It’s been raining incessantly for three days. It is a cool early morning in the beginning of July and I have just made a cup of coffee. Now an electrical power outage has occurred and so I am sitting in a rocking chair in the semi-darkness savoring my coffee and feeling thankful that I made it in time. I have[Read More…]
I wish to write a little on a couple of terms, one of which, Ground or Grounding Dimension, I learned from an essay by Larry Dossey, and the other, Floating World, came to me as a designation for America but which I now understand was formerly applied to the urban culture of Edo Japan. One of these terms implies connectedness,[Read More…]
“He who does not bellow the truth when he knows the truth makes himself the accomplice of liars and forgers.” CHARLES PEGUY – French Author (1873-1914). Looking Beyond the Erroneous Logic of Contemporary Professional Intellect and Political Leaderships Are we living in an era of false truth, feigned piety and alternate transient facts of human affairs? To answer a rational[Read More…]
The two figures strolled in the most relaxed manner, until they came upon what many up there call ‘ The Edge of Heaven’. They stood on the precipice and together peered down, below the ethers, through the stratosphere and then the clouds, until they could view the Earth. Jesus- Well my friend, isn’t that majestic, your domain? Lucifer- Yes indeed,[Read More…]
Of all visions accessible on this living Earth, no natural sight is more beautiful that a mother and child. If the mother and child are human (no matter of what race), they are beautiful. If mother and child are lion or tiger, horse, bison, swan, or mountain sheep, beautiful. If mother and child are bear, be they black or brown,[Read More…]
Let me tell you, divorce with kids is no fun. In most traditional divorces the dad goes off and the mom keeps the kids. Now, many will say that the mom then has it the worst, for she has to take care of them without a dad around to help. Everyone knows that it is the mom who has to[Read More…]
kitnaa hai badnasiib zafar dafan ke liye do gaz zamiin bhii na milii kuu-e-yaar men Exiled in Rangoon in the colonial British India, the last Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar wrote these lines, which expresses regret for the fact that he was not allowed a burial in his own beloved country. Used emblematically as the figurehead for the 1857 revolt,[Read More…]
“It has often been said that the only thing that could unite mankind was a threat from space.” I read this in Arthur C Clarke’s novel, 2061, Odyssey Three. The threat in Clarke’s science fiction was a second star — which mankind renamed Lucifer but was actually Jupiter set ablaze by superior space engineering by an intelligent species far more[Read More…]
Last night before dinner as I was deep-frying a batch of my favorite jalebi for dessert, Saroo Brierley’s face came to mind. Afterwards I found the 2016 movie Lion from my CD collection and watched it in bits and pieces. It tells a riveting story of how a hopelessly lost 5-year-old Saroo ends up from the slums of Khandwa, a[Read More…]
In our student days a large part of the year was consumed by three long spells of holidays. The year started after the Christmas vacations which were long, but not as long as the summer vacations in May-June. The Puja vacations were the shortest but in many ways the most exciting. Durga or Kali Puja in the small towns of[Read More…]
It’s better to stay away from poetics to present in prose someone who wrote in verse that his poems have no forewords, critical studies or words of adulation. My patron saint in this endeavour is Malayalam writer N S Madhavan, who dribbles with words when he writes on football,a style interspersed with quotes and blows of vuvuzela. One can take[Read More…]
“Compassion has no place in the natural order of the world, which operates on the basis of necessity. The laws of necessity are as unexceptional as the laws of gravitation. The human faculty of compassion opposes this order and is therefore best thought of as being in some way supernatural. To forget oneself, however briefly, to identify with a stranger[Read More…]
These are all very Kolkatan in nature and you really won’t get to see or hear them in any other parts of the country. What? Some years back a national daily carried an interesting photograph in their ‘City Lights’ column. It said that at Bowbazar police station, some paintings of Pablo Picasso were replicated and some of the painter’s quotations[Read More…]
The India Tourism byline is – Incredible India. I agree. I encountered it. Here is what happened. In 2015, two dear friends of mine and I decided to go to Corbett National Park & Tiger Reserve – being one of my favorite places on earth. I am a lifelong wildlife enthusiast and photographer and ensure that I spend at least[Read More…]
I’ve come to realize that I don’t conform to ideas of any particular political party, religion, ideology and position in the way that others think the world or people should be or other positions should be. It is because I think and feel independently. Besides I was not indoctrinated by my parents or others. They let me be free. Yes,[Read More…]
In my “Putting the Decalogue Under a Microscope” I distinguished between “normative” and “empirical” statements relative to human behaviors. The latter are factual statements that pertain to either a given individual, or humans in general; the former are assertions as to what behaviors individuals should, or should not, engage in. Thus, although both types of statements pertain to human behaviors,[Read More…]
Diya Barmecha from Mumbai, proving that young minds are capable of thinking equally, if not better than older ones. A stunning essay on the life of a security guard, drawing out the discrimination inherent in society. This day was like any other. What else can you expect from the life of a security guard of a common building? Right on time, the[Read More…]
15 year old Abhipsha Mohanty leads us to this fairytale land of clean skies, green farms, beautiful fragrance in the air and a peaceful life.But all of this for real in her village in Odisha, which she points out is the 6th cleanest village in India. Here is a wonderful message of cleanliness. Mahatma Gandhi once said, “The soul of[Read More…]
When you’re 20, full of piss and vinegar, you can open up to so much. That was the year, 1970, when dreams seemed so real. This writer had just returned from a brief summer in Virginia Beach, Virginia. This was but the second time I ever was away from my parents’ apartment, and for that matter, Brooklyn, NY, lauded as[Read More…]
Cats came into Preeti’s life long before camels, around the time cows found a way out of her heart but into her life. She had seen cows ever since she could remember…while riding horse driven tongas in Haridwar in 1970s, creating traffic jams in Delhi, Haridwar, Kolkata, Dehradun, Lucknow and wherever she happened to visit in India. From long before[Read More…]
Did the caveman laugh? Did he have a toothache? The cheering thing for him would have been, he would not have to visit a dentist. Or, is that a cheering thought for me? And he would continue in pain while his tooth rotted and fell! And mine gets pulled out or repaired by a dentist peering into my numb anaesthetised[Read More…]
About ten years ago, a friend who hadn’t seen me in over two decades, offered me some tips as to what jewelry to wear to lunch when I meet one of my former editors of a Dhaka daily. He came to Maryland on business and to spend time with his family. I was a little nervous about the lunch meeting.[Read More…]
First the words; Eulogy: a speech or piece of writing that praises someone or something highly, especially a tribute to someone who has just died. Elegy: An elegy is a sad poem, usually written to praise and express sorrow for someone who is dead. But eulogies, Wikipedia assures me, can also be delivered at retirement functions and other such events when a person[Read More…]
Covid-19 did the impossible: it changed the concept of time as a finite resource. Type A individuals, like me, were faced with the realisation that we had time on our hands. Therefore, we just had to make it as productive as possible. It sounded like good news. Gone were the dreadful Mondays that spoiled all our Sundays, and along with[Read More…]
This morning when I pulled opened the curtains to my dining room window overlooking the neighborhood park, I spotted one of my neighbors (let me call her Lillete) is power walking in the park. She looked radiant and chic in her joggers outfit. She appeared much energized. Looking back a few months ago, I remembered last year’s Halloween night (October[Read More…]
It’s always darkest right before dawn. In this dark time, which is the most frightening experience for a lot of people, we must find our strength to go on. The Coronavirus pandemic is going to be over one day and we must try our hardest to make it. Many have been lost and many are fighting for their life.[Read More…]
Lockdown Series 5 As lock down moves to 50 days, there is a “new normal’ emerging. Human beings have the amazing and scary capacity to adapt and endure in myriad ways to crisis and tribulations maintaining the minimum “ business as usual” attitudes”. The days of lock down and Corona scare have brought out this fortitude and coping strategies of[Read More…]
Jamal Uddin had lived an ordinary and extraordinary life at the same time. His life story is about hard work, determination, and resilience in living the life of an immigrant in New York City. “Mr. Uddin was born in Chittagong, Bangladesh, where the Karnaphuli River flows into the Bay of Bengal. He was not poor, but he knew what it[Read More…]
Lawrence in Arabia – War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East 
Revolutionary Comrade Shiv Varma Media Awards 
Dalit, Adivasi children in Kerala hit hard by Covid 
Remembering Comrade Harkishan Singh Surjeet 
Concerns of Fr. Stan Swamy to Protect Tribal Rights Also Related Much to Climate Change Mitigation and Adaption 
Museum Pests- Huge Threat to Cultural Heritage 
Resisting Nuclear Weapons in a Climate Crisis 
Cartoon by K.P. Sasi 
Capitalism and Alienation 
Reject The Government’s Declaration Of ‘Muslim Women’s Rights Day’ 
Our Dark Wicked Side 
The Manchurian Americans 
How History Is Weaponised 
A new age of surveillance and control in India 
ATTEND to GAIA the LIVING EARTH 
24 Muslim Brotherhood members sentenced to death in Egypt 
Gender blindness and the Vaccine Gap 
As Progressives Call for End to Blockade, Biden Announces More Sanctions Against Cuba 
How to manage urbanization 
A Missed Opportunity: Rights of Nature Removed From New Draft of Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework 
Review: “Cruelty Or Humanity” By Stuart Rees – For Humanity, Banish Cruelty 
The Crofting System 
Witness to Turbulent American Democracy: The Paradox for Soul Searching of American Acclaimed Values 
A bouquet of novel compounds: New treatment options for HIV 
Blinken’s Single-Point Agenda In Delhi – China 
Blinken comes riding the Pegasus 
Return to Lifta Is Not A Wish; It’s A Promise, Israel! 
“The Clash of Two Americas, the Unfinished Symphony”, a book by Matthew Ehret 
In rural Rajasthan, Dalit and Adivasi girls fight child marriages 
Forest Food — Important Source of Nutrition, Income and Joy for the Poor 
From Systems Theory to Action 
On Degrowth 
Impact and Challenges on Lawyers during Covid-19 
Sherni and the ‘Hunting Tale’ 
John Woodcock One Of The Greatest Cricket Writers Passes On 
The Crisis in Tunisia 
‘New Form’ of Ice Cream ‘Terrorism’: How Ben & Jerry’s has Exposed Israel’s anti-BDS Strategy 
Julian Assange’s Ecuadorian citizenship revoked 
Planet’s Vital Signs Are Reaching Dangerous ‘Tipping Points’ Amid Climate Crisis, Scientists Warn 
Pivoting to America 
Dear Authors and Readers of Countercurrents, You may all know Sheshu Babu an author for CC for long time. Most of our old authors may have received at least one thoughtful comment from him. In the early days, he used to read all CC articles and post a thoughtful comment for each article. Then one day, another CC author Emily[Read More…]
