REFLECTIONS

           My mother suffered with dementia for a long time. It took us few years to fully understand her condition and the disease. It was a daily struggle for all of us as we expected her to behave normally, which was impossible for her. I undertook a short capsule from NIMHANS (National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences), Bangalore (now Bengaluru) on dementia and read books and articles to understand the nature of disease. This changed my perspective and I realized that ignorance of the disease was the cause of our misery. The happenings which went beyond my understanding suddenly started making sense to me. Her conduct which looked so irritating, now, started looking natural, normal and in-fact pleasing and at times amusing. She was behaving exactly the way a dementia patient was expected to behave. The realization that we as care giver were to adapt to her requirement and not vice versa as we were trying to do till than, leading to fre...

       On retirement I gleefully joined all social networking sites which were out of bounds in service. Soon I got flooded with tsunami of comments and posts. I tried to catch some threads but was puzzled by the pattern of discussion. Though it was not new for me as the political debates which I had often heard on TV were being made on the same lines. I grew up hearing about the rich tradition of philosophical thought and debate in ancient Indian philosophy. Gargi Vachaknavi (Delhi University college Gargi is named after her) is believed to be the first female philosopher. She was famous for her intellectual debates with other philosophers. Her philosophical debate with the renowned sage Yagnavalkya about ‘nature of reality’ is documented in the Brhadarankyaka Upanishad.   After a long and intense debate Gargi humbly accepted her defeat in front of the knowledge of the great saint. The unpretentious acceptance of her defeat showed that debate was to genuinely p...

            In a short period of 4 days we crossed across all the five stages of grieving (Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance) as brought out by Dr. Kubler Ross in her ground breaking book ‘On Death and Dying’. The news that our 7 year pet Labrador has turned blind was received with firm denial. My daughter though kept insisting that there was something seriously wrong with Laila as she was disoriented and bumping into walls and furniture. The guy who used to walk her also expressed concern over her inability to navigate her usual route. I looked at Laila and ordered her to come to me. She was slow to react but walked albeit slowly, carefully and uncharacteristically keeping her head low. She was able move around the dining table before stopping in front of me. “See, she can see, it’s just that she is a little unwell and may be feeling low and lethargy” I tried to pacify all. I however remained restless the entire night with an eerie feel...

      The recent movie 'Animal' has invited lot of debate,  criticism  and condemnation for glorifying violence, misogyny, patriarchy and male chauvinism. There has been call for its   ban and boycott. Similar debate surrounded the movie Kabir Singh-  " Do Indian films encourage stalking, molesting, violence and other improper behavior towards women?" While we debated the movies ran full house. This issue was debated too in Australia and it was well settled by an Australian judge in 2015. An Indian student Sandesh Baliga in Australia was charged for stalking two women. He had been stalking them for a long time and ignored all their calls for leaving them alone till they had no option but to approach the police. When confronted for the charges he pleaded guilty but blamed Bollywood for misguiding him into believing that women eventually fall in love if pursued/chased enough. He also stated that he learnt the art of stalking from Shah Rukh Khan’s ch...

Refer news item in The Hindu, “Supreme Court questions quality of education in UP” on 26 th Sep’23 regarding the incident in a Muzaffarnagar school where a teacher was shown, in a video, hurling communal remarks on the 7-year-old Muslim student and goading his class mates to thrash him. The Judge hearing the case, raised questions about religious discrimination and quality of education in Uttar Pradesh. He asked, “If a teacher tells her students to hit another because he belongs to a certain community, what is the quality of sensitivity of the education being given?” The news item reminded me of another judgement on our education system and my own experience when choosing a school for my daughter. The pathetic conditions of the government primary schools in Uttar Pradesh had forced the Allahabad High Court judge Mr. Sudhir Agarwal to issue directives (dated 18 Aug 2015) to ensure that children/wards of government officials/servants, those serving in the local bodies, represent...

This article was published in The Tribune  on 18 Jul 2016. The link is below. https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/archive/musings/a-rose-bloomed-in-our-heart-267246 MUSINGS A rose bloomed in our heart A rose bloomed in our heart FINDING a maid was the first task on my agenda on reaching Brazil on a government assignment. An advertisement in a newspaper brought five contestants. BS Yadav FINDING a maid was the first task on my agenda on reaching Brazil on a government assignment. An advertisement in a newspaper brought five contestants. Rose won hands down. She was a middle-aged single mother of two. She never married and was separated from her boyfriend (such ‘friendship’ has legal sanctity, like marriage, and she was receiving a stipend from him). The wage was settled as per labour norms that catered to her security and insurance. Workers have right to two holidays per week, free lunch and an additional one month salary called ‘13th pay’. Working hours are strictly eight hours, with...

              I had often heard people uttering that they would never again keep pets due to the hurt and trauma their demise had caused them. I too felt the same sentiment after the death of our pet lab Kiara, but for entirely different reasons. Few days after her 14 th Birthday Kiara suddenly collapsed during walk and never got up again on her own. She was declared paraplegic by the vet with poor chances of recovery. Unsolicited advices poured in from friends and relatives advising us not to prolong her pain and put her to sleep. She had problems. She could not move her body below neck. Eating was an epic struggle and so was drinking. She moaned, cried and moved her neck painfully when no one was around. But if we were around she seemed to be comfortable. All her whimpering and crying would cease. If we gave her rubs she would close her eyes and slumber as she always used to do. All her pain would magically disappear at our tou...

 This was published in Hindustan Times in 2016.   Spice of life : Maid versus wife, they bring you strife ·        Air Cdr Biren Yadav, HindustanTimes   |    ·        Updated: Feb 02, 2016 11:22 IST   Amma became our full-time help on our posting to this town in far east. My wife, a cleanliness freak, had resisted her employment, as Amma was crude and rustic in both mannerism and turnout. For us, a working couple with two daughters aged 2 and 6, a maid was a necessity and Amma was the lone aspirant. In no time, all premonitions of my wife came true. Amma was egoist, unkempt, short-tempered and hated instructions. Her style of working, my way or no way, challenged the authority of my wife openly. Their mutual dislike soon turned into hostility, leading to frequent brawls. On the other side, Amma was an instant hit with children. They enjoyed each other’s company singing and dancing through...

 This article was published in The Tribune. Posted at: Dec 26 2014 12:41AM From flying to driving   ·          Biren Yadav In youthful exuberance it's not uncommon to transgress the lines of decency while interacting with elders. My such transgression invited full wrath of my father who asked me to raise my level from that of a driver to a gentleman. The comparison was a rude shock to me. This was in spite of the many other unwitting comparisons of me with the drivers which came unabated from my village folks who considered pilots superior to drivers but nevertheless of the same clan. The comparisons were everywhere. Buses and trucks had “Pilot” written on the driver’s seat.  An Army officer once joked that his driver claimed that he should be considered superior to a pilot as he did the same job with the additional difficulty of combating dense traffic and potholes which ...

 This article of mine was published in The Tribune on 26 Feb 2015. That time I was posted to Chandimandir Cantt which is close to Chandigarh. Since that time Chandigarh has started having many marathon running events. The local club of which I was one of the early member has grown big and they organise runs and travel around in groups to participate in running events all over the country.  s Posted at: Feb 26 2015 12:23AM BS Yadav Running: Brazil to Sukhna Lake   For most, Brazil may conjure up images of samba, beaches, beauties and football. But for me it resonates with running, the sport I picked up during my three years stay in Brasilia, the capital of Brazil. Brazilians may be crazy about football but it is the running which is the most visible sport. People of all ages and gender are seen running at all times of the day and night. On all weekends the six-lane main road in the city centre is blocked for the e...