RIFLE RANGE BOY

More than enough people are quick to sneer at India after Vikram's successful soft landing at the Southern Pole of the Moon. On one end, people were quick to say that the whole exercise was a hoax. It is an illusion. Then, others blurted that a country that cannot provide toilets to its citizens and whose population mostly live below the poverty line should not be sending rockets to the Moon (and playing with nuclear bombs). One even threatened to stop monetary 'aid' to India, conveniently forgetting any discussion on repatriation monies after years of looting from India.  Firstly, everyone knows there is no way for everybody to prosper in sync before society moves up one notch higher. Things happen in tandem. There will be people who will have to do catching up, and there will be those who will lose out in the race for prosperity anyway. The only people who believe that the world needs equity are communists. Again and again, it has been proven that human greed surpasses an...

Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa To see Praggnanandhaa, an 18-year-old chess whiz from Tamil Nadu, proudly posing in front of the international press with a big white ash stripe spread across his forehead as a symbol of his faith for a photo shoot reminded me of the numerous times I felt ashamed of wearing vibuthi in public during my childhood.   Coming from a country where my ancestors were bought in as bonded labourers, I did not have many role models to follow, I was ashamed to be an Indian. The fact that many fellow Indians in my neighbourhood were loud and boisterous and had many rows with the laws did not help my perception of the race of my parents. The sing-song undulating tone of my mother tongue was a point of mocking and sneering by many. The behaviour of the few who make it a point to be noticed with their loud colour, unmistakable scents, and high-decibel speeches in buses made me want to disappear.   Mother's eyes say it all! The elaborate display of my religiosity was ...