Love, Life and Happiness

  There is an interesting episode in Mahabharata , in Drona Parva . Mighty Drona, the teacher of Kaurava and Pandavas took charge after the great Commander of the Kaurava Army, Bhishma had fallen. There was a huge battle and Krishna predicted complete routing of the Pandava forces if Drona was to fight even for half a day. To circumvent this, Bhima was to make an announcement that Drona's son Ashwatthama was slain. This would have led to a dejected Drona surrendering his weapons and thus could be killed, unarmed. As Drona  did not believe in Bhima, he called upon  Yudhisthira, the eldest of the Pandava to confirm.  Yudhishthira, the righteous one, than famously said that  Ashwatthama was dead, not the man but the Elephant. It is then mentioned in before now the Chariot of Yudhishthira had remained at the height of four fingers' breadth from the Earth's surface; but after he uttered the lie, his steeds touched the Earth.  There is a certain glory and lightness of spirit in s

'There is a crack, A crack in everything; That is how The Light gets in.' Wrote Leonard Cohen, in his song Anthem. I have been meaning to write a review of the book by Rahul Roushan called Sanghi Who Never Went to a Shakha. I was not getting around to it, the dark shadows of deaths floating around in this resurgent wave of Corona Pandemic, where each man has been reduced to an isolated island of life in the middle of a dreadful sea of unknown. Apart from that it was the structure of the book which was confusing me. Is it a memoir? or a non-fiction tome of political history?  It would come across often that Rahul does not want it to be taken as a memoir. But then he also does not want it to be taken as a political history of say, India since the Nineties. It is in a sense both. Is it a beautiful book? Is the prose enchanting, the structure captivating? I would say no. But then a memoir is not supposed to be beautiful. It is supposed to be brutal. A memoir is not a reflection of