A New Beginning!

In many villages in India, hardworking farmers reap all they have sown and have celebrated and are still celebrating their harvest.! In Tamilnadu, they call it Pongal festival, some call it Sankranthi, some call it Bihu, some call it Lohri, Whatever the name, whatever the customs, the fact is it is a celebration of the bounty that Mother Earth has given us. It is the beginning of a cycle, the renewed vigour of beginning work again, but not before all have partied enough.

It is the new year and we are looking forward to a lot of things, the whole world, looks forward to gaining prosperity, a clear path to what was the good times. Jobs are being done with, Markets crash and the world still needs to find a way to peace, a way in which both terror and war can be eradicated. Be it Mumbai, or be it Gaza , Palestine. Everywhere people are awaiting a new dawn, hope and peace of mind. Even as some celebrate, some suffer, and then vice-versa. Life is a cycle and with Time all pain heals. Nature and Time is the only discovered panacea that we know of.

Having said that, we know for sure that the future is not bleak. Nothing is impossible, It is just a myth awaiting demystification. Like the farmers who toiled on their fields, under the sun, ploughing hard against the ground which had dried up. Rains were always either less or too much. Whatever remained of Mother earth, was as solid as stone and yet they ploughed panting and huffing, both beast and man. There was work to be done and very little time.

Water was needed and more money to get the motor pumps running, the bullocks had to be fed. The manure had to be procured and all the government grants that had been announced when the vote-hungry rulers came to their homes were yet to yield them anything of worth. But still they struggled, sold whatever little jewels they had, took more money from Money lenders and put all they had into that small piece of earth, they owned. They knew they had to work hard, and pray to the lords, for that is all they could do. Evenings were spent massaging their bodies with oil, the pain in their knees and limbs simply unbearable, but they knew that one good night's sleep would be enough. Some, weak at heart took their own lives, some fled to the cities and either begged or merely survived, but some remained.

Then finally the rains came, it poured and poured, for many a blessing, for many a curse, because the rains caused floods, and elsewhere the clouds had passed on. So eventually very few survived, the survival of the fittest and the most blessed. It was these blessed few, who raised the food and livestock for a billion of their brethren. Their struggle is no less severe and no less traumatic than what the world has gone through everywhere, the previous year. Yet they persisted to survive, to nourish and to provide, like Mother Earth herself.


So today when they celebrate in the villages, each one of those farmers know that they have to get ready for their next struggle. All this might sound like out of a Premchand Novel. However it is as close to reality as possible. Let us hope and pray that their struggles becomes easier and lesser, but let us also get inspired as we look up to that thin Indian Farmer as he rejoices this glorious harvest season. Let us believe in the mercy of nature and the ability of time to heal all and rejuvenate.

For us, for our families, for all countrymen, for the world's population at large, let us persist, no matter what. To survive, to nourish and to provide, no matter what the sacrifice.

A Happy and prosperous new year 2009 to All.

I've taken a resolution to try to keep posting in here. For the nth time, now I'll be making a new beginning. That's so cliched! I know.!. I love cliches.