The title of this post is a pithy translation of the following couplet from the great thinker (and better speaker) Hassan Nisar:
Shahr-e-aazeb me sirf aankhen kaafi nahiin
Yehan ulta latak kar dekho to sab seedha dikhai dega
In this Strange City, It is difficult to see straight
But if you hang Upside Down, Everything makes sense
I suspect I many be living in such a strange place Wherein:
1. If you are educated and even a graduate you will struggle to find a job. There is either nil or negligible social security. However if you take up arms against the state and kill a few unarmed civilians and indulge in extortion, kidnapping, rape and murder. You will get not only amnesty from the State, but a government job, and a gun with a gun license. Its well nigh impossible for a law abiding citizen to get same gun license.
2. Where the state was divided into two political entities, which subsequently became three. Half of the people who wanted separation stayed in the old entity, while most who opposed a new identity were cajoled and bribed and coerced into a new one.
3. Where the media does not even attempt a veil of objectivity and is still taken seriously.
4. Where in many particular political constituencies, the worst people with criminal records that must include multiple heinous crimes, are scrupulously and carefully chosen and put on top. The public is complicit, even enthusiastic, in insistence that their leader should score minimum of 17/20 on psychopathy scale. (there is a beautiful word for this - kakistocracy). This is provided that the psychopath be part of their endonamous group.
5. Where are a large minority that was lying dormant for decades under foreign rule, suddenly started raising hell in support of a falling regime 4000 miles away. The people of the foreign regime in the meantime, happily cast away their old regime, and gave the harbinger of the change the title of Father of the Nation.
6. Where Secularism means believing in every religion (with sizable population) vehemently and simultaneously, and visiting every place of worship possible.
7. Where allegation means conviction, and hearsay implies evidence against your ideological opponents. The exact opposite is true for your ideological fellow travelers.
8. Where half a million people bravely gather and die in police firing by the hundreds for a few hundred jobs for their endonamous group. When the borders are attacked by a foreign power, not a single necktie nor any dhoti shifts out of position.
9. Where during peacetime, there is constant belligerence about nationalism and patriotism, individual duties and collective sacrifice. In wartime there is deep intellectual conversation about the irrelevance of borders, Unity of Man, and the primacy of all human life, particularly of the soldier, who is paid to, and eager to do his duty at risk of life and limb.
10. Where courts give convictions on police theories without evidence. The clinching argument is that though there is no evidence, there is no evidence of anybody else doing it.
11. Where major roads in its capital is named after mass murders, and yes mass murderers of your own ancestors, not foreigners.
12. Where the same people who raise bloody hell over the rights of its ethnic group, enthusiastically elect the same person who describes a major attack of its own capital, with hundreds of casualties, as a minor incident.
13. Where the argument that I did not take bribes - my relative or friend did on my behalf is taken as a valid argument for innocence by both public and justice system.
14. Where nodding agreement with principles laid down in one's own Constitution is taken as evidence of bigotry by people who take Oath of Office on same Constitution.
15. Where a national crisis emerges and people froth at the mouth with rage when a movie actor practically unknown outside is given a security check at a foreign airport. When same foreign country decides to undress a former President (for chissake) or current Serving Defense Minister, not a single crease appears on any forehead.
16. Where Kafka would have struggled to understand and describe the society, state and scenario.
17. Where every sensible, sensitive and knowledgeable person cannot occasionally escape doubts about his own sanity.
"Waakai Seleucus, kitna vichitra hai ye desh, aur kitne vichitra hai is desh ke log"
Truly Seleucus, how strange is this country, and how strange are its people.
- Alexander on his arrival to India (according to legend)
