In the war conflict of 1962, China achieved military superiority, and there is no doubt about that. They annexed what was rightly theirs (the Aksai Chin) and what wasn’t (Arunachal). During the conflict, both sides faced immense logistical difficulties, Aksai Chin being a freezing salt desert at 5000m above sea level, and Arunachal being in the Himalayas, with dramatic peaks towering over 7000m. Soon after the occupation, China simply vacated Arunachal and shifted to its pre-war positions in the east, for reasons unexplained to us common people in the Indian heartland. Whatever the reasons might be, Arunachal has basically been Indian territory excepting that short period when China had occupied it. And thus that stands today.

Leaving aside the military reasons, Arunachal is a state which is culturally a part of India. Though ignored at first, the beauty of the area couldn’t remain shrouded for long. The state has not only seen an increasing number of tourists from the rest of India, but also seen rising is the number of immigrants who have settled down, finding the peace, tranquility and scenic beauty too hard to leave behind. And there are others from the economically deprived classes, who went to Arunachal in search of a steady source of sustenance, and can now be found running shops or roadside eateries. It is safe to say that Arunachal has the essence of all other states of India: indigenous culture, indigenous people, and among it all, a cultural diversity which mingles into the uniqueness of this wonderful land.

The third reason is my personal favourite. China is an autocracy. It  might be part of the Security Council, it might be ages ahead of us economically, but it is ruled by a select bunch of people. Poles apart is India, a democracy, where people at least can choose who rules them. We’ve had elections in Arunachal recently, and 70% of the population turned up to cast their vote, far higher than the average turnout during polls in other states. This, more than anything, is proof that the people of Arunachal identify with India, that they are willing to live on in a free world, that they are willing to be called Indian. And maybe this is proof that they have the same dream for India as the great Rabindranath Tagore had:

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world is not broken into fragments by narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake

Jai Hind.

Layla, you’ve got me on my knees
Layla, I’m begging, darling please
Layla, darling won’t you ease my worried mind?

The strength that women behold under their tender forms has been an enigma all through history, since the time of the cavemen. The very fact that they were the ones who could produce new life made their power something to be afraid of, something overwhelming to men. For their souls could give rise to new ones without causing them any apparent loss. Nature, weird in its sense of justice as always, had hence gifted men the power of the body. For centuries, women and men lived in this equilibrium, and while men were the ones who hunted and held sway over the community, they silently bowed to the feminine race by following the lunar calendar, worshiping them without conceding so.

But no equilibrium lasts forever in human society, and hence men went about proclaiming their superiority by way of politics and religion. Women were branded as mere carriers of seed, and worse, as a source of sin and guilt, a system of belief which is still visible in the tenets of the Roman Catholic Church for all to see, and in the teachings of almost all other faiths at a subtler though definitive level. The women who were revered once upon a time wes banished to the harems, treated as servants, branded as whores and executed as witches. And the men thought they had rid themselves of the power of the feminine race. To this day, that illusion prevails in the minds of most men. Why, most heads of state are men, most CEO’s are men,  the sports that are most popular involve men too!

Oblivious to them, though, women never lost their glory, for they have continued to hold sway over men’s minds. Kings have been led to victory and death by them, urchins have graced glory due to them, and riches have come to naught because of them. The fact that men would never admit they can be controlled by the weaker race of women makes it even easier for them to remain the powerful race they have always been, from behind the curtain for millennia and increasingly so in front of it. Those who know of it view them as a threat, but the reality is that we men have been unfair, very unfair to them. That they’ve managed to fight back despite the woes we’ve given them demonstrates the true power of womankind.

It is only when we fall in love with a woman, and hopelessly so, that we realize her true strength. She overpowers our mind, she controls it till we have no say over it whatsoever. And if she loves us too , she galvanizes our souls and makes it impenetrable for anything life can throw at us. Invincible, except in her presence. It is this overpowering nature of a woman that most men cannot accept, and herein the dreaded male ego comes into play, a sort of resistance that only ends up breaking the bond between man and woman. Heinrich Himmler, the greatest mass-murderer of modern times, is a despicable character to most. Yet even he was in awe of the feminine race at one point, stating in his diary:

A proper man loves a woman on three levels: as a dear child who is to be chided, perhaps even punished on account of her unreasonableness, and who is protected and taken care of because one loves her. Then as wife and as a loyal, understanding comrade who fights through life with one, who stands faithfully at one’s side without hemming in or chaining the man and his spirit. And as a goddess whose feet one must kiss, who gives one strength through her feminine wisdom and childlike, pure sanctity that does not weaken in the hardest struggles and in the ideal hours gives one heavenly peace.

The only way a man can find peace in his life is by giving up this struggle for power with the woman in his life, and letting his inhibitions relating to her bite the dust. If a man truly trusts his woman, then baring his soul and submitting to her presence cannot be a shameful act. We submit to our superiors, people who don’t even care about us, in worse ways. Then why not to the woman we claim to write our lives off to? If you were to ask me, I’d rather lose to her than to any other person in the world. For if you lose to her, there’s little chance you’ll ever lose to anyone else.

Oh Layla, I’m begging on my knees,
Oh Layla, I surrender at your feet.
Oh Layla, won’t you take me down,
Elevate me to the highest crown?

Front Cover

If a man has a heart that beats, then two people always reside somewhere within: the child, and the father. Khaled Hosseini’s first novel, The Kite Runner, touches both in an enchanting yet shattering way. The story revolves around the protagonist Amir, and traces his journey as a 12-year-old in Afghanistan in the 1970′s, to a 38-year-old in America, and then his venture back to his homeland, devastated by the Russian invasion and now infected with the plague of the Taliban, in order to redeem himself

And redemption comes in the form of Sohrab, the now-orphaned son of Amir’s best friend in childhood, Hassan. Hassan, the servant’s son. No, Hassan, his half-brother. His half-brother whom he betrayed one cold winter morning. His half-brother who will never come back. His half-brother, who’s son gives Amir what he had always craved for: fatherhood. Not just to be a father, but also to understand his own father. Understand he does, finally, but he also must mend the soul of his nephew, and now foster-son, for it is as devastated and shattered as is the country he calls his motherland.

The story is, in a nutshell, the story of Afghanistan. The story of a peaceful country overturned by the selfishness of foreign powers, as well by the greed and delusions of some of its own people. It moves you the way it paints a beautiful picture of the land, and then spatters tar and blood on that canvas. And then you realize, the story is not a work of fiction at all. It is a story which has probably unfolded in Afghanistan an uncountable number of times, albeit in parts. It moves you in a way very few works of modern literature can. And it moves you so much, that when the dark clouds in the story finally fade away and you see light peeping through, you find yourself in tears.

The Kite Runner is not just a book that has deeply touched my soul, but is also a means of redemption for me, for I have sinned too. I have sinned by not keeping a promise I made to the woman I love. A promise that today, I finally have upheld. She said a few days back, that once you break a promise, it becomes very difficult to get the trust back. Such is her nature, that she never forced it upon me, and such is my nature, that I took it for granted. And today, on this wonderful day which marks 20 months to the day we started loving each other, I ask for redemption.

I speak these words to you. To you, the one woman in my life, the one who’s heart beats for me. You have loved me with all your soul, with all the love one can give. And yet, I have failed you. You have made my life beautiful, you have given me a reason to smile on the most dull of days. And yet, I have turned back on my words. I make this modest start towards getting back all that I have lost. Because if I betray my own words to you, there can be no greater sin. But today, I make a start. For you, a thousand times over.