Idhar Udhar Ki Baat

“ Bachao! Bachao!” came a shrill shout for help from the far end of the park. Some stray dogs were barking. Something was clearly going wrong. I sprinted. As I reached closer, I saw a tall man — mid-forties, dressed in a nice track suit, running away from a bunch of stray dogs. He tripped, stumbled, and crash-landed. The dogs weren’t biting, just circling him and barking from a distance. I made one fake stone-picking move and the dogs backed off. The man was still shaking and mumbling prayers. I made him drink water from the water bottle he was clutching. I said, “you could have hurled that bottle at those dogs.” He feebly answered, “I got scared.” I could see the dogs didn’t look ferocious. Mischievous at best. You see, dogs are smart. They sniff fear. If you panic, they chase. And then, I remembered my days of ‘dog trauma’. There was a street terrorist (dog) in my colony — Ladoo. It was anything but sweet. Every day I’d cross its gate like I was in a minefield. If the door was open, ...

"We assess a criminal's reach or strength and then take action against him. Fauji blindly gets into a situation. In fact, you people have a habit of dealing with situations from a position of weakness ," said the DSP when I was coaxing him to book the over ground workers under Public Safety Act. "We have been helping you all through. We have been including your name in the sitreps for successful operations and you insult us by saying that we deal from a position of weaknes s," I said angrily.  "I am sorry to say it, so bluntly. I feel bad for your predicament because my three brothers are serving in the army and one of them is an officer." "That doesn't explain position of weakness ," I said firmly.  "Well, firstly you are including my name in the sitrep because you fear that I may spoil something. And look at the way you get treated by some civilians because you deal with them from a position of weakness," said the DS...

“I don’t think they should have arrested all those Youtuber spies,” I remarked, seated on a park bench surrounded by fellow veterans. An older veteran turned to me sharply. “What nonsense are you talking about? You’ll be branded anti-national.” “I agree, sir,” I replied. “On the surface, my statement sounds foolish. But I believe we lost a strategic opportunity.” The group chuckled. “What opportunity?” they asked in unison. “Emotionally, yes, I’d prefer a death sentence for those who betray the nation. But what will actually happen? A year or two in jail. Maybe even less. We could have used them instead—to feed misinformation to our enemies before busting them. If these Youtubers had been privately confronted, they might have cooperated. Fame is everything to them. The enemy handlers would’ve continued trusting them, not replacing them with fresh spies. Now that they’ve been arrested, new ones will be recruited, and we’ll be starting from scratch. Who knows—we could’ve traced...

  He should be called ‘Sotra’(Sleepyhead) and not Gothra!” That was a well-meaning complaint from an instructor to my wife once. All she could do there was smile. But on the way back you can imagine what I got from the Inglish wali madam . See, sleep and I go way back. Like proper childhood friendship. My mother’s eternal war cry was, “Uth ja, school ki ghanti bajne wali hai! (Get up, the school bell is about to ring.)” I’d still be buried in my rajai, ears twitching—trying to catch the faint sound of chaos from across the nallah where the school stood. The goal? Sleep until the first bell. The method? Supreme laziness. The result? Maa’s chappal. In college, I discovered a new thing, the best quality of sleep is between 4 am and daybreak. Oh, the snooze button! Those ten extra minutes felt like winning the lottery. Occasionally had to miss class as I sometimes lost track of time in that snooze game. Then came the Academy. Sleep became a luxury commodity. Instructors th...