Joyous Devi

 " A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new… when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance….. Are we brave enough and wise enough to grasp this opportunity and accept the challenge of the future?” This quote from India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru’s speech, immort alised a moment – the stroke of midnight on 15 th August 1947 -   and heralded a new age,   as India breathed freedom and unburdened itself of the yoke of centuries of servitude. These words could be perhaps used as appropriately    for the historic Judgement that was pronounced on 22 nd September 2017, against the practice of Triple Talaq by the five member bench of the Supreme Court.    While there are three forms of initiating divorce under Muslim law, this particular form of divorce named t alaq-e-biddat   or instant and irrevocable  talaq , an increasingly popular form adopted by m...

  70   years of Independence! We have just celebrated this milestone, with functions   held across the country, marked with the revelry and the assertion of patriotism, that these special dates reignite. The event also presupposes a certain   reflection – of ourselves as citizens of a sovereign state and how it shapes our identities including a national character, which in a more closely knit world is increasingly employed as a passport to gain entry into   countries, which use its badge to   profile   people. To give entry or keep them out accordingly. Our   ‘national character’ is   presumably shaped by our nation and as the argumentative Indians, we are unsparing in our criticism of its dark side, the frustrations directed at the lumbering elephantine gait of its governance,   and the urgent   need for an increased momentum   to ‘Swachchata’   ( cleanliness). , And what are the characteristics that we take away ...

Jhansi and my mother’s larger kin   Summer in Delhi, for many of its citizens, spells the time to escape the city. A much needed respite, away from its relentless battering sun and the overhang of its polluting air. The social calendar yawns its emptiness and life seems circumscribed by temperature controlled indoors. Facebook updates posted from gloriously exotic locales tell me that most people on my contact list are unreachable.   Yet there is a silver lining to the inhospitable season, for it allows one to luxuriate in the randomly selected passages of memory.    And so it was that I remembered Kusum, my mother, Amma as I called her, and her side of the family b acklit against a town, whose cadence sang in their veins – Jhansi!                                                  Kusum, amma in the fashion of the times As...