Santhosh's ramblings

A man, who had a safe and secure, culturally acclaimed government job, who threw this away at his middle age, not knowing what the future will hold. Joining a small mission organization, with no surety of the future, but a great vision and compassionate heart . A step in faith because of a heart and a vision he had. His heart was for – the then, most marginalized and rejected people of his and neighbouring states, who were dying of an incurable illness, rejected because of their behaviour, marginalized because of their illness, the Injecting drug users in Manipur and neighbouring states. His vision – a kingdom, where such rejection and pain will not be there, where the most marginalized can find comfort and care, a nation which will be free from such stigmatizing illness, and context where people in the margins can find unconditional acceptance which can lead to potential life transformation. Compassion, passion and vision together with a big picture vision on one hand bu...

The last few months, we have been bombarded with many discussions in print, and visual media on a series of issues that are affecting our nation. If you are like me, detached physically from all these but engaged mentally and emotionally, one gets caught in the visible and the audible – what is seen and heard. The voices are loud, the writings are prolific, the visual images are powerful and one allows himself or herself to be caught in the “profoundness” of these media circuses! And lose ability to “look beyond what you see”, or “listen beyond what you hear”.  But it is important at times to fast from these loud and impacting media cacophony, to reflect and ask, what is beyond the visible and audible. Nationalism is one such discussion. The words “Nationalism” and “Patriotism” and other similar words have been dissected so much that one is not any more sure who a Nationalist or Patriot is. Each power group decides on the definition which suits them and then label the rest as ...