest sister Nirmala,
whose son is almost the same age as
her brother.

Until now, courier delivery boys found
his house with great difficulty but now
even the fruit cart-wallah, one-and-a-
half kilometres away, will tell you
where the ‘IAS’ house is...

Hatsoff to both

Lead with an example for change you want to see.

Long Live India

A DYING BREED

I am 28 years old and I am growing up in a world of extremism. A rapidly growing outlet for anger has changed from exchanging of a few harsh words and holding of collars to a bullet. The only noticeable expression of a comfortable life has changed from healthy meals and shopping sprees once a month to setting up camp in malls, at least 3 cars for the two members of your family and an Armani wrist watch on your hand. The Jeans are getting shorter, the tops are getting lower, TV screens are getting bigger and religion no more echoes faith in anything larger than life but has become a business. The more we move towards the glowing light emitting from dollar bills and pounds, the blinder we are becoming to the littered streets of our nation. The more we get hypnotized by the sound of gold coins clinking together, the deafer we are to the voices of the poor. Money is no more a medium of payment to buy and sell goods. Instead, it has become a pass to neglect morality, social responsibility, law, heck even traffic lights. A pass “GUARANTEED BY THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT” in case you have any legal reservations and stamped with Gandhiji’s smiling face on it in case you have any moral reservations. The world is tumbling into a pit of chaos and there is no gravity defying superhero in sight to save us.

But there is hope. And the realization of this hope can only come if people my age listen. Listen, learn and rectify. It seems as though the new parents, those in between the generation that my parents belong to and the generation I belong to, have relinquished responsibility and left parenting up to televisions and computers. Boundaries that are important to maintain a healthy growing atmosphere are becoming blurred because parents push their children to extremes to help them keep up with the extremism. In keeping up with school, extra tuition, football classes, dance classes, swimming classes, art classes, birthdays and endless banal social obligations, the time for parents to discipline and germinate a conscience in their children has disappeared. And it took the entire breed of distinguished parents who truly understood how to raise responsible human beings along with it.

But there is still hope. The hope is with you and me. Spend time with your children when you have them. Remember their birthdays because you’re happy they were born and not because it is an opportunity to flaunt your money by throwing a party. Buy them what they need, even occasionally what they want; don’t buy them everything. Don’t be embarrassed by their public tantrums and give in to their every demand. When they get their first job, don’t ask about the pay. Instead, pop down to Archie's and buy them a card. Don’t be afraid to hurt their feelings if you’re doing it for their own good. Give them pocket money not blank cheques. And most importantly, remember everything your parents did while raising you that annoyed you the most, and do it. They were the ones trying to salvage the dying breed. So listen to them, learn from them and then perhaps we can rectify the extremism we’re living in.