Insane or Inane'

For how many times it has so happened, that I have no ideas and this is the worst phase, but than suddenly I see something and I decide to voice out, today, like all other times, it so happened. I was having my dinner, nothing special about it until the guy switched on to ‘Indian Idol’, this particular episode was staged in Lucknow. I have a special affinity for Lucknow and its people, this is because I have spent three glorious years of my life there.

After living in a city, from where you have done your college it is bound that you will know more about the city than the subjects you were taught and so has been the case with me. I will not say that I am quite familiar with every nook and corner of the city, but yes I have a fair view of the city and the people, not digressing from the main topic, I saw how the crowd in Lucknow swayed for those three good men, who sang songs, which are already well sung by others. I have nothing against them or the channel but I was anguished how westernized the people of my city has gone, I don’t know whether that mass which I saw on the show truly represent Lucknow, I hate to believe or admit that. Girls were swaying their arms and screaming out their lungs as if riding a wave of orgasm, boys waving frantically like if this is the only night, even some aunties and uncles were seen in these, if I may call obscene posture, joining this bandwagon of insanity, as if breaking their monotonous life cycle.

I don’t know, whether they all were just aping what they see in television or it was something coming from inside, I know my Lucknowallas real well, they brag a lot, they may be boisterous, they may spit pan and talk of politics all the time but they are not what it was shown on television, this picture repulsed me. I am used to all of that but not this. I don’t want Lucknow to become Mumbai, Pune or Bangalore just like, in spite of so called bureaucracy in Delhi, I love it.
The question that made me sits up and write is, why all of our cities are loosing their identities, if this is globalization I don’t want it.
I want Lucknow to remain Lucknow, where at a tea stall I can still hear the mixture of various eastern accent, people calling me Bhaiyya and everything so disarranged yet calm and serene. Lucknow where maxi cabs with yellow, green and blue stripes run, Lucknow where there is a bar shop next to KD Babu Singh stadium, Lucknow where Hazratganj was the epitome of urbanization, Lucknow where Tunde kebabs are still famous, Lucknow where from Aliganj to Kapurthala I walked, innumerable times just for tea and a net cafe, Lucknow where my youth rest in peace.

I am having a bad time at the Zoo, they are trying to teach me that which I don’t want to be taught about. The other inmates of zoo are performing real good, partly because of their background and mostly because they are putting in their best, even I am trying to put up a fight but than I already know the result so, I have pasted a silent smile on my lips, a smile which is sarcastic, a smile that doesn’t allow anyone to breach my privacy. There is a lot which can be said about my days at zoo, but I am restraining myself, why I don’t know, the tag of Unsuccessfulness’ is hard to be removed, especially when your soul has already submitted to the fact but than I am game, coz I am enjoying this.


Now since I have vented my anger, again I have lost my thoughts, I don’t know for how long this slumber will continue, am I Insane or just Inane or is there a difference between the two, who knows….

“Girte hain shah-sawar hi, Maidan-e-zang mein; Wo tifl kya girega, Jo ghutnon ke bal chale”