Month: October 2024

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Nobel Tolls for Me

“This is an abomination! The whole thing is rigged! It’s a disgrace!”

I am really thankful to God that my wife’s vocabulary of swear words is limited. ‘An abomination’ is the most vile word that she uses, and that too when she is incensed beyond limits. I kept quiet, hoping she would cool down soon. But I was wrong. For another hour, she kept muttering oaths and cuss words stranger than any thought of in my philosophy.

Most families have annual rituals. Rituals like playing cards on Diwali or getting the whole brood to gather at Christmas or the annual staycation in some five-star hotel because frequent flyer points are about to lapse. Stuff like that. Well, my wife and I are different. Not for us these mundane rituals. Instead, we observe the annual Lamentation of the Nobel Not Awarded To Me Day. This is preceded by a week-long vigil before the television, throughout which my wife makes me sit by her side with fingers crossed till the Nobel Prize for Peace is announced. Sad to say, year after year, I do not get the prize.

Things reached a critical point last year, when once again my name was not announced. My dear wife was more indignant than usual, so besides damning the whole thing as rigged, she demanded to know, “Why haven’t they given it to you? Isn’t it a joke that Arafat, Shimon Peres and Rabin were jointly awarded the Prize in 1994 for efforts to create peace in the Middle East? Look at Obama? Look at Jimmy Carter? What did they do? They even gave it to that chit of a girl, Malala something. And for what? Just yakking! They gave the prize to a useless and toothless organisation like the UN? Then why not you?”

I could see the logic in her arguments. If they all can get it, why can’t I? Nonetheless, I consoled her. “Darling,” I said, “For someone to get the prize, his name needs to be nominated first. Maybe no one sent in my nomination.”

“I did,” said the wife with a sob. “I send your nomination every year.”

She was so heartbroken that I suggested that we could try alternate methods.

“Alternate methods? Like what?” she looked at me hopefully.

“Well, I am not proud about it, but I do know a couple of ‘bhai’ type goons. You could use their services, you know, but nothing drastic. Maybe just rough up some of those people who decide such matters? Or you could bribe a few of them. You remember that guy, Pole Vault or Wall Pole something, who declared that every man has his price? How much would a Norwegian parliamentarian demand? Why don’t we buy a few of them in Norway, the way we do in India?”

But my wife would have none of it. She believes I deserve the Nobel Peace Prize in my own right. She has never explained why she has this firm belief, and I too had never questioned her—I had always assumed that this was yet another way in which she expressed her love for me.

Then, some days back, they announced the award for 2024. “This joker, Nihon Hidankyo, has been given the Peace Prize!” she screeched!

“Do you know who he is?” I asked, quite puzzled.

“No, I don’t. And I don’t care. I am sure it must be a typo. Instead of your name, some careless jack-in-office has typed the name Nihon whatever,” she declared.

Ever since the announcement of Hidankyo’s name, my wife and I have been waiting to be informed that there had been an error. But there is still no confirmation that it is actually I who has been conferred the award. Regretfully, I have to now accept the possibility that there has been no error. Only a mistake—they selected the wrong candidate. Once again.

Seeing how miserable the old girl has been these past few days, I mustered the courage yesterday to ask her why she is so convinced about my suitability for the award and why she waits with bated breath every year, only to be disappointed once more. I said, “Why do you keep insisting that I should get the Nobel Peace Prize? Why not the chemistry Nobel or the physics Nobel? Or even the economics prize?”

“You stupid man, don’t you know? For getting the Nobel for medicine or chemistry, etcetera, you actually need to have done something. The clowns who win those prizes might not be the best in their field, but at least they have accomplished something. It is only the Peace Prize that is given to non-performers and non-achievers. People like you! It is not given for actually doing anything, silly! It is awarded only for talking. And you are a great at that. Talk, talk, talk, talk. If you don’t deserve it, who does?”

Her logic is impeccable. Now, even I am hopeful! Let us see if next year the Norwegian Nobel Committee has the good sense to recognise true peace-making talent.

(The Week)

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Uncle Ji at the Barber’s 

“Isn’t that so Uncle Ji?”

I must have been meditating because I did not hear the question. I had been vaguely aware of the passionate exchanges between my barber, his assistant who was shaving another customer in the adjacent seat, and some companion of theirs who was seated where I could not see him. In fact, after sitting down for a haircut, I had tuned out completely from their meaningless chatter.

The barber repeated with greater vehemence, “Isn’t that so Uncle Ji?

I did not dare nod, because he was holding his scissors close to my head and I was not keen on being poked in the eye or ear with those. So I grunted – a neutral kind of grunt which could be construed to be a borderline ‘yes’ or a borderline ‘no’, depending on which side of the argument one was on.

That seemed to satisfy him for the nonce, but a short while later, he again sought validation, “Isn’t that so Uncle Ji?”

Now I am a fairly tolerant sort of blighter but I sincerely believe that for the twenty minutes for which one pays a handsome amount to receive the services of their barber, one is in a state of grace. One expects to remain undisturbed in order to be in communion with their Maker, or agnostic equivalent. It is in poor taste for any barber to keep derailing the train of thought of his patron. And it is indeed an abomination for the said barber to keep goading the said patron to answer asinine questions on pain of being poked in the eye or ear with the business end of his scissors.

When the barber asked for my endorsement yet again, I had been deliberating on matters of great import.  Matters like whether the ladies’ salons too were afflicted with the problem of pointless arguments. Did the lady hairdressers argue as passionately about profoundly stupid matters and then seek the approval of their elderly patrons?  And did they have the impertinence to address their ageing patrons as Aunty Ji? I was certain that this could not be the case, especially when the salons advertised that their mud packs and other mysterious ministrations would make ‘didi’ look ten years younger. On the contrary, here the barber, his assistant, and their disembodied companion were all revelling in calling me ‘Uncle Ji’. I sighed. One has to indeed pay a disproportionately high price for being a man!

The barber’s rude insistence forced me to divert my thoughts to the discussions of the plebeians. Very reluctantly, I started paying attention to their animated conversation. The disembodied voice at the back suddenly became aggressive, but I did not dare turn to see the speaker – again for fear of getting poked by the barber’s scissors.

“Uncle JI would know best! Don’t you agree Uncle Ji that the young are a generation of sissies? Your generation ate real desi ghee. We never got to eat desi ghee. Even our butter is full of chemicals!”

“Yes!” lamented the barber’s assistant, “We eat only pesticides, while your generation ate real food and real ghee, Uncle Ji!”

I did not know whether to apologise or claim superiority on this account. I decided it was best to maintain a lofty silence. But like an ill-tempered Rottweiler, the barber was not willing to let go of the issue. With great authority he announced, “Ask any really old man and he will tell you how good desi ghee is. Look at Uncle Ji. He is simply bursting with good health. You eat a lot of ghee, isn’t that so, Uncle JI?”

So I was not only being dragged into an asinine discussion, I was also being made an exhibit for the prosecution. “Uncle Ji, you must be at least sixty? Am I right?”

I grunted a reply, hoping that he would let the matter go. But the Rottweiler was not to be denied. “So how old are you?” he persisted. 

Confronted directly in this manner, I had no option but to confess. “I am seventy-five.”

“See! See!” chortled the barber. “Uncle Ji is seventy-five! See the result of eating desi ghee? See how healthy he is? And how luxuriant is his hair? Desi ghee is indeed a miracle food. Isn’t that so Uncle Ji?” 

I thought the virtues of desi ghee were being overplayed, so I kept quiet. But he persisted. “So, what do you say, Uncle Ji? Isn’t desi ghee a miracle food?” 

I hummed and hawed for a while but then I realised I could no longer hope to respond with a few grunts. So I said gruffly, “Don’t you think you have left the hair at the back a bit long?” 

The barber was immediately contrite and thereafter kept silent for a full five minutes; till he finished cutting my hair. He brushed off my neck and face and removed the sheet from my shoulders. He accepted the money that I handed to him. Then just as I was about to leave, he once again asked, “Don’t you think desi ghee is a miracle food, Uncle Ji?”

I gave him a wan smile and stepped out of the salon. I just did not have the heart to tell him that, on the orders of my cardiologist, I have not had even a spoonful of desi ghee for more than thirty years.  

(The Week – August 18, 2024) 

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The Milletization of India Must Stop

My wife is not gullible; not gullible at all. But propaganda always affects her decision-making. Ever since I can remember, she has made me and others around her go along with her choices. We changed soaps from Cinthol to Medimix to Santoor – solely because one jingle sounded nicer to her than the other. I had to switch from Rupa to VIP to Jockey or nothing, depending on which film actor was endorsing which underwear. Unfortunately, the same applies to our gastronomic choices. It is the hype that makes the lady of the house decide which foods we shall eat. Consequently, at different times, we have consumed vast quantities of quinoa or chia or sunflower seeds or cinnamon sticks. My muted complaints against fennel pancakes went unheeded, as did my protests against tofu-a-la-king. But they were all transitory fads that soon blew over, like some tropical storm or a midsummer’s nightmare.

I had got used to these passing whims and mastered the art of battening down for the brief periods that the craze lasted. Soon enough, the little woman would tire of the novelty and we would be back to wheat and rice and other familiar fare. Sometimes, even when she did not want to, the trend would change because some high priestess of food fashion would decree that chicken fat or carrot leaves were passe and the ‘in’ thing now was pork from Pindari or the sepals of Salvia from Supaul. I suffered through every passing fancy, but none lasted long enough to permanently scar either my psyche or my appetite.

Unfortunately, this stupid millet business started last year and even the FAO jumped on the bandwagon. This craze has now been going on for far too long and I miss my wheat flour, the maida, the dalia and the sooji. In the first flush of hyperbole, the missus adopted the millet route and we started quaffing the horrible stuff by the ton. I had never imagined that millets could come in such variety, but the missus became chummy with them all, and in their various avatars too – as grain, in semi-broken form and even as flour. She also learnt how to dish out the stuff in camouflage, in the form of noodles, pasta and crepes. She insisted that millets were good for her eyesight and for my sciatica. She insisted that every millet dish was yummy! But she never fooled me – because while declaring a dish to be yummy, she had the same crafty expression that she has when she feeds our dog his deworming medicine.

Over the past year, my wife and I had several showdowns over kodo and ragi and jowar. Ultimately, out of sheer fatigue, she promised not to buy any more millets. But fate keeps finding strange ways of getting around this promise and millets keep sneaking into our kitchen. And once the millet – any millet and in any form – has come in, my wife refuses to throw it out. She believes there should be no waste of any grain – no matter how coarse or uncouth it might be.

First, it was an old friend of mine from Patna who sent us two kilos of ‘madua’ without any provocation. Just a few years ago, madua was not even considered worth eating. It was the grain of the truly unfortunate – people so far below the poverty line that they were not even aware that such a line existed. Just when we managed to finish the stock from Bihar, my former office colleagues held a birthday bash for me. I was surprised to find that millets can be used for making not only dosas and idlis, but also dhokla and kachoris. Ugh! When I was leaving, a beribboned packet was placed in my car. I thanked my friends for the party and the birthday gift, which I presumed was a nice single malt or at least a fine selection of Swiss chocolates. But no! When I unwrapped the gift at home, I discovered that some twisted minds had deemed it appropriate to give bajra atta to a retired colleague on his birthday! Four packets of that vile stuff!

So the little woman and I ate bajra rotis for I don’t know how many days. Just as there appeared to be some light at the end of the tunnel, fate struck another blow, and in a totally unexpected manner. My wife, who enjoys her game of tambola in the ladies’ club but has never even gotten a loser’s prize, won a full house! And the prize was ten kilograms of assorted millets!

We had barely started consuming that stock when, last week, our daughter’s in-laws – who otherwise are perfectly normal people – sent us a hamper of finger, foxtail, barnyard and other weirdly named millets as an anniversary gift. I begged my wife to throw the stuff away or simply give it all to the maid. But she refused. “You know how talkative the maid is, don’t you? What will our sambandhis think when they visit us next and Phoolwanti waxes eloquent about the tasty millets sent by them?”

So whether it is by accident or design, we continue to be neck deep in millets and I for one am fed up, literally. I think it is time people woke up to the fact that millets are passe and beyond their ‘best by’ date. Even the FAO has declared that the International Year of the Millet has ended. Wake up, my countrymen! Salvation for all of us lies only in the total demilletisation of India.

(THE WEEK 13/07/2024)

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Nicking Napkins and Black Magic

Had Phulwanti, our maid, not taken leave, I would never have known that I am a kleptomaniac! Yes, I do look so innocent, but kleptomaniacs don’t necessarily have to look like thugs, do they? The shameful discovery that I am a klepto came about with events that started on Monday morning. When the missus opened my wardrobe, she saw three square pieces of black cloth lurking among the handkerchiefs. She let out a scream and dropped the two shirts she was about to place inside. I rushed from the study and found her standing transfixed, mutely pointing to the evil black patches.

“Where did these come from?” she asked in a frightened whisper. I looked at the black pieces of cloth. Each measured about four inches by four inches, with a neatly stitched border. They looked quite harmless to me, but the little woman was alarmed. “Where did these come from?” she repeated. I did not have the foggiest and said so. The missus feared that some voodoo skulduggery was afoot—an effort by my enemies to put a hex on me. I proudly declared that I had no enemies, but that cut no ice. She grabbed the three bits of black and warned me not to move. She then did some mumbo-jumbo around my head with a worn-out slipper and a broom. I ridiculed her belief in all this evil eye stuff, but she said, “Shush”, and I had to shush.

In the afternoon, she called a pandit to perform something called a maha mrityunjay jaap and also a shaman to do more jhaad phoonk. I was astonished when I heard what they would charge for their services, but the little woman had made up her mind. “We can’t be too careful in such matters, can we? Is money more important than our wellbeing?”

The pandit soon started his chanting and the witchdoctor made elaborate preparations. “Do you have a chicken that I could slaughter?” he asked. That charlatan claimed that sprinkling the blood of a freshly slaughtered chicken around the house acted like a wide spectrum antibiotic against evil. Now my wife is a Gandhian, a pacifist and a true believer in nonviolence (except of course when it comes to lizards). But so great is her dread of black magic that she almost acquiesced to the bizarre proposal. I, however, stubbornly opposed the idea till the rogue conceded that sacrificing a pumpkin instead was just as effective.

“But you know, it somehow lacks the drama; the colour; the theatre quotient!” he said lamely.

Had my wife not been so terrified of those pieces of black cloth, I would have shown that rascal what real drama and theatre quotient could be. I would have proved that the blood dripping from the nose of a crook was equally effective in checkmating the occult.

The whole night, the two exorcists continued their exertions to rid my wardrobe of evil spirits and any ghoulish spillover to the shoe rack. While the pandit mumbled complicated mantras, the jhaad phoonk guy danced around a large pumpkin cut into two. He burnt foul-smelling resins and merrily scattered cow dung in every room.

On Tuesday morning, Phulwanti walked in, all sweetness and light. In her Bengali accented Hindi, she demanded to know why the two ‘adbhut manush’ were spreading dirt in ‘her’ clean house. My wife explained excitedly that she had unmasked the sinister plans of my enemies just in time and stymied all conspiracies with the jaap and mumbo jumbo. As proof positive, she held up exhibit numbers one, two and three—the three black serviettes.

“But sahib only brought these,” declared Phulwanti. “They were in sahib’s trouser pockets, so I washed and ironed them along with the other clothes and put them in his wardrobe.”

That surprised the little woman, and I was stumped. Then I remembered! On Saturday, my wife and I had attended the gala opening of a new avant-garde restaurant. Black was the theme of the reception, with the walls, curtains and even the furniture being painted black. The tapas were served on black platters, with those small black serviettes.

“I must have inadvertently put those in my pocket,” I said.

Phulwanti chimed in, “Yes sahib, and not for the first time. Whenever you attend a party, the next day I find a napkin or two in the pockets of your trousers when I put them in the wash. After ironing, I always put such napkins in the linen drawer. These black serviettes were small, and they fitted better with your kerchiefs.”

An unfortunate fallout of this sordid affair has been my wife’s declaration that henceforth she will make me empty my pockets before we leave for home after any party. She has also had to promise a handsome bonus to Phulwanti at Diwali for keeping quiet about my being a klepto—a klepto who filches napkins at parties.

(THE WEEK 29/09/24)

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Vindictive Technology

There was a time when it was not too difficult to gain admission to one of the five IITs in the country. One needed only a modicum of intelligence to be selected, with no need for extra classes, or coaching and certainly no swotting in any Kotah factory. There were some who, after being invited to enter the hallowed precincts of an IIT, contemptuously declined. I was one of them. With supreme stupidity, I had declared that there was no future in technology. Alas! I had no premonition of how much technology there was to be in my future!

Instead of maligning women, Shakespeare should have declared, ‘Hell hath no fury like technology scorned!’ I have discovered the hard way how vengeful technology can be. It has been striking back in a variety of ways over the years even though, quite naively, I had hoped that its wrath would mellow with age. But no, it has continued to exact revenge.

My wife and I live in a multi-storeyed building where technology keeps tormenting us. We are held hostage by the myriad apps that are an intrinsic part of condominium living. Would you believe, we frequently get locked out of our apartment because that villainous electronic lock pretends to malfunction? That wicked smoke detector scares us by going off without any provocation, sometimes in the middle of the night. The electricity gets disconnected on its own. Our maid is randomly refused entry into the complex. And once, we were trapped by the malicious lift! For all of ten diabolical minutes!

When earlier this month, my wife went to our daughter’s place for a couple of weeks, technology saw it as an opportunity to drive a wedge between us. I had not been aware, but technology keeps me under surveillance! I discovered this only because some sneaky apps kept sending alerts to my wife’s phone each time I left our housing complex. And she telephoned each time, “Where are you going? It is well past dinner time! Surely not to that no-good Gopu’s place?”

The nefarious plot to make us quarrel included communicating the names of all the visitors to my wife’s phone. The presswala, the newspaperman and the courier were meticulously listed. Every pizza, every kebab, each and every calorie was counted and reported to the missus.

Now you must understand that my wife and I are no longer at the coochie coochie honeymoon phase of our marriage. In fact, we are at that stage when most questions are prefaced with, ‘Where the hell?’ or ‘What the hell?’  Even then, I was surprised when my wife cut short her visit and returned home early this morning.

“Who the hell is Heerabai?” she fumed.

I got jolted to total wakefulness from my sleepy state. Heerabai? I had no idea. No idea whatsoever.

“She visited you last night at ten!”

“Oh, that was Heera Bhai, the Blinkit delivery guy. I had ordered bread and eggs,” I said and showed her my phone payment app. “See! I paid Rs 150.”

My wife gave me a withering look. “This … this Heerabai charges Rs 150! How low can you sink?”

The implied accusation was so preposterous that it deserved a really absurd response. “See?” I said. “I never splurge money. Always scrimping and saving! That’s me!”

My wife did not find my attempt at humour at all amusing.  So I repeated, “Darling, Heera Bhai is a man.”

But she didn’t believe me.

This incident has shattered me. I surrender. I give up! I just can’t afford to upset the missus! Can someone please help me tender an unconditional apology to technology for holding it in contempt 60 years ago? 

(THE WEEK _ 5/8/24)

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Have You Kept Track?

Now that the annual bloodletting is over and done with, and Caesar has extracted what was his due – and then a wee bit more – I can get back to worrying about my finances and sanity. While my perennially anaemic finances pose no problem, I frequently lose my temper because of the threatening messages that I receive, especially around the time of filing my income tax return.

The initial irritation is caused by the innumerable reminders to file the return. They come as warnings through different channels – email, WhatsApp and SMS. They threaten to heap unspeakable ignominies on me if I do not file the return, but then they end in the whimper that the threat can be ignored if I have already made the mandatory genuflections. Each such message causes a twinge of regret – obviously, those income tax blighters have not been keeping track of my tax declaration. Ergo, they have also not kept track of the tax paid by me. Am I a sucker for having paid it in the first place? 

Fellow income tax sufferers can well anticipate my next peeve – to wit, the flurry of threats to verify the return in one of six suggested ways, or else! But to please ignore the threat if already done. The hordes of income tax officials who chase me for piddling sums of a few hundred rupees can’t even keep track of the verification executed by me in all six suggested ways? Oh what a fool I have been! I could have indeed gotten away scot free without paying any tax!

The minions of the Finance Minister are not the only ones sleeping on their jobs. Others too needlessly annoy, with my bank being the most consistent offender. Those somnambulist bank clerks repeatedly order me to file Know Your Client, or KYC, information at random and without warning. They threaten to freeze my account – unless I have already provided the information, in which case I can safely ignore their threats! I am convinced that my bank is a Know-all Yet Clueless entity. I ask myself, “Should such a KYC entity, that is incapable of keeping track of even my KYC documents, be trusted with my hard earned money?”

The telephone company, the insurance wallahs, the piped gas people – all blithely keep demanding money from me.They threaten me with unnamed fears if I do not pay and then, anticlimactically, tell me to ignore the dire warnings if I have already paid. Clearly, they lack the ability to keep track of my payments and again I feel foolish because I have paid the bills when I could have gotten away without paying a penny. A good friend of mine suggested that I should exact revenge by sending a cheque, with a note telling them to encash the cheque only if the bill remains unpaid. He argued that this would force them to check their records. For some reason, this seemed quite imbecilic, even to an intellect as inferior as mine.

I am sure at some time in the future I won’t be able to remember what I ate for breakfast or even whether my fly is zipped up. In that condition, I will certainly not be able to recall whether I have paid the banks, the insurance companies, the telephone service providers and sundry others. Unfortunately, they have all amply demonstrated that even today they are not capable of remembering anything. Will the world then come to a grinding halt? And if not, what are all these threatening messages for?  

Please ignore if this has been published earlier and you have already read it. 

THE WEEK – 15/09/2024

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For God’s Sake, Do Something!

“Plip! …. Plip! ….Plip!”

“Do Something! For God’s sake, do something!” she wailed.   

Tired as I was after a hard day’s effort in the rough and sand traps, I wanted nothing more than to go to sleep. So I ignored her.

“Are you even listening?” she asked. 

I ignored her again. But it is difficult to keep ignoring the little woman if she pokes you in the ribs – hard!

“What is it now?” I said irritably.

“Can’t you hear the water dripping? We must do something about it.”

Has anyone ever collected data on the number of instances when a wife wants to do something about something while the husband wants to do nothing about anything?  This is certainly a fascinating field of research just waiting to be explored, though I suspect that the frequency distribution would be predictably skewed. 

“Could it be the neighbour’s tap? It isn’t really making much noise, is it?” I asked. Everyone knows that the first step in problem solving is to blame others and/or downplay the problem.  

She glared at me. I meekly asked, “So how do you expect me to fix it?” 

“Well, you could call a plumber!”

“In the middle of the night?” I asked incredulously. Effective problem solving requires highlighting the difficulties in solving the problem. 

“Call the blighter in the morning then, but for God’s sake do something about that noise! Now!”  

Even as I reluctantly got out of bed, I asked, “Darling, are you sure you want me to do something? I might slip on the wet floor in the bathroom.” In management jargon, this is called ‘Amplified Anticipated Adverse Consequences’. If one can raise the spectre of greater problems arising from solving a smaller problem, then a solution to the smaller problem need not be found.

I was going to wax eloquent on the complications due to broken hips but she snapped, “Will you fix it or what?”

I shuffled off to the bathroom, just so the missus would stop grumbling. I pushed a bucket under the tap and adjusted its position so that the dripping water fell on its sloping side.  

“There! I have fixed it!” I said loudly from the bathroom. More important than actually solving a problem is to claim that you have done something about it.  

I returned to bed. There was peace! Absolute peace! And so to sleep – perchance to dream. But soon the little woman poked me in the ribs again.  

“The damn thing is dripping again!” she complained. This time, I could hear it too. With the bucket now half full of water, every drop was splashing with a louder ‘plop’ than the muted ‘plips’ of the bucketless circumstances.   

Plip! ….Plop! ….Plop! ….Plip! Plop! …. Plip!!

So off to the bathroom I went again. I turned the bucket upside down and this time adjusted its position so that the water dripped on the sloping outer surface.   

“I have fixed it!” I announced loudly for the benefit of the wife and the world in general.   

I prayed that there would be no further excitement that night. It is well known that if a problem can’t be solved, one should pray. 

Peace prevailed once more. The little woman and I slept, even though the muted ‘plip-plop’ became a part of the dream that I quietly slipped into. By morning, the drip had miraculously stopped by itself. Maybe my prayers had worked. Or maybe the ‘plip-plop’ was not audible above the morning noises. Or it could be because of the El Nino. Or climate change. Or something. Whatever might have been the reason, I thanked the Almighty.  

The night-long exertions proved that my problem-solving methods are flawless.  I am convinced that the UNO, NATO, the BIMSTEC and even the SCO have all studied my technique and copied it. All governments follow it, because it is as easy as 1,2, and 3. To recap: As the first step, don’t acknowledge the problem. Then downplay it or blame someone else. Next, announce it can’t be solved. Follow up by declaring that solving it will create other greater problems. Then claim that the problem has been solved.  Keep temporising till it goes away. And all the while, pray and pray that the problem will solve itself. Simple!

I suspect many management gurus would be sceptical about the universal applicability of my technique. These doubting Thomases need wait for just a few days, as another winter of our discomfort draws near.  Delhiwalas refer to it as the season of mists and shallow breathlessness, because stubble burning and temperature inversion make the national capital region into a gas chamber every winter. People shall clamour for the government to ‘do something’ this year too. Executive, legislative, and even judicial initiatives will be suggested. There will be much breast beating and apportioning of blame. Just wait and see – my methods of managing problems will be meticulously observed, step by step, till the problem will be finally solved through divine intervention in January, when strong westerly disturbances will blow the smog away! 

(THE WEEK 13/10/24)