Every year, since a decade or so, the deities of the Jagannath Temple at Puri are punished as if ‘They’ are servants and the greedy servitors are lords. The temple administration too behaves irresponsibly to please the people with authority and wealth, wrongly called VIPs, who have no existence in a decent law-respecting democracy. Dignitary, not VIP, is the word hardly used. Even the highly Westernised Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik rushes to the temple town to seek blessings to continue as a beloved CM forever. In Odisha, or for that matter across most of the north Indian regions, New Year commences around the close of autumn in April between 14 and 16. More than a million tourist-pilgrims, particularly young men and women throng Puri for a cursory glimpse of the deities before landing in some meat-liquor serving mad joint for freaking out for the rest of the day. The culture of appearing at Puri on the New Year day has become a culture after TV came and mobiles and motorbikes became easily available.
Other Ministers and public officials also come to Puri in full glare so that the CM can see them (at least on TV). The servitor community, by and large a greedy lot, turns out to be biggest beneficiary in the peculiar exercise for grabbing money by coaxing, cajoling and threatening gullible pilgrims. The servitors plan an overnight preparatory activity to make the deities look fresh by the dawn around when the anxiously waiting crowd is ready to storm in. Many heartless, headless, cultureless servitors do not let the deities sleep enough. The deities are woken up quite in the wee hours called midnight much before the crow caws and the Sun is ready to rise so that the foolish pilgrims do not feel dejected and money does not fail to land in the servitors’ pouch. The ill-equipped local administration goes haywire, traffic management facing the most terrible challenge. The one-way passage arrangement that the police enforce on the unruly pilgrim-tourists causes unspeakable inconvenience to local residents who are punished for no mistake of theirs. The CM in a democratic country should not commit silly un-secular acts and set a most dangerous trend among the crazy masses by rushing to the temple on a calendar ‘new year dawn’. He should shift this great divine duty to April, the 14 on which nearly the whole country celebrates New Year, except perhaps the Dravidian region below the Vindhya range of hills in the south. The sane Odia people along with countless literate Indians across the country do hereby appeal to the cleanest and wisest CM to desist from this meaningless 1st -January exercise henceforth and leave a healthier culture for the young people to imbibe and benefit greatly.
lord Jagannath must inspire Naveen Patnaik in a manner that Kalpataru, his son Balabantaray and a few others with land-grabbing taint get dismissed without delay. The land grabbers, more so the discretionary quota (DQ) allotting Ministers, be flung onto the enforcement courtyards for being dispatched to jail as no ‘brazen DQ misuse’ is legally tenable in any court of law. The act violates the ‘Doctrine of Public Trust’ which constitutes the basic structure of the Constitution of India. The GA land scam between 1980 and 2014 must ride Naveen’s mind with the grace of lord Jagannath to cause a speedy probe and discard public servants in any position. The lord of the Universe will hopefully come in dreams to tell Naveen to learn Odia and mingle in the crowds, the way very Desi Manohar Parrikar and Manik Sarkar do, not to mention Jose Mozuca of Uruguay who is a proven demigod of a ruling politician in the world of today. lord Jagannath is expected to persuade Naveenbabu to hold morning tea sessions at least once a week to listen to experienced elderly citizens and get to know the ground realities for establishing praiseworthy governance systems. lord Balabhadra is hereby prayed sincerely to inspire Naveen to start the morning activity from tomorrow. A small team of staff members can scrutinise applicants desirous of spending quality time with Naveen Patnaik. Maa Subhadra is known to demolish pride and arrogance. But since Naveen is humble, shy and reticent, the Goddess may not come in dream. But then, Maa Subhadra will compel him some way or the other to start reading books on the Jagannath culture starting with the eleventh chapter of the Srimad Bhagabata which explains how the human beings in authority should conduct themselves to ensure public joy.
Janaki Ballav Patnaik has just returned from Assam after serving a full term as the Governor there. There is absolutely no reason or rhyme why some leaders should rejoice at his comeback home. For sure, he is long-deflated, zero-substance Congress leader, now not even fit to be a quality follower of great Congress leaders of today. He has kicked up yet another row by proposing a move to get back Soumya Ranjan Patnaik into the party family, as if he were an important decision maker. As we get to know, Soumya is doing fine wherever he is. The Congress will finish him for good in case he walks back imagining the party will spring to life in near future. Ripe, old and extremely shrewd Janaki would do big service to humanity by preaching religious sermons at gatherings of retired people all over the country.
Narendra Modi is already a very lucky Prime Minister. Petroleum prices keep plummeting due to international trade situations, and Modi takes the credit in India. Masses imagine Modi has divine effect on the commodity price profile of India. Besides, other commodities have shown encouraging trends and a Modi effect is believed to be the cause. Inflation stands at a single digit factor of 1. The biggest achievement for Modi is to have US President Obama as the chief guest at the Republic Day celebrations. The same US administration had successively turned down Modi’s visa to enter the US even as a Chief Minister. It may be mentioned that as per the international rule, no head of state can be denied an entry visa to any country. Modi’s Pakistan policy is laudable too; but then more has to be seen if the gesture works out well or not.
Some of Modi’s grave blunders are deplorable. The Jammu and Kashmir election campaign witnessed Modi doing hurricane hops across 11 constituency locations which cost the public exchequer nearly 55 crore rupees, which is abuse of power. Modi admirers may look away from the accusations, but the act is not a welcome one in a healthy democracy. Knowing some of the Indian celebrities born on the New Year day would be fun: Career politicians Salman Khurshid and Jyotiraditya Madhavrao Scindia; movie actors Asrani, Nana Patekar, Sonali Bendre and Vidya Balan; movie director Deepa Mehta, spy Kim Philby. Physicist Satyendranath Bose was born in 1894. And the controversial Swami Nityananda, infamously now embroiled in sex scandals, is also a New Year-born guy. Interestingly, Kim Philby was born on New Year at Ambala of British India in 1912.
On a New Year day, a florist came to a barber shop for a haircut. When he dished out a 20-rupee note, the barber stopped him and said, “No Sir, I am doing social work for a week. It’s all free service.” The next morning when he reached the door of his salon, he found a bouquet of choicest flowers and a packet of sweets with a beautiful “Thank You” note. The next day, a grocer came and was told that it was a week of social work. The next morning, the barber found at the door a large bagful of grains, lentils and vegetables with a big ‘Thank you very much’ note. Next to appear was a politician who, after the free service, told the barber that he should give service to his voters on priority during the remaining free days. He never sent any gift or note. The last one was a so-called professional social worker who praised the barber for the great job and promised him a ‘standing ovation’ only when a grant came. The next day when the barber reached his shop, he saw a crowd of the professional social workers’ family members, friends and neighbours waiting for a free haircut. No flowers, no grocery, no ‘Thank You’ note. The social worker heading an NGO was identified as a champion preaching ‘Joy of Giving’.
(The writer is a core member of Transparency International, Odisha)