Santhosh's ramblings

This 20 years old young lady came to show herself a few weeks ago. She had a skin lesion on her left hand, which was clearly a pauci-bacillary Hansen’s Disease. (Leprosy). We initiated her on treatment and asked her to be on follow up for 6 months. Yesterday was a busy OPD. In the midst of the crowd, this girl and her mother walked in. I did a quick 30 seconds examination, and told her you can pick up medicines for a month and come back. The mother hesitated, and asked me a question. Does the patient need to come back, or can she (Mother) come and collect medicines every month? I casually replied, no issues, anyone can. Then something in her facial expression caused me to wonder, why is she asking this. I asked, why cannot the patient come. Then the story poured out. She is being send back to her husband’s house and in laws. They do not know that she has this illness. She has been married for more than a year. She started getting this lesion a few months back. And we brought her home ...

The discussion around in the media is all about democracy and dissent. How much dissent is allowable in a democracy and what should the dissent look like. What is acceptable dissent and unacceptable dissent. And if dissent happens, how should the main stream groups, and the governance structures respond. As we were growing up, we were brought up with this principle “ If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. ” A current translation of the same reads like this “Don’t hit back; discover beauty in everyone. If you’ve got it in you, get along with everybody.” The teaching then was “WAAA”….Learn to be WAAA people. People Who Agree to Agree Agreeably. This was reasonably easy in a mono cultural, mono religious traditional family where we were brought up. And one really did not have any other choice. You were expected to agree and keep quiet about it. And not even show much discomfort, even if you felt uncomfortable. And so life went on in the WAAA mode...

There are many kinds of people around us. One kind, who goes along with the flow. Where the current takes them, they move. They follow the current fads and flows. Where the popular opinion is, along with that they move. Where the Nation, the community, tribe, nationalism, economy, pluralism or any of the current “isms” move, they move along. It is an easy ride since the flow has been set by the dominant powers that be, and it is not too tough to flow along. And these people, I am not sure if they are in majority or minority, but are the most visible and respected by the powers. The Media and those voices “that matter”, talk much about them and they move up in the social ladder pretty fast. Because of that, they are in the limelight, whether they are majority or minority, they are the most visible. Then there are those who stand in the shores and watch the flow. A group, who though are silent spectators of the flow, but in total agreement with the flow. The issue with them is that ...