This lane is too dark for women..

I still remember the graphic and gory details of how President Najibullah came to the end of the road. Or Daniel Pearl. I was too young when Najib was castrated and murdered (subsequently his body was hung from a Traffic Signal Post) by the Taleban. But the horror remains etched in the memory.

Mob fury takes nasty turns and good men get sucked. I never acquainted Dr. Najib or Mr. Pearl and knew too little about them to pass a judgment. However, I strongly believe, they never attempted to molest a woman. And for an Indian like me, that’s enough to call someone a "GOOD" man. At least, a tad better than the average.

So why do good men meet gory ends? Or, more importantly, what stops us from offering the same ends to the “not-so-good” men who tease and molest two young girls in Juhu or squeeze someone’s private in Kochi. I don’t know.

I never respected Indians - shining, rising or - if you allow me - letch-ing & molesting. I never thought we should be proud of this half clad, ill-educated, primal millions - even if they end up topping charts in terms of Market capitalization or a Billionaires list. Am not with the Churchill-ian approach to this. But am not too far, either.

Don’t believe in Indian civilization – it is non-existent.

Or, lets say, our religion.

Baitullah Mehsud, (call him whatever, am not justifying violence to pursue ideologies) has the ****s to stand up and say he didn’t kill Benazir simply because his religion doesn’t permit violence against women – a religion that was ushered into existence some two thousand years after ours.
The word Religion doesn't have a perfect substitute in Sanskrit. It is loosely associated with the word Dharma. And Dharma, in turn, can be associated with Characteristic principles of a being. So, can we, by our own definition, figure out where we are leading our Dharma to? Trafficking young girls, molesting women and beating up home-makers for the bucks you couldn't earn yourself - thats our Dharma.

Where are our Gods and our Godmen? Where are the millions trying to learn the “art of living” the better way? Where’s our Kashi & Hardwar? Where’s that four lettered “Indian Heritage” for which the poor Swedish girl got her posterior pinched?

Fact is we are a lot of impotent, sex-starved jokers. Look at the joy in thefaces of the molesters in the HT photographs, you’ll know what am talking of.

A couple of years back when Dhananjoy was being set up for the gallows in Kolkata, some “pseudo” jokers (read “Civil rights activists”) made a lot of noise about the disadvantages of Capital punishment. Some, among them, were women too. God bless them – am not suggesting they should have been “whatever”, but if someday they happen to be “whatever” – I would be the first person to propose amnesty for the perpetrators (Guilty, is a long haul in the Indian Judicial system).