AJAX production house presents
"A maverick account of regionalism"
Statutory disclaimer: This is a work of fiction and entirely a work of the demented delusions of ajay pal singh sethi who is a fledging software engineer born in obscurity in 1989.
Narrator : Ajay Pal Singh Sethi
Welcome to the future friends
thud....thump, the door is rattled, what the....Its morning time and I think our newspaper vendor has just delivered the textovisual(don't go looking this up, it’s my creation) bomb aka the daily newspaper. I open the first page and a striking visual of some student activists demanding a separate state for the "engineering students who have passed with more than 70% marks" hogs the front page and below it the pros and cons for the idea of the state are listed, the same old hogwash, don’t be alarmed, its 2020, welcome to the future in the united(or is it untied) states of India.
Hi, I work for a company called soft tech (reserved for "Indians" from the united kingdom of Punjab and Haryana in the state of gurgaon(it is a state formed by the untiring efforts of CSUE(Compulsive Shoppers and Useless Engineers) party). Its Monday today and I have to go to office passing through 4 states, 3 of which are unfriendly towards the people of my state(southwestern northern... oh forget it, all i can remember is that it has got lots of directions in the name). Finally after nearly getting mugged and having my car windshield smashed I reach my office, oh what is that... not again, its some members of the NUUW(National Unemployed and Unproductive Workers) party (with a presence over about..ah..70 states, yes thats it) demanding jobs in my company and today they are even burning an effigy of our peon who greets me at the door and seems quite chuffed about it(his effigy getting burned that is, not meeting me).
He says "saheb, look they are even burning my effigy today, you must see a picture of this i posted on facebook, i already have 100 comments, i am finally famous."
"How many times have i told you that people from my state are not allowed to surf facebook?, we use only twitter". I retort back rather rudely.
"oh yes saheb, I am sorry(apologetically) and listen sir i forget to tell you something(now rather ebullient)"
"what is it, I have tons of statehood applications ahem..work waiting to be taken care of, come on blurt it out" I reply as I finally slump into my chair at the third floor.
" saheb, my son has got a job as a toll officer in the neighboring state of noida and that too because due to reservations he was the only candidate appearing for the interview" he smirks and chuckles in unison.
He departs leaving me into some deep thoughts, i doze off and in my dreams i see my childhood when India had a handful of states and then how demands for separate states based on language, caste , common place of birth etc. etc. divided the nation.Then in 2015 came the coup de grace, some people in northern Maharashtra(a new state created in 2012) demanded a new state because they belonged to the same ethnic sub sub sub(get my point, it was a lot of subs)...race of marathi-english speaking marathas. Initially there was huge uproar but then a compromise was reached and they were given a separate state of about 1000 acres. Then what, all hell broke loose and new states have been created almost every day since then, in protest the government of India has refused to draw a stable political map of India, its dynamic as the daily weather maps are.
A stone crashing the window of my office breaks my troubled sleep. I cautiously peer outside and voila..just what the day needed: a riot between the opposing statehood demand groups. Now India has about 128 states(last updated on Saturday, 14 March 2020) some even as small as 500 acres, each state has its own evangelist party fiercely protective of the rights of its citizens in terms of job reservations, college admissions etc.. Fierce battles are fought everyday and loss of life and property is common but who cares, everybody wants his state and consequently his small(getting smaller everyday) piece of the power pie under the guise of "helping the brethren acquire their true rights". Local businessmen who earlier voted and more importantly helped politicians to power now dictate terms both economically and socially in their tiny fiefdoms. Before applying for a job one has to look up a tediously long list to see if one is eligible to apply to the particular job or not The list of woes is endless, but fear not the promised land has been delivered and power centers have been established.
Just then I feel a tap on my shoulder and the guy from the next cubicle hands me the demand letter of a new state, ahh I forget to tell you my company maintains the records of new statehood demands.We have a board meeting to decide the fate of about 20 new demands, the parliament is too busy to deal with all this messy stuff and it has outsourced the decision making to us, its a hell lot easier and maybe we will get a new state for our company alone as a kickback.This raises a question: Its 2020 and blogging is a huge hit and we "still" don't have a state for bloggers, well maybe I can make the boss agree to one over a power lunch.hah, some things will never change and human greed is one of them.
Posts
Hehehee.. that was cool Engineer Saheb.. ;)
ReplyDeleteand don't worry, Bloggers don't need a state.. :P
thanks Saad Saheb, if you felt this was good then follow the link at the bottom and vote for me, vote for the NABP(New Age Bloggers Party)!!
ReplyDeleteTechie,
ReplyDeleteNice idea... Somewhat reminds me of Orwellian thought process - dunno why. And Saad has a point, you know.
Thanks Anirudh and how did you guess so correctly, just before i wrote this blog a book on Orwellian thought fell on my head, since then i have only that on my mind.... :) :) :)
ReplyDelete