Theres a common phrase ‘a solitary reaper’ and people generally attribute a negative connotation to it. I have always been a bit of a loner.I love quiet places sometimes ,to drift off on dreams ,to conjure up hypothetical situations or just laze around. Its not a real place but keeps you cocooned from it. A warm,safe haven from the rest of this mad barking world.Once in awhile reaping the bliss of solitude is good. I miss the NITK beach. It was a magical place.I come from the city of Marina hence its not the beach that attracts me in Surathkal ,its the stillness of time there. The place is so quiet that every cry of sea gulls and the roaring sound of waves crashing on the shore could be heard almost in synchronization with your heart beat. There would be times when you could just gaze at the vast ocean losing yourself in the enormity of the power of nature. In Marina its hard to do that amidst cacophony of large crowds.
The past few months I have been surrounded by people of all kinds from lab mates to friends to house mates. I have found out what it is to engage in conversation with people from different ages at IISc . Its weird sometimes, sometime fun and sometimes its a forced learning curve but life just takes you along on a juggernaut.
Its that beach I miss, a symbol of eternal passage of time yet an illusion of time standing still…
Archive for musings
Precious moments of solitude
Lectures,Sermons & Musings
The past few days I have been reading Ayn Rand and her lectures and views on various topics.I am not an Ayn Rand fan ,in fact I consider her philosophy and take on most issues a collection of hog wosh.I consider her views insidious and harmful to the functioning of society at large.While her premise of using rationality as a basis is worth admiring and accepting ,her subsequent take on numerous issues such as morality,freedom of speech, Man vs Woman,God vs Man, State vs People are too insular.Her views directly contradicts the Hinduism view of life.Its not that which bothers me ,its an application of pragmatic principles in an ideal manner discounting any medians between the extremities that disconcerts me. the irony in her philosophy is that its probably the only one that brackets the left and the right in the same set.If I have to repudiate Ayn Rand it would take a large amount of time and blogging space,So I leave it to rest here.
I have also listened to considerable amount of sermons on Vaishnavite philosophy the past few days. I realized I have hardly ever read anything related to this.I should have read substantially on it considering I belong to that tradition. It would help explain our views on God,on salvation,on life,on significance of rituals and so on.So if anyone knows any simple book that I can read up on it please do let me know.
The last of the lectures I wanted to blog about is the one I attended at the faculty hall of IISC yesterday.It was a lecture that sought to explain the presence of sensuality in sacred temple art throughout the country.It was a highly interesting and engrossing lecture that had as its basis that presence of erotic art in temples was normal back then and nothing is licentious or bad about it as people saw it as a symbol of fertility. Fertility the lecture sought to tell was the central motif.It was a method of transcending the barrier between the real(physical) and the surreal(divine or spiritual), a celebration of both.
The lecture was delivered by Ms.Vidya Dihijea(I am not sure of the spelling). Anyone interested in this can buy and read her book The body Adorned.
I have a few reservations though. If you were to look at the temples of India (atleast the ones in South) and the Khajuraho temples theres a glaring difference.While all temples have voluptuous dancing girls tanatalizingly poised and copulating pairs on its pillars none of them brazenly celebrate it as the ones built by the Chandela dynasty at Khajuraho.The erotic art there in its scale,intimacy and number out does most other temples.I said South because I have seen only those temples. I have wondered why.Its known that the Chandelas were there during the height of Tantrik following. Tantrik philosophy is different.it speaks of attainment of salvation through sensual pleasure. Obviously as a nation we were not uncomfortable with the idea at all. afterall a substantial part of Hindus,infact most of them are Phallic worshippers.I wish she had explained the phallic worship and the tantrik ideology after all its integral to the theme of the sacred and sensuos.
The lecture was peppered with quotes from ancient Hindu texts on Gods.the example of soundaryalahiri and bhagavad dhyana sopaanam were given to show that detailed physical description and a celebration of it is also a way of acknowledging the spiritual one I think. The thing is these are intended as mere physical descriptions. Both adi shankara and shrimad thoopil vedanta desikar are ecstatic describing the beauty of the blemishless(what Rajaji called korai illadha govindan) God. both the names of sopanam and soundarya lahiri stress on this aspect.There is no hint of anything uncomfortable in those lines even for the devotee who reads them. a better example could have been the description of lord shiva and parvati by kalidasa in his kumarasambhavam.
Interesting lectures are always a welcome change, I was not entirely convinced though.
Stop the communal rhetoric!
Day in and day out you hear the congress party speak of a secular India. They accuse the BJP of being divided on communal lines and falsely believe that they alone represent a bright secular India.Its so tiring and irritating that one wishes that the Congress shuts up and the left speaks sense for a change. The english news channels on their part are so biased against the BJP that they ought to call themselves the Congress media representatives. The influences of the electronic media has been so pronounced that a majority of young educated Indians have considered it a fad to tell that they are anti-BJP because the party has the blood of Godhra in its hands. For heavens sake people take a long look back and move on.
The congress does not in any sense of the word qualify to be called secular.At best its pseudo secular. Anti-Hindu in its projection but at heart its a party that still counts the largest number of upper caste Hindu MPs than any other party.The Congress has been at power for 30 odd years.It has lead to dynasty politics in a modern democracy and definitely should be blamed most for all the politician enforced ills on the country.Lets look back here,Shall we?
1.If BJP is accused of Godhra then Congress of the anti-Sikh riots following Indira’s assassination.Definitely all the people who claim who do not want to live under the PMship of a man who sponsored a state driven progrom against the muslims, you would not consider living under the rule of a party which actively supported the butchering of hundreds of Sikhs in the national capital because its party leader had been assassinated by members belonging to the community.Add to it the fact that Bindranwale had been incubated by Indira and the Golden temple ransacked by her too, you get a very gory picture.Now assuming that somehow the bloodbath of Godhra stinks more than that of the unfortunate sikhs’ of Delhi lets dig up another worm.
2. When the demolition of the Babri Masjid did happen it was Congress at the helm of power.P.V.Narasimha Rao chose to keep mum while that incident happened.He neither tried to curtail the large number of karsevaks who piled up at that site nor did he take any substantial punitive action following the demolition.Infact he did not even curtail the large scale rioting that followed.Now assuming that Godhra is far more significant than the riots and demolition of Babri masjid let’s look at the issue from a different perspective,
3.Congress does not want to hang Afzal Guru convicted of terrorist acts against the nation because he belongs to a minority community, Congress went ahead with the reservation from Arjun Singh and fought for inclusion of creamy layer for votes, Congress did not stop the building of the Sethu because it claimed Rama did not exist in the court before all hell broke loose.It did not even want to consider an alternate route more eco-friendly because, again its fashionable to give those anti-Hindu commends.Congress vehemently opposes uniform civil code.Why? because we all agree manu neeti is degrading to women and the so called lower caste, the concept of 3 wives and talaaq contributes to the up liftment of the nation.Congress does not dare to interfere with the madrasaas for obvious reasons. Congress watched mum when Singur happened, It did not on high moral grounds for the common man put its foot down like it did for the 123 agreement.Congress miserably failed to prevent terrorist attacks in the country, Led to a total catastrophic intelligence.Failed to push Pakistan,control Nepal and curtail SriLanka’s no witness genocide against its civilians.Its also the party which after even repeated warnings let the huge catastrophe of the Bhopal tragedy happen.Going a long way back its also the party that should be blamed to a significant extent along with the British and Jinnah for the post partition riots and much later for the elimination of the Kashmiri Pandits.Ironically Congress is also the party that spoke of compulsory sterilisation of the muslims, supported a presidential candidate who believes in spirits and speaks of a Nazi kind genetic pooling,Its the party that has repeatedly not seen any Indian good enough to be the PM for the past 10 years.Its also the party that gave us our only emergency.May be this does not mount to the atrocity of Godhra. Lets then look at economy shall we?
4.While there has been a global melt down Chidambaram should take a substantial amount of the blame.Waiver of loans, agressive pushing for credit ,American style opening the markets for credit card companies,caste based sanctioning of loans played havoc in the market.I am not even that well versed in economy. You might want to read an article from Gurumurthy in that regard. He of course belongs to the RSS in a sense, the communal monster but then he is also the character potrayed by Madhavan in Guru, that definitely must lend some credibility to the people who believe in all the media hype?
What then makes a party culpable? Only Godhra, explicit communal speeches? being chastised for wearing saffron colors when other communities display their religious identity. If you do argue that Congress’ faults are long gone past then morally you are incorrect in your stance against the BJP for Godhra or Kandhamal.Blood is always blood and the one thats dried more mostly stinks the most and is difficult to wash off.If you do believe that a BJP in power would lead to a state sponsored genocide then a) its humanely impossible due to the sheer numbers on each side it would take to fight b)international pressure would prevent that c) public anger would halt that. When you are confident enough that Congress would not repeat its blunders its unlikely BJP would repeat its biggest blunder till date-Godhra.
Surely it would not be al rite to make sense of a party that believes fielding a PM candidate is a sense of impudence,thats been throwing overtures to jaya and DMK, Maya and SP at the same time, that has come out and said 30% of Philibit is not voting for Varun and thats a big victory for them , as if BJP did not work that arithematic out.
The BJP should realise its biggest strength is that its anti-Congress. It should not be non inclusive,should mend its way and makes sure a Godhra or a Kandhamal never repeats again.
All that aside I am not canvassing for the Congress or the BJP. All that I am saying is that there has been too much of Godhra baiting. I do condemn the Godhra carnage in as vehement a manner as possible. But Godhra should not be Congress’ and that obsolete Left’s panacea for all other shortcomings. Surely looking back and assessing on a scale of political carnage the Congress would inch closer to the red mark by a margin much higher than the BJP’s? Its time we saw that and moved on.
Merry Christmas
Christmas like diwali transcends religions and races.As a kid in school I always enjoyed Xmas celebrations the most.Its easy to understand why.First of all there was this exotic factor to it; because you did not celebrate it at home you thought you did something special.And then there is of course Santa Claus ,the biggest brand ever in my opinion. Santa came and gave us gifts(we knew much later that it was our teacher as santa and our parents had secretly given the gifts to her) and he is a jolly good person to dance with. The funny costume with the wiggling stomach made you feel warm and nice.Lastly there is that huge collection of children’s tales and carols and songs to draw inspiration from. Afterall most stories have the goodness of christmas in them which is perhaps so wonderfully brought to life in Christmas Carol.Then there was the fact that we were taught really good carols like the one below-
You better watch out,
You better not cry,
Better not pout,
I’m telling you why:
Santa Claus is coming to town.
He’s making a list,
And checking it twice;
Gonna find out
Who’s naughty and nice.
Santa Claus is coming to town
He sees you when you’re sleeping.
He knows when you’re awake.
He knows if you’ve been bad or good,
So be good for goodness sake!
Oh, you better watch out!
You better not cry.
Better not pout,
I’m telling you why:
Santa Claus is coming to town.
Santa Claus is coming to town!
Thats one of my favourites.Importantly christmas embodies the spirit of goodness,charity,caring and the mood of gaiety.
When young the celebrations at school were always wonderful with carols and santa and gifts.the play of the three kings was staged every year and it all eneded in a lot of dancing,singing and a riot of color.Since then i have always felt drawn to this festival.Its also that part of the year when i tune into DD to watch the story of Jesus and i have done that almost every year and finally there are those gifts and sweets from friends who celebrate christmas.When its time to sing merry christmas and a happy new year you know its the time for fun filled holidays as a child and till today that spirit hangs on.
Here’s wishing all of you a merry christmas!!!( a bit early but nevertheless)
A celebration of life-Maargazhi maadam
What the vibrant city of Bengalooru does consciously with Bengalooru habba its quiter counterpart Chennai has been doing routinely with maargazhi. Its almost unconscious like some endemic clock that programs a city together during the month of dec-jan every year.i do not know the reason for the significance of the month nor the origin of the customs followed during that period. At a point when I am finding it increasingly difficult to find time to be in Chennai its this month I miss the most.
The thing with maargazhi is that it transcends communities and castes .I lived for 21 years in Nungambakkam .I liked it there; you saw different kinds of people unlike mambalam or triplicane. Even now I find areas such as the latter suffocating because you see people only in one mold always. Anyways now I no longer live in Nungambakkam but somewhere in me I shall always belong there.
You know its maargazhi when ullikayam (garlic) and venkayam(onion) become a strictly enforced taboo. It always is but no one cares .No amount of begging and throwing tantrums would work with your mother. So its also the month I eat out often. You see when something is forbidden its all the more irresistible. Its like when, though you may be an insomniac for days before vaikunta ekadeshi you sleep at nine and eat for three people that day. But apart from no garlic maargazhi is also the month you get up early. When I was younger and more at home it used to be five or six, now it’s a more earthly eight or nine. For a person like me who sleeps at five and gets up at two in holidays(you escape the hot sun that way) such early timings is a sin but its impossible to sleep later than nine even if you wished. For, Maargazhi is the month of the fourth veda of tamil , that of aandal’s thirrupavai. So, every channel and hence every household blares that and in some like mine my mother recites that loud enough to make my sleep uncomfortable and yet not disturb the neighbours. It’s an achievement that none of my friends in college have been able to achieve. She has this strategic point outside my bedroom that lets her disturb my utopia, keep an eye on the kitchen, watch T.V and chat to the aunty outside. When you hear elle illankiliye innam urunkudiyo you give up and get up. That’s the point she knows she will break me and hence takes the high pitch there. Its thirrupavai that’s so integral to this month, so wonderfully framed it’s my greatest regret that I don’t know thirrupavai properly. It is chanted everyday in the morning. You hear it in temples, mutts, households, TV, in the katcheris in the evening or the discourses in the morning it’s all pervading during those few weeks.
Apart from thirrupavai it’s also the month of discourses in the morning. Every sabha, auditorium or even schools has one. But what maargazhi is world famous for is its concerts in the evenings called katcheris. from junior artistes to the best you see all of them. while traditionally a carnatic stronghold you can also get to hear music from around the globe at that time. the crowds flock all the concerts, toursists come to the city and its when daily conversations begin with “inniki sudha enga padraa paaru?” each one has their favourite artiste, the connosieurs devour the chance, critics descend like a plague and newspapers devote sections to musical reviews, aunties debate who is the best this season ,the sarees and jewellery of singers become the latest fashion statement and little children(like I was a long time ago) lose their evening cartoons. Today as a part of SPICMACAY I realize why the movement or concerts fail to excite me as it does to some of my friends, its because when you are a part of maargazhi ,concerts are what the city breathes and you as a part of it fall into the rhythm. A lot of things pale in comparison to that.
Rangolis are another aspect of the month.i no longer see them in my street but when I was 12 or 13 I used to get up and assist(more like disrupt) my mom’s rangoli. You could see a whole lot of kids and aunties doing the same, everyday every house has this huge rangoli in front of them. I was generally given a small one to fill up seperately next to my mother’s. Not a single soul later in the day would appreciate my piece of art. Everyone even your maid will point at the bigger one and seem impervious to the beautiful small one next to it. You see I had my limitations I was given only those shades not needed in the main one and I experimented a bit(like not filling it all inside the white outlines) and apparently it wasn’t that appealing.
Lastly its that time of the year when you get venpongal with ghee everyday. prasadam in each temple out does the other and idlis and vadas and sambar mirror the spirit of the city more then than anytime of the year.
A day in the life of a blogger-con&porn and a bit more.
Yesterday was one of those days when you had a lot to tell but was lazy enough not to do so.Apart from the fact that i came down with a bad cold and sore throat and my laptop is teetering over the edge with a con virus , it was a pretty uneventful day. The virus in my laptop is a porn watcher’s delight. It made me give 2 significant frustrated outbursts.One was about how i dont even watch porn and yet the virus , ppl found that funny. So funny that every person who has so far promised to set my laptop right has laughed at me, my comp or in the case of shiny ended up watching movies on it.This led to the other outburst- more a cry that went ‘ i dont want windows’…you see with Windows its like the ants in the basement story. There are ants all over the place in the room next to yours. yet you believe it wont be your room next.It takes a good few bites to realize and go and get a lakshman rekha.This moral holds ofcourse for the average laptotting ,non-open crazy ,non-geeky,non-Gates basher whose ultimete utilisation of the comp is watching movies,like me.
Then there was this speech in the afternoon organized by SPICMACAY. I dont even remember the guy’s name. He was ok, conservative,praising the media and believing in Utopian ideals .The worst part was that heair gave the sppech in Kannada. Now thats discriminatory in a national institute of technology.
Back in school i used to have this wonderful long discussions on a lot of topics. We fought, badgered but always discussed. It mattered to argue whether reservations are right or not,about dvaita and advaita, open relationships,whats diff btw american girls and indian ones,that Scarlett O Haara was perfectly justifiable or the run of the mill Tamilnadu politics. It did nothing but to increase phone bills, reduce the concentration in class hours and lead to small phases of ‘i wont talk with you’.
It also strengthened bonds of friendship,made you understand people better,helped you to while your time in sanskrit classes and most importantly it molded me into a debator and a pretty successful one at that till i crash landed at NITK.The prob was a large number of ppl i met as a naive first year did not take such discussions in the right sense. They called it giving fundae and still do .The thing with such discussions is that they are meant ultimately to be taken in the right sense,its not about who is better its about what you think. Of course opinions vary for some wierd reason and you need to live by that.
Lastly I read IWoz and realsized that Wozniac belongs to a rare breed of ppl.If its indeed the triumph of the nerds then its the triumph of this guy more than the other for Gates is like a poisonous ivy in your backyard and a shrewd bussisnessman(at some level they mean the same
) and Jobs ofcourse is this rockstar cum politician cum visionary cum streetfighter all rolled into one. My god there is no geekiness in him, he is the larger than life CEO whose charm is at best irresistible.As for Michael Dell,packard and others we will leave it for another day.
P.S: the answer to that question abt the girls is .. mind you i quote,” To an American girl its important that you always have a boyfriend and to an Indian girl its important that you ever had one”. I dont own anypart of that statement its been copyrighted elsewhere.
As for the guys by mutual consent we came to conclude not much of a difference . afterall after a certain drop it does not matter if its left or right.
We incredibly have no choice!
A triumphant Modi definitely spells big time trouble.This would of course mean a resurgent BJP hindutva and possibly a greater role for Modi at the center.That’s not a rosy proposition.Hindutva or not,communal-ism or polarisation politics I am a BJP supporter,simply because I do not see a sensible alternative.Divisive stratagem is cancerous but it also almost unfailingly works especially in a country like India as the British so tactfully knew along all those years of colonialism.For, we carry a heavy baggage from the past and the macabre spectre still haunts us
Its not easy to be forgiving to a sect of people who ravaged across a non transgressing nation,came to occupy it brutally,subjugated its people,used its resources,finally caused its partition and even now mostly vow their allegiance to their religious faith and across the border rather than to their home land.The Muslims have definitely not been kind.It doesn’t help either that every-time there is an act of terrorism we see names from a single religious faith flash across the screens.We have stopped being gracious hosts too.But the only problem here is we are no longer the hosts and they no longer the transgressors.A sizable part of the population is occupied by the Muslims and they are as much a part of this nation as anyother group of people are.To alienate is dangerous and not right.And now of all times is not the right moment to start a blame war.It would be good if people like Modi realise that for they are a part of the problem instead of framing a solution for it.
Does hindutva sell across all sections of the society?Does the modern Indian care enough about it?The answer to the question is partly a yes. And the majority of the blame for this, rests not with the BJP but the Congress.In pursuing a pseudo secular policy, it has managed to alienate successfully vast sections of the society.And then again there is a question of choice.whom do we elect?
The Left: the only party which will possibly never capture power at the centre yet makes a living out of an obsolete political ideology which tells you what not to do but never ,what is it that needs to be done.A lot of digressing noise unfortunately of significant consequence at the centre,today.Its high time some one rapped Karat on his knuckles and told him to shut Buddhadeb first and lick the wounds of Nandigram next, rather than hound the Government.Then ,the Congress. And the most credible thing about it is that India has grown despite this party rather than because of it. That leaves the BJP. Irrespective of whether you like their ideology or not they seem a slightly more sane option than the rest.But the danger of-course is that when an increasingly empowered India starts lapping up men like Modi it will tear the fabric of the society apart and that won’t be a pretty sight at all.
Attraction la fatale.
We are so often used to reading stories and watching movies from the hero’s perspective that we sometimes fail to realise how important the villain is to any decent plot.Villains have unfortunately been stereotyped over the years and have been merely reduced to serve the interests of the superhero.But thankfully he has not been made as monotonous as the hero has managed to devolve into.I have always found these anti-heroes interesting and I am pretty sure most people do. The human nature has always had a surreptitious liking for the dark,the gory and the rebel.Here is a list of the villains I have admired almost always more than the hero himself.
Ravana from the Ramayana:He was learned,well versed in all the shastras,the vedas and is said to have mastered the sixty four arts.He was a brilliant administrator,a brave warrior,a highly disciplined man,a good king and the most powerful man in the three worlds.The epic brilliantly fleshes out his character.Rama struggles to win him and recognises him as a formidable opponent.The only major blemish of Ravana is the abduction of Sita.The aaditya hridayam speaks of Rama seeking the Sun God’s help to win Ravana.Rama has to do penance ,train hard and seek the help of the monkey hordes to defeat him.Sri Lanka under Ravana was said to be better than the Indraloka.He conquers the nine planets and ties Indra up and drags him in the streets of Lanka.contrary to common perception he does not disrupt all the sages.He merely targets Vishvamitra whom he recognises as a kshatriya and not a brahmin,an arrogance stemming from the fact that by birth Ravan was a Brahmin .
Shylock,Merchant of Venice:In many ways one can sympathise with this Jew who was austracised by the society at large.His speech that deals with the emotions of a jew reiterating that they too are humans is one of the most brilliant of Shakespeare.One cannot help but be moved when he asks”Do we not die when you poison us?”Shylock’s argument that he lends money at high interests because he is not allowed by the prejudiced Christian community to do anything else has always seemed more coherent than Antonio’s Christian and Biblical values.I have always believed that Shylock is the hero of Merchant of Venice.
Duryodhana,The Mahabharath:he was again the astute administrator and a better king than Yudhishtira,in some ways.Bhasa’a play Urubhangam and the showering of heavenly flowers when duryodhana dies after the mace battle are a testimony to his greatness.
Nathuram Ghodse:he was not a hindu lunatic or a deranged fanatic as people thought.He had a family to care for and he shot point blank after unsuccessfully trying from a distance.His views for a Hindu state was not unsupported .Anyone who has read the shastras will agree that some of the Gandhian principles are contradictory to the fundamental vedantic phiosophy.If you like ghodse watch Kamal’s Hey Ram or read ‘Yes, My Majesty.’It is believed that his argument in the trial was so convincing that Nehru was forced to order a blackout.
Indira Gandhi:foolish stubbornness.Her nationalist policies and authoritative rule ravaged India.Yet she is the only man that ever sat on the Prime Minister’s chair.Her handling of the 1975 war and her unflinching support for the Soviet under extreme American pressure are worth admiring.
Who stole my basement?
The basement in the GB(i.e the girl’s block) has always been special to different people in different ways.For some its the height of fun,for others its a reminder of their past here and not so nice memories. But for me it has always been a place with the cleanest bathrooms in the block and a perennially dog-free zone.It has admittedly been nothing more and nothing less,until today that is.While the entire block was rejoicing the much awaited opening of the new mess,I was left sweeping ants out of my room.How an anthill came to be near my room in a matter of few hours between lunch and tea is something I am not able to fathom.May be as so many things are, its endemic to the hostels here.They were too many in number to be successfully swept off which meant I had to kill the whole wretched lot of them.Its not a nice thing to do anytime, least of all on a day when you wake up to find that people actually don’t know how to flush toilets.With my safest sanctuary gone and my feet red with ant-bites, me and my room mate some how managed to get rid of the scary looking writhing black patches on the walls,floor,bins and pretty much everywhere.Its after that I realised that the impregnable basement had been broken down.Tomorrrow the new mess shall be opened and with that every girl in the block will use the new path through the basement,indeed the days of peace in solitude seem to have been stolen away…
Watch out,you are under surveillance-cctvs in school campuses!
Sometime back a school in Bombay banned any kind of physical contact between guys and girls.Another school now installs cameras and monitors them .Though both these incidents are neither isolated nor are they the first of their kind its sad that more academic institutions resort to such measures.
I have always wondered what these people aim to achieve by this.I strongly believe that children and young adults are by nature rebellious simply because its a combination of callousness of youth and the inexperience that comes with it.It only makes matters worse to be told not to do this and that particularly after you pass standard eight.
Imagine being constantly reminded that you are not to touch the guy or girl sitting next to you.How embarrasing would that be and worse if you do for the most innocent reasons and are caught and reprimanded.Even if its not innocuos it is still bad enough.
Sadder of course is the case of cctvs.A school is meant to provide a secure and fun environment of learning.To monitor children and keep them under survelliance can mean tremendous pressure especially on the younger ones.It can possibly be in some instances traumatic however farfetched that might sound.This must not be allowed for the simple reason that it would take away the fun from school and make you diffident.School is as much about dealing with peer pressue,adoloscent crushes,standing upto bullies,learning your first swear words,forging and breaking frienships as it is about academics.
We want environs of learning and not pedantic buildings.Some one must take these ‘policing’ guys to court for robbing the innocence from the lives of young students.
